Sean Carroll's Mindscape: Science, Society, Philosophy, Culture, Arts, and Ideas
Ever wanted to know how music affects your brain, what quantum mechanics really is, or how black holes work? Do you wonder why you get emotional each time you see a certain movie, or how on earth video games are designed? Then you’ve come to the right place. Each week, Sean Carroll will host conversations with some of the most interesting thinkers in the world. From neuroscientists and engineers to authors and television producers, Sean and his guests talk about the biggest ideas in science, philosophy, culture and much more.
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371 | Kyle Harper on How Humans Have Shaped Life on Earth
10/19/2026
371 | Kyle Harper on How Humans Have Shaped Life on Earth
Humanity is merely one species out of millions living on Earth, but we have a disproportionate impact on the rest of the biosphere. Recent transformations have accelerated that impact, but in fact it stretches back to the earliest days in human history. In his new book , historian Kyle Harper traces how humans have impacted the rest of the planet, from extinction events to much more subtle changes. Blog post with transcript: Listen or watch Rolex Planet Visionaries wherever you get your podcasts. #ad Got to https://scribe.how/mindscape and mention Mindscape for you first month of Scribe Capture free on select plans. #ad Stop piecing your software together. Go to to learn more. #ad Upgrade your everyday with Quince and get free shipping and 365-day returns at . #ad Support Mindscape on . Kyle Harper received a Ph.D. in history from Harvard University. He is currently the G.T. and Libby Blankenship Chair in the History of Liberty, Professor of Classics and Letters, Senior Advisor to the President, and Provost Emeritus at the University of Oklahoma, and an external faculty member at the Santa Fe Institute. Among his honors are the Award for Excellence in Historical Studies from the American Academy of Religion and the PROSE winner for best book in the history of science, technology, and medicine.
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Ask Me Anything | October 2026
10/12/2026
Ask Me Anything | October 2026
Welcome to the October 2026 Ask Me Anything episode of Mindscape! These monthly excursions are funded by (who are also the ones asking the questions). We take questions asked by Patreons, whittle them down to a more manageable number -- based primarily on whether I have anything interesting to say about them, not whether the questions themselves are good -- and sometimes group them together if they are about a similar topic. Enjoy! Blog post with show notes, AMA questions, and transcript: Listen or watch Rolex Planet Visionaries wherever you get your podcasts. #ad Upgrade to a TP-Link WiFi Mesh System -- use code MINDSCAPE10 at . #ad
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370 | Daniel Akerib on a Faint Hint of Dark Matter
10/03/2026
370 | Daniel Akerib on a Faint Hint of Dark Matter
One reason it's been so hard to directly detect the dark matter is that we're not sure what it is. But for a long time, a leading candidate has been "Weakly Interacting Massive Particles" (WIMPs), so an impressive amount of experimental effort has been put into trying to detect them. Recently, a single provocative event appeared in the (LZ) dark matter experiment. Daniel Akerib, a physicist at LZ, joins us to talk about dark matter and the recent data, which has low statistical significance but is intriguing nevertheless. Blog post with show notes and transcript: Support Mindscape on . Daniel Akerib received a Ph.D. in physics from Princeton University. He is currently Professor of Particle Physics and Astrophysics at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and Professor of Physics, by courtesy, in the physics department at Stanford University. He has been searching for dark matter since the early 1990s, first with the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search and more recently with the LUX and projects. Paper: ""
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369 | Gregg Caruso on Living Well Without Free Will
09/28/2026
369 | Gregg Caruso on Living Well Without Free Will
The worry about debates over free will is that they degenerate into semantics -- what do you mean by "free will," really? But there are important substantive issues that shouldn't be ignored. Do people deserve blame for doing wrong things? Can we make choices that create meaning for our lives? Philosopher Gregg Caruso denies the reality of free will, but is in favor of making good choices, as he discusses in his new book Listen or watch Rolex Planet Visionaries wherever you get your podcasts. #ad Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Gregg Caruso received a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the City University of New York. He is currently Professor of Applied Ethics and Management and Director of the Patrick J. Waide Center for Applied Ethics at Fairfield University, and Scientific Advisor, Center for Justice and Mental Well-Being, Nova Institute for Health. Among his awards are the Joseph B. Gittler Award from the American Philosophical Association.
