The Joe Walker Podcast - podcast cover

The Joe Walker Podcast

Well-researched interviews on ideas, technology, and policy. (Plus a recurring series on Australian public policy.)

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Episodes

Shruti Rajagopalan — On Spotting Talent, And Making Sense of Rising India

Shruti Rajagopalan is an Indian-American economist. She leads the Indian political economy research program and Emergent Ventures India at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. She also hosts the Ideas of India podcast. Full transcript available at: jnwpod.com See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Nov 28, 20232 hr 45 minSeason 7Ep. 152

Raghuram Rajan — Debt, Monetary Policy, and Unintended Consequences

What were the deep causes of the global financial crisis and great recession? Has unconventional monetary policy in the wake of the crisis done more harm than good? And should monetary policy target financial stability? I discuss these questions and more with Indian economist and Professor of Finance at the University of Chicago Raghuram Rajan. Raghuram Rajan was chief economist at the IMF from 2003 to 2006, and from 2013 to 2016 he was Governor of the Reserve Bank of India. As RBI Governor, he ...

Nov 01, 20231 hr 52 minSeason 7Ep. 151

Peter Singer — Moral Truths and Moral Secrets

Peter Singer is the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University. He is widely regarded as the world's most influential living philosopher. Full transcript available at: jnwpod.com Episode recorded on 26 April 2023. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Sep 19, 20231 hr 55 minSeason 7Ep. 150

Peter Turchin — Why Societies Fall Apart (And Why the US May Be Next)

Peter Turchin is a complexity scientist and one of the founders of cliodynamics — a new, cross-disciplinary field that applies mathematics and big data to test historical theories. Full transcript available at: jnwpod.com. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Aug 30, 20231 hr 42 minSeason 7Ep. 149

Stephen Wolfram — Constructing the Computational Paradigm

Stephen Wolfram is a physicist, computer scientist and businessman. He is the founder and CEO of Wolfram Research, the creator of Mathematica and Wolfram Alpha, and the author of A New Kind of Science . Full transcript available at: jnwpod.com. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Aug 16, 20234 hr 24 minSeason 7Ep. 148

Katalin Karikó — Forging the mRNA Revolution

Katalin Karikó is a Hungarian-American biochemist. She is one of the inventors of mRNA technology. Full transcript available at: thejspod.com. Episode recorded on 15 February 2023. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Aug 01, 20232 hr 4 minSeason 7Ep. 147

Richard Rhodes — The Making of the Atomic Bomb

Richard Rhodes is an American historian and the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Making of the Atomic Bomb . Full transcript available at: thejspod.com See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Jul 25, 20233 hr 42 minSeason 7Ep. 146

Ken Henry — An Economic Odyssey

Dr Ken Henry is an Australian economist who served as Secretary of Australia's Treasury from 2001 to 2011. He was instrumental in helping Australia avoid recession during the 2008 Global Financial Crisis — Australia was the only major advanced economy to do so. Full transcript available at: thejspod.com See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

May 09, 20234 hr 35 minSeason 7Ep. 145

Palmer Luckey — Science (Non)fiction

Palmer Luckey is an American tech entrepreneur and billionaire. He has founded two companies: Oculus VR (acquired by Facebook for $2 billion in 2014), and Anduril (recently valued at $8.5 billion). He has been described as the real-life Tony Stark. Full transcript available at: www.thejspod.com See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Apr 25, 20231 hr 39 minSeason 7Ep. 144

Daniel Kahneman — Dyads, And Other Mysteries

Daniel Kahneman is widely regarded as the most influential psychologist alive. He won the Nobel Prize in Economics (2002) for his work on judgment and decision-making under uncertainty, much of it done jointly with his late collaborator Amos Tversky. He is the author of the bestselling books Thinking, Fast and Slow and Noise: A Flaw in Human Judgment (written with Olivier Sibony and Cass Sunstein). Full transcript available at: thejspod.com See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information....

Apr 13, 20231 hr 13 minSeason 7Ep. 143

Talent Is That Which Is Scarce — Tyler Cowen

In the long run, talent allocation is almost everything. But as a society, we're not actually very good at it. The question of how to reliably match people with jobs they are well suited for is one of the big unsolved problems of our times. Joe catches up with return guest Tyler Cowen to discuss the art of identifying talent. Tyler is a professor of economics at George Mason University and host of the podcast Conversations with Tyler . He is also the co-author of a new book, Talent: How to Ident...

Dec 31, 202248 minSeason 6Ep. 142

Intellectual Exoskeletons — Andy Matuschak

From language and writing to the Hindu-Arabic numeral system, computers and Adobe Photoshop, our species has a history of inventing tools for augmenting our own intelligence. But what comes next? Andy Matuschak is a developer and designer. He helped build iOS at Apple, founded and led Khan Academy's R&D lab, and now works as an independent researcher investigating 'tools for thought' — that is, technologies that can transform human cognition and creativity. Full episode transcript available ...

