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Scholar considers limits on God and freedom for humans

Rachel Sauer — Wed, 07 Jan 2026 16:50:59 +0000

Scholar considers limits on God and freedom for humans Rachel Sauer Wed, 01/07/2026 - 09:50

Clay Bonnyman Evans

CU Boulder philosophy PhD student Nathan Huffine offers ‘limited foreknowledge’ to solve the paradox of human free will and an all-knowing deity

For many believers, squaring belief in a traditional “omni” deity—a god that is omniscient, omnipotent and omnibenevolent—with the notion that human beings possess free will poses a quandary.

Here’s how �� philosophy PhD student Nathan Huffine describes the paradox:

“If there is an omniscient being, such as God, who infallibly knows the truth-values of all propositions, including propositions about future human actions, then no human action can be performed freely. No human action is free, since any human action is subject to the implications of this eternal and infallible knowledge of God. Such knowledge implies that an agent cannot do otherwise than what God knows she will do.”

Nathan Huffine, a CU Boulder philosophy PhD student, argues that belief in both divine foreknowledge and free will are necessary to address the classic theological “problem of evil,” also known as the “problem of suffering."

Huffine argues that belief in both divine foreknowledge and free will are necessary to address the classic theological “problem of evil,” also known as the “problem of suffering”—if a deity is all-powerful, all-knowing and all-good, why is there suffering and evil?

“If one believes there is a god, one also ought to posit that humans have libertarian free will”—individuals are free to make, and therefore must take responsibility for, all their choices—“in order to deal with the problem of evil,” Huffine says.

But in his recent paper, “Limits on God, Freedom for Humans,” published in the International Journal for Philosophy of Religion, Huffine defends the foreknowledge-freedom problem from assertions that it’s merely a game—an intellectual bauble or “pseudo-problem” —and considers two potential solutions to the conundrum, settling on one as most viable.

“It’s an interesting subject because the ideas of God and free will are important to me, and to many other people in their daily lives,” Huffine says.

He first considers what’s commonly referred to as “the eternity solution,” which posits that an atemporal deity—one that exists “outside” of time and space—would be always and eternally aware of everything that is, was and will be. Or as he describes it, “all times are equally real.”

Huffine describes a hypothetical situation in which a woman, Ellie, skips work to go to the beach. While there, a bottle washes onshore, bearing a message predicting that she will skip work and go to the beach that day.

“Suppose Ellie does have the ability to choose otherwise, and that the prophetic statement … has existed since 102 BC. … Also suppose that Ellie actually goes to work … never visiting the beach,” he writes. “Given this, the prophetic object (the bottle) from 102 BC would be wrong, and consequently, God would be wrong.”

But if a deity is inerrant and infallible, such a “conclusion is absurd,” Huffine writes. Because under eternalism, there is no time at which the bottle and message did not exist, “Therefore, there is no moment in Ellie’s life where she can act otherwise.”

Limited foreknowledge

Huffine finds the next potential solution, that of “limited foreknowledge,” more viable and persuasive.

First, he argues, one must assume an omni-deity cannot “do the metaphysically impossible”—the classic example is that a deity cannot create a stone that is too heavy for it to lift; or, as Aquinas argued, God cannot make a circle a square.

But if one defines God as “that than which nothing greater can be ideally conceived,” Huffine writes, then “one cannot ideally conceive of any being that is capable of performing metaphysically impossible feats.”

And if it is metaphysically impossible—contradictory—to square human free will with a deity that is already is aware of every future event, then something has to give, Huffine concludes.

“Therefore, God does not know the truth-value of all propositions but only those propositions it is possible for God to know without threatening human freedom,” he writes. If that’s true, he acknowledges, then “Jesus’ prophecies had the potential to be wrong.”

Huffine acknowledges that his thesis includes complicated, debatable metaphysical arguments, such as whether a deity limited is truly omniscient or omnipotent, given that metaphysics and logic can appear to trump its abilities.

“But you have to explore all these crazy pretzels,” he says. He cites the field of quantum mechanics: “We have to try to make sense of it, and whatever the data says, we have to try to square it with macro-reality.”

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CU Boulder philosophy PhD student Nathan Huffine offers ‘limited foreknowledge’ to solve the paradox of human free will and an all-knowing deity.

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Why a boy and his tiger still matter

Rachel Sauer — Thu, 18 Dec 2025 18:44:15 +0000

Why a boy and his tiger still matter Rachel Sauer Thu, 12/18/2025 - 11:44

Bradley Worrell

Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson’s beloved comic strip, ended three decades ago this month, yet its magic endures, says William Kuskin, CU Boulder English professor and expert on comics and graphic novels

When teaching his popular course on comic books and graphic novels, William Kuskin’s classroom represents a microcosm of the university, where engineering majors sit alongside business students and aspiring writers.

In that mix, the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes, which debuted in November 1985, sparks an enthusiasm across students—even though the comic strip ended its syndicated run in December 1995, before most of those students were born, says Kuskin, a �� Department of English professor and department chair.

“Students will march down at the end of class and gush about Calvin and Hobbes,” he says. “It’s not just nostalgia; there’s an ongoing love for it in this generation.”

William Kuskin, CU Boulder department chair and professor of English, teaches a course on comics and graphic novels that draws students from disciplines across the university.

That love often comes with a personal twist.

“A lot of dads and kids sat around reading comics together,” Kuskin explains. “Students tell me this course brings them closer to their dads. There’s a comic culture out there that spans generations.”

While no new Calvin and Hobbes comic strips have been produced since 1995, author Bill Watterson authorized the publication of 18 books between 1987 and 2005 that reprinted comic strips from various years. In honor of the publication of the three-volume The Complete Calvin and Hobbes in 2005, re-runs of comic strip were made available to newspapers from Sept. 4, 2005, to Dec. 31, 2005.

Kuskin says the beloved comic strip is not just a relic of the bygone newspaper era—it’s a shared language of humor and imagination between generations.

Describing Calvin and Hobbes to a newcomer

How does one describe what Calvin and Hobbes is about to the uninitiated?

Kuskin says the task is not as easy as it sounds, because the comic transcends its characters. On one level, it’s about Calvin, a mischievous 6-year-old boy who enjoys undertaking adventures with his stuffed tiger, Hobbes, who seemingly comes to life with biting humor when alone with Calvin. Beyond that, Kuskin says, it’s about the endless possibility of childhood, served up with doses of humor, philosophy and whimsy.

He identifies two endearing qualities that he says gives the comic strip its remarkable staying power. The first is its balance of cynicism and sentimentality.

“Calvin and Hobbes critiques the world but ends with love and warmth,” he says. “As cruel as the outside world is, they still have time for a hug. Our world needs that—maybe now more than ever.”

Kuskin says Watterson’s work reminds its audience that skepticism doesn’t have to cancel tenderness. He notes that Calvin’s sharp observations about consumerism or dreary school regimen coexist with moments of pure joy—snowball fights, sled rides and bedtime musings.

Calvin and Hobbes invites readers to slow down, to imagine, to laugh—and perhaps to question what really matters, Kuskin says.

“Our culture promotes avarice and excess over happiness and personal expression,” he says, quoting Watterson: ‘To invent your own life’s meaning is not easy, but it’s still allowed, and I think you’ll be happier for the trouble.’”

Kuskin says the second appeal of Calvin and Hobbes results from the comic strip’s role as a portal to the imagination.

“Hobbes himself is a gateway,” he says of Calvin’s stuffed tiger. “He’s both real and imaginary. That ambiguity invites readers to participate in the magic.”

The Exploring Calvin and Hobbes exhibit will be open to the public through Dec. 31 at the Fenimore Art Museum in New York City. (Screengrab: Fenimore Art Museum)

From cardboard-box “transmogrifiers” to intergalactic daydreams, Kuskin says the comic strip celebrates childhood imagination. Hobbes—neither fully stuffed nor fully alive—embodies that space where fantasy and reality blur, Kuskin says.

Comics as high art

Kuskin says the recent Calvin and Hobbes exhibition at the Fenimore Art Museum in New York underscores the comic strip’s artistic stature, which he sees as part of a broader movement to elevate comics.

“Comics have a fundamental tension,” he explains. “They don’t belong comfortably to any one discipline. They’re literature, but they’re also visual art. And they’re tied to franchise culture.”

That tension creates a spectrum—from mass-market superhero films to avant-garde graphic novels. Watterson, like Art Spiegelman (author of Maus), staked out the high-art end of that spectrum, resisting the strong pull of merchandising, Kuskin says.

