our get money out of campaign has exploded in its first few days. more than 67,000 of you have joined us, i'm not sure who us and you is, but we're all together in an effort to raise the green curtain of money that is strangling our political system and making real debate, that we all so desperately want, on trade, on bank reform, on taxes, health care, education, virtually impossible. later on in the show, we'll tell you again how you can get into this whole situation and learn about the get money out campaign and ultimately stop the political pro wrestling that we're still getting from most in washington and for that matter, outside washington. we begin today with other folks who are mad as hell, however. protesters, as you may have heard, are spreading from a small unrelenting and persistent group on wall street to an

ever-growing group in san francisco, with more planned tonight in boston, chicago, l.a., even dallas. the numbers multiplying in lower manhattan where the movement started as the city's labor unions are now pledging to join, taking the number occupying wall street next week from a few hundred to a few thousand. it is not clear what their desired agenda is, but we can only hope it's to help us get the money out! the mega panel today, with us, ari berman, toure, and krystal ball. hi, guys. it's very interesting -- you don't know this at home, but just seconds ago, there was a man attempting to adjust wiring on the back of krystal ball's head, because she can't hear anything, but she's going to pretend and play along like a good professional would. >> well, we can hear you. >> i can hear. i can hear. >> we'll talk later.

how do you interpret, toure, the energy wave that we are witnessing? not just the wave that you have just recently made with the publication of your book and the pushing of a conversation to a different place, the response that we're seeing to get money out, the expansion of what was this small group of wall street that was largely ignored that is now transitions through its own unrelenting nature into this -- what are we -- what is going on here, man? >> people are angry. and i think that when you say that we're not clear on exactly what they want and they're not saying, this is a pinpoint goal of ours -- >> i'm saying i hope they want to help me get money out. that's what i'm saying. >> of course. but that there's not a very precise goal highlights that they are angry and they're so angry that they're like, we're going to do something. we need to take some action. >> i don't blame them. >> this is not a clear goal, but -- >> do you think they can help us get the money out? >> i think they should. because people need to put two and two together. the reason wall street remains

so powerful is because they're funding both political parties. and the reason we get people in the obama administration who are part of the deregulation push of the bush administration is because of the money. i'm glad you're talking about, i'm glad they're out there. people just have to realize that this is an issue and then you start talking about the solution. but if they're not even aware that anything's going on, you're never going to get -- >> what do you think about the attacks on wall street energy to the energy that we're witnessing about getting money out. so you take, you harness that for positive action. >> i think that's exactly what needs to happen, as a matter of fact. because with occupy wall street, you have this amorphous protest movement, what are they about, what's their message? we don't really know other than they're frustrated. if you had something very concrete, we want to get the wall street money or the money altogether out of politics. people would respond to that in either greater numbers. that is a coherent message. >> there's no representative at all of occupy wall street here. in fact, i doubt they even have a representative. but if there were such a

representative, i would suggest to them right now that we partnerengagement, the simple message we have all agreed to. to take your energy and help to harness that energy for positive change around the singular exclusive focus of get money out. think about it, go learn -- learn, if you would, about the actual amendment. that's all it is. you can hate me, you can disagree with me about everything else, but if you want to get money out, i'd love to work with you. it does seem like the 2012 election, even though the political apparatus is nowhere near this. and they call the political -- wrote about us the other days, called us the chicago cubs. ratigan's lost his mind, he's a fruit loop, and they're going to spend $8 billion next year. which is absolutely correct. at the same time, i don't see how this presidential election doesn't come to this issue because of the amount of money we're going to see spent. >> yeah. well, i'm a cubs fan, first off,

so go cubs. but the obama campaign said they're going to have to raise $1 billion. chris christie meeting with a budge of hedge fund guys right now to plan his campaign. both parties are expliccomplici this. >> i wouldn't say they're complicit. if any one in that system tries to get out, i just torture them. i just did my own learning about this. that we actually learned to have -- it's a weird thing to say, people are going to be confused, a little bit of empathy and compassion for everyone in the political process for the simple reason that they are trapped inside of that system. some willingly, some delightfully, some unwillingly. you'll never know the difference. but what we do know is that if we don't relieve all of them of the money on one time, on three, one, two, three, out, with an amendment, there's no other way to do it. the panel stays, the conversation continues. we take a break. bernie sanders joins us out of d.c. right after this. just one phillips' colon health probiotic cap a day

