Episode 19: The Burning Bridges Episode (Pt. ...

David and Tamler do another tier ranking--this time on philosophical thought experiments, so as not to further alienate our chemistry-adjacent listeners. We hit most of the big ones: Pascal's wager, Pascal's mugging, Mary the color scientist, the Ring of Gyges, Jarvis Thomson's v ...  Show more

David and Tamler talk about Jorge Luis Borges' disorienting short story "The Other." A 70-year-old Borges sits on a bench by the Charles River and who should he encounter but himself as a 19-year-old, by the Rhône River in 1918 Geneva. Is this a dream? Who is dreaming it? What do ...  Show more

In one of the weirdest online controversies yet covered by Blocked and Reported, Katie walks Jesse through the wild, twisting tale of @Sciencing_Bi, a young anthropologist who just wanted to do good work, but who was tragically hindered from achieving this goal by the vicious ant ...  Show more

Sean Illing talks with psychologist Paul Bloom about his new book The Sweet Spot, and whether it's necessary to experience suffering in order to live a fulfilling, meaningful life. They discuss the rich philosophical history of the question: what does it mean to be happy? They al ...  Show more

Dan Bigg, activist, visionary, and harm reduction pioneer, died on Tuesday, August 21, 2018. In this episode, Zach Siegel interviews journalist Max Blau, who has been researching the history of naloxone, about Bigg’s radical legacy. You can follow Max on Twitter @MaxBlau Follo ...

Robert Sapolsky is a Stanford neuroscientist and primatologist. He’s the author of a slew of important books on human biology and behavior, including most recently Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst. But it’s an older book he wrote that forms the basis for this c ...  Show more