“He stood by his principles. He made his art. It’s beautiful and lasting,” he adds. “There are many ways to make comics, but Watterson’s way—purity of vision, resistance to exploitation—defines a kind of artistic practice that’s very beautiful.”

Art over commerce: Watterson’s high road

Unlike many cartoonists who embraced merchandising, Watterson famously resisted commercialization. Thus, no Hobbes plush toys and no animated specials. Kuskin sees that as a principled stand.

“Watterson fought hard for artistic control,” he says. “He framed his work as art, connecting back to early innovators like George Herriman (Krazy Kat) and Winsor McCay (Little Nemo). Comics often straddle art and commerce—Watterson pushed toward high art.”

That decision was not without cost. While Peanuts became a multimedia empire—complete with beloved TV specials—Calvin and Hobbes remained confined to the printed page. That purity may be why the strip feels timeless rather than dated, Kuskin says.

“Would the world have been better for a few more Hobbes stuffed animals snuggled in at night?” he muses. “Watterson thought not. He believed the work should speak for itself.”

The cultural company Calvin and Hobbes keeps

Will CU Boulder students still be talking about Calvin and Hobbes in another 10 years?

“Calvin and Hobbes critiques the world but ends with love and warmth,” he says. “As cruel as the outside world is, they still have time for a hug. Our world needs that—maybe now more than ever.”

Kuskin doesn’t hesitate in his response: “Absolutely. Parents and grandparents will keep sharing it. And it’s entered that rare cultural space—like Spider-Man, Batman or even Marilyn Monroe. It’s iconic.”

That “iconic space” includes other comic strips that transcended their medium: Peanuts, Krazy Kat and Little Nemo. Like them, Kuskin says, Calvin and Hobbes combines accessibility with depth—simple enough for children but layered enough to be appreciated by adults.

“The best comics have always transcended age,” he says. “They’re not just for kids. They explore fantasy, philosophy—even avant-garde art.”

And while Calvin and Hobbes often gets mentioned in the same breath as Peanuts, Kuskin says featuring cute kids and animals is not a prerequisite for a comic strip having enduring appeal.

“Will Dilbert ever go away? I can’t imagine—it nails corporate life,” he says.

Endings as beginnings

For Kuskin, Watterson’s final comic strip—with Calvin and Hobbes sledding into a snowy landscape—is a farewell, but also a reminder that imagination is infinite.

“It’s about endings as beginnings,” he explains. “The snow becomes a metaphor for possibility. Watterson’s goodbye is a clean start—not an end.”

The dialogue is simple: “It’s a magical world, Hobbes, old buddy … let’s go exploring.” But Kuskin says its resonance in the comic panels is profound: the blank whiteness of snow mirrors the blank page—a canvas for imagination.

“The snow looks like snow because we invent it as snow in our imagination,” he says. “That’s the genius of Watterson—he makes us co-creators.”

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Top image: Rachel Schmidt/Encyclopedia Britannica

Research charts the pathway from thought to emotion

Rachel Sauer — Mon, 15 Dec 2025 22:00:35 +0000

Research charts the pathway from thought to emotion Rachel Sauer Mon, 12/15/2025 - 15:00

Alexandra Phelps

CU Boulder scientist Roselinde Kaiser and research colleagues seek to understand the connection between executive functioning and mood problems

You’ve just missed your test. Thoughts about how you missed it keep circling around in your head and won’t stop. These thoughts begin to disrupt your everyday life by changing the way you approach tasks. You can’t shake the blame you’re putting on yourself for missing this test, and now your mood has dropped.

This pattern is just one of the pathways that Roselinde Kaiser, a �� associate professor of psychology and neuroscience, and research colleagues Quynh Nguyen and Hannah Snyder at Brandeis University tested in research recently published in the journal Anxiety, Stress & Coping.

In this study, led by graduate student Nguyen, researchers aimed to understand the pathway between executive functioning (EF) and mood problems, and found that poor EF creates risk for developing depression and mood problems. EF is an umbrella term that refers to an individual’s ability to pursue goals and adapt to change. The discovery that this pathway is what links EF and mood problems is significant because it creates a foundation for researchers and mental health professionals to develop interventions that can help treat people.

CU Boulder scientist Roselinde Kaiser and her research colleagues aim to understand the pathway between executive functioning and mood problems.

Nguyen, Kaiser and Snyder’s data show that problems in EF can contribute to mood problems through a chain reaction: problems in EF predict dependent stress, which predicts repetitive negative thinking (RNT) and then lower mood. Dependent stressors are stressors that are generated by, at least partially, an individual’s behaviors. The stress that stems from these dependent stressors leads to RNT, which functions like a “washing machine, where the same negative self-oriented thoughts circle in your mind over and over again,” Kaiser says.

Kaiser, who is the director of the CU Boulder Center for Healthy Mind and Mood, and who leads the Research on Affective Disorders and Development (RADD) Lab, first became interested in psychology when she was an adolescent and had questions about human suffering. Her research centers around finding ways to support people during periods of suffering, boost individuals’ resilience, foster their recovery or even stop their suffering.

Kaiser, who received a combined PhD in clinical psychology and neuroscience from CU Boulder in 2013, is drawn to clinical psychology as “a corner of psychology that seems to be poised for the highest impact for the most people,” she says. Through her research she seeks to understand the mechanisms that cause mood problems and that could be potential targets for clinical prevention, especially among younger populations.

“My jam is working with adolescents and young adults, in part because it is this really potent period of risk, and it's also a period in which if we do deliver effective interventions, we can have a lifelong impact.”

Executive functioning and mood problems

Kaiser and her Brandeis colleagues began their recently published research from the previously established connection between EF and mood problems. “We know that EF is associated with mood problems,” Kaiser notes. “We see that within a number of different studies within our research group. How does that happen for individual people?”

EF is an essential part of being able to complete tasks. “College students are a really interesting sub-population because they are navigating a lot of stressors on their own, for the first time. The demands on EF are especially high for college students because they transitioned from—usually—living with adults and caregivers who help them with things like getting them to school on time, homework, laundry, getting their car checked out at the mechanic, grocery shopping, all of the kinds of things that we need to do on the daily, and that we need EF to do all of those things.”

Balancing higher-level academics and more extensive everyday tasks can become even more challenging if EF becomes negatively impacted. “If you look at the age of onset distribution,” she says, “what you’ll see is that more than 50% of the people who experience depression in their lifetime will say it started before the age of 23.”

The researchers’ study took place over a six-week period during the COVID-19 pandemic. Through online surveys every two weeks, their participant pool of 154 Brandeis University undergraduate students logged their answers to questions that focused on the pathways the researchers were looking at. Participants’ ages ranged between 18-23, a span intentionally chosen because Kaiser and her colleagues were interested in understanding neurocognitive mechanisms of risk that are targets for intervention.

“We know that EF is associated with mood problems. We see that within a number of different studies within our research group. How does that happen for individual people?” says CU Boulder researcher Roselinde Kaiser.

Their research aimed to determine which, if either, of the pathways they designed based on the previously determined connection between EF and mood would provide a structure of how EF leads to mood problems.

In the first pathway, the scientists predicted that executive dysfunction has an indirect effect, or a mediation path, on depression. The concept is that executive dysfunction causes stress generation, which in turn causes RNT. That results in an individual's mood sinking, leading to depression. Kaiser and her colleagues hypothesized that poorer EF would prospectively predict higher RNT levels, and RNT in turn would predict higher depression levels.

In the second model, Kaiser and her colleagues substituted a dependent stressor for perceived uncontrollability of stressors. Perceived uncontrollability means that an individual believes that they lack the ability to change a stressful situation. This pathway looked at proving that if someone struggles with EF, then they have trouble keeping their actions and thoughts directed toward goals. This then causes an individual to feel that they have less control over stressors, in turn causing RNT and their mood to sink. For model two, the researchers hypothesized that poorer EF would predict lower perceived control over stress, and higher levels of RNT would subsequently predict higher depression levels.

“One of the reasons we’re interested in breaking down these pathways is it gives us better insight and more ideas into how we can help people by delivering effective clinical interventions, preventions or preventative programs,” Kaiser explains. “It’s hard to change executive functionability, but we can help buffer people against the dependent stressors by giving them skills and tools so that those types of stressors are less likely to happen.

“From where I sit as a clinical psychologist as well as a neuroscientist, that’s a good reason that we want to understand who is at risk, and how that risk happens.”

