Making Sense with Sam Harris - Subscriber Content

Sam Harris speaks with Kathleen Belew about the white power movement in the United States. They discuss white supremacy, white nationalism, white separatism, the militia movement, “The Turner Diaries,” the connection between the white power movement and war, the significance of Ruby Ridge and Waco, the Christian Identity movement, the significance of “leaderless resistance,” the failures of the ju...

Sam Harris speaks with Barbara Tversky about how our senses of space and motion underlie our capacity for thought. They discuss the evolution of mind prior to language, the importance of imitation and gesture, the sensory and motor homunculi, the information communicated by motion, the role of “mirror neurons,” sense of direction, natural and unnatural categories, cognitive trade-offs, and other t...

Sam Harris addresses listener concerns that he uses a “double standard” to evaluate the relative threats of white supremacy and jihadism.

Sam Harris speaks with Matt McCarthy about his book Superbugs: The Race to Stop an Epidemic. They discuss the problem of drug resistant bacteria, fungi, parasites, and viruses, and the failure of the pharmaceutical industry to keep pace with evolution. Matt McCarthy, MD, is an infectious disease physician and assistant professor of medicine at Weill Cornell. His writing has appeared in The New Eng...

Sam Harris speaks with Caitlin Flanagan about her work as a writer. They discuss controversies on social media, the contradictions within feminism, media bias, #MeToo, the new norms of sexuality, the wokeness of academia, affirmative action, college admissions, HR departments, sexual harassment, and other topics. Caitlin Flanagan is a contributing editor for The Atlantic and a former staff writer...

Sam Harris speaks with Judea Pearl about his work on the mathematics of causality and artificial intelligence. They discuss how science has generally failed to understand causation, different levels of causal inference, counterfactuals, the foundations of knowledge, the nature of possibility, the illusion of free will, artificial intelligence, the nature of consciousness, and other topics. Judea P...

Sam Harris speaks with Ricky Gervais. They discuss fame, the effect of social media, the changing state of comedy, offensive jokes, Louis CK, political hypocrisy, Brexit and Trump, the state of journalism, and other topics. Ricky Gervais is a stand-up comedian, actor, director, and screenwriter. He co-created and starred in the BBC mock documentary series The Office and the sitcom series Extras. H...

Sam Harris speaks with Eric Topol about the way artificial intelligence can improve medicine. They talk about soaring medical costs and declining health outcomes in the U.S., the problems of too little and too much medicine, the culture of medicine, the travesty of electronic health records, the current status of AI in medicine, the promise of further breakthroughs, possible downsides of relying o...

Sam Harris speaks with Jared Diamond about the rise and fall of civilizations. They discuss political polarization, disparities in civilizational progress, the prospect that there may be biological differences between populations, the precariousness of democracy in the US, the lack of a strong political center, immigration policy, and other topics. Jared Diamond is Professor of Geography at the Un...

Sam Harris speaks with Michael Weiss and Yascha Mounk about the state of global politics. They discuss the rise of right-wing populism in Europe, the prospect that democracy could fail in the US, Trump’s political instincts, the political liability of “wokeness,” the Left’s failure to re-think its support of Chavez, the dangers of political polarization, the attractions of extreme partisanship, ca...

Sam Harris speaks with his wife, Annaka Harris, about her new book, CONSCIOUS: A Brief Guide to the Fundamental Mystery of the Mind . Annaka Harris is an author, editor, and consultant for science writers, specializing in neuroscience and physics. Annaka is also the author of the children’s book I Wonder , a collaborator on the Mindful Games Activity Cards , by Susan Kaiser Greenland, and a volunt...

Sam Harris speaks with Adam Grant about the social science of the workplace. They discuss how teams work effectively, the nature of power, personality types and fundamental styles of interaction, the critical skill of saying “no,” creativity, resilience, the strange case of Jonas Salk, the nature of mindfulness, the power of cognitive reappraisal, reflections on mortality, the replication crisis i...

Sam Harris speaks with Benjamin Wittes about both volumes of the Mueller Report. Benjamin Wittes is a legal journalist who focuses on issues of national security and law. He is a Senior Fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution, where he is the Research Director in Public Law. Benjamin is also the cofounder of Lawfare, a blog devoted to discussion of U.S. national security choices,...

