With a beak like a parrot, venom strong enough to dissolve flesh, and eight writhing tentacles, the octopus is among the most mystifying and alien of creatures.
On today’s show, a naturalist reaches across half a billion years of evolution to find the soul of an octopus. Then, from playing catch in the backyard to taking junior to his first ball game, baseball is a bonding tradition--and cliché--for many American men. We’ll look at the father-son relationship through the lens of baseball.
Listen to the full show
Finding the Soul of an Octopus
In a new book, the naturalist and author Sy Montgomery explores whether she can reach across the divide that split the octopus and humans lineage more than half a billion years ago to discover whether octopuses have feelings, consciousness, or maybe even a soul. The Soul of an Octopus: A Surprising Exploration into the Wonder of Consciousness
Learn more about the octopus at this link: 5 Things You Might Not Know About Octopuses
A Personal Quest to Cure Stage Fright
Sara Solovitch joins us to talk about her new book, Playing Scared: A History and Memoir of Stage Fright.
Fathers, Sons, & Baseball
Kevin Cook is former Senior Editor at Sports Illustrated and author of The Dad Report: Fathers, Sons and Baseball Families.
Related | From the Archives: A Century of Babe Ruth
Danny Boy
Our celebration of Father’s Day continues with radio producer Maeve Conran, whose father Desmond lives at an Alzheimer nursing home in Dublin. Her story shows that while some memories fade, intimacy between a father and daughter lasts forever.
You can listen to this story again at PRX.org.