Kaiser and her colleagues found through the data they collected that the first pathway was supported but the second was not. There were a number of factors that could have resulted in the second pathway not being supported.

“One totally reasonable explanation is that we were just wrong—that it is not a pathway that is consistently observed among people with EF,” she says. Another possible explanation could be “that the era in which we were measuring these variables—during the COVID pandemic—everyone kind of had heightened uncontrollability in their world. What that might mean is that because everyone was generally feeling like the world was out of control, we weren’t able to pick up on just the people who are more likely to perceive stress as uncontrollable even in the absence of a global pandemic"

She adds that a third reason could be “the timing is just different if you perceive control or not. Maybe … uncontrollable perceptions happen on a slower time scale (their research was measured every two weeks) meaning that it may take longer for perceived uncontrollability to build up and then push your mood around. Or the opposite, it could happen more quickly. (Overall), we don’t know if any of those things could be true, and it certainly merits more exploration.”

“My jam is working with adolescents and young adults, in part because it is this really potent period of risk, and it's also a period in which if we do deliver effective interventions, we can have a lifelong impact.”

Getting mood snapshots

Neuroimaging, neurocognitive testing (computer testing, psychophysical testing, interviewing and self-reporting are all methods that can be used to collect information from participants. However, since Kaiser, Nguyen and Snyder completed their project, there have been wide strides in the development of new data-collection methods. Kaiser and her research groups are now implementing these new methods alongside others to further their research.

“Each of these modalities has pros and cons in terms of what they can tell us about the underlying constructs that we’re interested in measuring,” Kaiser says. “EF, for example, we can measure that through a neurological assessment or a computer-based assessment. I can also tap into that by asking people about their abilities out in the world; but there are key differences in what we’re getting at.”

These different kinds of assessments are that they give complementing information, but do not duplicate what researchers receive from the surveys. “More recent research from my research group and also my collaborators and colleagues indicates that we’re getting two complementary sources of evidence, but it’s not the same evidence. So, the kind of information from computer-based testing or from the brain is not necessarily the same information we get when we ask people.” These two sources of evidence are only weakly related. Since Kaiser and her colleagues completed the project, they have developed a way to collect information without having participants fill out surveys.

“What we’ve been working with are mobile applications that perform something called digital phenotyping, which effectively means using the information your phone is already collecting about you to understand your actions out in the real world and to get little snapshots on your mood and your stress level in daily life,” Kaiser says, adding, “They can see things like numbers of calls, screen time and other factors that allow them to better understand the individuals.”

Now, researching alongside various experts and students on a number of different projects, Kaiser says she hopes to “make these interventions accessible to everyone at the touch of a finger on their smartphone in the real world. We want people to be able to access this information when they need it.”

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CU Boulder scientist Roselinde Kaiser and research colleagues seek to understand the connection between executive functioning and mood problems.

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Murder and the microbiome

Rachel Sauer — Thu, 11 Dec 2025 14:40:00 +0000

Murder and the microbiome Rachel Sauer Thu, 12/11/2025 - 07:40

Daniel Long

A paper co-authored by CU Boulder researcher Christopher Lowry draws upon the infamous ‘Twinkie defense’ to explore the relationship between ultraprocessed foods and human behavior

On November 27, 1978, in the heart of San Francisco, former City Supervisor Dan White climbed through a window into City Hall, pulled out a gun and fatally shot Mayor George Moscone and City Supervisor Harvey Milk. He then turned himself in to the police, saying, “Why do we do things . . . I don’t know . . . I just shot [Moscone], I don’t know.”

In the trial that followed, People v. White, which ran from May 1-21, 1979, White’s defense argued not that White was innocent—he’d confessed, after all—but that, when he committed the murders, he’d been suffering from “diminished capacity” and was therefore incapable of premeditation, a key requirement of first-degree murder charges.

One revealing piece of evidence, the defense claimed, was White’s diet. For days leading up to the shootings, White had been gorging himself on junk food, an abnormal behavior for the typically health-conscious former police officer, firefighter and Army veteran.

CU Boulder scientist Christopher Lowry and his research colleagues suggest a link between ultraprocessed foods and human behavior.

It was a risky legal tack—journalists at the time mockingly dubbed it the “Twinkie defense”—but it worked. White was charged with voluntary manslaughter, a lesser charge than first-degree murder, and received a prison sentence of just under eight years, of which he ended up serving only five.

A fierce backlash followed the ruling. Many took to the streets to express their outrage, most notably with the White Night Riots, while others took to the media.

“There is no question that a travesty of justice occurred in the trial of Dan White,” wrote psychiatrist Thomas Szasz. “In the trial of Dan White, the defense, aided and abetted by the prosecution, had the power to hand the case over to the psychiatrists, and the psychiatrists had the power to redefine a political crime as an ordinary crime, and an ordinary crime as a psychiatric problem.”

Yet in a paper published in the journal NeuroSci, �� Professor of Integrative Physiology Christopher Lowry, along with several co-authors, suggests that the White case might have been ahead of its time in assuming a link between ultraprocessed foods and human behavior.

Gut reactions

It’s unsurprising that so many people found White’s claim of diminished capacity less than persuasive, says Lowry. In 1979, the scientific community hadn’t yet recognized the microbiome, or the commonwealth of bacteria occupying the human gut. The connection between it, one’s diet and one’s behavior therefore seemed flimsy.

“We didn't know that there was a microbiome, and that the microbiome impacts behavior,” Lowry explains. “[White’s defense team] was just basing their conclusions on observations that these types of foods, these ultraprocessed foods, could affect people’s behavior in negative ways. So, it was kind of a crude assessment of this association between what you eat and behavioral outcomes.”

But for the past several decades, scientific research in a field referred to as psychoneuroimmunology, much of it pioneered by Steven F. Maier and Linda R. Watkins of CU Boulder’s Maier Watkins Laboratory, has established a clear relationship between microbes (or their components), the brain and behavior.

A crucial explanatory ingredient in this relationship, says Lowry, is inflammation, or the body’s immune response to what it deems threats.

“There’s a through-line between diet impacting the microbiome and the permeability of the gut barrier, which allows bacteria and bacterial products to get into the body, which can drive systemic inflammation. Systemic inflammation drives neuroinflammation in the brain, and neuroinflammation in the brain alters brain and behavior.”

“Given the growing evidence that ultraprocessed foods lead to multiple negative health outcomes, I think the goal is to shift away, to the extent possible, from ultraprocessed foods toward less processed food,” says CU Boulder researcher Christopher Lowry. (Photo: iStock)

The takeaway, Lowry explains, is that some foods—namely ultraprocessed foods—can negatively affect the microbiome and thus increase risk factors for violent or rash behavior. “It’s clear that inflammation does impact aggressive behavior, does impact impulsivity.” It’s so clear, in fact, that the negative health outcomes of ultraprocessed foods are now at the forefront of public health policy, and San Francisco is suing makers of ultraprocessed foods for creating products that have saddled governments with public health costs.

Yet the news isn’t all bad, Lowry says. Just as ultraprocessed foods can lead to negative mental health outcomes, less-processed foods can lead to positive mental health outcomes.

“What other researchers have found is that, regardless of whether you look at people without a diagnosis of depression or anxiety, or you look at clinical populations—people that have a diagnosis of anxiety disorder or mood disorder—in either case, you can simply change the diet of these individuals [by reducing their intake of ultraprocessed foods] and improve their anxiety and depression symptoms.”

Food or foodlike substances?

Moving away from ultraprocessed foods would mean big changes for many Americans, says Lowry, who points out that more than 50% of the foods purchased in U.S. grocery stores are ultraprocessed.

But what counts as ultraprocessed anyway? Don’t most foods go through some degree of processing before ending up on eaters’ plates?

One useful resource, says Lowry, is the four-level NOVA system developed by Carlos Augusto Monteiro and a team of researchers at the University of São Paulo in Brazil in 2009.

“Level 1 is unprocessed. This would be if you pulled the carrot out of the ground and ate it,” says Lowry. “Level 2 involves more processing,” but it’s processing “that we can do in our kitchen. So, you might take a carrot and combine it with some celery and spices and make a stir-fry that you put on rice.”

Level 3 involves processing that people generally can’t perform in their kitchens. “For example, there’s very few of us that can take salmon and make canned salmon. It’s food—it’s salmon—but it’s been processed in a way with very high heat and pressure to make it sterile so that it has a prolonged shelf life.”

Level 4, on the other hand, is another thing entirely, different from the other three levels not just in degree but in kind.

