How does art influence our perception of the world? Can fostering creativity in education lead to overall personal happiness and growth? What lessons can be drawn from historical and modern art practices? Will Gompertz is the director of Sir John Soane’s Museum in London, and the author of several books, including What Are You Looking At?: The Surprising, Shocking, and Sometimes Strange Story of 150 Years of Modern Art , Think Like an Artist: How to Live a Happier, Smarter, More Creative Life , ...
Nov 04, 2024•52 min•Ep. 477
AI is a fast-growing field full of potential insights, challenges, and ethical implications for its users and the world. How can the people behind the machines explore the ways to use AI and data technology to leverage societal benefits? Juan M. Lavista Ferres is the Corporate Vice President and Chief Data Scientist of the AI for Good Lab at Microsoft. He also co-authored the book AI for Good: Applications in Sustainability, Humanitarian Action, and Health . Greg and Juan discuss Juan's book 'AI...
Oct 31, 2024•37 min•Ep. 476
How have economic crises throughout history shaped the relationships between nations? Which crises had a hand in wars and major global conflicts? Harold James is a professor of history and international affairs at Princeton University. His recent book, Seven Crashes: The Economic Crises That Shaped Globalization examines major economic upheavals from the 1840s to modern day. Greg and Harold chat about the concept of a crisis and its evolution, the delicate nature of interconnected economies, and...
Oct 28, 2024•44 min•Ep. 475
With sex and gender becoming such politicized and polarizing issues recently, what’s a common sense approach to sorting through all the information to better understand the issues at hand? How have different struggles for equal rights throughout history shaped and informed these common-sense positions? Doriane Lambelet Coleman is a professor at Duke Law School, specializing in scholarship on women, sports, children and law. She is also the author of On Sex and Gender: A Commonsense Approach and ...
Oct 24, 2024•47 min•Ep. 474
As we get better and better at training machines to emulate humans, are there certain aspects of human intelligence that artificial intelligence will never be able to copy? Neil D. Lawrence is a professor of machine learning at the University of Cambridge. His new book, The Atomic Human: What Makes Us Unique in the Age of AI explores the meaning of intelligence as it relates to both humans and machines. Neil and Greg chat about the nuances of human intelligence and artificial intelligence, discu...
Oct 21, 2024•56 min•Ep. 473
Historically, how were narratives used around race, species, and the beliefs of Western civilization? What have been the contemporary implications for those earlier societal beliefs? Stefanos Geroulanos is the director of the Remarque Institute, a professor of history at New York University, and the author of several books. His latest book is called The Invention of Prehistory: Empire, Violence, and Our Obsession with Human Origins . Greg and Stefanos discuss the complexities of defining human n...
Oct 18, 2024•56 min•Ep. 472
The long-held dominant narrative about evolution is that it works like a tree. But as science has advanced in the last century, the idea of a family tree might not tell the full story anymore. Evolutionary biologist David P. Mindell is a visiting scholar at UC Berkeley’s Museum of Vertebrate Zoology and the author of The Network of Life: A New View of Evolution which explores the concept of horizontal evolution alongside traditional Darwinian vertical evolution. Greg and David discuss the import...
Oct 14, 2024•49 min•Ep. 471
When COVID-19 hit, many predictions were made about how the global pandemic would impact the macroeconomy. Some of those predictions were accurate, some of them turned out to be false alarms. But when business leaders need to make strategic decisions with macroeconomic forecasts in mind, how do they tell the truth from the doomsaying? Philipp Carlsson-Szlezak is the global chief economist at Boston Consulting Group. He also leads the BCG’s Center for Macroeconomics and regularly contributes to p...
Oct 10, 2024•51 min•Ep. 470
How is technology disrupting on-the-job learning? What do we lose from outsourcing the work of novices to technological tools, and what do we gain? How do some surgical students make surprising decisions about where to do their residencies? Matt Beane is an assistant professor of Technology Management at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He is also the author of The Skill Code: How to Save Human Ability in an Age of Intelligent Machines . Greg and Matt discuss the impact of technology...
Oct 07, 2024•57 min•Ep. 469
How important is creative thinking and the fusion of business and art in today's ever-evolving business landscape? What are the challenges of navigating uncharted futures with the role of AI? Amy Whitaker teaches Arts Administration at New York University and is also the author of three books, including Art Thinking: How to Carve Out Creative Space in a World of Schedules, Budgets, and Bosses and Economics of Visual Art: Market Practice and Market Resistance . Greg and Amy discuss the value of i...
