Synopsis
Join neuroscientist, philosopher, and best-selling author Sam Harris as he explores important and controversial questions about the human mind, society, and current events. Sam Harris is the author of The End of Faith, Letter to a Christian Nation, The Moral Landscape, Free Will, Lying, Waking Up, and Islam and the Future of Tolerance (with Maajid Nawaz). The End of Faith won the 2005 PEN Award for Nonfiction. His writing has been published in more than 20 languages. Mr. Harris and his work have been discussed in The New York Times, Time, Scientific American, Nature, Newsweek, Rolling Stone, and many other journals. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Economist, Newsweek, The Times (London), The Boston Globe, The Atlantic, The Annals of Neurology, and elsewhere.Mr. Harris received a degree in philosophy from Stanford University and a Ph.D. in neuroscience from UCLA.
Episodes
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#74 — What Should We Eat?
06/05/2017 Duration: 47minSam Harris speaks with Gary Taubes about his career as a science journalist, the difficulty of studying nutrition and public health scientifically, the growing epidemics of obesity and diabetes, the role of hormones in weight gain, the controversies surrounding his work, and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#73 — Forbidden Knowledge
23/04/2017 Duration: 50minSam Harris speaks with Charles Murray about the controversy over his book "The Bell Curve," the validity and significance of IQ as a measure of intelligence, the problem of social stratification, the rise of Trump, universal basic income, and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#72 — Privacy and Security
17/04/2017 Duration: 14minSam Harris speaks with General Michael V. Hayden about the reality of spying, the difference between the NSA and the CIA, the ethics of secrecy, Edward Snowden, the Russian Hacking of the 2016 US Presidential election, and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#71 — What Is Technology Doing to Us?
14/04/2017 Duration: 46minSam Harris speaks with Tristan Harris about the arms race for human attention, the ethics of persuasion, the consequences of having an ad-based economy, the dynamics of regret, and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#70 — Beauty and Terror
10/04/2017 Duration: 50minSam Harris speaks with physicist Lawrence Krauss about the utility of public debates, the progress of science, confusion about the role of consciousness in quantum mechanics, the present danger of nuclear war, the Trump administration, the relative threats of Christian theocracy and Islamism, and realistic fears about terrorism. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#69 — The Russia Connection
24/03/2017 Duration: 37minSam Harris speaks with Anne Applebaum about Russia's meddling in the U.S. Presidential election and Trump's troubling affinity for Vladimir Putin. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#68 — Reality and the Imagination
19/03/2017 Duration: 38minSam Harris speaks with Yuval Noah Harari about meditation, the need for stories, the power of technology to erase the boundary between fact and fiction, wealth inequality, the problem of finding meaning in a world without work, religion as a virtual reality game, the difference between pain and suffering, the future of globalism, and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#67 — Meaning and Chaos
13/03/2017 Duration: 45minSam Harris and Jordan Peterson discuss science, religion, archetypes, mythology, and the perennial problem of finding meaning in life. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#66 — Living with Robots
01/03/2017 Duration: 24minSam Harris speaks with Kate Darling about the ethical concerns surrounding our increasing use of robots and other autonomous systems. Kate Darling is a leading expert in robot ethics. She’s a researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Media Lab, where she investigates social robotics and conducts experimental studies on human-robot interaction. Kate is also a fellow at the Harvard Berkman Center for Internet & Society and the Yale Information Society Project, and is an affiliate at the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. She explores the emotional connection between people and life-like machines, seeking to influence technology design and public policy. Her writing and research anticipate difficult questions that lawmakers, engineers, and the wider public will need to address as human-robot relationships evolve in the coming decades. Kate has a background in law & economics and intellectual property. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to al
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#65 — We're All Cucks Now
20/02/2017 Duration: 25minSam Harris speaks with David Frum about the presidency of Donald Trump. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#64 — Ask Me Anything 6
16/02/2017 Duration: 42minSam Harris answers questions from listeners about his conversation with Jordan Peterson, the reaction to Milo Yiannopoulos at U.C. Berkeley, the “Muslim ban,” the echo chamber of social media, Trump’s lies, the value of the humanities, the ethics of ending aging, whether consciousness can be an illusion, evolution and morality, free speech and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to gain access to all full-length episodes at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#63 — Why Meditate?
31/01/2017 Duration: 48minSam Harris and Joseph Goldstein answer questions about the practice of mindfulness. They discuss the nature negative emotions, the importance of ethics, the concept of enlightenment, and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#62 — What is True?
21/01/2017 Duration: 55minSam Harris speaks with psychologist Jordan B. Peterson about freedom of speech and the nature of truth. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#61 — The Power of Belief
15/01/2017 Duration: 49minSam Harris speaks with author Lawrence Wright about al-Qaeda & ISIS, Arab culture, 9/11 conspiracy theories, the migrant crisis in Europe, Scientology, parallels between L. Ron Hubbard and Donald Trump, the Satanic cult panic, and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#60 — An Evening with Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris (2)
10/01/2017 Duration: 36minSam Harris speaks with Richard Dawkins at a live event in Los Angeles (second of two). They discuss Richard’s experience of having a stroke, the genetic future of humanity, the analogy between genes and memes, the “extended phenotype,” Islam and bigotry, the biology of race, how to find meaning without religion, and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#59 — Friend & Foe
05/01/2017 Duration: 49minSam Harris speaks with Maajid Nawaz about the Southern Poverty Law Center, Robert Spencer, Keith Ellison, moderate Muslims, Shadi Hamid’s notion of “Islamic exceptionalism," the migrant crisis in Europe, foreign interventions, Trump, Putin, Obama’s legacy, and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#58 — The Putin Question
27/12/2016 Duration: 41minSam Harris speaks with Garry Kasparov about the problem of waning American power, the rise of Putin, the coming presidency of Donald Trump, computer chess, the future of artificial intelligence, and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#57 — An Evening with Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris (1)
19/12/2016 Duration: 42minSam Harris speaks with Richard Dawkins at a live event in Los Angeles (first of two). They cover religion, Jurassic Park, artificial intelligence, elitism, continuing human evolution, and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#56 — Abusing Dolores
12/12/2016 Duration: 01h09minSam Harris speaks with Paul Bloom about empathy, meditation studies, morality, AI, Westworld, Donald Trump, free will, rationality, conspiracy thinking, and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.
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#55 — Islamism vs Secularism
06/12/2016 Duration: 01h14minSam Harris speaks with Shadi Hamid about the power of religious belief, the failure of the Left, Islamist democracy, free speech, profiling, white nationalism, Obama’s foreign policy and other topics. SUBSCRIBE to listen to the rest of this episode and gain access to all full-length episodes of the podcast at samharris.org/subscribe.