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368 | Elizabeth Alexander on Why Democracy Needs Imagination
09/21/2026
368 | Elizabeth Alexander on Why Democracy Needs Imagination
In all sorts of ways, the modern world makes it difficult to nurture our individual humanity and connect with the humanity of others. The disciplines that try to do so are, naturally enough, the humanities. Poet Elizabeth Alexander's new book, , grapples with the question of how literature and other humanistic studies can help us build empathy and become better people, and why that task is crucial to a flourishing democratic society. Blog post with transcript: Use code MINDSCAPE at to get your first year of Monarch Core half off at just $50. #ad Upgrade your everyday with Quince and get free shipping and 365-day returns at . #ad Listen or watch Rolex Planet Visionaries wherever you get your podcasts. #ad Support Mindscape on . Elizabeth Alexander received a Ph.D. in English from the University of Pennsylvania. In addition to her work as a poet and writer, she is currently the President of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. She composed and read a poem for Barack Obama's inauguration in 2009. Among her honors are a Guggenheim Fellowship, a National Magazine Award, and several Pushcart Prizes for poetry.
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Mindscape Ask Me Anything, Sean Carroll | September 2026
09/14/2026
Mindscape Ask Me Anything, Sean Carroll | September 2026
Welcome to the September 2026 Ask Me Anything episode of Mindscape! These monthly excursions are funded by (who are also the ones asking the questions). We take questions asked by Patreons, whittle them down to a more manageable number -- based primarily on whether I have anything interesting to say about them, not whether the questions themselves are good -- and sometimes group them together if they are about a similar topic. Enjoy! Blog post with show notes and transcript: Stop piecing your software together. Go to to learn more. #ad The one app to rule them all. Statskey. Download your free trial today at the App Store and Google Play. #ad Support Mindscape on .
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367 | Jared Diamond on the Course of History and the Role of leaders
09/07/2026
367 | Jared Diamond on the Course of History and the Role of leaders
The course of history is affected by many things, including the political and social situations of large groups of people, their biological and physical abilities, and their geographical and environmental contexts. Sometimes, it would seem, history -- or corporations, or religions, or sports teams -- can be affected by the actions of just a few influential persons. In his new book, , Jared Diamond asks what effect leaders can have, and what it is that makes them successful (or not). Right now, Babbel is offering listeners who want to learn a new language up to 60% off. Go to . #ad Preserve your online privacy at Incogni and get 60% off an annual plan at . #ad Monthly pledges to FarmKind to help fight factory farming will be boosted by 50% at . #ad Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Jared Diamond received a Ph.D. in physiology from the University of Cambridge. He is currently a professor of geography at the University of California, Los Angeles. Among his awards are the U.S. National Medal of Science, the MacArthur Fellowship, and the Pulitzer Prize. His international bestseller Guns, Germs, and Steel has sold over seven million copies.
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366 | Jim Al-Khalili on Time, Quantum, Biology, and Cosmology
08/31/2026
366 | Jim Al-Khalili on Time, Quantum, Biology, and Cosmology
Everyone lives through time, but we continue to struggle to fully understand it. We remain unsure whether time is fundamental or emergent, why it has an arrow pointing from past to future, and how that arrow connects to our experience of time's passage. Jim Al-Khalili's new book is . We discuss what time is at the most basic level, and how it connects to open questions in biology, cosmology, and quantum mechanics. Mindscape listeners can try StatsKey Pro free for one month . After that, it’s $4.99 per month unless canceled. #ad Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Jim Al-Khalili received his Ph.D. in physics from the University of Surrey. He is currently Distinguished Emeritus Professor of Physics at Surrey. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society, and has served as past president of the British Science Association. He has been awarded the Michael Faraday Prize by the Royal Society, and has been appointed an appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire.
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365 | Vitor Cardoso on Why Black Holes Are Special
08/24/2026
365 | Vitor Cardoso on Why Black Holes Are Special
Black holes, as Stephen Hawking discovered, do grow old: they emit radiation, lose mass, and eventually evaporate away. But our fascination with black holes never grows old. This is especially true today, as we are seeing a flood of new data and intriguing theoretical ideas, which both tests the limits of Einstein's general relativity and teach us new things about the astrophysical universe. At the at the University of Copenhagen, they are currently celebrating , which provides an excellent opportunity to talk with Center director Vitor Cardoso about what we've been learning about these singular cosmic objects. Use code MINDSCAPE at to get your first year of Monarch Core half off at just $50. #ad Upgrade your everyday and get free shipping and 365-day returns at . #ad See what ElevenAgents can do for your specific workflows at . #ad Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Vitor Cardoso received his Ph.D. in physics from the Instituto Superior Técnico in Portugal. He is currently a Villum Investigator and Director of the at the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen, and a Distinguished Professor at Técnico.
