Episode notes
Bob Watson Discusses Large-Scale Systems Transformation, His Life in Science Assessment, and the Need for Trust in an Anti-Science Era Global science assessment goes far beyond crunching numbers and tallying up abstract human impacts: it is about convincing the world to act. Recalling his life in leadership with co-hosts Kai Chan (professor and Canada Research Chair at UBC) and Maia O’Donnell (UBC graduate in soil science and producer of the Small Planet Heroes podcast), Robert (Bob) Watson narrates his path from early training in atmospheric chemistry to high-stakes positions at NASA, the…
Podcast
Small Planet Heroes
CoSphere · Tech & Science · English
Do you worry about our world in crisis? Social inequity, polarization, shifting climates, and disappearing nature can feel like too much for any one person to take on. We’ve been there, and we found hope. On Small-Planet Heroes, we invite change-makers to share their stories of trial and triumph in
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S2 · 14 Jul 2026 · 1 min
Trailer: Season 2
A sneak peak from Dr. Kai Chan and occasional co-host Clare Price.
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S2 · E9 · 28 Nov 2025 · 1 hr 10 min
David Suzuki: David's Community Party
An Invitation from David Suzuki to Connect, Commit, Compete, and Correct Our Way to Sustainability Within and Beyond Our Generation David Suzuki has spent a lifetime translating the living world for the rest of us, first as a young geneticist, then as a groundbreaking broadcaster, and later as a public advocate for ecological responsibility. In this rich and personal conversation, he looks back with the perspective of someone who has watched societies, institutions, and ecosystems evolve over more than 80 years. Suzuki speaks candidly with co-hosts Kai Chan and Sam Blackwell about the…
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17 Nov 2025 · 1 hr 6 min
Terre Satterfield: Culture is a Co-Production
Terre Satterfield Explores Queasy Questions, the Quest for Environmental Justice, and the Narrative Imperative in Ecosystems Services Research Queasy questions shake us. It’s that nervous strangeness of surveying the very limits of what we know. For Dr. Terre Satterfield, anthropologist and environmental social scientist, that queasiness has fueled a career bridging critical and constructive perspectives. In this conversation with UBC colleagues and co-hosts Kai Chan (professor and Canada Research Chair) and David R. Boyd (professor and legal expert on human rights and the environment),…
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7 Nov 2025 · 1 hr 9 min
David Boyd: Nature’s Rights are Human Fights
David R. Boyd on Levering Transformative Change for a Healthy Environment from a Global Legal Perspective In the coastal Wild West, when laws and justice do not align, the town can summon an environmental cowboy, someone able to negotiate a way out of the hair-trigger standoff to turn towards the sun. Leaving the Alberta Rockies behind in the rearview mirror of a Greyhound bus, lawyer, academic, and frontier spirit David R. Boyd has gone on to sheriff local, national, and international courts. While fulfilling mandates for governments and non-profits alike, he has also published several…
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31 Oct 2025 · 1 hr 9 min
Ingrid Waldron: Our Bodies, Our Land, Our Laws
Ingrid Waldron’s Road to Racial and Environmental Justice Through Community, Law, and Collective Action Growing up in Montreal, young Ingrid Waldron never imagined drafting what would become this country’s first environmental justice legislation. Bill C-226 acknowledged the historical roots and lived realities of environmental racism. Deeply committed to health equity, Ingrid’s research led to her 2018 book and the award-winning documentary There’s Something in the Water . Both stressed the need for everybody to have a voice in environmental decision-making, especially when the places we…
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24 Oct 2025 · 1 hr 10 min
Eli Enns: We are All Treaty People
Eli Enns On Indigenous Conservation and Bringing Balance Back Conservationist Eli Enns’ voice exudes warmth, irony, and a nuanced historical awareness of what it is to live in Canada (from kanata, the Haudenosaunee word for “village”) and be Canadian today. This lively conversation, accented by personal stories from his West Coast Indigenous heritage, tackles the fine balance between rights, laws, and responsibilities when undertaking ethical stewardship of traditional lands and waters everywhere. By viewing all inhabitants of present-day Canada as treaty people, Eli highlights the eternal…
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17 Oct 2025 · 1 hr 3 min
Teika Newton: No Place Is Isolated, No One a Stranger
From a relatively isolated, “tech-less” childhood in small-town Ontario to the unglamorous frontlines of community-based environmental organizing, Teika Newton shows us the undeniable value of showing up. Whether bridging the work of researchers and activists, catalyzing multi-dimensional partnerships across disparate cultures and worldviews, or simply talking to strangers as a revolutionary act of love and trust, Teika proves how authentic relationships drive successful collaborations. Understanding that lasting change often happens slowly and behind the scenes, she discusses with co-hosts…
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