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well, we talked about the occupy wall street protesters. one of the folks with them and another ally in the mad as hell narrative, vermont senator bernie sanders. i should say mad as hell narrative, because having talked with you, senator, i'm actually quite clear that you are mad as hell. if you were to look at these protesters and their energy, and if you were to look at the energy in our get money out petition, with the message, what i call the caveman communication, senator, three words, get money out, how do you interpret the rising energy? >> i think more and more people

understand that if we're going to get out of this recession, if we're going to create the millions of jobs we desperately need, you know what, you have to look at wall street. these are the crooks who have plunged us into the horrendous economic situation we're in right now. and we're going to need fundamental reform of wall street, breaking up these ve hems. so focusing attention on wall street is exactly the right thing to do. >> i guess the only place where i would disagree with you senator, and maybe it's not so much of a disagreement as a distinction, which is what ari was saying earlier. because wall street is so active in the political system, while the need to discuss the gross dysfunction in the capital markets, which you described perfectly, the only way to address that is to cut off the flow of money from wall street

to washington by again, pushing to get the money out between those two institutions. >> well, that's not in opposition to what i'm saying. obviously, we have a horrendous campaign finance situation in america today. but it's not just wall street. wall street is very, very big, in terms of funding their friends and punishing those of us who are opposed to them. but it's not just wall street. it's the energy companies, it's the military industrial complex, it's the drug companies. it's big money flooding congress with campaign contributions and lobbying. clearly, we need real campaign finance reform. and i should tell you, dylan, that the citizens united decision obviously made a very bad situation worse, because now these guys can put money into campaigns with no disclosure at all. nobody knows who they are or how much they're spending. >> which makes it how important by your measure that we get money -- that we make getting

money out a central issue in this presidential election? how important is it that 2012 becomes a referendum on getting money out of our political system? >> well, i think, as i said, the current campaign finance situation is an absolute disaster. we're talking about huge, huge amounts of money coming in from very wealthy individuals, large corporations, who want to dominate the agenda in washington. citizens united has made it even worse. so if we are talking about the united states as being a vital democracy, where ordinary people have power to determine what happens, obviously, you need real campaign finance reform. in my view, that means public funding of elections, getting corporate money out of the system. >> but we have to begin with knowing that we have to get the money out and then we can have the debate about how we're going to replace that system. senator, what is your interpretation of the efforts on

china of your colleagues, particularly on currency manipulation and trade and obviously the white house doesn't seem to be on board with this. the treasury never classifies china as a currency manipulator. and this is a very good campaign platform. but how much of what we're seeing from the politicians in the senate is intended at really engaging china and how much of it is bipartisan pandering? >> well, i certainly hope that we address the china issue in a very bold way. as you know, dylan, we have a huge trade deficit with china. we have seen corporation after corporation in this country shut down, throw american workers out on the street, and move to china. we've lost millions of good-paying jobs as a result of this disastrous trade policy. i am interested in sustainable energy. and to give you an example, what china is doing is saying to solar companies in america and all over the world, come to china. we will give you very low-interest financing.