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364 | Stuart Firestein on How Science Relies on Ignorance and Failure
08/17/2026
364 | Stuart Firestein on How Science Relies on Ignorance and Failure
One of the paradoxes of science is that it seeks objectively true understanding of the world, but its methodology is driven by ignorance, failure, and uncertainty. Some phenomena we understand pretty well, but interesting research happens at the boundary of what we do and don't know. And there is no foolproof algorithm for moving in the right direction; we need to make conjectures and test them against the world. Biologist Stuart Firestein has been advocating for a better public understanding of the true methods of science, most recently in his new book . Stop piecing your software together. Go to to learn more. #ad Mindscape listeners can try StatsKey Pro free for one month . After that, it’s $4.99 per month unless canceled. #ad Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Stuart Firestein received his Ph.D. in neurobiology from the University of California, Berkeley. He is currently Professor of Neuroscience at in the Department of Biological Sciences at Columbia University, and Fractal Faculty at the Santa Fe Institute. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Sloan Foundation, and the Guggenheim Foundation. His research studies cellular mechanisms of signal transduction and olfaction. His previous books include and .
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363 | Chandra Sripada on How LLMs and Humans are Cognitive Cousins
08/10/2026
363 | Chandra Sripada on How LLMs and Humans are Cognitive Cousins
Large Language Models display an uncanny ability to construct human-sounding speech, and can synthesize concepts in novel ways. Is this because they are truly thinking like human beings in some way, or have they found a way to be human-like without reproducing the internal mechanisms of human thought? Chandra Sripada argues that LLM cognition is more human-like than we suppose, and offers evidence from the ways that cognitive scientists study actual humans. Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Chandra Sripada received an M.D. from the University of Texas and a Ph.D. in philosophy from Rutgers University. He is currently a professor of philosophy and psychiatry at the University of Michigan, where he holds the Theophile Raphael Research Professorship and directs the Weinberg Institute for Cognitive Science. He writes , a Substack newsletter about AI, cognitive science, and philosophy. Babbel is offering listeners up to 60% off. Go to . #ad Get 60% off an annual plan from Incogni using code MINDSCAPE at . #ad
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Mindscape Ask Me Anything, Sean Carroll | August 2026
08/03/2026
Mindscape Ask Me Anything, Sean Carroll | August 2026
Welcome to the August 2026 Ask Me Anything episode of Mindscape! These monthly excursions are funded by (who are also the ones asking the questions). We take questions asked by Patreons, whittle them down to a more manageable number -- based primarily on whether I have anything interesting to say about them, not whether the questions themselves are good -- and sometimes group them together if they are about a similar topic. Enjoy! Blog post with questions and full transcript: Support Mindscape on .
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362 | Luis Bettencourt on the Universal Properties of Self-Organizing Cities
07/27/2026
362 | Luis Bettencourt on the Universal Properties of Self-Organizing Cities
People who live in large cities produce more patents per person than those who live in small towns. They also walk faster down the street, and use less infrastructure per person. Indeed, the relationships between these quantities and city population obey power laws with apparently universal exponents, reminiscent of scaling laws is biological organisms? Luis Bettencourt argues that they can be explained in similar ways, using ideas from complex systems and network theory. Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Luis Bettencourt received a Ph.D. in theoretical physics from Imperial College London. He is currently the Lorna Puttkammer Straus Professor Department of Ecology and Evolution & Data Sciences Institute, as well as Associate Faculty and Special Friend in the Department of Sociology, at the University of Chicago. He is the author of .
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361 | Bonnie Bassler on How Bacteria Talk and Work Together
07/20/2026
361 | Bonnie Bassler on How Bacteria Talk and Work Together
One of the characteristics of life is that living organisms gather information and put it to use. Even one of the simplest lifeforms, bacteria, are able to sense features of their surroundings and alter their behavior accordingly. Most impressively, they are able to sense the presence of similar bacteria by a process called . Today's guest, Bonnie Bassler, is a leader in this field, and explains how quorum sensing allows groups of bacteria to do things (including in our bodies) that wouldn't be possible for individual bacteria. Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Bonnie Bassler received a Ph.D. in biochemistry from Johns Hopkins University. She is currently Andrew K. Golden University Professor of Molecular Biology at Princeton University and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator. She is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Medicine, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Among her awards are a MacArthur Fellowship, the Gruber Prize in Genetics, and the National Medal of Science.
