TrueSciPhi

Podcast Profile: The Big Idea

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42 episodes
2018 to 2020
Median: 10 minutes
Collection: SciPhi-Adjacent

Description (podcaster-provided):

Themes and summary (AI-generated based on podcaster-provided show and episode descriptions):

This podcast explores influential ideas that shape how we understand society, human behavior, and the challenges facing the modern world. Guided by conversations with leading researchers and thinkers, it moves across disciplines including psychology, neuroscience, economics, philosophy, criminology, and political science, using current events and everyday experiences as entry points to deeper concepts.

A recurring focus is how minds work and why people behave as they do: the mechanisms behind addiction and craving, the function of sleep, the formation and fragility of beliefs and choices, and how emotions arise from interactions between brain and body. It also examines social cognition and moral psychology, including disgust, laughter, outrage, conscience, memory reliability, unconscious bias, and the limits of human social networks and friendship.

Another major thread is how institutions, norms, and environments influence outcomes. The podcast considers rule-following and rule-breaking in cities, trust in an age of misinformation, and how to reduce harm through better policy and prediction. It looks at crime and justice—such as identifying problematic policing and understanding why murder rates vary across countries—as well as political change, including strategies for resisting authoritarian rule and the relationship between democracy and famine.

Economic and technological perspectives are used to analyze inequality, fairness, development, and the role of data in understanding cities and behavior. The show also engages with future-facing questions about pandemics, artificial intelligence, automation in medicine, climate solutions including alternatives to livestock, and even debates about consciousness and intelligence beyond humans, from machines to trees.

Episodes:

Fighting pandemics 2020-Dec-19 11 minutes

The science of addiction 2020-Dec-12 11 minutes

The new normal 2020-Dec-05 11 minutes

Do cities need rules? 2020-Nov-28 9 minutes

The science of sleep 2020-Nov-21 14 minutes

The importance of fairness 2020-Nov-14 12 minutes

How do we spot rogue cops? 2020-Nov-07 11 minutes

Understanding emotions: Should we follow our hearts? 2020-Oct-31 12 minutes

Ubernomics 2020-Oct-24 15 minutes

Why living in the city could make you happier 2020-Oct-17 13 minutes

Why do we find things disgusting? 2020-Oct-10 13 minutes

The fragility of choice 2020-Oct-03 9 minutes

The truth about marriage 2020-Sep-26 10 minutes

How to topple a dictator 2020-Sep-19 9 minutes

Why do we laugh? 2020-Sep-12 10 minutes

The Afterlife 2018-Sep-23 9 minutes

Why Are Some Nations Rich? 2018-Sep-16 9 minutes

How does language work? 2018-Sep-09 10 minutes

A Future Without Doctors? 2018-Sep-02 8 minutes

The Intelligent Tree 2018-Aug-26 9 minutes

Consciousness: A Strange Theory 2018-Aug-19 10 minutes

The Teenage Brain 2018-Aug-12 10 minutes

How To Stop Murder 2018-Aug-05 9 minutes

Democracy and Famine 2018-Jul-29 9 minutes

Dimensions of Discrimination 2018-Jul-22 11 minutes

Inequality Makes Us Anxious 2018-Jul-15 10 minutes

Are We All Racist? 2018-Jul-08 11 minutes

The New Distrust 2018-Jul-01 10 minutes

Contact Theory 2018-Jun-24 9 minutes

Economics and Mosquito Nets 2018-Jun-17 10 minutes

Memory Wars 2018-Jun-10 10 minutes

A World Without Livestock? 2018-Jun-03 9 minutes

Outrage and Moral Conscience 2018-May-27 9 minutes

Friends 2018-May-20 9 minutes

Baby Boffins 2018-May-19 9 minutes

Super-Intelligence 2018-May-17 9 minutes

Social Physics 2018-May-16 9 minutes

The Growth Mindset 2018-May-15 9 minutes

Epigenetics 2018-May-14 9 minutes

Future Gazing 2018-May-13 9 minutes

Monkey Money 2018-May-12 10 minutes

The Big Preview: The Big Idea 2018-May-11 2 minutes