Oct 03, 2024•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 468
Much of the field of economics derives its theories from a subset of Adam Smith’s philosophy found in the Wealth of Nations . But are economists overlooking other parts of Adam Smith’s teachings that could explain more about human behavior and economics? Nobel-prize winning economist Vernon L. Smith is an emeritus professor of economics and law at Chapman University. His books like Rationality in Economics: Constructivist and Ecological Forms and Humanomics: Moral Sentiments and the Wealth of Na...
Sep 30, 2024•55 min•Ep. 467
Just like all people, scientists have their own morals and political ideologies. But how do those values influence their work? What are the potential ramifications of science mixing with politics? John Staddon is an emeritus professor of psychology and neuroscience at Duke University and the author of numerous books. His works like Science in an Age of Unreason and Scientific Method: How Science Works, Fails to Work, and Pretends to Work examine the history of the scientific field and the challe...
Sep 26, 2024•43 min•Ep. 466
Ellen J. Langer is a Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. She is also the author of several books, including The Mindful Body: Thinking Our Way to Chronic Health , Mindfulness , Counterclockwise: Mindful Health and the Power of Possibility , and The Power of Mindful Learning . Ellen and Greg discuss the profound influence of mindfulness on decision-making and work-life balance, while challenging the illusions of control, certainty, and predictability. Ellen also breaks down the extraor...
Sep 23, 2024•1 hr 3 min•Ep. 465
There’s a significant mismatch between our ancient brain's capabilities and the rapid advancements in technology. Simply put, our brains just can’t keep up in the digital age. But what does that impact look like from the brain’s point of view? What’s really going on with the neurotransmitters when we take in all that information? Richard Cytowic is a professor of neurology at George Washington University. His books like Your Stone Age Brain in the Screen Age: Coping with Digital Distraction and ...
Sep 19, 2024•56 min•Ep. 464
When does predicting the future become a science and not a fantasy? What can be learned from forecasts throughout the ages and across different industries? What does the future of energy look like, given certain unchangeable limitations of physics themselves? Mark P. Mills is the founder and executive director of the National Center for Energy Analytics and the author of the books The Cloud Revolution: How the Convergence of New Technologies Will Unleash the Next Economic Boom and A Roaring 2020...
Sep 16, 2024•59 min•Ep. 463
How do you measure the quality of management at a company? And how much do management practices impact a firm’s overall performance? Nicholas Bloom is a professor of economics at Stanford University and co-director of the Productivity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship Program at the National Bureau of Economic Research. His research on working from home and management practices has been published in numerous scientific journals, including the Journal of Political Economy and Nature. Nicholas and...
Sep 12, 2024•48 min•Ep. 462
Women have been systematically marginalized throughout history. However, new research shows a growing gender gap in the other direction. Today, men may face many disadvantages regarding education and the workforce. So, how should society address the disadvantages of both women and men in a nuanced and inclusive way? Richard Reeves founded the American Institute for Boys and Men after writing the book Of Boys and Men: Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do about It . Hi...
Sep 09, 2024•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 461
Is there a secret recipe for start-up success? Probably not. But if you take a close enough look at some of the massive success stories like Twitter and Lyft, patterns start to emerge. Venture capitalists Mike Maples, Jr. and Peter Ziebelman pull back the curtain and examine how start-ups go from seedling ideas to billion-dollar companies in their book, Pattern Breakers: Why Some Start-Ups Change the Future . Mike, Peter, and Greg discuss the roles that insight and implementation play in determi...
Sep 05, 2024•1 hr 16 min•Ep. 460
How does drawing from experiments and scientists on the fringes of science help all of science and strengthen the core? How does luck actually work? How did the early members of NASA treat scientists who made mistakes in the quest to reach the moon? Richard Wiseman is a professor of the public understanding of psychology at the University of Hertfordshire, a magician, performer, and the author of several books. Two of his latest titles are Moonshot: What Landing a Man on the Moon Teaches Us Abou...
Sep 02, 2024•53 min•Ep. 459
Are we a more addicted society now than ever before in history? And if that’s the case, is it because there are more things to be addicted to or has the thinking around addiction simply shifted in the last century? David Courtwright is an emeritus professor of history at the University of North Florida. His books like, The Age of Addiction: How Bad Habits Became Big Business and Forces of Habit: Drugs and the Making of the Modern World examine the history and proliferation of drugs and addiction...
