Dr Stephen Mallory is assistant professor of game design at Lawrence Technical University in Southfield, Michigan. After a career in the video game industry, Stephen turned his considerable intellect to analysing games as an aspect of digimodernism - the contemporary cultural phenomenon where much of our lived experience, indeed, our reality and even sense of self, is mediated through digital technologies, artifacts, and environments. His research is especially concerned with the intersection of...
Apr 28, 2026•1 hr 8 min•Season 7Ep. 6
Timotheus Vermeulen is a full professor of media, culture and society at the University of Oslo in Norway. Together with Robin Van Den Akker, he coined the term metamodernism and kick started scholarship of this new idea, co-founding the webzine Notes on Metamodernity and co-editing the book series Studies in Metamodernism. Metamodernism refers to the culture or structure of feeling that comes after postmodernism - it's what we are living through right now. It's character is contested. One the o...
Apr 07, 2026•1 hr 5 min•Season 7Ep. 4
Innovation is crucial for improving quality of life and clearing away ossified and unhelpful ways of doing and being, like fossil fuel capitalism. So how do we get it moving? The innovation ecosystem of a nation, a region, or even the world is a complex network of physical infrastructure, human capital, industrial policy, and R&D centres among other things. If any part of the network grows weak, it can drag down the whole system. Here to help us navigate this environment is Halima Jibril, As...
Mar 06, 2026•1 hr 2 min•Season 7Ep. 3
It seems these days that we are awash in data. Indeed, in their recent book The Ordinal Society, Marion Foucard and Kieran Healy argue persuasively that the passive data collection facilitated by the internet, digital technologies, wearables, and social media allows us for the first time to map the deep substrate of the social. Is that true though? In all this data, is there signal ? Valeria Ramirez from Cambridge University has made a career out of tracking the advent of digital metrics and the...
Feb 06, 2026•58 min•Season 7Ep. 2
Metamodernism is the cultural mode that is emerging after postmodernism, and boy do we need it. Postmodernism was a period of deconstruction. A necessary deconstruction, I hasten to say, one that shook the foundations of many obsolete structures that kept people oppressed like homophobia, patriarchy, colonialism, and opinions masquerading as expertise. But as there was only deconstruction, we find our culture mired in a nihilistic swamp. How can we reconstruct shared values, shared perspectives ...
Jan 15, 2026•1 hr 5 min•Season 7Ep. 1
In one of his Letters Provinciales , the French philosopher and Theologian Blaise Pascal apologises that “I have made this letter longer than usual because I have not had the time to make it shorter”. This is an aphoristic statement that could form one part of the definition of an aphorism: a pithy observation that contains a general truth. There are thousands of well-known aphorisms coming in all manner of media, like the old proverb “a rolling stone gathers no moss”, or the quite recent lyrics...
Nov 10, 2025•1 hr 2 min•Season 6Ep. 9
The so-called “replication crisis” engulfed psychology over the last 10 years, with numerous failures to reproduce canonical studies from the biggest names in the discipline like Dweck’s growth mindset, Baumeister’s willpower as a muscle, and around half of Kahneman’s Thinking Fast and Slow. Interrogation of this failure of replicate led to discoveries of p-hacking, publication bias, a huge disconnect between the theories psychologists were supposedly testing and the cute little studies they wer...
Oct 22, 2025•51 min•Season 6Ep. 8
Dr Shreeharsh Kelkar from UC Berkeley on to discuss massive online open courses or “MOOCs” and other varieties of education technology. Are they destined to displace the traditional university, or are (were) they just a fad? How do they compare with more general online platforms that host educational content, like YouTube? What sort of people start these ventures? Can they be trusted? Dr Kelkar is extremely well placed to answer these questions, combining a background in electrical engineering a...
Jun 23, 2025•1 hr•Season 6Ep. 7
Simone Schneider is a PhD candidate in sociology at the University of Cambridge. Her dissertation explores the meanings and experience of infidelity in intimate relationships, combining both long, in-depth interviews with people who have experienced or committed infidelity, and discourse analysis of dating platforms that facilitate this sort of behaviour. It’s a fascinating body of work on one of the oldest, innermost domains of human affairs, one that is changing with the times as dating moves ...
May 19, 2025•1 hr 2 min•Season 6Ep. 6
This episode’s guest is Dr Maria Bach, postdoctoral fellow at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland and host of Ceteris Never Paribus: the History of Economic Thought Podcast . She completed her PhD at King’s College in London, now available as a book with Cambridge University Press, Relocating Development Economics: The First Generation of Modern Indian Economists. The book excavates the overlooked history of Indian thinking about progress and growth, showcasing how a generation of thinkers...
