PODCAST · fiction
Starbase Indy Podcast
by Starbase Indy
Science fiction, and particularly Star Trek, has inspired many people to work toward making the future somewhere we want to live. In this podcast we talk to those people about their work, their inspirations, and what they hope to do with their future.
Episodes
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AI In Fact and Fiction
Russ Eberhart was one of the developers of the idea of Swarm Intelligence, a technology that's used to train the LLMs we refer to as AI. He's also a novelist with the pen name Ross Carley, who writes crime and science fiction. Find his website here: https://rosscarleyauthor.com/ And the webinar…
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Conventions and Creativity
Matthew Barron is an author, comic creator, filmmaker, playwright, and next weeek he gets to add Convention Guest of Honor to his list of accomplishments. Listen to Matthew talk about the role conventions have played in his creative journey, and what he does when his stories scream at him.
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Kickstarting the Creative Process
Dr. Lawrence M. Schoen is an award winning science fiction author, a hyponitist, a psychologist, and the founder of the Klingon Language Institute. In this episode he talks about his writing, and gives us advice for kickstarting the second volume of the Starbase Indy Anthology.
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Trekking into Anime: Part 2
Talking to Sami was so much fun I didn't want to stop after an hour - so here's some more time with my favorite anime showrunner and all around amazing human!
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Trekking into Anime Part 1
Samantha Inoue-Harte calls herself Neurospicy - but talking to her for more than a few minutes reveals that the brain works is definitely a superpower. She's a showrunner - but when that gets boring she dabbles in animating (for Disney among others), voice acting, writing, and whatever else keeps...
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Believing What's Beyond the Stars
When the aliens arrive, it will change a lot about how we see the universe. This conversation explores what we know about changing our understanding of the world around us.
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The Science of Science Fiction
The Science of Science fiction is back, with Rufus Cochran of Indiana Sciences leading us through what some recent (and not so recent) science fiction gets right, wrong, and the questions that it explores either way.
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Working Together in Fact and Fiction
The conversation delves into the dynamic archetypes present in fiction shows, highlighting the common character dynamics and their storytelling impact. It also explores the inversion of cliches in the show Farscape, offering a fresh perspective on character portrayal and development.
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Education of the Future
The conversation covers the future of education, the changing work landscape, the impact of technology on education, agricultural research and technology, evaluation in education, customization and personalization in education, meta-learning and metacognition, and the challenge of learning and...
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Indiana's Space Economy
Dr. Barrett Caldwell has been the head of the Indiana Space Grant Consortium for 20 years, interfacing Indiana concerns with NASA programs. He leads Purdue University's GROUPER lab, and had been teaching in the aerospace program for decades. He came into this work, in part, because he grew up...
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Storytime with the Starbase Indy Historian
Listen to Starbase Indy historian talk about the history of the event and some of the adventures we've had in the past 20 years.
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Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations
The conversation delves into the impact of community on individual perspectives and the influence of fandom on expanding one's mindset.
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Working with Robots
This conversation highlights the challenges and ethical considerations in human-robot relationships and the impact of automation on various industries.
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Zeitgeist and Media
Zeitgeist means the culture and feel of an age. What difference do art and media make in the zeitgeist?
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Inspiring Action Through Music
Music has been used across the ages to inspire people to action. In this episode we discuss the ways that has worked through history and what makes it work well still today.
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Afrofuturism
Recorded live at the 2025 Starbase Indy event, this episode features Franklin Oliver and Ronald Craig talking about what Afrofuturism is, how it shows up in Star Trek and other science fiction, and how it can influence our future
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Adventures in Fandom
Recorded live at the 2025 Starbase Indy event, this panel discusses the joys and adventures fandom can bring into our lives. Hugo Award-winning Christopher Barkley tells the story of the controversial 2023 Hugo Awards, and why he didn't get posession of his physical award for more than 2 years...