Nicholas Christakis is a sociologist and physician known for his research in the areas of social networks and biosocial science. He is the Sterling Professor of Social and Natural Science at Yale University, where he directs the Human Nature Lab. His books include Death Foretold: Prophecy and Prognosis in Medical Care and Connected: The Surprising Power of Our Social Networks and How They Shape Ou...

Sam Harris speaks with Nicholas Christakis about his new book, Blueprint: The Evolutionary Origins of a Good Society . Nicholas Christakis is a sociologist and physician known for his research in the areas of social networks and biosocial science. He is the Sterling Professor of Social and Natural Science at Yale University, where he directs the Human Nature Lab. His books include  Death Foretold:...

Sam Harris speaks with Shane Parrish about some of the mental models that should guide our thinking and behavior. Shane Parrish is the host of  The Knowledge Project  podcast and the founder of  Farnam Street  blog, which aims to help others develop an understanding of how the world works, make better decisions, and live a better life. Shane was previously a cybersecurity expert at Canada’s top in...

Sam Harris reads from an issue of Dabiq, the magazine of ISIS, and discusses the beliefs and goals of jihadists worldwide.

Sam Harris introduces John Brockman’s new anthology, “ Possible Minds: 25 Ways of Looking at AI ,” in conversation with three of its authors: George Dyson, Alison Gopnik, and Stuart Russell. George Dyson is a historian of technology. He is also the author of Darwin Among the Machines and Turing’s Cathedral . Alison Gopnik is a developmental psychologist at UC Berkeley and a leader in the field of...

Sam Harris speaks with Roger McNamee about his book Zucked: Waking Up to the Facebook Catastrophe . Roger McNamee has been a Silicon Valley investor for thirty-five years. He has cofounded successful venture funds including Elevation with U2’s Bono. He was a former mentor to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and helped recruit COO Sheryl Sandberg to the company. He holds a B.A. from Yale University and...

Nick Bostrom is a Swedish-born philosopher with a background in theoretical physics, computational neuroscience, logic, and artificial intelligence. He is Professor at Oxford University, where he leads the Future of Humanity Institute as its founding director. He is the author of some 200 publications, including Anthropic Bias, Global Catastrophic Risks, Human Enhancement, and Superintelligence: P...

Sam Harris speaks with Nick Bostrom about the problem of existential risk. They discuss public goods, moral illusions, the asymmetry between happiness and suffering, utilitarianism, “the vulnerable world hypothesis,” the history of nuclear deterrence, the possible need for “turnkey totalitarianism,” whether we’re living in a computer simulation, the Doomsday Argument, the implications of extraterr...

Sam Harris speaks with Daniel Kahneman at the Beacon Theatre in NYC. They discuss the replication crisis in science, System 1 and System 2, where intuitions reliably fail, expert intuitions, the power of framing, moral illusions, anticipated regret, the asymmetry between threats and opportunities, the utility of worrying, removing obstacles to wanted behaviors, the remembering self vs the experien...

Sam Harris speaks with Sally Satel about addiction. They discuss whether addiction should be considered a disease, the opiate epidemic in the U.S., the unique danger of fentanyl, the politicization of medicine, PTSD, and other topics. Sally Satel, M.D., is a practicing psychiatrist and lecturer at the Yale University School of Medicine who examines mental health policy as well as political trends...

What are your thoughts about picking a career, or about picking areas of academic study that lead to viable careers? Recently you mentioned that Noam Chomsky had expressed interest in coming on the podcast. Can you provide an update on whether this is happening? Who is your favorite thinker that you mostly disagree with? What exactly were the "pointing out instructions" you got from Tulku Urgyen t...

Jack Dorsey is a tech entrepreneur and CEO of Twitter and Square, which he cofounded. He was recognized as one of Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people, was named an “outstanding innovator under the age of 35” by MIT Technology Review and named “Innovator of the Year” by the Wall Street Journal for his work in technology. Website: twitter .com and squareup.com Twitter: @jack