Apr 28, 2025•59 min•Season 6Ep. 5
A special issue episode where regular host Dr Mark Fabian is on the other side of the microphone being interviewed by @economeager about his new book - Beyond Happy: How to rethink happiness and find fulfilment. It is out today in the United Kingdom. Here's a summary of the book: A comprehensive guide to cultivating wellbeing, combining cutting edge science and primordial folk wisdom. Mark Fabian, one of the most exhilarating thinkers working on wellbeing today, presents a revolutionary approach...
Apr 09, 2025•1 hr 31 min•Season 6Ep. 4
Anyone on social media these days has encountered a bot. An algorithm-driven fake account that engages in some nefarious activity, whether it’s turning uncontroversial points into debates, repping the Kremlin’s talking points, or directing you to pussy in bio, the bots are enshittifying social media at an alarming rate, especially now that artificial intelligence allows them to be more convincing, more targeted, and faster to set up en masse. But what if we could turn this pernicious technology ...
Mar 26, 2025•54 min•Season 6Ep. 3
Trump is back in the White House and as anticipated, his administration is moving fast and breaking things. One of the first aspects of government to get stepped on was USAID, one of the biggest financiers and administrators of global development, including programs like PEPFAR. To understand the implications of this for the wider global philanthropy sector, ePODstemology reached out to Shonali Banerjee, Assistant Professor of International Development at the University of Warwick. She was previ...
Feb 14, 2025•59 min•Season 6Ep. 2
Climate change is the single biggest policy challenge facing the world today. A global political coordination problem of epic proportions, with baggage from colonialism, short election cycles, and a deep pocketed fossil fuel lobby running interference. The stakes couldn’t be higher, with hundreds of millions of human and billions of animal lives in the balance. Who do we need to take action? Parliaments. How do we get them to do it? Here to answer that question is Mitya Pearson, assistant profes...
Jan 16, 2025•57 min•Season 6Ep. 1
Democracy is unwell. Trust in politicians, institutions, experts, and other people is steadily falling across the OECD, and even young people seem to be losing faith in the system. What can be done? One idea that has gained traction and demonstrated potential of late is deliberative democracy: bringing together citizens, policymakers, area specialists, and other stakeholders to ponder a policy issue together. Hot off its success in generating a deep, heartfelt and restorative referendum on abort...
Nov 14, 2024•1 hr 14 min•Season 5Ep. 10
In the UK, up to 80% of a social worker’s time can be spent filling out forms rather than helping the desperate people in their care. This is an example of what Dan Honig calls ‘management for compliance’. Honig is associate professor of public policy at University College London, among many other affiliations including Georgetown, Harvard, Johns Hopkins, and Lahore University of Management Sciences. In his new book, Mission Driven Bureaucrats , he argues that a ‘management for empowerment’ resu...
Oct 17, 2024•1 hr 1 min•Season 5Ep. 9
“Digital governance” is a term commonly used to refer to the transformative potential of integrating contemporary technological advances into the day-to-day activities of government. Electronic filing of tax returns, text message reminders to get your vaccine booster, medical records that can follow your around as you change doctor’s offices – all are examples of digital governance. Digital governance holds much promise, most obviously in terms of efficiency and convenience, but also many risks ...
Sep 11, 2024•58 min•Season 5Ep. 8
Dr Jaclyn Siegel from NORC at the University of Chicago joins regular ePODstemology host Dr Mark Fabian to discuss the psychological science of eating disorders and body image, especially her own qualitative research on eating disorders in the workplace and romantic relationships. The conversation also covers the relationship between social media and eating disorders, gluttonous eating, the pros and cons of the Kardashian physique and other pseudo-body positivity trends, the value of grounded th...
Aug 21, 2024•57 min•Season 5Ep. 7
ePODstemology brings you cutting edge insights and analysis from early career researchers to help you cut through 21st century complexity. A major driver of that complexity is Algorithms - an increasingly ubiquitous yet remarkably opaque aspect of modern life, directing what you watch on television, who drives your taxi, what products you see when online shopping, and, increasingly who purchases your labour. This episode, regular host Dr Mark Fabian from the University of Warwick is joined by Dr...
Jul 15, 2024•1 hr 6 min•Season 5Ep. 6
Some of you may have heard of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, an area of the Pacific Ocean roughly 1.6 million square kilometres in size that contains between 45 000 to 129 000 metrics tonnes of plastic waste, mostly in the form of microplastics – fingernail sized or smaller bits of the material. The patch has increased 10-fold in size each decade since 1945, and has a twin in the North Atlantic Garbage patch. Growing awareness of the patch and other environmental consequences of plastic waste,...