“Level 4 is not food,” says Lowry. “Level 4 is chemicals that have been put together in a way that makes them highly palatable.” In the words of Michael Pollan, Level 4 processing produces not food but “edible foodlike substances.”

To avoid inflammation—and its attendant behavioral risk factors—Lowry suggests eaters opt for the first three levels and do their best to steer clear of the fourth.

Just as ultraprocessed foods can lead to negative mental health outcomes, less-processed foods can lead to positive mental health outcomes, says CU Boulder scholar Christopher Lowry. (Photo: Jacopo Maiarelli/Unsplash)

“Given the growing evidence that ultraprocessed foods lead to multiple negative health outcomes, I think the goal is to shift away, to the extent possible, from ultraprocessed foods toward less processed food,” he says. “The diets that have benefit are rich in fresh fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, healthy fats like olive oil and occasionally fish.”

Free will on trial

In their paper, Lowry and his co-authors raise questions about the role of free will in criminal law. Specifically, how much responsibility does a person bear for a crime they committed while under the influence of diminished capacity?

A few non-food-related examples bring this question into stark relief.

Shane Tamura, who in July shot four people in a Manhattan office building before killing himself, was revealed in an autopsy to have had low-level chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a disease often associated with contact sports like football and boxing. “[S]tudy my brain please,” he said in his alleged suicide note. “I’m sorry.”

And Charles Whitman, the “Texas Tower Sniper” who in 1966 killed his wife, his mother and 11 people on the University of Texas at Austin campus, likewise requested that he undergo an autopsy following his crimes.

“[L]ately (I can’t recall when it started) I have been a victim of many unusual and irrational thoughts,” the Eagle Scout, scoutmaster and Marine veteran wrote in his confession the night before his crimes. “After my death I wish that an autopsy would be performed on me to see if there is any visible physical disorder. I have had some tremendous headaches in the past and have consumed two large bottles of Excedrin in the past three months.”

During the autopsy, medical examiners discovered a nickel-sized tumor pressing up against Whitman’s amygdala. Since the 1800s, researchers have known that damage to the amygdala can cause emotional and social disturbances.

Whether Tamura’s and Whitman’s brain pathologies directly caused their crimes is unknown and impossible to prove, but if their writings are any indication, they didn’t seem fully committed to perpetrating those crimes. And yet perpetrate them they did. What if something similar happened with Dan White? What if what people eat alters their sense of what they choose to do—their free will?

Of course, some philosophers and scientists don’t believe free will exists at all, perhaps the most popular among them being the neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky, author of Determined: A Science of Life without Free Will.

“When most people think they’re discerning free will, what they mean is somebody intended to do what they did: Something has just happened; somebody pulled the trigger. They understood the consequences and knew that alternative behaviors were available,” Sapolsky says in a New York Times interview.

“But that doesn’t remotely begin to touch it, because you’ve got to ask: Where did that intent come from? That’s what happened a minute before, in the years before, and everything in between.”

For his part, Lowry expresses less certainty than Sapolsky, but he nevertheless believes the issue of free will as it relates to ultraprocessed foods, the brain and human behavior is an important one to consider.

“If you’re born in an inner city with low socioeconomic status, you have very limited access to fresh foods—vegetables, nuts, seeds, healthy foods—and instead you’re raised on ultraprocessed foods, which are very cheap, do you ultimately have free will? Do you have the mental foundation to make decisions based on free will? Or is your free will somehow compromised by these conditions, which, at one level, are imposed by societal factors?

“This is a philosophical question,” Lowry adds. “I don’t claim to have the answer.”

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A paper co-authored by CU Boulder researcher Christopher Lowry draws upon the infamous ‘Twinkie defense’ to explore the relationship between ultraprocessed foods and human behavior.

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Top photo: Thayne Tuason/Wikimedia Commons

Hellems to reopen: A new era of sustainability and learning

Rachel Sauer — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 18:40:44 +0000

Hellems to reopen: A new era of sustainability and learning Rachel Sauer Wed, 12/10/2025 - 11:40

After more than two years, the historic Hellems Arts and Sciences building is ready to welcome faculty, staff and students back to campus life

This month, faculty and staff members will begin moving into their newly renovated offices, and when the spring semester kicks off in January, students will once again fill the halls of one of CU Boulder’s most iconic academic spaces.

The renovation was made possible through a combination of university resources and partial funding from the state of Colorado, underscoring the shared commitment to preserving historic campus spaces while advancing sustainability and student success.

Learn more about Hellems reopening

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After more than two years, the historic Hellems Arts and Sciences building is ready to welcome faculty, staff and students back to campus life.

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CU Boulder philosopher building a bridge to Africa

Rachel Sauer — Tue, 09 Dec 2025 22:11:46 +0000

CU Boulder philosopher building a bridge to Africa Rachel Sauer Tue, 12/09/2025 - 15:11

Cody DeBos

Associate Professor Ajume Wingo was recently appointed as a research associate at the Center for Philosophy in Africa at Nelson Mandela University, a recognition of his decades of scholarship

For a young Ajume Wingo growing up in Nso, a northwestern region of Cameroon, philosophy wasn’t a topic relegated to ancient Stoics or the halls of academia.

“Philosophy was not an abstract pursuit. It was a living practice woven in everyday life,” says Wingo, an associate professor of philosophy at the ��. “As a child I was surrounded by elders who transmitted their wisdom to me through storytelling, through rituals, through symbols, through ceremonies. That had deep philosophic meaning.”

That early foundation shaped not just how Wingo views philosophy today, but also how he practices it. He values using lived experience as a starting point and working toward the abstract, rather than the other way around.

Ajume Wingo, a CU Boulder associate professor of philosophy, was recently appointed as a research associate at the Center for Philosophy in Africa at Nelson Mandela University.

“I start from life, and then I go up. That’s the way I think about philosophy as a living practice. As life,” he explains.

Looking beyond our circles

Recently, Wingo’s philosophical journey has taken a major step forward.

In October, he was appointed as a research associate at the Center for Philosophy in Africa at Nelson Mandela University in South Africa. The role recognizes his decades of scholarship and offers a new platform for expanding international research collaborations between African and Western thinkers.

“At a personal level, it’s a recognition many years in the making. It gives me the opportunity to work collaboratively at the international level, to act like a bridge between Western philosophy and African philosophy,” Wingo says.

His appointment is the result of a personal connection with Nelson Mandela University that has grown over many years. Wingo had previously delivered lectures across South Africa, but his keynote speech in April 2024 at Nelson Mandela University titled “In the Shade of Power” sparked something more.

“Many of the students from the university came up to me after. They wanted to exchange numbers and work with me and all that,” Wingo recalls.

During that same visit, he also participated in many broader conversations around ethics and justice in business alongside thinkers and industry leaders from across Africa.

Wingo’s research draws on both his formal training and his cultural roots in Cameroon. That dual grounding allows him to explore concepts through multiple lenses, he says, from Western theories of justice to African communal models of governance.

“Philosophy reflects the lived experience of the people that philosophers are dealing with,” he says. “And that already gives us some kind of differentiation.”

For Wingo and the kind of political philosophy he practices, Nelson Mandela University is a natural home.

“The Nelson Mandela University is named after Nelson Mandela, who was a victim of apartheid and who came out with a lot of compassion and reconciliation,” he says.

Take the concept of freedom.

In Western political philosophy, Wingo says, freedom is often defined as the absence of interference or constraint. But he says that idea doesn’t translate well into many African contexts.

“The African perspective on freedom is the presence of the right kind of associations. The presence of the community, of belonging. The more you belong, the more you are associated with people, the more freedom you have,” Wingo explains.

He says this contrast extends to views on politics, citizenship and even the role of blood and kinship in shaping identity. Where Western models may emphasize choice, contract and individual rights, African perspectives tend to view community as organic and identity as inherited.

“Politics from the African perspective has always been about … these bounded people in this place with a story, real or imagined, deciding for themselves how they should live,” Wingo says.

By bringing these frameworks into the conversation, he hopes to “humanize” politics and offer new ways of asking questions that might help us understand global and regional challenges. However, he warns that conversation can only happen when philosophers are willing to look outward.

“Philosophy itself is a kind of death when it is inward looking,” Wingo says. “Some of the time I worry that philosophy is becoming like a ghetto … a bunch of people sitting around talking among themselves about themselves.”

“You miss a lot when you’re inward looking, when you keep asking the same thing over and over again. And you gain a lot when you open up to the rest of the world.”

