Many Minds

Our world is brimming with beings—human, animal, and artificial. We explore how they think, sense, feel, and learn. Conversations and more, every two weeks.

From the archive: Philosophers on psychedelics 07/17/2026

From the archive: Philosophers on psychedelics Hi friends! We're taking a bit of a summer pause. We will be back soon—in the meanwhile, enjoy this listener favorite from our archives! ----- [originally aired May 14, 2025] Some call it the "psychedelic renaissance." In the last decade or so, interest in psychedelic drugs has surged—and not just among Silicon Valley types and psychiatrists and neuroscientists. It's also surged among a stereotypically soberer crowd: academic philosophers. The reasons are clear. With their varied and sometimes transformative effects, psychedelics raise ethical questions, epistemological questions, metaphysical questions, questions about the nature of experience and the nature of the mind. My guest today is . Chris is a philosopher of cognitive science at the University of Western Australia and the author of the 2021 book, . Here, Chris and I talk about the so-called classic psychedelics—LSD, psilocybin, ayahuasca, and others—and how interest in them has gone through three distinct waves. We discuss the effects that these substances seem to have, in particular their capacity to treat certain psychiatric conditions and their tendency to induce "mystical-like" experiences. We consider the idea that psychedelics might serve as agents of moral enhancement. And we dig into the psychological and neural mechanisms by which psychedelics seem to have their diverse—and often salutary—effects. Along the way, we talk about ontological shock, comforting delusions, brain plasticity, unselfing, microdosing, placebo effects and adverse effects, physicalism and idealism, the REBUS model, environmental virtues, plant consciousness, meditation, and much more. Maybe this is obvious but this episode is not just for the seasoned psychonauts out there. Whatever your personal experience with these substances, they offer a distinctive window into the mind—a new way of grappling with big questions. Perhaps this much is also obvious but we're not encouraging or endorsing the use of psychedelics here—just offering a little fuel for your intellectual fires! Alright friends, on to my conversation w/ Dr. Chris Letheby. Enjoy! A transcript of this episode is available . Notes and links 4:00 – For a brief historical overview of research into psychedelics, see 8:30 – For work by an early trailblazer in the philosophy of psychedelics, see Thomas Metzinger’s . 12:30 – For our earlier episode on the psychology and philosophy of visual illusions, see . 18:00 – For a history of the concept of “set and setting,” see . 19:00 – A of “adverse events” in classic psychedelics. 26:00 – A on the history of the term “psychedelic.” 27:00 – A of the use of psychedelic therapy for depressive symptoms. 31:00 – On mystical experience see Walter Stace’s classic work, On the measurement of mystical-type experiences, see, e.g., Walter Pahnke’s paper . 36:00 – On the idea of “psychoplastogens,” see . 39:00 – See our on placebo effects. 41:00 – For the study using Ritalin as an active placebo, see . 44:00 – Michael Pollan’s book on psychedelics is . 48:00 – On the idea of “idealism,” see . 50:30 – For the 2021 study on psychedelics’ capacity to alter metaphysical beliefs, see . 54:00 – For Dr. Letheby and collaborators’ paper about the “mysticism wars,” see . 1:02:00 – For a popular article on the possibility that psychedelics reduce fear of death, see . 1:03:00 – For Dr. Letheby’s paper on psychedelics and the fear of death, see . 1:11:00 – The phrase “comforting delusion” comes from by Michael Pollan. 1:15:00 – For the “REBUS model,” see . 1:20:00 – On the idea that psychedelics could serve as agents of moral enhancement, see the paper by Brian Earp . 1:21:00 – For Dr. Letheby’s paper on psychedelics and environmental virtues, see . For his paper on psychedelics and forgiveness, see . 1:23:00 – On the subfield of “virtue ethics,” see . On the virtue of “living in place,” see the paper by Nin Kirkham . 1:28:00 – For the New Yorker article, by Matthew Hutson, on how psychedelics led him to see trees as smart, see . For the study, led by Sandeep Nayak, on psychedelics leading people to expand their attributions of consciousness, see . 1:32:00 – For a first paper by Dr. Letheby on the comparison between meditation and psychedelics, see . Recommendations , Aidan Lyon , Robert Masters & Jean Houston , Benny Shanon Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Our transcripts are created by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Twitter () or Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/42133740

