Keep Talking

Bill Wasik is the editorial director for the New York Times Magazine and the author of a variety of books, including his newest - co-written with his wife Monica Murphy - Our Kindred Creatures: How Americans Came to Feel the Way They Do About Animals. During our conversation, Bill talks about the dawn of the animal rights movement in post-Civil War America, the lives and work of Henry Bergh and Ge...

Oliver Burkeman is a journalist and an author of multiple books, including his bestseller, Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals. During our conversation, Oliver talks about being an insecure overachiever, his historic obsession with productivity, learning to say no to things you want to do, the 80/20 principle, and how modern life rewards winners with an unending, lifetime supply of in...

Derek Sivers is an author, a TED speaker, a businessman, a musician, and one of my favorite thinkers on the planet. During our conversation, Derek talks about pursuing mastery, having enough, what success means to him, how he thinks about money, having and raising a kid, and more. Derek's book Hell Yeah or No is one of my all-time favorites, and his essays have had a huge influence on my life. I l...

Hemant Mehta is an author, a YouTuber, and an atheist activist. During our conversation, Hemant talks about his journey to atheism, the threat of Christian nationalism to secular society, and the atheist and secular movements. He also addresses the loss of community felt by those who leave religion, and the life and legacy of Daniel Dennett, including his work with The Clergy Project. ------------...

D.J. Taylor is a novelist, a literary critic, and the author of two biographies of George Orwell: Orwell: The Life , and Orwell: The New Life . During our conversation, D.J. talks about Orwell's life, why Orwell's books, particularly his two on totalitarianism, Animal Farm and 1984, have endured so many years after his death, and the relevance of his ideas and insights to modern times. -----------...

Camilla Kring is an author, a global speaker, and is the founder of B-Society, an organization fighting for "chronotype equality." During our conversation, Camilla talks about night owls and morning birds, why humans have a wide spectrum of sleep cycles, our cultural bias towards early birds, the damage done to night owls who are asked to fit into a morning bird society, and how we might be able t...

Sarah Everts is a science journalist, an associate professor at Carleton University, and the author of " The Joy of Sweat: The Strange Science of Perspiration ." During our conversation, Sarah talks about how sweating was an evolutionary superpower for humans, what sweat is, why some people sweat more than others, the history of the antiperspirant industry, and why we receive such psychological be...

Sherry Ning is an author and an essayist, whose Substack, " Pluripotent ," has some of the best writing I've come across on human nature, purpose, and how to live. During our conversation, Shelly talks about creating one's own path, success, open-mindedness, beauty, nostalgia, spirituality, and religion. ------------ Keep Talking Substack Rate on Spotify Rate on Apple Podcasts Social media and all...

Stuart Whatley is a writer, a Senior Editor at Project Syndicate, and the author of " Toward a Leisure Ethic , " my favorite essay that I've read of the past few months. During our conversation, Stuart talks about the historic purpose of leisure and work, our culture's obsession with busyness and praise of toil, and the reason for striving towards a life of a leisure ethic: where one has control o...

Matt Johnson is the Susan Hill Ward Professor of Psychedelics and Consciousness and a professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Johns Hopkins University. As stated on the Hopkins' website, Matt "is one of the world’s most published scientists on the human effects of psychedelics, and has conducted seminal research in the behavioral economics of drug use, addiction, and risk behavior." Dur...

Rob Henderson is an Air Force Veteran, an alumnus of Yale and Cambridge, an essayist, and the author of " Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class ." During our conversation, Rob talks about his early life, his experience in the American foster care system, and his unlikely journey out of the unstable and chaotic environment of his youth. Rob is one of my favorite thinkers, and...

Jon Dean is a postdoc research fellow at UCSD and received his PhD in molecular and integrative physiology at the University of Michigan, where he published a landmark 2019 study on DMT. During our conversation, we talk about how and why Jon became interested in DMT, the details of his 2019 study, Rick Strassman's 2001 book " DMT: The Spirit Molecule" , and what Strassman found after giving nearly...