we'll build the buildings for you. how do you compete against that kind of subsidization? i don't think you do. so i think we need new trade policies with china, with the rest of the world based on fair trade principles, not on feted free trade. >> all right, my last question unrelated to everything we just discussed. yesterday, josh levine and yasha broke a story. they disclosed a letter between frederic hayek, the nobel laureate, and koch. hayek, the noble laureate who was being hired to advocate for the disassembly of the american -- or of any socialized system of social security or health was very concerned for his own health and social security and charles koch assured him that he, himself, would have the benefits of

social security. it's just that those down the line would not. i'm less concerned about the scandal of that interaction than i am about the assertion that money has not only influenced our politics, but is now actually purchasing ideas through think tanks and is infecting the entire polarity of debate. >> dylan, i have to tell you, that's old news. right-wing money from the koch brothers and from other right wingers has created -- they literally have created a number of right-wing think tanks, and those guys are on tv, they're in the newspapers every day, pushing the corporate agenda, pushing the agenda for the wealthiest people in this country. >> last question and i'll let you go, senator. what do you think about -- not that you have any, a horse in the race, but what do you think about my idea of approaching the the occupy wall street crowd, which obviously has a tremendous amount of energy, and suggesting to them that the action item for 2012 is to get money out? >> well, i think that's part and parcel of the kinds of reforms

we need in the united states of america. i'll just give you an example. wall street spent billions of dollars, dylan, fighting to deregulate their industry, which led us to the illegal behavior which caused the recession. so these guys, wall street and these other large companies are spending huge amounts of money, influencing politics in america and the legislative agenda. and of course, we've got to get that money out of politics. >> senator, it is an absolute delight to talk to you. thanks for the time. bernie sanders, thank you, senator. turning away from that conversation to our defense and intelligence posture. as you may have heard, u.s. intelligence has killed a major -- what is being presented as a major terror threat, and i might add, credibly so. an american-born individual, an al qaeda leader, you may have heard the name, anwar al awlaki, was known as the next generation of al qaeda.

he was known for using social media like facebook and youtube to inspire lone wolf terrorists. it gets better. he's said to have ties to almost every major planned attack on the united states. that includes the failed underwear bomber, the deadly ft. hood shooter, and the foiled times square bomber -- remember him? not to mention a connection to three of the 9/11 hijackers. sounds like a bad guy. president obama weighed in on it earlier today. >> death of awlaki is a major blow to al qaeda's most active operational affiliate. he took the lead in planning and directing efforts to murder innocent americans. >> the expanded u.s. drone program we told you with about earlier this week, by the way, was, in fact utilized. it was a drone that killed awlaki. now, let's be phenomenally clear. there is no question that the world may be a safer place with this man's death. he was clearly working on multiple levels to provide

support and action to harm american interests. but there may be two more interesting and controversial issues that this brings up. number one, is it really in our long-term interest to have remote-controlled drones flying what seems like all around the the world in a web, taking people out on remote control at the individual discretion of whoever the sitting president of this country is? and two, should it be legal for the president or the u.s. government to kill, murder a u.s. citizen, regardless of how horrible they may be, without giving them the rights of a u.s. citizen and due process and who do you trust to make that decision? our friday mega panel, msnbc contributors toure and krystal ball look with ari berman, contributing editor for "the nation." you're nodding your head, why? >> it's absolutely frightening

for us to be killing american citizens without due process. >> this is a bad guy. >> we know that. but what do we do with u.s. citiz citizens? we put them through a trial. i would like to see, even though we have evidence, if it's so clear cut, arrest him, put him in solitary confinement, put him through a trial, give him the death penalty, if that's what we're going to do. i'm very nervous at killing people without due process. >> me too! >> even though this situation seems clear, the next time it won't be so clear. >> i get it! this is the home of the slippery slope. >> and think about where we have come. and by we, i mean, the left. where have we come from? we used to be outraged -- >> are you calling me left? >> no, i'm calling me and whoever else who wants to affiliate with the left. you're whatever you want to be. >> i'm teasing. i'm here to help. >> you're post-partisan. >> don't offend the host. that's the number one rule. think of this, though. we used to be outraged at -- >> the left used to be outraged. >> yes, at unauthorized warrantless wiretapping.