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Mindscape Ask Me Anything, Sean Carroll | July 2026
07/13/2026
Mindscape Ask Me Anything, Sean Carroll | July 2026
Welcome to the July 2026 Ask Me Anything episode of Mindscape! These monthly excursions are funded by (who are also the ones asking the questions). We take questions asked by Patreons, whittle them down to a more manageable number -- based primarily on whether I have anything interesting to say about them, not whether the questions themselves are good -- and sometimes group them together if they are about a similar topic. Enjoy! Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on .
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360 | Marc Berman on the Science of Touching Grass
07/06/2026
360 | Marc Berman on the Science of Touching Grass
Modern life has, in many ways, removed us from the environments in which our ancestors lived and adapted. Not only do we spend time looking at screens, but we spend time indoors, or outdoors but in urban spaces. How does this affect how we think and feel? Psychologist Marc Berman is a pioneer of "environmental neuroscience." In his recent book, , he presents evidence that spending time in nature not only puts us in a better mood, it makes us better thinkers. Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Marc Berman received his Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Michigan. He is currently Professor of Psychology and Faculty Co-Director of the Chicago Center for Computational Social Science at the University of Chicago. Among his awards is the American Psychological Association Distinguished Scientific Award for Early Career Contributions.
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359 | Solo: Theories of Dark Energy
06/29/2026
359 | Solo: Theories of Dark Energy
The cosmological constant, as discussed last episode, provides a perfectly good (thus far) explanation for why we observe the universe to be accelerating. But it might not be the right explanation, and demonstrating that would be yet another foundational discovery. In this episode I discuss what is required to invent a plausible theory of dynamical , This includes considerations from particle physics, possible experimental tests, and the option that we should modify gravity rather than adding a new source of energy to the equations. Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on .
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358 | Solo: Vacuum Energy and the Cosmological Constant
06/22/2026
358 | Solo: Vacuum Energy and the Cosmological Constant
The most surprising discovery in fundamental physics during my career as a scientist was undoubtedly the , announced in 1998. The most straightforward explanation for these observations is a positive cosmological constant, or vacuum energy. I talk about the origin of the idea with Einstein, how quantum physicists started to think about it and understand the "cosmological constant problem," as well as how its discovery also raised the "coincidence problem." This is the first of two connected solo episodes; the next will be on theories of dark energy that are not the cosmological constant. Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on .
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357 | Jeff Coller on mRNA, Vaccines, and Bespoke Therapeutics
06/15/2026
357 | Jeff Coller on mRNA, Vaccines, and Bespoke Therapeutics
Messenger RNA (mRNA) plays a literally central role in the functioning of life as we know it, shuttling information back and forth between the DNA where it is stored to the ribosome where it is used to produce proteins. RNA may even have been the first molecule to kick-start the origin of life. Today, scientists are learning how to manipulate mRNA to cure and prevent diseases, whether through vaccination or literally editing one's DNA. Jeff Coller explains how it all works and how mRNA is revolutionizing medicine as we know it. Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Jeff Coller received his Ph.D. in cell and molecular biology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is currently Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Director of the RNA Innovation Center at Johns Hopkins University. He is co-founder of Tevard Biosciences and the Alliance for mRNA Medicines, and leads the REPAIRx consortium. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
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356 | Andrea Wulf on Enlightenment, Nature, Romanticism, and Modernity
06/08/2026
356 | Andrea Wulf on Enlightenment, Nature, Romanticism, and Modernity
All ideas have a history, no matter how inevitable and well-entrenched they may seem to us today. The later Enlightenment was a heady time when people were exploring new conceptions of nature, humanity, and the self. Andrea Wulf is a writer of narrative histories, examining the origins of ideas through the lives of the people who explored them. In this episode we discuss three of her books: , about Alexander von Humboldt and environmentalism; , about the Jena circle of Romantics including Goethe, Schiller, Schlegel, and others; and most recently , about George Forster, an early naturalist, ethnographer, and champion of human equality. Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Andrea Wulf was born in India, raised in Germany, and studied design history at the Royal College of Art, London. She is the author of seven books. She is a Miller Scholar at the Santa Fe Institute and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. The Invention of Nature won multiple prizes, including the Royal Society science book prize and the LA Times book prize.
