2024-W51 Ancient Scrolls, Terraforming the American West, and AI for Kids

Christine sits down with Julie Newman, chief engineer for satellites at Impulse Space and mother of three, preparing to welcome a second set of twins. They talk about building an engineering career alongside a growing family, preparing for maternity leave, and the ways parenting can change how you approach work. Julie discusses her book, Pull, Don’t Push, and why well-intentioned messages about STEM can discourage the girls they’re meant to inspire. The conversation ranges from AI tools and the value of interdisciplinary skills to the practical systems that keep a large household running, including color coding for twins. They also get into book marketing, reading nonfiction without feeling obliged to finish every page, and bringing accurate engineering into children’s books. Plus: public speaking as a career skill, advice for women starting out in engineering, and why a turbopump might become a “turtle pump” when toddlers encounter rocket science. Show notes Guest & host Julie Newman, engineer, author, and STEM advocate Christine Corbett Moran, host of RE:Productivity, engineer, author Books discussed Pull, Don’t Push: Why STEM Messaging to Girls Isn’t Working and What to Do Instead by Julie Newman. Julie explains how outreach can replace discouraging narratives with messages that connect engineering to what girls care about. Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World by David Epstein. Julie connects the book to her experience building valuable skills across disciplines. Rocket Science for Kids: An-Easy-to-Understand Guide by Russell Newman, illustrated by Laura Fearn. Technically accurate rocket science with watercolor animals, including the family’s “turtle pump” anecdote. Engineering & career Julie’s path through SpaceX, NASA JPL, Boeing, Outpost, and Impulse Space Why skills at the intersection of disciplines can be especially valuable Public speaking, outreach, and writing as engineering career skills Maternity leave, career transitions, and advice for women entering engineering Parenting & household systems Preparing for a second set of twins and five children under five Color coding and the logistics of a growing family Applying engineering skills to household organization How parenthood changes priorities and approaches to work AI, reading & creative projects Using AI to manage email, refresh a website, and experiment with marketing Learning from side projects and bringing those skills back to work Audiobooks, nonfiction, and permission to skip unhelpful chapters Making science engaging and accurate for young children

Christine talks with Kate Darling, author of The New Breed and research lead for Robotics, Ethics & Society at the RAI Institute, about parenting in an era of AI and robotics. They cover Alexa upsells, AI tutors, YouTube rabbit holes, humanoid robot hype, school logistics, social media, kids’ books, and the gap between American and European parenting norms. They also cover Kate's recent hobby: romance novels and how to fit it all in between parenting, work, and life.

Christine sits down with husband-and-wife duo Kara Linse Buckley (sports marketing, ex-Senior Advisor, U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee advisor) and Darragh Buckley (CEO at Increase, employee #1 at Stripe), parents of four in Bend, Oregon. They dig into designing a walkable life around two anchoring goals : easy enjoyable parenting and meaningful productive work, including a custom upcoming house move with kids' bedrooms small-by-design to push family into shared spaces. The conversation ranges across the "lawless place" of the school bus, an extra hour of bedtime math as a happiness hack for the eldest, Beast Academy and the Hard Math for Elementary School curriculum, and how the Federal Reserve quietly pulled off a Fedwire format change with no one noticing. They get into kids learning to code, cursor and Replit unleashing creative explosions (Space Invaders clones, a chemistry-meets-math game), the tension between teaching kids to type vs. voice-driven AI workflows, and the inevitable question of when your child will out-sysadmin you. Plus: an unintentional capitalism unleashing via pesos in a Mexican market, Monopoly variants without sub-$100 settlements, the books making the rounds in their book clubs, and how parenting changes your brain.

Christine sits down with Aline Lerner, founder and CEO of Interviewing.io, for a wide-ranging conversation on parenting, productivity, and the strange in-between space where life and work blur. Aline shares her first-ever Claude Code project, a LinkedIn browser extension to surface meaningful connections, and Christine gives a deep tour of her Open Claw household setup, complete with a Mac mini, a Slack-driven AI agent named Nova, that lets the AI handle birthday party shopping, gardening orders, and recurring doctor appointments. The conversation moves into the trade-offs of schooling gifted kids in California versus magnet programs Aline grew up with in 1990s New York City, calibrating realistic risk (sharks vs. cars vs. small aircraft), and the meritocratic brutality of professional kitchens. Aline shares her unexpected love of Below Deck and Catfish as practical anthropology, useful, it turns out, for catching fraudulent job candidates. The episode closes on raising kids who aren't assholes despite growing up with more privilege than their immigrant parents had, and on hedging your sources of meaning across both family and work.

Summary Christine sits down with Brittney Gallagher, co-founder and Board Chair of the AI Objectives Institute and team member at AI watchdog The Midas Project. They cover parenting, hobbies, and current events such as cold-turkey potty training, gaming and role-playing, an Expeditionary Force audiobook binge, gardening from orchids to edible flowers, and how much Replit and Scratch to allow a 7-year-old. Then a sober look at this year's AI policy landscape: open-source Chinese models catching up, super PACs spending $125M to defeat Alex Bores over the RAISE Act, and whether you'd board a plane with a 3% chance of crashing. Show Notes Guest & Host Brittney Gallagher, Co-founder & Board Chair, AI Objectives Institute; Team Member, The Midas Project Christine Corbett Moran, VP of Engineering at Horizon3.ai Games & Media Disco Elysium (and Kim Kitsuragi) Expeditionary Force by Craig Alanson UFO 50 and Party House Dominion Don't Worry About the Vase by Zvi Mowshowitz Kids' Tech & Education Khan Academy Kids Replit Scratch Edge Esmeralda AI Safety & Policy The Midas Project "The reporters at this news site are AI bots. OpenAI's super PAC appears to be funding it." (Model Republic), the viral investigation Brittney references AI Objectives Institute California SB 53 New York's RAISE Act and Alex Bores, targeted by Leading the Future super PAC Alibaba Qwen and DeepSeek