The origins of Darwin's ideas 07/03/2026

The origins of Darwin's ideas No discipline, no sphere of intellectual life, has been untouched by the work of Charles Darwin. He died in 1882 but his ideas are very much alive; they're now central to how we understand the natural world, the human mind, non-human minds, plants, biogeography, morality and emotion, culture, language, and more. But where did his ideas come from? How did they grow out of his travels, his social circle, his hobbies, his particular cast of mind? My guest today is . Janet is Professor Emerita at Harvard University in the department of the History of Science. She is perhaps best known for her widely acclaimed of Charles Darwin. And she has now published an updated and abridged . Here, Janet and I talk about Darwin's life and ideas. We pick up the story during his travels on the Beagle, a five-year voyage that laid the foundation for the rest of his career. We talk about what he was reading, what he was seeing, and how these experiences helped form his most influential work, On the Origin of Species. We discuss Darwin's style as a thinker, as a naturalist, as a writer, and as an experimentalist. We touch on his relationships with contemporaries like Charles Lyell and Alfred Russel Wallace. And we consider his long—and often overlooked—engagements with pigeons, barnacles, plants, and worms. I greatly enjoyed Janet's two-volume biography of Darwin, and I enjoyed this new single-volume edition just as much. So if this episode sparks your interest, I heartily recommend that you check these books out. Alright friends, on to my conversation with Dr. Janet Browne. Enjoy! Notes 3:30 – Darwin’s autobiography is available . All of Darwin’s letters are readable (and searchable) at the . 11:00 – Darwin’s account of his five-year stint on the HMS Beagle can be found in his book, . 17:00 – Charles Lyell’s . 27:00 – For a recently published history of Lamarck and his ideas, see . 31:00 – For more on Darwin’s interest in pigeons and pigeon breeding, see . 34:00 – For more on Darwin’s barnacle studies, see . 40:00 – For a brief account of the relationship between Wallace and Darwin, see Dr. Browne’s article . 44:00 – Alfred Russel Wallace’s The Malay Archipelago is . Wallace’s own essay on natural selection, sent to Darwin before the publication of On the Origin of Species, is . The in which Darwin’s and Wallace’s first papers on natural selection appeared together. 53:00 – For a modern treatment of the concept of sexual selection, see . For an online version of Darwin’s The Descent of Man, see . For a recent collection of essays on Darwin’s Descent, including one by Dr. Browne, see . 58:00 – Darwin’s . 1:03:00 – Darwin’s short article, ‘.’ 1:08:00 – Darwin’s . For more about Darwin’s last book, The Formation of Vegetable Mould, through the Action of Worms, see . For more about Darwin’s “root-brain hypothesis,” see our . 1:14:00 – For more on Darwin’s theory of gemmules and pangenesis, see . 1:15:00 – For more on Darwin’s substantial archive, see . Recommendations , Rebecca Stott , Renée Bergland /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/41957250

The sparkling deep 06/20/2026

The sparkling deep It’s tempting to see bioluminescence as an oddity, one of those rare eccentricities of life on earth. And, on land, maybe that’s true. But our planet is mostly water, and out in the open ocean bioluminescence is utterly commonplace. Creatures of all shapes and sorts sparkle and glow, glitter and pulse. But what are these displays for? Why did they evolve? How did light become the currency of the deep? My guest today is . Sönke is a Distinguished Professor of Biology at Duke University, where he and his research group study the visual ecology of the ocean. He’s the author of a number of books: most recently , about life in the pelagic realm, and , a photographic tour of bioluminescence and color, written in collaboration with Dr. Steven Haddock. Here, Sönke and I talk about the open ocean: the most common habitat on our planet, yet one that many people will never experience. We consider the curious distribution of bioluminescence— rare on land, exceptionally prevalent in the ocean, and all but absent in freshwater. We talk about how bioluminescence seems to have evolved—many, many times over in fact. We survey the functions of making light in the deep—from counter-illumination to courtship to revenge. Finally, we consider what Sönke takes to be the biggest remaining puzzle about bioluminescence at sea. Alright friends, if you’re enjoying Many Minds, we ask (humbly) if you would think about rating us, reviewing us, leaving us a comment, boosting us on social media, or perhaps haranguing your friends—relentlessly—until they give us a listen. Without further ado, onto my conversation with Dr. Sönke Johnsen. Enjoy! Notes 3:30 – The by Dr. Johnsen and colleagues describing the bioluminescent octopus, Stauroteuthis syrtensis. 12:00 – A on the bristlemouth. The article reports a scientist's estimate of “as many as a dozen [bristlemouths] per square meter of ocean.” 15:00 – A of the “burglar alarm hypothesis.” 18:00 – The for the Johnsen Lab at Duke University. 24:00 – A of the depth zones of the ocean. 29:30 – A by Séverine Martini and Steven Haddock quantifying the prevalence of bioluminescence at different depths. A of the same study. 33:00 – A on vertical migration in the ocean, also called “diel vertical migration.” A recent of the phenomenon. 39:00 – A on the evolution of bioluminescence. 45:00 – For detailed scientific discussion of the physical basis of bioluminescence, fluorescence, and other phenomena we discuss, see Dr. Johnson’s book, . 52:00 – For previous episodes on the use of sound in the animal kingdom, see and . For our previous episode on electroreception and electric ecology (including in marine organisms), see . 57:00 – For more on the functions of bioluminescence, see . For a report of a recently discovered function of bioluminescence, see . 1:03:00 – An by Dr. Johnsen about the different colors of bioluminescence present in the deep sea. 1:05:00 – A of ostracod mating displays. 1:08:00 – For our recent episode on cave art, see . 1:16:00 – For our earlier episode on firefly synchronization, see . Recommendations and by Steven Haddock The of Todd Oakley , Edie Widder Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/41707550

