The Atlantic’s How to Touch Grass addresses our modern-day tech anxieties

🎧 The latest season of The Atlantic’s How To podcast series proposes How to Touch Grass — a timely take on our increasingly tech-ruled lives. A common response to being chronically online, “go outside and touch grass” is a euphemism we can all benefit from every once in a while. Co-hosts Natalie Brennan and Julie Beck use the series to ask listeners to re-evaluate their relationship with technology and consider how they can use it more intentionally.

What to expect: The series kicked off last July and ran for five weeks until mid-August, delivering a short-and-sweet roster of only five episodes, each with a 30- to 40-minute runtime. Aptly, it opens with an episode on pre-internet nostalgia, exploring our growing antagonism toward the internet and technology and the temptation to switch back to analog or older devices to simulate a tech-less life where we actually did touch more grass. Other episodes dig into the obvious AI takeover, how it’s making us more anxious, the effects of a visually dominant internet, and ways to reclaim our attention spans.

The fourth episode of the series looks into perhaps the most existential question facing us in the AI era: Do we actually need to learn anything if machines can already do so much for us? Together with guest cognitive psychologist and professor Michelle Miller, hosts Brennan and Beck probe the true value of learning and why it’s a lifelong experience. As an educator herself, Miller describes learning and teaching as “one of the highest expressions of humanity that there is.”

Beyond its benefits for character building and our brains in general, she argues that learning is inherently social, often motivated by our desire for connection and self-agency. Miller also cautions against completely antagonizing technology, instead framing it as a natural progression of human invention — the question is not whether we use technology, but how we choose to use it.

What we liked: The podcast strikes a light, bright, and conversational tone, despite the somewhat cautionary subject it tackles. The episodes feel more urgent than ever but are still fun and engaging, with the final one even featuring an experiment run by the hosts themselves. Overall, the show lives up to its name — relevant, playful, and thoughtful. The hosts are friendly and casual, while Miller makes for a strong guest on the fourth episode, with plenty of insight to offer and a lot of food for thought on our approach to AI and machine learning.

The verdict: How to Touch Grass is the perfect listen for when you’re feeling overwhelmed by our fast-moving era. It’s appropriately meditative, asking the right questions and giving substantive, accommodating answers. If you have some spare time this week, pop in your headphones and work your way through the series for an interesting listen on your daily commute.

WHERE TO LISTEN- You can tune in on Apple Podcasts | Spotify | YouTube.