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The Hospital at the End of the World
The Starbase Indy Podcast is back for its 5th season with an interview with Justin C. Key. Key's new book tells the story of a world where AI has taken over the practice of medicine everywhere except the hospital at the end of the world. The book is filled not only with fascinating concepts, but...
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Space Update with Tom Rathjen
Tom Rathjen is back on the podcast this week. He is a human factors engineer whose 30 year career at NASA and subsequent work with Blue Origins and Space X gives him a unique perspective on getting us off the planet. Listen to him talk about the latest news, about why public - private…
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Kids Explore Robotics
Vinod Agrowal and his son created Kids Explore Robotics because they experienced what kids were being taught about robotics, and had some ideas about how to do it better. Listen to Vinod talk about their inspirations, what they do, and the fun they'll be bringing to this year's Starbase Indy.
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Chat with Con Chair Ryan Howe
Come hear what this year's Con Chair is excited about for Starbase Indy.
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The Science of Cats
Recorded during our 2024 live event, this discussion of the Science of Cats features KJ McGlinn, the Kitty Correspondent, creator of The Cat Conversation and PurrCon talking about the science of house cats and what it can do to help us keep them safe and happy in our homes.
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The Science of Science Fiction
In this perennial favorite panel, experts discuss the science in the latest science fiction - what could be real, what's just wrong, and what are the possibilities.
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Exploring New Worlds through Faith
What does the role of faith have in common with the role of science fiction? Both explore reasons, and ways the world does or could function. Listen to experts discuss more similarities and differences.
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Exploring New Worlds Through AI
Listen as Dr. James McGrath and Dr. Ankur Gupta discuss the ways AI (or, more accurately the large language models that are being advertised as AI) help us to explore new worlds.
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Exploring New Worlds through Language
Enjoy this conversation on how created language communities use language to expand what we understand about invented cultures. How does one create an alien language? What grammatical tricks can be used to indicate a vastly different culture? How do you balance the desire to create an alien…
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Exploring New Worlds -Literally
Listen to two experts in human space flight talk about what human space flight has taught us about the nature of humanity.
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Exploring New Worlds Through Comedy
Discussion of how comedy reflects our humanity, and the impact it has on the people who create and perform comedy.
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Exploring New Worlds Through Voice
Listen to Bonnie Gordon and Nick Ramey talk about their work performing characters and conveying information through the power of the human voice.
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Writing Diverse Worlds
All of fiction, and especially science fiction, revolves around balancing the need to make characters believable. Science fiction adds in an additional challenge - creating characters who are different from what the readers expect, sometimes in surprising ways. Listen to Dr. Mohamed Noor, Maurice...
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Protopia vs Utopia
When we talk about a hopeful future, Utopia is often the word that comes to mind. Is that the vision we should be striving for, though? Is it even possible to create a state in which everything is perfect? Importantly, is it possible to make things perfect for everyone? Or are utopias for some...
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AI and the Nature of Truth
AI is often depicted as a way to find answers to questions. Is this the same as finding truth? Are our current AI technologies structured to find truth? Or are they designed to do something different, and how does that affect their functionality and how they are (and how they should be) used?…
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AI, Sentience, and the Rights of Robots
AI isn't sentient -at least not yet. But what would it mean to our systems if that changed? When would (and when should) our legal system begin to recognize the rights of non-human intelligence? What would that change for humans, and for other intelligent beings? This episode was recorded during...
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The Ethics of Machine Learning
Machine learning holds great potential - but also comes with some significant ethical challenges. Listen to experts discuss the technology, and the ethical concerns it creates. This episode was recorded during our live event in November of 2023, and is a part of our series on the Humanities of...
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Eclipses
Dan McGlaun is an expert on eclipses, and he's working to get the state of Indiana ready for the total eclipse that will cross the state in 2024. We talk to Dan about the experience of viewing a total eclipse, the science behind eclipses, and why all eclipses are not created equal.