Is Man the Hunter just a myth? 06/05/2026

Is Man the Hunter just a myth? There's a story about of our past that you know well. It goes like this: At some point earlier in human evolution, we started to hunt. Men in particular—perhaps channeling some deep-seated aggressive impulses—began to seek out big game. This new food source, this bonanza of calories, was what allowed our brains to expand. It changed our bodies and our societies and sent our species off on a whole new track. In short, Man the Hunter made us human. This story—told in different versions, with different points of emphasis—has circulated for decades. It's been debunked and revived, rejected and reimagined. What is the history behind the Man the Hunter idea? How does it square with our current understandings of evolution? Is it, in fact, pure fiction? My guest today is . Vivek is an evolutionary anthropologist at the University of Calgary, and an editor-in-chief of the journal . He and his collaborators recently published on the different layers and meanings of the Man the Hunter idea. Here, Vivek and I lay out those meanings. We talk about how the phrase refers, first, to that popular myth about our evolution, but also to a landmark scientific conference in the 1960s, and to a major finding of research on contemporary hunter-gatherer groups—namely, that men generally do do most of the hunting. We do a little crash-course on the field of hunter-gatherer research, including the kinds of questions it asks and frameworks it uses. We dig into some of the key ingredients of the Man the Hunter myth: the idea that we have aggressive tendencies, the idea that only men hunt, and the idea that hunting played a transformative role in our evolution. We walk through three recent, high-profile studies challenging Man the Hunter ideas in various ways. And we talk about the ever-present danger of projecting our current norms and ideals back in time. Along the way, Vivek and I touch on 2001: A Space Odyssey; reasons why contemporary hunter-gatherers may differ from the hunter-gatherers of long ago; giant sloths; extractive foraging; the case of the Agta, a society in which women do engage in big-game hunting; the forest people and the fierce people; risk and cooperation in sexual divisions of labor; persistence hunting and endurance activities; caregiving and cognition; and honey. Alright friends, I think you'll enjoy this one. On to my conversation with Dr. Vivek Venkataraman. Notes 3:30 – The by Dr. Venkataraman and colleagues, ‘The Meaning and Dividends of Man the Hunter.’ Commentaries on the article can be read . A recent by Dr. Venkataraman on the same ideas. 5:00 – Raymond Dart’s “killer ape” was originally laid out in a 1953 article ‘The Predatory Transition from Ape to Man’ (unavailable online) and then developed in book, . 8:30 – The from 2001: A Space Odyssey. 16:00 – The 1966 conference titled ‘Man the Hunter’ resulted in a of the same name. 27:00 – A of the use of the “ethnographic analogy” in reconstructions of the past. The describing the “tyranny of the ethnographic record.” 33:00 – The classic ethnography, ; the classic ethnography, . 36:00 – The by Chris Boehm on the concept of “reverse dominance hierarchy.” See also his book . 37:00 – Our with Brian Hare. 38:00 – Steven Pinker’s widely read and contested book, . 44:00 – A of the Agta, a society in which women hunt for big game. 48:00 – The by Judith Brown about childcare and subsistence. A by Haneul Jang and colleagues about how young girls help mothers during foraging. 55:00 – For a book-length treatment of hunting in evolution and history, see Matt Cartmill’s . 1:01:00 – For the 2023 paper by Anderson and colleagues on the prevalence of women’s hunting across cultures, see . For Dr. Venkataraman and colleagues’ commentary on the paper, see . For the related study by Dr. Venkataraman and colleagues about women’s hunting, see . 1:05:00 – For the 2020 paper by Haas and colleagues about female hunters of the Americas, see . 1:13:00 – For the academic ‘Woman the Hunter’ papers by Lacy and Ocobock, see (for the physiology paper) and (for the archaeology paper). For their article in Scientific American, see . For an interview on the podcast On Humans with Cara Ocobock, see . 1:14:00 – For the recent study on persistence hunting in the ethnographic record, see . 1:20:00 – The authors of the three critiques discussed here have all written commentaries on Dr. Venkataraman and colleagues’ paper. These commentaries and others can be read . 1:24:30 – For the commentary emphasizing the links between popularization and science, by Nadine Weidman, see . 1:28:00 – For our earlier episode with Alison Gopnik, in which we discuss the overlooked cognitive capacities involved in caregiving, see . 1:29:00 – For papers on the importance of honey in human evolution, see and . For one of Dr. Venkataraman’s own honey-related studies, see . Recommendations , by Erika Lorraine Milam , by Nadine Weidman Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/41545240