Aug 29, 2024•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 458
What factors influenced the development of early democracies, the role of technology in governance? Who came up with the concept of fairness in taxation, and the evolution of democratic institutions over time? David Stasavage is in the department of Politics at New York University, and also the author of several books. His latest book is titled The Decline and Rise of Democracy: A Global History from Antiquity to Today . Greg and David discuss the historical divergence between Europe and China i...
Aug 26, 2024•55 min•Ep. 457
The fear of AI taking our jobs has been buzzing for years, but it’s not a new conversation. Technology has been shaking up industries and displacing workers since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution. In this episode, Greg sits down with Carl Benedikt Frey, the Dieter Schwarz Associate Professor of AI & Work at the Oxford Internet Institute, to dive deep into these shifts. As the Director of the Future of Work Programme and author of The Technology Trap, Frey sheds light on the historical a...
Aug 22, 2024•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 456
Discover how the American dream of meritocracy, rather than being a ladder to success, may actually be fueling inequality, eroding the middle class, and even harming the elites it was meant to reward. Our guest today is Daniel Markovits, the Guido Calabresi Professor of Law at Yale Law School and the Founding Director of the Center for the Study of Private Law. Markovits publishes widely and in a range of disciplines, including law, philosophy, and economics. Greg LaBlanc sits down with Daniel i...
Aug 19, 2024•58 min•Ep. 455
Why have historians often overlooked childhood despite its significance in shaping culture and political views? How did trends in family demographics and child-raising change across the country as new research became popular or new technology became widely adopted? Paula S. Fass is an emerita professor of history at UC Berkeley and also the author of a number of books. Her latest books are Inheriting the Holocaust: A Second-Generation Memoir , Children of a New World: Society, Culture, and Globa...
Aug 16, 2024•57 min•Ep. 454
How was the financial world changed by the structured use of wooden sticks with dents in them? Why did silver coins disappear from England as soon as they were minted? How did one country that aimed to eliminate money ultimately end up creating the most stable currency in Europe? Paolo Zannoni is Executive Deputy Chairman at Prada, and the author of the book Money and Promises: Seven Deals That Changed the World . Greg and Paolo discuss Paolo’s career choices between academia and banking, his re...
Aug 14, 2024•49 min•Ep. 453
The thing about sovereign debt is that if a country defaults on its loan, there are no international bankruptcy laws in place to ensure the creditors get their money back. So what happens then? Gregory Makoff, a physicist turned banker, is a fellow at Harvard Kennedy School and the author of the book, Default: The Landmark Court Battle over Argentina's $100 Billion Debt Restructuring . In this debut, Makoff tells the gripping story of Argentina’s years-long court battle in the U.S. to settle a m...
Aug 12, 2024•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 452
In what ways is England’s imperial past connected to its present? What of that past is reflected in the schools and schoolwork of students? Are there ways to acknowledge and repair things from the past in a way that moves society forward? Sathnam Sanghera is a journalist for The Times of London and the author of several books. His latest two are titled Empireland: How Imperialism Has Shaped Modern Britain and Empireworld: How British Imperialism Shaped the Globe . Greg and Sathnam discuss Sanghe...
Aug 09, 2024•50 min•Ep. 451
How did the teachings of the great Greek and Roman moral philosophers shape America and its founders? How has the shift away from studying those teachings had an impact on the modern political landscape? Jeffrey Rosen is the CEO of the National Constitution Center, a law professor at George Washington University, and the host of the podcast We the People. His recent book, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America delves into ...
Aug 07, 2024•51 min•Ep. 450
Does modern society have too many laws? Have we complicated legal codes to the point where we’re suffocating under them and grinding the government to a screeching halt? Lawyer and author Philip K. Howard is the founder of the nonpartisan coalition, Common Good, which works toward legal and government reform. He’s the author of numerous books like, The Death of Common Sense: How Law is Suffocating America and most recently, Everyday Freedom: Designing the Framework for a Flourishing Society . Ph...
Aug 05, 2024•1 hr 9 min•Ep. 449
Out of all the ancient moral philosophies, which one feels most applicable to how we live our lives in the modern world? As today’s guest would say, we are all Epicureans now. Catherine Wilson is an emerita professor of philosophy at the University of York. She’s written many books on the subject of ethics and philosophy, including How to Be an Epicurean: The Ancient Art of Living Well and Moral Animals: Ideals and Constraints in Moral Theory . Catherine and Greg talk about Epicureanism’s releva...
Aug 02, 2024•45 min•Ep. 448