now the president of the united states -- >> elected by the left. >> -- whoever they may be, we're not always going to have barack obama, can single out any u.s. citizen and be judge, jury, and executioner, with no oversight. none. >> okay. so, i want you to put yourselves in the shoes of a typical conservative viewer, listening to this conversation about how terrible it is, oh, how could we go and do this? this guy is a terrorist. we are in a war. we are in a situation where there are individuals that are at -- and that's, by the way, not a dispute. there are individuals, whether it was this one or somebody else who are actively working on a regular basis to try to perpetrate harm to the interest of america. and so while krystal and toure and all of us, it's all lovely that you are worried about the democracy, i've got to prevent people from getting killed. and the best way to do that is with drones on my discretion. that's a hard thing to get past.

>> yeah, so let me put my tea party hat on and then argue against the tea party at the same time. >> yeah. this is easy. >> number one, what's the potential blowback? so we use these drones all the time in afghanistan. they kill innocent men and women. that leads to more attacks on u.s. troops -- >> they call that collateral damage. >> but that puts our troops at more risk. what if it gets flipped and china and russia start doing it. what if they start taking out places. what if americans -- >> then it will be like "star wars," basically. >> well, if americans are getting killed, it won't be a very cool version of "star wars". >> no, it will not. that's a bumper sticker. you got anything else on the rebuttal? >> i would just say, in terms of -- i think it's a good rule of thumb and i don't know if this is a necessarily conservative position, but if it's right under bush, it's wrong under obama, and if it's wrong under bush, it's wrong under obama. this is a very dangerous precedent. >> you talk about, it's a bad guy -- >> no, no, very bad.

he wants to kill you. >> he's trying to damage americans, but we are damaging the fabric of what america is by changing america to say, we don't need due process to go out and kill this person that wants to harm us. that we have to still be america properly. >> and if you're constitutional conservative, you have to care about the institution, and these are one of the most basic rights of the constitution. >> which is due process. >> the panel stays. the conversation continues. straight ahead, forget about improving our educational system. our specialist explains why this cartoon in front of you may be the key too an entirely new way to begin the learning process in the 21st century. ♪ [ dog barks ] [ birds chirping ] ♪ [ mechanical breathing ]

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and the reality is, american people are innovative and

creative at the core. but it's the system that's broken. and i have no doubt that americans in many ways are the most innovative and creative people in the world, but if the system doesn't encourage them to take risks, then that innovation, that creativity will eventually be beaten out of us. >> that, today's specialist, on how we all must rethink not the educational process, but the learning process in america. how does our brain learn new things to adapt to new information, and in the process, unlock innovation and creativity, not only in our schools, but in our society? at this hour, as we all know, our kids struggle to keep up with the rest of the world. frank moss, our specialist, argues creating a fun learning environment and allowing teachers and students to take risks, knowing ahead of time they will fail in the process, but it will be those failures that will be the things that teach them the most about how to succeed, is the only way to

prepare our children for a 21st century marketplace. an example of how to do it, something he calls scratch. a website he developed at the mit lab with which fosters children's computer skills and other creativity and problem solving by challenging them to create their own web videos and stories, effectively provoking the back of the brain neural pathways that drive group-based problem solving. it is my absolute pressure to welcome back frank moss, former director of the m.i.t. media lab. the fact of the matter is, frank, everybody loves to solve problems, they love the creative process, but we have a culture right now that's afraid of taking chances and afraid of failure. how did we get here and why is it so bad? >> dylan, it's a pleasure to be back speaking with you about this subject. i'm glad this has really come to the surface, this discussion about our education system and how it intersects with this issue of innovation and taking risks. it's very important for our country. you know, it's a funny thing. we do a good job with our kids