He believes true philosophical vitality comes when thinkers “communicate across the mighty mountains and across the vast oceans,” adding, “That’s philosophy at its best.”

Becoming a bridge

For now, Wingo hopes his appointment at Nelson Mandela University can serve as a bridge, both for his own work and for the CU Boulder community. He’s already planning faculty and student exchanges between the two institutions as well as an international symposium and conferences in both Colorado and South Africa.

“Even just the idea of me being there is exciting. Many people will learn about CU Boulder because of me and will get to hear a new perspective on philosophy,” he says.

That kind of cross-cultural exchange is good for the discipline, helping to shape the ideas born of those who practice it.

“To learn about your culture, you should make it foreign to you by learning about the cultures of other people,” Wingo says, paraphrasing Aristotle. “And in that way, you learn about your culture, not just the cultures of other people.”

In a world facing increasingly global challenges, Wingo believes that philosophers must rise to the moment. He says asking bold questions, ones that defy norms and societal comforts, is the only way we can overcome today’s biggest obstacles.

“You miss a lot when you’re inward looking, when you keep asking the same thing over and over again,” he says, “And you gain a lot when you open up to the rest of the world.”

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Associate Professor Ajume Wingo was recently appointed as a research associate at the Center for Philosophy in Africa at Nelson Mandela University, a recognition of his decades of scholarship.

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Top photo: Hu Chen/Unsplash

Photojournalist turning aerial art into climate archive

Rachel Sauer — Thu, 04 Dec 2025 14:30:00 +0000

Photojournalist turning aerial art into climate archive Rachel Sauer Thu, 12/04/2025 - 07:30

Cody DeBos

CU Boulder geography alumnus Katie Writer shares Alaska’s changing landscape from the skies

On a clear day high above south-central Alaska, you can find Katie Writer pulling open the window of her Super Cub airplane and leaning her camera out into the rushing wind. Below, the landscape doesn’t look like the same one she once hiked and skied. That’s exactly why she’s flying.

For Writer (Geog’91), flying offers a unique vantage point from which to witness the planet changing in real time.

“Climate change is something I saw coming all the way back in my CU days studying geography, and I knew it would be a big part of my life’s calling. I have a sense of duty as a photojournalist pilot and an advocate for the environment. Whenever there’s a chance for me to tell the story of the landscape or point emphasis to an area that needs some protection, I jump on it,” she says.

Geography alumnus Katie Writer has built a career at the intersection of science, storytelling and adventure. (Photo: Katie Writer)

From documenting glacier retreat to photographing generations of spruce trees withered by beetle kill, she’s built a career at the intersection of science, storytelling and adventure.

Skiing onto the page

Writer’s journey to the cockpit wasn’t traditional. At CU Boulder, she majored in geography and raced on the ski team, balancing course loads with weekend races. After graduating, she worked as an interpreter for the United States Olympic Committee at the 1992 Winter Olympics in France, and that lit a fire in her for world-class racing.

“I quickly moved up the ranks and placed 17th at the U.S. National Championships in 1994,” Writer recalls.

But when an injury derailed her career, she pivoted her skiing passion from racing to the page, becoming an aptly named writer of outdoor adventure articles for the likes of Couloir and Powder magazines. One story led her to Denali National Park.

“On that trip, I was inspired to become a pilot,” she says. “I’d also been on another ski trip where a Cessna 185 flew us into the wilderness in a ski plane, and it made me realize that these little planes give you some great access to the wilderness.”

After earning her pilot’s license with support from aviation scholarships, Writer settled in Alaska, where she has since filled her appetite for adventure and storytelling through the lens of her camera. She didn't give up competitive skiing entirely, though, and races in three World Extreme Skiing competitions in Alaska

“Others were noticing my photography and really appreciating the bird’s eye view I was getting as an aerial photographer/pilot. It helped me realize that capturing these images was something I was really passionate about,” she says.

Seeing the story from above

When Writer takes her camera into the sky, the viewpoint of Alaska’s stunning landscapes brings awe, but also a sense of urgency. From her Super Cub, she observes patterns of change. Hillsides of dying spruce. Once thriving glaciers shrinking every year. Riverbanks collapsing after torrential storms. She has returned often to the same places, documenting changes that most people never get to see.

“There’s no doubt when you live in Alaska, you see the effects of the beetle kill. I realized this was an excellent way to present climate change with the visuals from an aerial perspective,” Writer says.

Warmer winters have allowed spruce beetles to survive year-round, leaving entire forests stained with rust-colored decay. Glaciers tell a parallel story of loss.

Aerial views of the changing Alaska landscape captured by Katie Writer from the open window of her Super Cub airplane. (Photos: Katie Writer)

“We spent a lot of time going back to the toe of the Ruth glacier, photographing the specific area year after year and seeing how dramatically the receding lines were, as well as observing the collapsing walls,” she adds.

She also tracks what happens downstream. After record rainfall from an atmospheric river in August 2025, she flew over the swollen Talkeetna River and saw entire stretches of bank washed away.

“These weather events with high levels of moisture, in my opinion, are another visual acceleration of erosion.”

These scenes are part of a photographic timeline Writer has spent years assembling. With each flight, she adds a new layer to the growing visual archive that captures the rapid reshaping of Alaska’s wilderness. For those of us on the ground, it’s a rare glimpse at what our world looks like from above.

Exploring a new medium

In time, the stories Writer wanted to tell outgrew both print and pictures. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she launched the All Cooped Up Alaska Podcast, a show born from isolation and the desire to connect. It’s since evolved into the Alaska Climate and Aviation Podcast, where she explores stories of weather, flying and environmental change.

“Being in the air and photographing the landscape feels like artistic movement and is a spiritual experience. The natural world is just stunning,” says Katie Writer. (Photo: Katie Writer)

“The benefit of producing your own podcast is that you get to be as creative as you want and can tell the stories you want to tell,” she says. “A lot of the stories I used to create for our local radio station would be edited down to three and a half minutes for airtime. I was always a little bit frustrated by that.”

Now, Writer brings on regular guests, including prominent Alaskan climatologists Rick Thoman and Brian Brettschneider, to discuss everything from wildfire smoke to Arctic feedback loops. She also covers major events like the Arctic Encounter Symposium in Anchorage.

“Arctic Encounter is attended by world leaders from all around Arctic countries, including Indigenous leaders, policymakers, scientists, villagers and Arctic dwellers,” she says. “It’s a very inspiring event with fascinating panels of people talking about the problems they’re having and solutions they envision.”

Writer has also added a sightseeing business to Visionary Adventures, taking people out on Super Cub Airplane Rides so they can experience the beauty themselves. And these days, her children are her most frequent fliers: "We—my son, Jasper, and daughter, Wren—have also enjoyed soaring above the wilds looking for wild game and fishing spots."

CU at altitude

Looking back, Writer credits her time at CU Boulder with helping to shape her worldview.

“One of the primary things that made a major influence on choosing geography as a major was an upper-division course that was in the Arctic Circle, learning field research techniques,” she says.

She also recalls the atmosphere of both Boulder’s scientific community and cultural diversity.

“As a sophomore, our house was across the street from the Hari Krishnas, where we ate a meal a week and enjoyed philosophizing on life and world religions. It was just a really neat place to be,” Writer says. “All of the beautiful architecture and even the Guggenheim building for Geography really held a special place in my heart for a place of learning.”

Her advice for today’s students? Write often.

“Writing is a really important skill that I’m noticing more and more being lost with the use of AI. Getting the pen flowing onto a piece of paper lets you tap into a whole different type of creativity,” she says.

“Realize that you may not know what your whole career is going to be, but don’t be afraid to explore and take a risk in opportunities you might get. When I look back at the journals that I had at that time in my life, I’m like, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m doing it,’” she adds.

Even now, after decades of flying and learning to balance the art with the business, Writer isn’t sure where her career will lead next.

“I always aspired to work for National Geographic as a photojournalist,” she says. “And I still haven’t met that goal—but who knows what could happen in the future.”

One thing is certain: Writer has no plans to stop flying over Alaska and documenting its changes.

“Being in the air and photographing the landscape feels like artistic movement and is a spiritual experience,” she says. “The natural world is just stunning.”

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CU Boulder geography alumnus Katie Writer shares Alaska’s changing landscape from the skies.