Robin Dunbar is a professor, an evolutionary psychologist, and the author of many books, including "Friends: Understanding the Power of Our Most Important Relationships." During our conversation, Robin talks about how and why he became interested in evolutionary psychology, what evolutionary psychology is, and its explanatory power. He also talks about human social dynamics, and our "circles of fr...

James Hollis is a Jungian psychoanalyst and the author of many books, including his latest: "A Life of Meaning ," which is the primary subject of our conversation. During our conversation, Jim talks about some of the major themes in his work and his book: the shadow, the numinous, psychopathology, lethargy, and fear. Jim is one of my favorite writers and thinkers, and I reference him as much as an...

Paul Conti is a psychiatrist, a trauma expert, the former Chief Resident at Harvard, and the author of " Trauma: The Invisible Epidemic ." During our conversation, Paul talks about the precise definition of trauma: something that overwhelms one's coping mechanisms and changes the brain, his own personal experience with trauma, the state of mental healthcare in America, how we know one has experien...

Eric Jorgenson is an investor, the CEO of Scribe Media, and the author of " The Anthology of Balaji: A Guide to Technology, Truth, and Building the Future ." During our conversation, Eric talks about what drew him to Balaji Srinivasan as a subject, the overlap between Balaji and the subject of Eric's first book, Naval Ravikant, and the major themes of his new book: technology, truth, and the futur...

Peter Levine is a lecturer, a psychotherapist, and the author of various best-selling books including " Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma ." During our conversation, Peter talks about how our culture deals with and talks about trauma, the oneness of the mind and the body, and viewing trauma from a naturalistic perspective. Peter has been revolutionary in reframing trauma as something physical, some...

Barry Schwartz is a TED speaker, a professor, a social scientist, and the author of "The Paradox of Choice." During our conversation, Barry talks about decision paralysis, the downsides of having too many options, and the difference between what calls a "maximizer" and a "satisficier." He also talks about his view that modern depression is in part caused people feeling overwhelmed by choice, how s...

Jon Kostas ( hello@apollopact.org ) is an activist, a former alcoholic, and the first study participant in the NYU psilocybin clinical trials. During our conversation, Jon talks about his years of alcohol abuse, his attempts to rid himself of the addiction, his doctor's belief that, in his mid-20's, his quantity of alcohol consumption would likely kill him within a few years, and his eventual expe...

Leidy Klotz is a professor at the University of Virginia and is the author of "Subtract: The Untapped Science of Less." During our conversation, Leidy talks about why humans are so wired to add to, rather than subtract from, their life, how addition is a signal of competence that we are hard-wired to display, and the downsides of this natural tendency. Leidy also talks about the many ways in which...

Shawn T. Smith is a clinical psychologist and an author of many books, including his best-seller, The " Tactical Guide to Women ." During our conversation, Shawn talks about modern dating, the relationship issues with which his male and female clients are struggling, dating apps, how evolutionary psychology has influenced him, and the "red pill" community. More expansively, he talks about how "The...

Brent W. Roberts is a professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and specializes in human personality. During our conversation, Brent talks The Big Five personality traits, what personality is, the differences between the Big Five and the Myers-Briggs personality test, diversity in human personality, the role of genes and sex differences in personality, evolutionary psychology, the s...

Warren Farrell is a political scientist, a former board member of the National Organization for Women (NOW), and the author of many books, including " The Boy Crisis ," the focus of this conversation. During our conversation, Warren talks about his time at NOW, second wave and modern feminism, the gender pay gap, what he learned when he stopped lecturing at and started listening to men, and the hi...

Ed Hagen is a professor of anthropology at Washington State University Vancouver. During our conversation, Ed talks about the evolutionary reasons for two of humanity's most common mental illnesses: anxiety and depression. He also talks about psychic pain, the correlation between grip strength and depression, hypervigilance and anxiety, differences in suicide rates between men and women, and suici...

William Irvine was a professor at Wright State University and is the author of seven books, including his best-seller, "A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy." During our conversation, Bill talks about the history of the Stoics, an ancient school of philosophy that began in Athens in 300 B.C. He also talks about the psychological training that the Stoics encouraged, including nega...