in kindergarten. we free them up to play, to tinker, to try and build up structures with blocks and if they fall down, they build it again. they work with other kids and collaborate and so forth, and the minnesoute we put them in t first grade, we lock them down. we program them, essentially, to follow a path that's very narrow, to go to the next step, to ultimately get into the right college and the right job. and we've lost it. if we can only capture the kind of creativity, the kind of willingness to take risks and learn while you're building and tinkering in our elementary schools and our middle schools and our high schools, i think that step alone would provide a great increase or improvement to our education system, as far as learning goes. >> it would be revolutionary. >> it would be revolutionary. and we've actually done it at the media lab, where masters degree students and ph.d students are actually learning by having fun, by playing, by taking risk. and they're creating great innovations. and they're also learning about computer science, design, engineering, et cetera. so it must be doable.

>> frank, it's toure. i want to talk about the idea of age desegregation within the schools and your comments on how putting kids of varying ages together will help them. but then, also, we think about the sort of age bullying that is very common among kids of different ages. so how do we navigate those two things. if you're with older kids, you learn more, and then the bullying might happen, and that might stifle some kids. how do we work with that? >> well, you know, it's all a question of diversity. and making kids used to dealing with diverse and diverse environments where there are many disciplines going on. so ari, i think it's not just about mixing kids of different ages, but i think it's about mixing kids with different interests, different expertise. we don't want to segregate kids into those who like music and those who like engineering and those who like art. i think it's even more important to bring together kids with varying deferent interest, certainly with different backgrounds, and of different ages. but i think the bullying problem

is not going to be solved by segregating kids into different age groups. i think we have a fundamental society problem of respect for the individual. >> and you're arguing the way you break that is by hyperexposure to variable people at an early age, not through protecting that exposure. >> i think so. i think it's exposure to very diverse environments, to build a certain sense of understanding of what the other person is thinking and how they're feeling. and asking them those questions. and we do too little of that today. >> frank, this is krystal ball. there's been this huge debate over test-taking in our country and the no child left behind act. are we testing our kids too much, are we not testing them enough, are we not holding them to a high enough standard. and i was just wondering if you could weigh in with your thoughts as to how testing and measurement could be incorporated to the type of education system that you're envisioning? >> well, you know, you're not going to get rid of testing completely. there's been a lot of discussion and debate about testing this

week and in the recent past. you know, my strong belief that the best way to learn is by encountering with building and tinkering and toying. by getting involved. by actually building a prototype of something. seeing how it works. taking it apart. trying it. and my experience has actually been, and it's true with the media lab, that if you do that, you'll actually develop the basic skills that could improve the testing scores. so i don't think that testing, although i think we're doing too much of it, we're too focused on it, and this more creative, build, learn, fail, and then learn again environment are actually at odds. i think they can work together. >> go ahead, ari. >> hey, frank, ari berman. i have a question following up on krystal's point, which is that the education debate has become so politicized in this country is that you're either for testing or not for testing or for unions or not for unions. how do we broaden it out and have education be something that's easier for us to the discuss and talks about more quality of solutions. >> it's a debate about learning,

not about spending on education. >> yeah, i think what you just said is correct. this is all about learning. we focus too much on education and teaching. and of course, the real issue here is our teachers. we need to be able to teach our teachers this way of doing -- this way of having their kids learn. we've got to begin with the teachers and inspire them them to understand that the best way they can teach their kids is to be sourcers or mentors and have their kids be apprentices. it's in that new relationship, it's not student and teacher, it's not test and creativity, it's a mentoring/apprentice relationship between teachers and kids that's not only going to create a new learning environment, but if you think about it, it will make it sustainable. because if our teachers teach our kids as apprentices, the apprentices will then become the teachers of the future. so we need to think about sustainability. we need to rethink the term "teacher" and "student" and replace it with master and apprentice. we need to rethink testing and

