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University of California Video Podcasts (Video)
University of California Video Podcasts (Video)

University of California Video Podcasts (Video)

UCTV delivers documentaries, faculty lectures, cutting-edge research symposiums and artistic performances from each of the ten UC campuses. Visit: uctv.tv

Available Episodes 10

This talk provides a deep time perspective for assessing the behavioural implications of the creation of the earliest known structure and the technologies used in its making. Evidence for the earliest structure appears relatively late, about 500,000 years ago in Zambia, and before the evolution of Homo sapiens. The next oldest structures were made by Neanderthals in Europe, 176,000 years ago. The site in Zambia preserves rare evidence for the shaping and fitting together of two tree trunks to make a stable framework. The process of combining parts to make a whole reflects a conceptually new approach to technology, one which remains central to everything we make as humans, including structures. Did the invention of combinatorial technology require the use of language to discuss and evaluate diverse ways to form new constructs and constructions? This question arises from the extended planning and expertise needed in the making of combinatorial tools.    Series: "CARTA - Center for Academic Research and Training in Anthropogeny" [Humanities] [Science] [Show ID: 40160]

Artist Jeff Koons is renowned for his provocative and often kitschy sculptures that blend pop culture, consumerism, and art history. His works often feature oversized and glossy renditions of everyday objects, from balloon animals to household items, challenging the boundaries between high and low art while eliciting questions about mass production and cultural value. Koons talks with Kathryn Kanjo, director & CEO of the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, about his evolution as an artist, from simple inflatable rabbits to large-scale metal sculptures. [Arts and Music] [Show ID: 39155]

Director Don Hertzfeldt joins moderator Miguel Penabella (Film and Media Studies, UCSB) for a discussion of his films ME and It’s Such a Beautiful Day. They discuss his time as a UCSB student and his early interest in animation, as well as the development of his new film. Hertzfeldt also shares insights into his influences from silent cinema, and his thematic interests in deep time and memory across his work. Series: "Carsey-Wolf Center" [Humanities] [Show ID: 40070]

Dennis O. Clegg, Ph.D., discusses treatments for age-related macular degeneration (AMD), a condition that causes vision loss. Clegg explains that while patients often report improved vision after receiving implants, objective tests don't always confirm this. He explores the potential differences in patients' responses based on genetics and disease progression. There is also an ongoing challenge in finding the best ways to reduce immune rejection of these treatments. New trials are underway to test implants in earlier stages of the disease, and researchers are looking at different strategies like localized immunosuppression. Additionally, some studies suggest that secretions from retinal cells may help preserve vision. Overall, there are many open questions, but advances in the field offer hope for better AMD treatments. Series: "Stem Cell Channel" [Health and Medicine] [Science] [Show ID: 39459]

Artist Shana Moulton’s other self, ‘Cynthia,’ seeks enlightenment through song, shopping and exercise. Performing the misadventures of her semi-autobiographical alter ego, artist Shana Moulton has drawn attention in the field of new media studies. Over two decades, Moulton, a professor of time-based arts at UC Santa Barbara, has used physical comedy to interpret her artistic creation, “Cynthia,” a wide-eyed ingénue. In Moulton's performance, video and sculpture series, "Whispering Pines" — named after the trailer park in Central California where Moulton grew up — Cynthia often sports a housecoat or spandex and seeks enlightenment through exercise and shopping. Most recently, Moulton presented an extension of “Whispering Pines” — “Meta/Physical Therapy” — at The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York. (While the work was on view, from Feb. 17 to April 21, 2024, the museum's overall attendance was close to half a million people.) Series: "UC Santa Barbara News" [Arts and Music] [Show ID: 40207]

As voters prepare to head to the polls on Election Day, join the Goldman School of Public Policy and Cal Performances for a critical look at the moment we’re in, the issues that have shaped and led us to this year’s tumultuous election, and the future of American democracy. UC Berkeley experts from former presidential administrations—Janet Napolitano, former Secretary of Homeland Security under the Obama administration (2009-2013); Robert Reich, former Secretary of Labor under the Clinton administration (1993-1997); and Maria Echaveste, former Assistant to the President and Deputy White House Chief of Staff under the Clinton Administration (1998-2001)—as well as PolicyLink founder-in-residence and Chief Vision Officer for the Goldman School of Public Policy’s new Democracy Policy Initiative, Angela Glover Blackwell. Series: "The Goldman School - Berkeley Public Policy" [Public Affairs] [Show ID: 40302]

The risk for many chronic diseases is directly linked to metabolic changes in the body and loss of muscle mass often associated with aging. In this program, Dr. Natalie Marshall focuses on the central importance of movement, strength training, and body composition to improve metabolic fitness and tips to help you get started “building muscle for life." Series: "Osher WISE: Well-being and Integrative Science for Everyone" [Health and Medicine] [Show ID: 40071]

The Universe is full of such wonderful mysteries. We know why we have Aurora, as the sun’s energy interacts with the upper atmosphere. But why such beauty in this shimmering dance? Perhaps music can reveal inner harmonies, and help us appreciate these mysteries with awe and joy. French musician Catherine Brisset plays the cristal Baschet, a unique glass keyboard with fanciful metal shapes to help the mysterious sounds resonate. Here, she plays a variation on Bach’s Sonata #2, the Grave movement, with such subtle and emotive touch. We fly over and through the Aurora Australis, so artfully photographed by astronauts of ISS Expedition 67, on June 18, 2022. Series: "Arts Channel " [Arts and Music] [Show ID: 40317]

At a global level, Homo sapiens have reshaped the planet Earth to such an extent that we now talk of a new geological age, the Anthropocene. But each of us shapes our own worlds, physically, symbolically, and in the worlds of imagination. This symposium focuses especially on one form of construction, the construction of buildings, while stressing that such construction is ever shaped by diverse factors from landscape to culture and the construction of history embodied in it - and more. After a brief look at birds building their nests as an example of variation on a species-specific Bauplan, we sample a broad sweep of cultural evolution and niche construction from the earliest stone tools of Neanderthals and Homo sapiens through the Neolithic and the rise of cities to the formal and informal architecture of the present day. Finally, we explore the ways artificial intelligence may further change how humans construct their mental and physical worlds. Series: "CARTA - Center for Academic Research and Training in Anthropogeny" [Humanities] [Science] [Show ID: 40169]

As distinct from the buildings of termites (interesting though these are), bird nests offer a more apropos point of comparison for human buildings – they are conducted by single vertebrate (or a few) and can be adapted to varied circumstances, with even a small effect of social learning. However, the basic Bauplan remains species-specific, unlike the creativity of the human architect. Since nonhuman primates lack interesting building skills, and so we suggest that bird nest construction may come to play a similar comparative role for architectural design. The static Bauplan of birds can be compared to the near-stasis of human tool use until the end of the Paleolithic, challenging us to assess the changes in human practice that unlocked an increasingly rapid process of cultural evolution. Series: "CARTA - Center for Academic Research and Training in Anthropogeny" [Humanities] [Science] [Show ID: 40159]