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Envisioning Star Trek
We have a special treat for our 50th episode - an interview with Emmy Award Winner Doug Drexler. Doug has been involved in Star Trek since TNG, in roles including makeup, visual effects, conceptual design, and more - having a major effect on the look and feel of the Star Trek many of us grew up...
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Starship Tempest
Listen as the cast of the Starship Tempest talks about their show, and the Star Trek universe in which it exists.
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Star Trek and Science
Star Trek Science Advisor Dr. Erin Macdonald talks about how Star Trek has influenced her career, and how that that career is continuing to evolve.
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AI and the Search for Truth
Dr. JamesMcGrath joins us to talk about the real AI that's been in the news so much lately, and how it compares to the fictional AI we see in Star Trek and other Science Fiction.
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The Realities of Human Space Flight
Thomas Rathjen claims to like this planet just fine - even though he's spent his whole career working to get us off of it and into space. In this interview we talk about how long we've had humans in space, what they do there, and what we can hope for from the Artemis program and other programs...
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Episode 43: Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations
In this episode, made possible by the Indiana Gig Grant funded by the National Endowment for the Arts, Mary Chieffo, Madi Goff, and Brantley Moate talk about the impact of their identities on their careers in creative fields. This episode was recorded live at Starbase Indy 2023.
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Writing the Fantastic
"Spirited debate is the love language of the Star Trek fan." - Aaron Waltke Aaron and Demetrius Witherspoon talk about the process of writing for animated and comic book worlds. This episode was recorded live at Starbase Indy 2022.
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The Future of Human Space Flight
Dr. Barrett Caldwell and Thomas Rathjen, both multi-decade veterans of the effort to get somebody off the planet awhile, talk about the challenges and state of human space flight today. They talk about the why, the how, and the perhaps surprising value proposition of space travel in this episode,...
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Creating Mental Health
In this episode of the podcast, recorded LIVE at Starbase Indy 2022, longtime volunteer Todd Wiley joins with Marianne Halbert, JD, from NAMI to talk about common mental illnesses and how to manage them at and away from conventions.
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Creating A Better World
Recorded live at Starbase Indy 2022, this episode speaks on how we can make the world a better place.
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Creating Aliens on Screen
This is the first episode recorded LIVE at Starbase Indy 2022. Bill Blair and Sandy Gimpel talk about their careers creating aliens and stunts on the screen.
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Creating Games
Local game designer John Kennedy talks about the process of bringing the world of Star Trek into tabletop gaming.
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Father of Klingons part 2
In this continuation of the conversation with Marc Okrand, we talk about the difference between linguistics and fluency, and what has made Klingon one of the most successful constructed languages on the planet.
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Father of Klingons part 1
In this episode, we talk about how closed captioning for the Oscars was related to the creation of the Klingon language. Listen to Marc Okrand talk about the way he became involved, and some of the decisions he made in designing the language.
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Spark of Creativity
Rue Sparks is a writer, artist, and poet. She's also a queer, disabled widow. We talk about how these aspects of her identity affect her work and her creativity.
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Science fiction, and particularly Star Trek, has inspired many people to work toward making the future somewhere we want to live. In this podcast we talk to those people about their work, their inspirations, and what they hope to do with their future.
HOSTED BY
Starbase Indy
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Starbase Indy Podcast have?
Starbase Indy Podcast currently has 89 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Starbase Indy Podcast about?
Science fiction, and particularly Star Trek, has inspired many people to work toward making the future somewhere we want to live. In this podcast we talk to those people about their work, their inspirations, and what they hope to do with their future.
How often does Starbase Indy Podcast release new episodes?
Starbase Indy Podcast has 89 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
Where can I listen to Starbase Indy Podcast?
You can listen to Starbase Indy Podcast on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Starbase Indy Podcast?
Starbase Indy Podcast is created and hosted by Starbase Indy.
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