replace it with the idea of learning by doing. >> or experimentation, yeah. frank, i love you so much and i am so pleased and inspired by your comments, i put it in my book, okay? i don't know whether that is a sign of my book's need of better content than i had or a sign that i'm enamored of you, but i'm excited to have the opportunity to talk to you again. talk to you again, frank. >> looking forward to your book. i'll tweet it out right away. >> you don't have to do that. >> it's been a pleasure to be back. >> what are you laughing about? >> the male lovefest. >> why do you judge me on gender? >> i'm not judging you. just that you love the brother and that's a beautiful thing. >> what's the name of your book? >> "greedy bastard$!". >> what's your book? >> "herding donkeys." >> that's a good title. she's still working on it. >> krystal, come on. >> i feel left out. >> thank you to the panel. check out some "post-blackness"

and "herding donkeys" on the weekend. we see you next week. the show continues. from education to trade and housing, we all know that money and politics is preventing america from getting the debate we deserve. and as promised earlier in the show, here's how you can learn about the campaign to get money out. it's very simple. you can go to getmoneyout.com, and if you like what you see, sign the petition and tell a friend about it. or if you prefer, you can grab your cell phone and text "sign" to 917-720-6888. although i do recommend you read the text of the amendment before you sign so you have a sense of what you're getting yourself involved with. then make waves with it. e-mail, tweet, text. however you do it, remember, after you sign, try to get that link to one other engaged person so that you can help learn -- help them learn what we're doing and so that you and all of us can double our impact every time we get a signature.

now, up next, taking a spouse for a test drive before you get stuck with them for life. the lawmakers pushing to make marriages start with a two-year deal. yo

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while some fiber ads use super models, metamucil uses super hard working psyllium fiber, which gels to remove unsexy waste and reduce cholesterol. taking psyllium fiber won't make you a model but you should feel a little more super. metamucil. down with cholesterol. well, bringing the rent-to-own concept to marriage, you'll be able to tell it's late in the show on a friday here, because this is some -- i don't know, this is some entertaining stuff. listen to this. 'til death do us part may soon become until two years go by, give or take. a group of lawmakers in mexico city is now pushing the idea of a temporary marriage license. the contract would allow couples to decide whether or not they want to continue their relationship after the two-year expiration or opt out. if it's 24 months of wedded bliss, the contract gets renewed and you're good for life. but if things aren't working out, no harm, no foul, you just

go back to living single and there's even a preset plan for divvying up things like children. i don't know. in theory, the lawmakers say the law would cut divorce rates. their argument, quite simply, that a large percentage of divorces occur within those first two years of marriage. if their marriage contract reflects that probability, they believe it will make for fewer long-term divorce cases because of the two-year opt-out clause. i have no idea, personally, what this means for marriage. but i would say this looks like a rather good marketing opportunity for jewelers looking to sell that coveted two-year ring. next, could dinosaurs soon walk among us once again? when we come back, i kid you not, i have a paleontologist working to hatch an actual dinosaur. i'm not even sure if this is legal. you don't want to miss the conversation after this.

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push. come on. come on, then. there you are. there you are. >> how close are we to living in a jurassic park? our next guest worked as a

technical adviser for the spielberg film and now he plans on hatching a living, breathing dinosaur, or so he says. how? he says he can work backwards from a chicken. jack horner wants to reverse evolution, if you will. you want to call him crazy? he says, go for it. just keep in mind he has been proving people calling him crazy wrong for decades. joining us now is renowned paleontologist, jack horner, whose newest quest is featured in october's "wired" magazine. you can see it there, reverse evolution. what is the premise, jack? >> well, first off, birds are dinosaurs. a chicken, being a bird, is a dinosaur. but what we want to do is make a bird or a chicken look a little more like a dinosaur, satisfy the sixth graders. >> and that, i think, would have

made me about as happy as a sixth grader could have been at the time if i was in sixth grade, and i imagine there are plenty of others, probably all of them, who would give their favorite tennis ball or whatever it might be for the opportunity to visit with your dinosaur. how to you -- is this legal? like, how do you -- we all saw the movie, you know what i'm saying, jack? >> right. i understand that. and fortunately, we make these -- we will be making these chicken dinosaurs one at a time, so we don't have to worry too much. and they are chickens. they're not -- they're not dinosaurs. they're not tyrannosaurus, anyway. >> but the idea is -- the whole idea -- sorry, go ahead. >> well, the whole idea is pretty simple. it's to do a little bit of genetic engineering and just flip a couple of switches, hope, that will bring back the tail.