Babies, dogs, and the riddles of word learning 05/22/2026

Babies, dogs, and the riddles of word learning It's kind of astonishing, really, that kids ever learn words. Each one poses a little riddle. Does this sound string refer to a person? A category of things? Or maybe some other feature of the blooming, buzzing world? And yet word learning happens. In fact, we now know it begins earlier in infancy than we realized. And we now know, further, that dogs (or at least some dogs) understand words as well. So how does this happen? What do babies and dogs really know about words? And how might we go about figuring this all out? My guests today are and Dr. Claudia Fugazza. Elika is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University, where her lab studies how infants learn language. Claudia is a Researcher at Eötvös Loránd University in Hungary, where . In this conversation, Elika, Claudia, and I talk about the thorny question of what it means to understand a word—and whether there are different degrees or kinds of understanding. We consider the challenges posed by different types of words—by nouns, by names, by verbs, by function words, size terms, and more. We discuss why it is that some dogs are so good at learning words, and why infants of a certain age seem to get so much better at it. We talk about learning in different contexts and situations. And we circle the question of how different word learning really is in dogs and babies. Alright friends, before we get to it, one tiny ask: If you've been enjoying Many Minds, you can help us grow by leaving a review or comment or a rating, or by sharing us with a friend or colleague. We would greatly appreciate the support! Without further ado, on to my interview with Claudia Fugazza and Elika Bergelson. Enjoy! Notes 3:30 – A on infants’ understanding of proper nouns like “Mommy.” 6:00 – For our earlier audio essay on names across the animal kingdom, see . 11:00 – For Dr. Bergelson’s early study showing that 6-month-old infants already understand the meanings of some words, see . 13:30 – For more on the “comprehension boost” in infants after age one, see Dr. Elika’s paper . 16:30 – For Dr. Fugazza and colleagues’ first studies on gifted word-learning dogs, see and . 20:00 – See earlier studies on and . 24:00 – For more on the qualitative changes that infants may undergo as they learn to learn words, see a paper by Dr. Bergelson and a colleague . 30:00 – A by Dr. Fugazza and colleagues comparing personality profiles and playfulness of gifted word learner dogs and typical dogs. 31:30 – A recent consoling readers that having a “dumb” (i.e., non-gifted) dog is okay. 39:30 – A by Dr. Fugazza and colleagues showing that dogs can extend labels of toys (“pull,” “fetch”) to new objects that are used in the same way. 43:00 – A by Dr. Bergelson and a colleague on how broadly (or narrowly) infants apply labels like “foot” or “juice.” A by Dr. Bergelson and colleagues looking at how familiarity affects infants’ understanding of words. 52:00 – For an example of a study on the so-called noun bias in early word learning, see . For work on the (lack of) a noun bias in Tseltal infants, see . For a sample discussion of the so-called shape bias, see . 54:00 – For Dr. Fugazza and colleagues’ work on dogs’ biases toward shape or texture when generalizing about objects, see . 57:00 – For the work by Asifa Majid (!) on odor words in Jahai, see . For the work on scent-tracking in humans, see . 1:02:00 – On “dog-directed speech” and its consequences, see and . For comparisons of dog- and infant-directed speech, see and . 1:04:00 – For the study finding that Tseltal-speaking children learn honorific terms (which are never addressed to them), see . 1:06:00 – For the study by Dr. Fugazza and colleagues, “examining exclusion-based choice” in dogs, see . For the study by Dr. Fugazza and colleagues showing that gifted word learner dogs can learn by over-hearing labels, see . 1:10:00 – For the study showing that children seem to request labels for objects by pointing to them, see . 1:12:00 – For some of the first scientific studies on the use of soundboards for communication in dogs, see and . For our earlier episode with Dr. Federico Rossano discussing some of this research, see . Recommendations ‘,’ by Lila Gleitman and Elissa Newport ‘,’ by Jun Yin and Gergely Csibra ‘,’ by Mireille Babineau et al. The Genius Dog Challenge Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/41396770

