William MacAskill is an Associate Professor in Philosophy at Lincoln College, Oxford. He was educated at Cambridge, Princeton, and Oxford. He is one of the primary voices in a movement in philanthropy known as “effective altruism” and the cofounder of three non-profits based on effective altruist principles: Giving What We Can , 80,000 Hours , and the Centre for Effective Altruism . William is the author of Doing Good Better: Effective Altruism and a Radical New Way to Make a Differe...
Aug 29, 2016•2 hr 10 min•Transcript available on Metacast Sam Harris reads from an issue of Dabiq, the magazine of ISIS, and discusses the beliefs and goals of jihadists worldwide.
Aug 17, 2016•48 min•Transcript available on Metacast Glenn C. Loury is the Merton P. Stoltz Professor of the Social Sciences and Professor of Economics at Brown University. He has taught previously at Boston, Harvard and Northwestern Universities, and the University of Michigan. He holds a B.A. in Mathematics (Northwestern University, 1972) and a Ph.D. in Economics (MIT, 1976). Professor Loury has published mainly in the areas of applied microeconomic theory, game theory, industrial organization, natural resource economics, and the economics of ra...
Aug 08, 2016•2 hr 6 min•Transcript available on Metacast Eric R. Weinstein is a managing director of Thiel Capital in San Francisco. He is also a research fellow at the Mathematical Institute of Oxford University. Weinstein speaks and publishes on a variety of topics including, gauge theory, immigration, the market for elite labor, management of financial risk and the incentivizing of risk taking in science. He can be contacted on Twitter: @EricRWeinstein . Articles mentioned in this podcast: A. Koestler. “The Nightmare That Is a Reality” ...
Aug 01, 2016•2 hr 22 min•Transcript available on Metacast Sam Harris speaks with biologist David Krakauer about information, intelligence, the role of IQ, complex systems, technological advancement, the future of humanity, and other topics. David Krakauer is President and William H. Miller Professor of Complex Systems at the Santa Fe Institute. His research explores the evolution of intelligence on earth. This includes studying the evolution of genetic, neural, linguistic, social and cultural mechanisms supporting memory and information processing, and...
Jul 11, 2016•2 hr 43 min•Transcript available on Metacast Essays mentioned in this podcast: Reflections on “Free Will” by Daniel C. Dennett The Marionette’s Lament by Sam Harris
Jul 03, 2016•2 hr 43 min•Transcript available on Metacast Sam Harris reads and discusses the second chapter of “The End of Faith.”
Jun 15, 2016•2 hr 36 min•Transcript available on Metacast Neil deGrasse Tyson is the head of Hayden Planetarium in New York City and the first occupant of its Frederick P. Rose Directorship. He is also a research associate of the Department of Astrophysics at the American Museum of Natural History. His research interests include star formation, exploding stars, dwarf galaxies, and the structure of our Milky Way. Tyson is the recipient of nineteen honorary doctorates and the NASA Distinguished Public Service Medal, the highest award given by NASA to a n...
May 31, 2016•2 hr 44 min•Transcript available on Metacast Juliette Kayyem is one of the nation’s leading experts in homeland security. A former member of the National Commission on Terrorism, and the state of Massachusetts’ first homeland security advisor, Kayyem served as President Obama’s Assistant Secretary at the Department of Homeland Security where she handled crises from the H1N1 pandemic to the BP Oil Spill. Presently a faculty member at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, she also is the founder of Kayyem Solu...
May 02, 2016•1 hr 22 min•Transcript available on Metacast In this episode of the Making Sense podcast, Sam Harris reads and discusses the first chapter of The End of Faith.
Apr 25, 2016•2 hr•Transcript available on Metacast Sam Harris speaks with philosopher David Chalmers about the nature of consciousness, the challenges of understanding it scientifically, and the prospect that we will one day build it into our machines. David Chalmers is Professor of Philosophy and co-director of the Center for Mind, Brain, and Consciousness at New York University, and also holds a part-time position at the Australian National University. He is well-known for his work in the philosophy of mind, especially for his formulation of t...
Apr 18, 2016•2 hr 44 min•Transcript available on Metacast Anxiety is a monster that is crippling and paralyzed and keeps you in a loop of debiliating negative emotions even when one desperately wants out. What are the causes? What can one do to help themselves? What steps big or small do you suggest? What are your thoughts on immortality or at least living a very very long time as pursued by researchers like Aubrey de Grey? Do you think it's possible? Do you think it's desirable? I remember you mentioning getting flack from Maajid about not liking hip ...
Mar 26, 2016•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast Sam Harris talks to Omer Aziz about Islam, Islamism, free speech, and related topics.
Mar 12, 2016•4 hr 31 min•Transcript available on Metacast Jonathan Haidt is a social psychologist at the NYU-Stern School of Business. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1992, and spent most of his career (1995-2011) at the University of Virginia. Haidt’s research examines the intuitive foundations of morality, and how morality varies across cultures–including the cultures of American progressives, conservatives, and libertarians. Haidt is the author of The Happiness Hypothesis , and of The New York Times bestselle...
Mar 09, 2016•2 hr 31 min•Transcript available on Metacast Michael Weiss is a Senior Editor at The Daily Beast and co-author of the New York Times bestseller ISIS: Inside the Army of Terror . He also edits The Interpreter, an online translation and analysis journal devoted to all things Russian and Ukrainian. To support the Making Sense podcast, please visit: https://www.samharris.org/support...