birds evolved, you know, from tailed dinosaurs, so there was -- they basically lost their tail over time, and we want to just sort of reverse that and kind of grow a tail back. by flipping a, we think, a single or at least what we think is a single gene. we know that when the embryo is developing, a chicken embryo is developing in its egg, it actually starts to grow a long -- it starts to grow a tail, and then a gene turns on that resorbes that tail, so we're looking for that gene to stop it from resorbing so it will hatch out with a tail. >> i feel like you have a little bit -- some of the things you're saying seem very concrete and others seem to be a theorization or hypothesis on your part that you believe you can manifest. am i interpreting your language

correctly? >> well, that's -- yeah. but some of this has been done. recently a lab at the university of wisconsin was able to -- using a gene, stimulate a gene to actually get a bird to create its, you know, basically grow first generation teeth. and we know that birds, you know, their ancestors had teeth, so without adding anything to the chicken, we now know how to at least grow some kind of a tooth in a bird. i figure if we get bird -- if we did teeth, a tail, and transformed the wings into hands, which we think is another relatively simple operation, we will have something that looks a lot more like a dinosaur than a bird. >> what are the chances that it will try to bite you? >> well, it probably will. a chicken would try to bite me

too, i'm sure. >> so a small chicken, that has been converted to an animal with a tail and hands and teeth is, sounds like, as you said, stimulating and all this. how do we prevent this chicken from becoming, oh, i don't know, the size of a hippopotamus? >> well, that would take a little more gene manipulation, i think. >> i see. >> but the cool thing about this project is, you know, it's not just to make -- you know, we do want to transform a bird into something that looks a little more like a dinosaur. but, remember, it's still a chicken. you know -- and a chicken still is a dinosaur. so it's sort of a modification of a turtle -- of a chicken. >> you're going to get us all confused, because you're telling us it's still a chicken and then you're telling us a chicken's a dinosaur, and it's a who's on first over here. but the real part of this article is that science has advanced to an extraordinary place, obviously, where a conversation like the one that

we're entertaining and the nature of the editorial in the magazine is not just about the goal that you have right now, but also the fact that science is in a position to even entertain such ambitions. is that correct? >> exactly. and related to one of your previous topics on education, there's a great chance for kids to get involved in learning about developmental biology and evolutionary development. >> are you suggesting kids should start experimenting on converting chickens into dinosaurs? >> i think that would just be great, yeah. >> that would be pretty fun, right? you should actually recruit -- i mean, who's -- do you have any young people working with you in the laboratory? >> not yet. but i think that's a really good idea. >> yeah. it seems like it could be fun. what is the major innovation that you're benefiting from that you happen to be here at a point in human history where you can do this? >> well, i, you know, a benefit to come out of this, once we understand how to turn these

genes on or how to turn them off, obviously, it's going to help a lot of applications in the medical field. but, really, you know, the coolest thing about it is that if you can reactivate an ancestral gene, obviously, you can only have ancestral gene if there were ancestors. so this is one of those cases where, you know, it shows how evolution works. >> the headline says reverse evolution. scientists know how to turn a chicken into the dinosaur, although the headline should be, scientists know that a chicken is a dinosaur. but we'll take that up with the edit editors. what could possibly go wrong is your question. and give us your -- there's obviously a lot we all are thinking about right now on that question. what could go wrong? >> well, i don't -- there's not really anything that could go wrong.