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Sanctuary brims with happy tales (and tails)

Rachel Sauer — Tue, 02 Dec 2025 14:30:00 +0000

Sanctuary brims with happy tales (and tails) Rachel Sauer Tue, 12/02/2025 - 07:30

Clint Talbott

Tails of Two Cities Sanctuary, founded and run by CU Boulder alumna Jess Osborne and her husband, CU Boulder Professor Myles Osborne, gives unwanted or neglected animals a safe, comfortable forever home

Why did this chicken cross the road? No one knew. And this was no joke.

Late last month, the chicken was strutting on Magnolia Road in the mountains near Nederland—a place inhabited by coyotes, fox and other canines. Three passersby stopped to help, and, together, they captured the bird by wrapping it in a shirt, whereupon one good Samaritan drove the bird to Tails of Two Cities Sanctuary.

Friends of the sanctuary posted the news to the local Facebook group, called Nedheads, hoping to find the chicken’s owner. No one claimed the bird.

Myles (left) and Jess Osborn founded Tails of Two Cities Sanctuary to rescue "unwanted and discarded animals and provide them with high-quality food and medical care to live out their natural lives.” (Photos: Clint Talbott)

It’s possible that the chicken wandered away from its home, through the forest, to this road. It’s also possible that the bird, which appears to be a rooster, was dumped on the side of the road because it won’t produce eggs. (Discarding roosters is common.)

Jess and Myles Osborne, who founded the sanctuary, have adopted the rooster and named it Chamonix, after the resort town in France. Like his namesake, Chamonix is striking, but why name a bird after a town? Thereby hangs a tale.

Tails of Two Cities Sanctuary is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit launched in 2021 by Jess, who graduated in 2005 from the �� with degrees in communication and fine arts, and Myles, CU Boulder associate professor of history.

The sanctuary, just south of Magnolia Road west of Boulder, aims to rescue “unwanted and discarded animals and provide them with high-quality food and medical care to live out their natural lives.”

On the sanctuary’s 23-acre parcel, more than two-dozen animals—horses, pigs, goats, ducks, dogs, plus a cat, yak, donkey, turkey and, now, chicken—enjoy lives they otherwise would not have had.

And an oink-oink here…

Consider the pigs, named Bolton and Berlin, which a friend of the Osbornes noticed wandering on another roadside near Nederland. The pigs had broken out of their home because they were starving and didn’t have water, and their owner gave the OK to take the pigs. Bolton and Berlin now sleep, snort and snuffle, in the sanctuary’s loving embrace.

Each animal has a backstory.

Wilbur, a dog named for Wilbur, Washington, came to the sanctuary after his foster family refused to put him down, against the advice of three veterinarians, to join his biological brother, Ziggy, named after Zagazig, Egypt.

Chamonix the (suspected) rooster came to Tails of Two Cities Sanctuary in October after being found strutting alone on Magnolia Road near Nederland; attempts to find an owner were unsuccessful.

The brothers were both born with the same neurological disorder. Wilbur also has a dog version of Wilson’s disease, which makes him retain excessive amounts of copper. He takes medicine to remove copper from his blood.

Wilbur was in a wheelchair but now can walk, though unsteadily. Ziggy suffers from spells resembling seizures that prevented him from walking or standing at least 30 times a day. He often had to be carried.

Wilbur and Ziggy are clearly happy, though, and Jess dubs them the “wiggle brothers.”

Talkeetna (Alaska), a yak usually called “Tallie,” was born prematurely and was unlikely to survive. She was donated to the sanctuary, which took her to Colorado State University and gave her a shot at survival. These days, Tallie is hale and hearty and hangs around with the goats. She seems to enjoy gently headbutting people who walk by.

London and Brooklyn are mini horses who had been awfully neglected. Both had severely overgrown hooves when they were rescued from a kill pen at auction. Brooklyn had suffered some kind of trauma when she was younger, and her left eye has been removed once at Tails to give her the same standard of care as humans and dogs.

Both mini horses love being taken for walks and chomping as much roadside grass as possible in the broad meadow that sits under a stunning vista featuring James Peak, South and North Arapahoe Peaks.

A herd of elk often gathers nearby, drawing curious glances from many of the animals, perhaps none more than Rio, a 2,000-pound draft horse whose head is higher than the eaves of the sanctuary.

Tails of Two Cities Sanctuary provides a loving home and high-quality care to animals in need and creates a welcoming place for humans to experience the love, joy and healing of connecting with animals.

When Tails adopted her from a rescue in Montana, Rio had a crooked foot and still needed extensive veterinary care to make sure she was comfortable and could walk comfortably. Now, she’s playful and mischievous, sometimes inadvertently crushing pieces of the aluminum fencing around the horses’ area.

Animals soothe the human psyche

Jess Osborne has always loved animals. As a kid in Gunbarrel, she collected the critters her mother could afford (and their home could accommodate): frogs, geckos, chickens and dogs.

Animals helped her feel better, much better. She has grappled with ADHD and anxiety since childhood. As she speaks, her focus can drift into several sometimes-related topics.

Jess Osborne with Tallie the yak (left) and Darwin the dog.

But focusing on animals is no problem. “Even though I can’t remember history or make it through any of Myles’ books without falling asleep, when it comes to medicines and animal care and stuff like that, I go down the hyper-focusing tunnel,” she told The Colorado Sun.

And the animals helped other people, too, Jess noticed. Nine years ago, when she was working at a nursing and memory-care facility in Boulder, Jess brought her dogs Dublin and Brisbane. The residents loved the dogs.

After adopting Brisbane and Dublin, who died in 2023, Jess and Myles adopted a bunny and, later, the mini horses.

This was the seed of an idea: Elderly people often can’t care for (or aren’t allowed to have) pets. Unwanted and abused animals need forever homes where they can live their best lives. And rescued animals can bring comfort and joy to people who—for many reasons—don’t have animals in their lives.

This was true for Jess’ grandmother, whom Jess and Myles took care of and who died in 2021. It was also true for a neighbor’s boy, who was on the autism spectrum.

He rode and brushed the horses to build core strength and fine motor skills. Occupational and physical therapists have shown that movement and interaction with horses can improve physical, cognitive and emotional well-being in people with varying conditions.

In the career world, Jess had not found her place, but launching an animal sanctuary was her calling. She and Myles bought the sanctuary’s current home, which is large enough to allow the sanctuary to help more animals and humans. There, they have room for large horses and the rest of the menagerie.

But what to call the sanctuary? Happy Tails wasn’t quite right. Given Myles’ extensive travel and his English background, Tails of Two Cities Sanctuary seemed to fit, even though the place is not Dickensian.

The name reflects the fact that both Jess and Myles love to read and travel.

Of course, the place, which had been a regular home with a two-car garage and a large deck, had to be converted to serve its primary residents, the animals. The garage was turned into a barn, and an additional shelter for the goats was built adjacent to the newly fashioned barn.

Myles Osborne with several of the eight goats, who often lounge on the sunny deck and fall asleep, snoring.

A sunny enclosure next to the deck serves as a warm spot for the pigs and sometimes the eight goats, who often lounge on the sunny deck and fall asleep, snoring.

Below the deck, the chicken, Chamonix, the newest feathered child, and ducks (Louise, Abe and Albie, after Lake Louise and Lake Abraham, Canada, and Lake Albert, Uganda) have their own petite house called the Duck Tails Saloon, which resembles an Old West bar, next to a small fenced area.

Jess, Myles and sanctuary volunteers build and mend fences, string electric fencing (which keeps big horses in and bears out), fashion goat playgrounds, and spend their days raking muck, preparing special food for two-dozen different palates and attending to the animals’ medical needs.

Being as bold as your dreams

It’s a lot of work and, no doubt, a fair amount of stress. As he talks about this, however, Myles’ demeanor remains steady and calm, just as it does when he discusses the history of colonialism in Africa, the necessary steps to refashion a horse fence or his attempted climb of Mount Everest, which he abandoned in the “death zone” to save a man’s life.

Myles suggests that the decision to start a sanctuary was a no-brainer:

“If you have a dream and something that you are excited about, you have to lean into it. And if you are in your early 40s and financially secure, if you're not gonna do it, then when are you gonna do it?”

He observes: “I do think that generally when people are brave and people lean into things that seem intimidating, it works itself out. … And why not be brave? Why not go for it? And it clearly is Jess’ passion in life. It's what she was put on the earth to do, very clearly. So it wasn't that tough of a decision.

“Now, keeping the numbers reasonable is a bit more of an ongoing conversation,” he adds. There are bills for veterinarians, racks of hay, tons of animal feed, walls of sawdust (for sleeping and padding) and more. The operation is 40% self-funded (down from 70% self-funded last year).