Mar 06, 2016•2 hr 39 min•Transcript available on Metacast Sam Harris responds to criticism of his views on the Apple-FBI controversy and then speaks with Maryam Namazie about friendly fire among secularists, profiling, the immigration crisis in Europe, and other topics. Maryam Namazie is an Iranian-born atheist, a secularist, and a human rights activist. She is a spokesperson for a variety of organizations, including Fitnah (a movement for women’s liberation), Equal Rights Now, One Law for All (against Sharia Law in Britain), and the Council of E...
Feb 24, 2016•2 hr•Transcript available on Metacast Sam Harris offers a few more thoughts on Clinton vs Sanders, as well as on the ethics of strong encryption. He then speaks with Uma Valeti, cardiologist and CEO of Memphis Meats , about the future of food production.
Feb 20, 2016•48 min•Transcript available on Metacast Sam shares his thoughts on Eiynah Nice Mango's "Open Letter to Sam Harris" alleging that Douglas Murray is a bigot. How should we differentiate labels used for clarity and labels used in a way that encourages tribalism? What about the idea of "free won't" as opposed to "free will"? Why are you planning to vote for Hillary Clinton over Bernie Sanders? Sam shares his thoughts on Noam Chomsky's interview with Medhi Hasan on Al Jazeera. What was the most unexpected and or remarkable audience reactio...
Feb 12, 2016•1 hr 10 min•Transcript available on Metacast Jocko Willink is a retired Navy SEAL officer, and co-founder of Echelon Front , where he is a leadership instructor, speaker, and executive coach. Jocko spent 20 years in the U.S. Navy SEAL Teams, starting as an enlisted SEAL and rising through the ranks to become an officer. As commander of SEAL Team Three’s Task Unit Bruiser during the battle of Ramadi, he orchestrated SEAL operations that helped the “Ready First” Brigade of the US Army’s First Armored Division bring st...
Jan 19, 2016•2 hr 45 min•Transcript available on Metacast Scott Reitz is a thirty-year veteran of the Los Angeles Police department. He worked in the elite Metropolitan Division and finally as a member of ‘D’ platoon (SWAT). He remained there for ten years until he became the primary firearms and tactics instructor for the whole of Metro Division and all LAPD advanced in-service firearms/tactics training. In addition to his work with the LAPD, Reitz has worked with U.S. Department of Energy, US Marine Corps, U.S. Army Delta, Naval Special W...
Jan 14, 2016•2 hr 43 min•Transcript available on Metacast Sam addresses Twitter controversy regarding Fareed Zakaria, Dalia Mogahed, and John Esposito. What progress have you made toward becoming vegetarian or vegan? If the Islamic reformation/modernization movement doesn't succeed, what do you think should be the alternative? Do you think your reliance on hypotheticals and thought experiments has become a hindrance to making headway and discourse on important issues, in particular the thread of Islamic terrorism? Generally speaking, how big a role sho...
Jan 04, 2016•2 hr 32 min•Transcript available on Metacast
Dec 21, 2015•1 hr 10 min•Transcript available on Metacast Sam Harris talks to physicist David Deutsch about the reach and power of human knowledge, the future of artificial intelligence, and the survival of civilization. David Deutsch is best known as the founding father of the quantum theory of computation, and for his work on Everettian (multiverse) quantum theory. He is a Visiting Professor of Physics at Oxford University, where he works on “anything fundamental.” At present, that mainly means his proposed constructor theory . He has wri...
Dec 16, 2015•2 hr 53 min•Transcript available on Metacast Further reading: Migrant Crisis? Europe Hasn’t Seen Anything Yet by Douglas Murray
Nov 22, 2015•2 hr 11 min•Transcript available on Metacast
Nov 15, 2015•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast
Oct 08, 2015•2 hr 35 min•Transcript available on Metacast Sam Harris speaks with MIT cosmologist Max Tegmark about the foundations of science, our current understanding of the universe, the risks of future breakthroughs in artificial intelligence, and other topics. Max Tegmark is a professor of physics who has published more than two hundred technical papers and been featured in dozens of science documentaries. His work with the Sloan Digital Sky Survey on galaxy clustering shared the first prize in Science magazine’s “Breakthrough of the Y...
Sep 23, 2015•1 hr 26 min•Transcript available on Metacast Sam Harris responds to misrepresentations of his views (again).
Sep 16, 2015•12 min•Transcript available on Metacast Paul Bloom is the Brooks and Suzanne Ragen Professor of Psychology at Yale University. His research explores how children and adults understand the physical and social world, with special focus on morality, religion, fiction, and art. He has won numerous awards for his research and teaching. He is past-president of the Society for Philosophy and Psychology, and co-editor of Behavioral and Brain Sciences, one of the major journals in the field. Dr. Bloom has written for scientific journals such a...
Aug 25, 2015•2 hr 34 min•Transcript available on Metacast Sam and Joseph discuss the practice of meditation and answer questions that came from listeners in response to their first conversation, The Path and the Goal. Joseph Goldstein has been leading meditation retreats worldwide since 1974. He is a cofounder of the Insight Meditation Society, the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies, and the Forest Refuge. Since 1967, he has practiced different forms of Buddhist meditation under eminent teachers from India, Burma, and Tibet. His books include The Experi...
Aug 11, 2015•2 hr 39 min•Transcript available on Metacast 