"jurassic park" is a movie, it was a good movie, but we're not messing with dna, we're messing with genes. so you can only make these animals one at a time. so if a chickenosaurus mates with a chicken, you still get a chicken. >> okay, what if we take an alligator, which is also a dinosaur, if i'm right -- >> no. >> okay, so i'm wrong. this is why you can't hire me. is there another large animal like this that is as chicken-like as a dinosaur as i incorrectly speculated that an alligator would be -- >> all birds are dinosaurs, so you could take an ostrich, i guess, and do the same thing. >> okay. okay. >> yeah. an ostrich would work. but sixth graders want them big, just like you do, but i say,

let's keep them small until i know what we're doing. >> i think that's why you're in charge. >> probably. >> nice to meet you, jack. >> it was nice talking to you. >> jack horner. check it out. the man in charge of making sure we don't make a chicken too big before we know what we're doing. reverse evolution. scientists know how to turn a chicken into a dinosaur because chickens are dinosaurs. check it out on newsstands. good luck with that, jack. >> i'm sure he does. coming up on "hardball," chris matthews with more on what the death of anwar awlaki means for the future of al qaeda. but first, the daily rant and it's toure's turn at that.

all right. now for our friday installment of the daily rant, the author of "who's afraid of post-blackness?" our friend, toure, with thoughts on, i don't know what. >> in sports, there's as much joy to be gained from loving a given team to hating a given team dancing when they fail and cheering when they fall on their face and pathetically implode as the red sox did this week. it wasn't just that the team lost and missed the playoffs, but that they collapsed in historically pathetic fashion. failing in a way that left fans feeling as if their hearts had been violently ripped from their chests by the sort of soul-crushing collapse they thought was only part of their pest. in the immortal words of paul simon, hello, darkness, my old friends, sox fans must talk to you again, and i couldn't be happier. i happened to be in a bar at

harvard square at the moment where carl crawford failed to go all-out to make a season-saving catch and the orioles scored to end the game. i was surrounded by ashen-faced sox fans, but ispontaneously cheered. yes, i was that guy, the lone voice celebrating as everyone turned to look at me like, screw you, dude, and that only made it all the more sweet. how did i get to this place where sox hatred consumes me, to the extent i take soul-stirring joy in seeing their fans get intimate again with soul-paralyzing pain? it goes back to my childhood in boston. when i was 4 years old, my dad taught me, black people do not root for the red sox. they were then thought of by many as the most racest team in sports. the last baseball team to integrate. the team that had rejected a chance to sign jackie robinson, dismissing him with the "n"

word. who could cheer for that? they were to me a symbol of bost boston's regressing, anti-busing side. the celticses were the first to have a black nba player and the first to have a black coach. the reason why we root for and against certain teams root deep and is sometimes passed down through our fathers as something we can bond over with them. but should we move on? the owner of the sox who resisted black players are long gone and now the team is as diverse as you could hope for in modern baseball. their star off-season acquisition was an african-american, the aforementioned carl crawford. so shouldn't we let go of our sox hatred? no! after the sox left, i called dad to say, hey, see them fall apart? his response was to joyfully stomp on the coffin of their season with a colorful phrase that cannot be repeated on tv. the sox hatred remains strong and i love him for that.

>> oh, my goodness. that was an absolutely spectacular -- i should be clapping that performance was so magical. is there anything that the red sox could do to convince to you that the basis for your hatred that they have resolved whatever it was. we know what it was, but they've resolved it and they have moved on and they would simply like to court you for their fandom as a competitive team. >> i asked them for an interview once and they said no, so that slams the door shut. but this was something that was resolved in me very early, 4 years old, the mind virus got in -- >> 3, it's all done at that point. you didn't stand a chance. >> i grew up in boston, we had no baseball teams, moved to new york, and then became a yankees fan. and here's the thing, my dad grew up in brooklyn rooting for jackie robinson, so these issues are deeply emotional and wrapped up in identity for us. and we lov