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AMA | June 2026
06/01/2026
AMA | June 2026
Welcome to the June 2026 Ask Me Anything episode of Mindscape! These monthly excursions are funded by (who are also the ones asking the questions). We take questions asked by Patreons, whittle them down to a more manageable number -- based primarily on whether I have anything interesting to say about them, not whether the questions themselves are good -- and sometimes group them together if they are about a similar topic. Enjoy! Blog post with AMA questions and transcript: New paper I talk about in the beginning of the episode:
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355 | Solo: Looking Quantum Mechanics in the Eyeball
05/24/2026
355 | Solo: Looking Quantum Mechanics in the Eyeball
One of the major obstacles to understanding quantum mechanics is the difficulty we have in simply accepting what the theory itself is telling us. The problem is that we know what the everyday world looks like -- stuff, arranged in space, evolving through time. So we can't resist the temptation to impose that picture on the quantum description, even if it's not actually there. In this solo episode I talk about what it means to take quantum mechanics at face value, and the difficult work involved in understanding how the everyday world of our experience fits into the picture. Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Here is the survey on physicists' opinions about unsettled big-picture questions: Afshordi, Halper, Rini, and Schirber, "." And here is a short technical overview on the ideas described in this episode: Carroll, "" If you want further papers, look at the papers cited in this one.
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354 | Christian List on Free Will and Levels of Reality
05/18/2026
354 | Christian List on Free Will and Levels of Reality
Did I have any freedom in choosing this particular podcast guest? At the level of particles, fields, and the fundamental laws of physics; no. At the level of human agents navigating the world, yes. Today's guest, Christian List, is a philosopher and political scientist who has arguably done the most to articulate the "compatibilist" perspective on free will, according to which the freedom of rational agents is entirely compatible with underlying mechanistic laws. The reconciliation depends on thinking carefully about emergence and the relationship between levels of reality. Take your personal data back with Incogni! Use code MINDSCAPE at this link and get 60% off an annual plan: #sponsored Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Christian List received his D.Phil in Politics from Oxford University. He is currently Professor of Philosophy and Decision Theory and Co-Director of the at LMU Munich. He is a Fellow of the British Academy and a member of Academia Europaea the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities. Among his honors are the Joseph Gittler Award from the American Philosophical Association. He is the author of and (with Philip Pettit) .
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353 | Alvin Roth on the Economics of Morally Contested Markets
05/11/2026
353 | Alvin Roth on the Economics of Morally Contested Markets
Economic markets are efficient ways of deciding fair prices, at least in ideal circumstances of perfect competition, information, and choice. But there is more to life than fair prices. Two people might decide on a fair price to carry out a contract killing, but society generally frowns on the idea. Many examples of morally contestable markets feature less consensus than that one: sex work, drugs, selling organs, adopting children. In his new book , economist Alvin Roth investigates how we should reason through such tricky cases, and what we can learn from them. Get twenty percent off your first purchase at when using the code MINDSCAPE at checkout. Mindscape listeners get free shipping and 365-day returns on clothing from . Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Alvin Roth received his Ph.D. in operations research from Stanford University. He is currently the Craig and Susan McCaw Professor of Economics at Stanford University and the Gund Professor of Economics and Business Administration Emeritus at Harvard. He was President of the American Economic Association in 2017. He and Lloyd Shapley shared the for "the theory of stable allocations and the practice of market design."