May 10, 2024•1 hr 2 min•Season 5Ep. 5
This podcast strives to bring forward new insights and innovative frameworks for understanding the world of the 21st century. Few things underscore just how radically different things are today from the 20th century than recent advances in artificial intelligence, where an AI ‘copilot’ on your smartphone can now perform myriad tasks for you in a few seconds. This episode’s guest is one of the people best placed globally to help us understand the implications of this new technology. He’s Ash Font...
Apr 18, 2024•1 hr 3 min•Season 5Ep. 4
James Steele is Associate Professor of Sport and Exercise Science at Solent University. He has extensive research and consultancy experience working with elite athletes across a range of sports, the general population across the lifespan, and both those who are healthy and diseased. He was a member of the Expert Working Group revising the CMO Physical Activity Guidelines for the United Kingdom and is a founding member of both the Strength and Conditioning Society, and the Society for Transparenc...
Mar 19, 2024•58 min•Season 5Ep. 3
Regular host Dr Mark Fabian is joined by episode guest Dr Stefania Fiorentino, senior teaching associate in planning, growth, and urban regeneration at Cambridge university’s department of land economy. Dr Fiorentino’s research is at the intersection of urban planning and local economic development, specifically how to innovate with respect to the inclusivity and effectiveness of urban regeneration strategies. Her research is extremely impact-oriented and is typically conducted in partnership wi...
Jan 31, 2024•56 min•Season 5Ep. 2
Regular host Dr Mark Fabian is joined by Dr Jacqui Lau, senior lecturer and discovery early career fellow (DECRA) at James Cook University in Australia. Jacqui is an environmental scientist employing interdisciplinary perspectives and mixed methods to understand how coastal communities in the pacific islands and Australia respond to climate change and environmental transformations. She has worked collaboratively in the Pacific, East and West Africa to examine ecosystem services, the impact of sh...
Jan 09, 2024•55 min•Season 5Ep. 1
‘Copaganda’ is the name given to media that seeks to portray the police in a favourable, often distorted light. This includes fictional shows like Law and Order, CSI: Crime Scene Investigations, and Miami Vice, as well as reality-TV style shows that follow policy officers around as they go about their business. Emma Rackstraw’s research investigates how these shows affect the behaviour of the police, perceptions of the police among viewers, and attitudes towards the police in the communities whe...
Nov 22, 2023•59 min•Season 4Ep. 11
Climate change is the biggest existential threat facing humanity. So why aren’t we doing more about it? This week’s guest is Dr Antonio Valentim, a political scientist and postdoctoral fellow at Yale’s MacMillan Centre. His research seeks to answer two main questions 1) when and why do voters change their opinions and behaviours with respect to climate change? and 2) how do political incentives influence political elites’ behaviour on climate change? Who better to help us get some answer on how ...
Oct 05, 2023•1 hr 1 min•Season 4Ep. 10
While Kim Jong Un might disagreed, democracy is widely regarded as a universal value – it is a system of political organisation that enshrines the right to self-determination. Recent centuries have seen a wave of democratisation relative to historical trends, with democracies replacing dictatorships and other autocratic forms of governance in nations across the globe. Yet many of these democracies have also struggled to put down strong roots. Backsliding is common and consolidation arduous. A fe...
Sep 21, 2023•1 hr 3 min•Season 4Ep. 9
One way to think about what makes *social* science distinct is that it is trying to study subjects, not objects. Subjects have feelings, opinions, and values, which are often hard to observe and even harder to measure. Subjects’ behaviour is also often endogenous to being studied. For example, the ‘shy conservative’ phenomenon refers to the observation that people often lie about their right wing and traditionalist beliefs when responding to political polling. Finally, subjects are embedded in s...
Aug 29, 2023•1 hr 11 min•Season 4Ep. 8
Regular host Dr Mark Fabian from the University of Warwick is joined by Dr Malte Dold, assistant professor of economics at Pomona College. Malte is one of the most prominent scholars in the field of behavioural welfare economics, which sits at the intersection of economics, philosophy, and psychology. You might have heard of behavioural economics, which inspired the idea of nudges in public policy – little tweaks to the choice environment citizens face as they navigate the world that can help th...
Aug 14, 2023•1 hr 4 min•Season 4Ep. 7
Raffaella Taylor-Seymour is an anthropologist and Postdoctoral Research Scholar at the Institute for Religion, Culture, and Public Life at Columbia University. Her work examines religious transformations in the context of struggles over gender, sexuality, and the environment in contemporary Zimbabwe. This is a context in which colonization violently upended ideas about personhood, spirituality, and ties between people and place. Raffaella’s work explores how young people navigate a religious lan...
Jul 21, 2023•1 hr•Season 4Ep. 6
