If climate change concerns you, consider nuclear power, which, according to many of its proponents, does not involve emissions of carbon dioxide or other greenhouse gases. But is this true? Kristin Shrader-Frechette contests those claims; she also discusses the financial costs of nuclear energy, the risks to human health it poses, the perils of industry-funded science, and the contours of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster.

If you were to go off the mainstream media, you would think youth violence is on the rise. But is it? East Asian scholar Adrienne Carey Hurley has taken a careful look at the demonization of young people in both the United States and Japan. She discusses the less noted but widespread abuse that children and youth are subjected to. Hurley also talks about mass protests by students in Québec, as well as the anniversary of the Fukushima nuclear meltdown.

The Japanese occupy Manchuria; the US occupies postwar Japan. What does moviemaking have to do with all this? What role do cultural productions, and high-minded idealism, play in domination and brutality? Ian Buruma explores the intersection of culture and politics in his novel The China Lover. Also featured on the program is archived audio of Rachel Carson, speaking after the publication of Silent Spring.

Could China be the next world hegemon? Will it collaborate with other nations to break the US grip on the rules of the global economy? John Gulick considers whether China has the resources and endowments to take over as world leader. Also, Ward Wilson argues in an essay that Japan's decision to surrender in 1945 was not compelled by the bombing of Hiroshima.