A science conversation featuring environmental historian Stephen Pyne, a leading authority on the relationship between people and fire, including the history of fire management. Pyne is joined in conversation by Cary ecologist Winslow Hansen, who directs a national collaborative aimed at reducing the risk of catastrophic wildfires.

Fire is often seen as a force of destruction—but it has shaped life on Earth for over 400 million years and remains essential to many healthy ecosystems. Pyne and Hansen will discuss how our relationship with fire has changed, from ancient, mutual dependence to today’s era of megafires—what Pyne has coined the “Pyrocene.”

Drawing on historical insight and case studies from the Western U.S. to the Northeast, they examine the rise of “bad fire”, why we have too little “good fire” on the landscape, and how climate, fossil fuel combustion, and land use decisions have reshaped fire behavior. They also explore what it will take to restore a more balanced relationship with fire, and the role that communities, policy, and land stewardship can play.