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AMA | May 2026
05/04/2026
AMA | May 2026
Welcome to the May 2026 Ask Me Anything episode of Mindscape! These monthly excursions are funded by (who are also the ones asking the questions). We take questions asked by Patreons, whittle them down to a more manageable number -- based primarily on whether I have anything interesting to say about them, not whether the questions themselves are good -- and sometimes group them together if they are about a similar topic. Enjoy! Blog post with AMA questions and full transcript: Henson Shaving is offering 100 blades free with the purchase of a razor — just head to and or use code MINDSCAPE at checkout. #sponsored Take your personal data back with Incogni! Use code MINDSCAPE at this link and get 60% off an annual plan: #sponsored
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352 | Bing Brunton on Connecting the Connectome to the Body
04/27/2026
352 | Bing Brunton on Connecting the Connectome to the Body
The connectome is the wiring diagram of a brain, a big matrix that tells us what neurons talk to what other neurons. Understanding it is an important step to understanding how brains work, but a long way from the final answer. A big next step is understanding how neuronal circuits connect to and guide bodily behavior. Very recent work on mapping the fruit-fly connectome has brought us closer to that goal. I talk with neuroscientist Bing Brunton about the connectome, how we can study it to understand bodily motion in flies and other creatures, and where it's all taking us. Chubbies is here to keep you comfy and looking good year-round. Get 20% off with code MINDSCAPE at ! #chubbiespod Upgrade your denim game with Rag & Bone! Get 20% off sitewide with code MINDSCAPE at . #ragandbonepod Support Mindscape on . Blog post with transcript: Bing Wen Brunton received her Ph.D. in neuroscience from Princeton University.. She is currently a Professor of Biology and the Richard & Joan Komen University Chair at the University of Washington, with affiliations at the eScience Institute for Data Science, the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering, and the Department of Applied Mathematics.
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351 | Peter Singer on Maximizing Good for All Sentient Creatures
04/20/2026
351 | Peter Singer on Maximizing Good for All Sentient Creatures
Peter Singer has been an influential philosopher for a number of decades. He was a significant early voice in animal rights, has been a leading thinker of utilitarianism, and helped inspire the effective altruism movement. In this podcast episode, we try our best to talk about all of those things -- working from metaethical questions of consequentialism vs. other approaches, to specific flavors of utilitarianism, the practical demands that ethics places on people, the rights of animals, and the decisions we make at the end of our lives. Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Peter Singer received his B.Phil. in philosophy from the University of Oxford. He retired from Princeton University in 2023, and now lives in Melbourne, Australia. He is the author of a number of influential books, including (1975). He has been named a Companion of the order of Australia, and is a winner of the Berggruen Prize. He is the founder of the charity . He and philosopher Kasia de Lazari Radek are co-hosts of the podcast (, , ).
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350 | J. Eric Oliver on the Self and How to Know It
04/13/2026
350 | J. Eric Oliver on the Self and How to Know It
We are more familiar with ourselves than with anything else in the universe, but we generally don't come very close to really understanding what our "self" is. That's not too surprising, as selves are very complicated and we are burdened by all sorts of biases. Today's guest is J. Eric Oliver, who has been teaching a popular course at the University of Chicago called "." His academic specialty is political science, but he brings together ideas from psychology, neuroscience, and a broad swath of the humanities. His view is summarized in his recent book, . Take your personal data back with Incogni! Use code MINDSCAPE at this link and get 60% off an annual plan: #sponsored Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . J. Eric Oliver received his Ph.D. in political science from the University of California, Berkeley. He is currently a Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago. His research interests include contemporary American politics, suburban and racial politics, political psychology, and the politics of science. He is the host of the podcast .
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AMA | April 2026
04/05/2026
AMA | April 2026
Welcome to the April 2026 Ask Me Anything episode of Mindscape! These monthly excursions are funded by (who are also the ones asking the questions). We take questions asked by Patreons, whittle them down to a more manageable number -- based primarily on whether I have anything interesting to say about them, not whether the questions themselves are good -- and sometimes group them together if they are about a similar topic. Enjoy! Henson Shaving is offering 100 blades free with the purchase of a razor — just head to and or use code MINDSCAPE at checkout. Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on .
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349 | Daniel Harlow on What Quantum Gravity Teaches Us About Quantum Mechanics
03/30/2026
349 | Daniel Harlow on What Quantum Gravity Teaches Us About Quantum Mechanics
There is something special about gravity. After decades of effort, there is still no convergence on the right way to reconcile Einstein's theory of general relativity with the framework of quantum mechanics. But a number of intriguing ideas have arisen along the way, including black hole radiation, the wave function of the universe, the AdS/CFT correspondence, and the role of quantum information theory. Theoretical physicist Daniel Harlow has made significant contributions to our understanding of information loss in black holes; in this conversation we turn those insights onto quantum cosmology, with potentially significant implications for how quantum mechanics itself works. Blog post with transcript: Support Mindscape on . Daniel Harlow received his Ph.D. in physics from Stanford University. He is currently an associate professor of physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Among his awards are a Packard Fellowship and the .
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