But it’s worth it, they say.

The couple still visit elder-care facilities in which there will be 25 or 30 people in wheelchairs in a circle. “And we just release 2,000 pounds of goats and yak and the dogs. And they all know exactly how to behave, how careful they need to be. And (the animals) will walk around the circle, they will greet everybody, everyone pets them.”

Tallie the yak was born prematurely and given scant odds of survival, but these days she is hale and hearty and hangs around with the goats. She seems to enjoy gently headbutting people who walk by.

Myles also relates a story about a blind woman who came to the sanctuary and walked onto the deck. Goats quickly crowded around her. The woman petted them and marveled aloud that four goats were pressing into her.

Myles told her there were actually six goats. Goats (seeking treats) can become pushy around fully able-bodied people, but they took it easy on this visitor.

“And then we said to her that there has actually been a 500-pound yak who has been two yards away from you for the past 15 minutes, who clearly understands that you have some issue that she's not familiar with and she's holding back and she's waiting.”

The animals, he adds, “understand instinctively when people are old or disabled or young or blind or something, they get it.” And for the woman, the experience was “profound.”

The next horizon

Tails of Two Cities Sanctuary has more its leaders hope to do. Chief among them is to build a “proper” barn that has more room for the animals, whose design facilitates feeding, cleaning, visitors’ experiences and volunteers’ work.

While that’s on the horizon, more immediate tasks remain. On a recent evening, Myles and three volunteers worked to rearrange and refashion the fence that keeps the horses from wandering away and separates the minis from the large horses and Murphy, the donkey.

As Myles worked here and there, tools usually in hand, Stanley, the turkey (named for Istanbul), followed Myles around.

Stanley came from a backyard homestead whose owners didn’t have the heart to slaughter him. And no wonder. Jess describes him as “the friendliest turkey on Earth.”

Stanley’s gobble, a cheerful trilling song, often punctuates the background sounds of barks, whinnies, bleats, clucks and snorts. Stanley tends to follow people around the sanctuary.

With Myles in the horse pen, Stanley performed some “turkey dances,” with Myles’ gentle encouragement and praise.

So there they were, human and animal, working and strutting, talking and gobbling. Two tales as one.

Learn more about Tails of Two Cities Sanctuary at this link.

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Rosa Parks: 70 years beyond the bus seat—a lifetime of activism

Julie Chiron — Mon, 01 Dec 2025 18:14:17 +0000

Rosa Parks: 70 years beyond the bus seat—a lifetime of activism Julie Chiron Mon, 12/01/2025 - 11:14

Bradley Worrell

CU Boulder historian Ashleigh Lawrence-Sanders delineates misperceptions surrounding ‘the mother of the Civil Rights Movement’ and the Montgomery Bus Boycott while highlighting Parks’ enduring legacy

When people hear the name Rosa Parks, they likely picture a quiet, tired, older African American seamstress who refused to give up her seat to a white patron on a Montgomery, Alabama, bus on Dec. 1, 1955.

Ashleigh Lawrence-Sanders

But as �� historian Ashleigh Lawrence-Sanders explains, 70 years after Parks’ act of civil disobedience—and the Civil Rights Movement it helped ignite—there is a lot Americans tend to get wrong about that defining moment, which she says is far more complex, courageous and enduring.

“Many people still think of her as a tired seamstress and an old lady, but she was just 42 years old, she was the secretary of the local NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) chapter and she had been politically active in campaigns previously,” says Lawrence-Sanders, a Department of History assistant professor who specializes in African American history, including the Civil Rights Movement.

Notably, Parks was not the first Black person to be arrested for violating Montgomery’s segregated bus seating rules, Lawrence-Sanders says. She explains that civil rights activists had been looking for a test case to initiate a city-wide boycott to push for integration of the bus system and Parks was deemed a promising candidate.

“In class, I tell my students why Rosa Parks was chosen—because she was considered a respectable older woman who was married. Also, although she grew up in a working-class family and worked as a seamstress, she had completed high school, which was a rare achievement for Black Southerners then,” Lawrence-Sanders says. “There were teenage girls like Claudette Colvin who had been arrested before but weren’t chosen because, unfortunately, movement leaders did not view them as the right public face for a court challenge.”

Arrest prompts the Montgomery Bus Boycott

Rosa Parks was arrested on Dec. 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama.

Days after Parks’ arrest, Black leaders in Montgomery organized a city bus boycott. On Dec. 5, 1955, about 40,000 Black bus riders—representing the majority of the city’s bus commuters—boycotted the city transit system.

Seven decades after the bus boycott, Lawrence-Sanders says many people don’t fully appreciate the herculean task of organizing the endeavor, the sacrifices it required and its duration. She says that when she asks her history students to guess how long the bus boycott lasted, they typically say about a few weeks or a month. In truth, it lasted 381 days.

There also tends to be a misperception that the bus boycott was a spur-of-the-moment act—but that was not the case, Lawrence-Sanders says.

Black leaders working for civil rights in Montgomery had been waiting for an opportunity to challenge the city’s segregated bus system—and after Parks’ arrest, they leapt into action with astonishing speed—all without email, social media or other modern technologies. Flyers were printed and distributed by hand by the Montgomery Women’s Political Council, and churches became organizing hubs.

“The Montgomery boycott was planned—not spontaneous,” Lawrence-Sanders says. “Activists were organized and strategic.”

Organizers established vast carpool systems that operated as shadow transit networks, but many Black men and women trudged on foot for miles to and from work every day rather than use the city’s segregated bus system, Lawrence-Sanders says. In some cases, wealthy white women offered rides to their Black domestic workers, which sparked some controversy within Montgomery’s white community, she notes.

And while leaders were chosen for the movement, including a young Martin Luther King Jr., decisions were democratic: at mass meetings, ordinary citizens voted to continue the boycott despite the challenges, Lawrence-Sanders says.

“There are obviously people who are considered leaders of the movement, but ordinary people in the community are making these sacrifices to try to overturn a really unjust system,” she adds.

Montgomery amid the broader struggle for civil rights

Lawrence-Sanders says it’s important to understand the Montgomery bus boycott in the scope of the larger Civil Rights Movement in the 1950s.

“At the time, we’re just about one year in time removed from the Brown vs. The Board case, which sets off initial school desegregation battles. In my African American history course, I try to make clear (the idea) that ‘The Supreme Court decides it, but it is not decided,’” she says. “There is not a single moment where all of the schools in the South have abandoned segregation; there are multiple local battles for the next two decades or so.”

“We know from images at the time how violent some of those battles became in Little Rock, Arkansas, and in Mississippi and other places.

And then, just months before the Montgomery Bus Boycott began, Emmett Till, a 14-year-old Black boy from Chicago was abducted and lynched after allegedly flirting with a young white woman while visiting family in rural Mississippi, in violation of Southern societal norms at the time.

The brutality of Till’s slaying and the acquittal of the men charged with his murder drew international attention to the long history of lynching in the South in particular, Lawrence-Sanders says. What’s more, Till’s murder laid bare the limitations of U.S. democracy at a time when the United States was engaged in a Cold War with the Soviet Union, where America was portraying itself as the home of liberty and justice, she adds.

“I think the Cold War context is really important, as international media actually picks up what is happening in the United States surrounding the lynchings and murder of Black people and Black children,” Lawrence-Sanders says. “Emmett’s mother’s decision to have an open casket to show what happened to him is a turning point, I think, for some people who may have been unaware of the brutality of the violence of the Jim Crow South.

“The fact that the men that are charged with his murder are acquitted was not a surprise to most people who were familiar with the Jim Crow legal system, but it may have been shocking to those people seeing it for the first time.”

It was against that backdrop that civil rights activists pushed for desegregated busing in Montgomery, often facing intimidation, violence and arrests, Lawrence-Sanders notes. It bears mentioning 70 years later that there was no guarantee their efforts would ultimately prove successful, she adds.

Victory in Montgomery comes at a cost

Handwritten reflections from Rosa Parks on her arrest.
Click to see full document.

On June 5, 1956, a Montgomery federal court ruled that any law requiring racially segregated seating on buses violated the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which guarantees all citizens—regardless of race—equal rights under state and federal laws. The city appealed that ruling, but on Dec. 20, 1956, the Supreme Court upheld the lower court’s ruling.

Montgomery’s buses were officially integrated the next day.