Dec 23, 20222 hr 9 minSeason 6Ep. 141

Rationality And Its Opposite — Steven Pinker

How rational are we? How can a species smart enough to set foot on the moon also be prone to conspiracy theories that the moon landing was fake? Joe speaks with Steven Pinker to discuss rationality — and its opposite. Steven Pinker is the Johnstone Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. He is a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist, an elected to the National Academy of Sciences and one of Time ‘s 100 Most Influential People . Full episode transcript available at: thejspod.com See omnystudio....

Dec 14, 202253 minSeason 6Ep. 140

Against Bayesianism — David Deutsch

Bayesianism, the doctrine that it's always rational to represent our beliefs in terms of probabilities, dominates the intellectual world, from decision theory to the philosophy of science. But does it make sense to quantify our beliefs about such ineffable things as scientific theories or the future? And what separates empty prophecy from legitimate prediction? David Deutsch is a British physicist at the University of Oxford, and is widely regarded as the father of quantum computing. He is the a...

Apr 24, 20221 hr 39 minSeason 6Ep. 139

The Lessons Of Afghanistan — William Dalrymple

William Dalrymple is an acclaimed historian and writer. Show notes available at: josephnoelwalker.com/138-afghanistan See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Sep 05, 202158 minSeason 5Ep. 138

The Race That Stopped The Nation — Richard Holden & Steven Hamilton

Richard Holden is Professor of Economics at UNSW. Steven Hamilton is an Assistant Professor of Economics at The George Washington University. Full transcript available at: josephnoelwalker.com/holden-hamilton See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Aug 30, 20211 hr 55 minSeason 5Ep. 137

Ergodicity — Ole Peters

Ole Peters is a physicist and a Fellow at the London Mathematical Laboratory. Show notes available at: josephnoelwalker.com/136-ergodicity See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Aug 23, 20212 hr 9 minSeason 5Ep. 136

The Tyranny Of Merit — Michael Sandel

Michael Sandel teaches political philosophy at Harvard University, where he is the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of Government Theory. His course “Justice” is the first Harvard course to be made freely available online and on television and has been viewed by tens of millions of people around the world. Full transcript available at: josephnoelwalker.com/michael-sandel See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Jun 22, 20211 hr 5 minSeason 5Ep. 135

The Spectre Of Havoc — Graham Allison

Graham Allison is an American political scientist and the Douglas Dillon Professor of Government Harvard University. Full transcript available at: josephnoelwalker.com/graham-allison See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Jun 14, 202153 minSeason 5Ep. 134

A General Theory Of Catastrophe — Niall Ferguson

Niall Ferguson is one of the world's most renowned historians. He is the Milbank Family Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and a senior faculty fellow of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard. He is the author of sixteen books, including most recently Doom: The Politics of Catastrophe . Full transcript available at: josephnoelwalker.com/niall-ferguson See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information....

Jun 06, 20211 hr 9 minSeason 5Ep. 133

Policy In An Age Of Politics — John Hewson

John Hewson is a former Australian politician and was leader of the Liberal Party from 1990 to 1994. Full transcript available at: josephnoelwalker.com/john-hewson See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

May 24, 20212 hr 10 minSeason 5Ep. 132

Is Science Reaching Its Limits? — John Horgan

John Horgan is a science journalist and Director of the Center for Science Writings at the Stevens Institute of Technology, Hoboken, New Jersey. He was senior writer at Scientific American from 1986-1997 and is the author of the bestselling book The End of Science . Full transcript available at: josephnoelwalker.com/horgan See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

May 10, 20211 hr 21 minSeason 5Ep. 130

A Forgotten Genius — Cheryl Misak

Cheryl Misak is a Canadian philosopher and the author of Frank Ramsey: A Sheer Excess of Powers . Full transcript available at: josephnoelwalker.com/misak See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Apr 28, 20211 hr 12 minSeason 5Ep. 128

Progress And Planet — Malcolm Turnbull

Malcolm Turnbull was the 29th Prime Minister of Australia. Full transcript available at: josephnoelwalker.com/malcolm-turnbull See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Apr 12, 20211 hrSeason 5Ep. 127

The Reign Of Keynes, Part II — Lord Robert Skidelsky

Robert Skidelsky, FBA is a British economic historian. He is the author of a three-volume award-winning biography of British economist John Maynard Keynes. Full transcript available at: josephnoelwalker.com/skidelsky See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Mar 22, 20211 hr 25 minSeason 5Ep. 125

Recollections Of A Wild Man In The Wings — Noam Chomsky

Noam Chomsky is the father of modern linguistics and one of the most cited scholars in modern history. He is also one of the most influential public intellectuals in the world, having written more than 150 books. Full transcript available at: josephnoelwalker.com/chomsky See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Mar 17, 20211 hr 3 minSeason 5Ep. 124

There Is Such A Thing As Society — Sir Paul Collier

Sir Paul Collier is a British development economist. He is currently a professor of economics at the University of Oxford and was the Director of the Development Research Group at the World Bank between 1998 and 2003. Paul has authored numerous books, including The Bottom Billion , The Plundered Planet , and The Future of Capitalism . His latest book, co-authored with John Kay, is Greed is Dead: Politics After Individualism . See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information....

Mar 08, 20211 hr 9 minSeason 5Ep. 123
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