Lawrence-Sanders says the success of the Montgomery boycott is now seen as one of the first successful mass protests on behalf of civil rights in the United States, setting the stage for successive actions to bring about legal protections for African Americans. It also resulted in Martin Luther King Jr. becoming a national civil rights leader and solidifying his commitment to nonviolent resistance, she notes.

At the same time, Lawrence-Sanders says it’s important to recognize that there was a cost to be paid for the people who participated in the Civil Rights Movement.

“Activism was never glamorous, protests like sit-ins were disruptive and unpopular at the time,” she says. “Activists faced danger and hostility. We praise them now, but they weren’t celebrated then. We fail to recognize that many people involved in the Civil Rights Movement either died young or struggled for the rest of their lives.”

A number of civil rights leaders had their homes bombed or were killed for their activism, including King. As for Parks, she and her husband moved to Detroit in 1957 after they both lost their jobs and she received death threats.

“She never stops being an activist, though,” Lawrence-Sanders says. “She was involved in the Black Power movement in Detroit, in the anti-apartheid movement and pan-African causes well into the 1980s and 1990s. Like a lot of activists then and now, Rosa Parks protested segregation, sexual violence, unjust imprisonment and apartheid; she understood that solving one issue didn’t end the struggle.”

Parks was later recognized for her efforts, receiving the Congressional Gold Medal in 1992—the highest honor the nation bestows on citizens. At the same time, Lawrence-Sanders says that Parks spent her last years in near poverty, living in a modest Detroit apartment and at one point facing eviction before a rich benefactor came to her aid.

An enduring legacy for civil rights

Lawrence-Sanders says that when she teaches students about the Civil Rights Movement, she instructs them to avoid the trap of seeing those leaders one-dimensionally, in that one moment of their lives.

“History tends to freeze these activists in these celebrated moments, like Rosa Parks in 1955—but she lived for 50 more years and never stopped being an activist,” Lawrence-Sanders says. “The most important part of Rosa Parks’ legacy is her long life of activism—not just the one act we all know about. She made a decision that ignited one of the most important acts of civil disobedience in U.S. history—and then she kept fighting for justice for five decades more.”

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Rosa Parks was arrested, fingerprinted and briefly jailed for "refusing to obey orders of a bus driver."

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Wally the Wollemi finds a new home

Rachel Sauer — Mon, 01 Dec 2025 14:30:00 +0000

Wally the Wollemi finds a new home Rachel Sauer Mon, 12/01/2025 - 07:30

Rachel Sauer

CU Boulder alumni Judy and Rod McKeever donate a tree once considered extinct to the EBIO greenhouse, giving students a living example of modern conservation

Wally probably doesn’t know he’s a dinosaur.

He’s just living his best life in a bright spot—but not directly sunny, he doesn’t like that—in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology greenhouse on 30th Street.

This guy! Talk about charisma. People have certain stereotypes and expectations for what he should be, and he defies them. For starters, he’s here and not, after all, extinct.

Yes, Wally the Wollemi is something special—a Cretaceous Period pine tree thought to have gone extinct 2 million years ago, rediscovered in a secluded Australian canyon in 1994 and, with a few steps in between, recently donated to the greenhouse.

. “Where we are right now with climate change, we’re losing plants and animal species and insect diversity at an extremely rapid rate, so as scientists and horticulturists and curators it’s our job to maintain the diversity of the world in collections, and Wally is an important part of that," says Malinda Barberio, EBIO greenhouse manager.

“The Wollemi pine is an interesting story about paleobotany as well as conservation,” explains Malinda Barberio, greenhouse manager. “Where we are right now with climate change, we’re losing plants and animal species and insect diversity at an extremely rapid rate, so as scientists and horticulturists and curators it’s our job to maintain the diversity of the world in collections, and Wally is an important part of that.”

Back from extinction

How Wally came to live in a quiet spot in the 30th Street greenhouse is a story that started in the Cretaceous. Scientists theorized that herbivorous dinosaurs living then dined on Wollemi pines, which belong to a 200-million-year-old plant family and are abundantly represented in the fossil record dating as far back as 91 million years.

Where they weren’t abundantly represented was in the living world. They were theorized to have gone extinct, living only in stone impressions.

However, in 1994, New South Wales (Australia) National Parks ranger David Noble was rappelling in a remote canyon about five hours west of Sydney when he happened upon a stand of pine trees unlike anything he’d seen before. They had fern-like foliage, distinctive bumpy bark and a dense, rounded crown. They towered over other trees in the canyon.

“Typically, you think of pines as Christmas tree-shaped, fairly triangular, so that dense top crown that’s very rounded is a little odd for pines,” Barberio says. “And you typically expect large, fluffy branches, but the Wollemi’s branches are covered in thicker, flat needles that are in two rows parallel to each other along the sides of branches, which is really distinctive.”

Intense scientific investigation followed Noble’s discovery, including comparison to the fossil record, until it was agreed: This was the Wollemi pine—back from extinction.

The ongoing threat of extinction loomed large, though, because there were fewer than 100 trees in that canyon, whose location remains a closely guarded secret. So, in 2006, and in an unusual partnership between the National Geographic Society, the Floragem plant wholesalers, conservationists, botanists and scientists, 10-inch Wollemi pines were offered for sale in National Geographic’s holiday catalog.

Follow Wally and his friends in the greenhouse at @CUBoulderEBIOGreenhouse on Instagram.

“You are now the owner of a tree that is a survivor from the age of the dinosaurs, a miraculous time traveler and one of the greatest living fossils discovered in the twentieth century,” began the catalog description of the 10-inch saplings selling for $99.95.

That’s what caught Judy McKeever’s attention.

A tree named Wally

“My husband (Rod) does bonsai and loves his bonsai garden, so when I saw the advertisement for National Geographic selling these trees, and it was a love story about finding a dinosaur in an Australian canyon, I thought it would be the perfect addition to his collection,” recalls McKeever (A&S’76). “But he never got bonsaied or really trimmed at all, and just kind of grew out of control.”

The couple named him Wally because it sounds like Wollemi, and he lived in a sheltered, south-facing spot on their Boulder deck in the summer and under a grow light in their basement in the winter. Between seasons, they toted him up and down the stairs—and every year he was bigger.

CU Boulder alumni Judy and Rod McKeever donated Wally the Wollemi pine tree to the EBIO greenhouse in October.

“We didn’t really do anything special, just treated him like every other plant we have,” McKeever says. “He lived a sheltered little life, occasionally got fertilized, and he was very happy. We just let him do whatever he wanted to do; he’s an Australian free spirit.

“We just loved Wally, but he grew a few inches every year and with the soil and pot, he just got to be too heavy to take down to the basement every winter.”

In early autumn, McKeever began looking for places that might be interested in adopting Wally and found the EBIO greenhouse. There was an element of homecoming since both Judy and Rod are 1976 CU Boulder graduates (Rod in chemical engineering); Wally would be staying in the family.

“We are very happy to bring Wally into our collection,” Barberio says. “For the university to have a Wollemi pine is a really special privilege. It allows students to have an example of conservation efforts that are modern and recent in history and shows them that they have the opportunity to participate in these efforts as well.”

Plus, she adds, Wally is a great opportunity for public outreach: People can schedule time to visit him in the greenhouse and see science, conservation and worldwide partnerships at work. And students in future paleobotany classes will be able to see just how close scientists and artists got in visually rendering the Wollemi pine from fossil evidence.

“It’s surprisingly accurate how well they were able to reproduce (Wollemi pines) in theory,” Barberio says. “We have all of these animals and plants that are extinct, and having this living example is a really cool way to show how close we got it.”

A part in plant diversity

As for the care and feeding of Wally, who actually isn’t only male since pines produce both male and female cones, he likes acidic soil and bright but not direct light, given that he’s prone to sunburn. He likes regular watering and doesn’t like his soil to completely dry out, but he also dislikes “wet feet,” or for the bottom layer of soil to be damp.

Because his very few wild relatives live in a protected canyon, it may be implied that Wollemi pines prefer protection from rapid temperature changes, Barberio says, adding that so far, he’s shown no signs of producing cones.

“We would love to have Wally produce cones in the future,” she says, “and of course we would try to plant and grow them.”

Until that time, Wally the Wollemi pine will be a signature plant in the greenhouse collection and an example, Barberio says, “that we can play a part in maintaining the diversity of the plant world.”

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CU Boulder alumni Judy and Rod McKeever donate a tree once considered extinct to the EBIO greenhouse, giving students a living example of modern conservation.

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