The inner life of the hand 05/07/2026

The inner life of the hand Newton saw in the human hand proof of the divine; Darwin saw a key to our species' success. Many others, too, have described the hand in hyperbolic terms, as a paragon of design, a cornerstone of human uniqueness, an engine of our achievements. But what makes the human hand so powerful? Is it the proportions of the fingers? Is it the opposability of the thumb? Or, could it be none of this? Could it be that the real power of our hands lies—not in the physical design—but elsewhere, out of sight? My guest today is . Matt is Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience at Birkbeck, University of London. He's the author of the recent book, , a wide-ranging tour of the human hand and how it's geared into the brain. Here, Matt and I talk about the difference between the "visible hand"—that is, its physical structure—and the "invisible hand"—its representation in the brain. We consider the evolution of the visible hand and whether there really is anything truly distinctive or impressive about it. We talk about the biology of touch. We tour the invisible hand, discussing how—through cortical magnification—the hand becomes over-represented in the brain's sensory maps. We catalogue a few ways that the hands can go awry. And we talk about whether we should feel any nostalgia for all the hand-based activities and crafts that we're losing. Along the way, we also touch on star-nosed moles and raccoons; tetrapods and the primitive archetype; hand dominance; the parallel between a horse's knee and a human's wrist; tool use, plasticity and abstraction; homunculi; the rubber-hand illusion; supernumerary fingers; the Third Thumb project; and the question of what it might unlock if dolphins had hands. Alright, friends, this is a fun one. On to my interview with Dr. Matt Longo! Notes 3:00 – For discussion of the many traits and behaviors that have been proposed as uniquely human, see our . 5:00 – For an example of the “if only dolphins had hands” thought experiment, see . 8:00 – See by Frederic Wood Jones. 10:30 – Dr. Longo’s book, The Invisible Hand, is available open access . 16:00 – For discussion of how—in horses and other species—the five digits have been reduced or otherwise tweaked over evolution, see . For an image showing examples of homology between the human forelimb and the forelimbs of other creatures, see 19:00 – For a brief discussion of “thumb opposability,” see . For an influential discussion of hand morphology and human hand grips, see work by Mary Marzke . 30:00 – For our earlier episode on the brain’s many maps, see . 34:00 – For a discussion of Penfield’s work and the idea of a “homunculus” in the brain, see . 42:00 – For an illustration of a “homunculus” with big lips and hands, see . 44:30 – For more on the star-nosed mole and its distinctive appendage, see . 49:00 – For the report that first coined the term “numbsense,” see . For recent work on “anarchic hand,” see . For more on phantom limbs, see . For a classic study of the “rubber hand illusion,” see . 59:30 – For a discussion of hand-dominance across primate species, see . 1:03:00 – More on the 1:06:00 – A classic case of “motor equivalence” is seen in . Recommendations Marco Catani, ‘ Tracy Kivell, ‘’ , by John Napier Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/41207530

From the archive: The cuttlefish and its coat of many colors 04/22/2026

From the archive: The cuttlefish and its coat of many colors Hi friends! We're skipping a beat to take care of some spring housekeeping tasks. We will be back in May! In the meanwhile, enjoy this listener favorite from our archives! ----- [originally aired April 30, 2025] We humans have a hard time becoming invisible. For better or worse, we're basically stuck with the skin and body we have; we’re pretty fixed in our color, our shape, our overall appearance. And so we're fascinated by creatures that aren't—creatures that morph to meet the moment, that can functionally disappear, that can shape-shift on a dime. And no creatures are more skilled, more astonishing, more bedazzling in their abilities to do this kind of thing than the cephalopods. But how do they do this exactly? What's going on in their skin? What's going on under their skin? And what's going on in their brains that makes this all possible? My guest today is . Tessa is a neuroscientist in the Axel Lab at Columbia University; she studies the brain and behavior of the dwarf cuttlefish, with a special focus on the biology of their dynamic skin behaviors. Here, Tessa and I talk about how cuttlefish and other cephalopods exhibit the most impressive camouflaging abilities on the planet. We discuss how they change their skin's appearance with remarkable speed and fidelity—and not just when trying to blend in, but also when hunting, courting, fighting, and more. We talk about whether these behaviors are flexible and whether they're voluntary. We linger on the cruel irony that cuttlefish seem to be colorblind. We talk about the idea that a cephalopod's skin is kind of a window into their brain. We lay out the cells and organs in the cephalopod skin the make these behaviors possible—especially the tiny pigment-bearing structures called "chromatophores." And of course we also dive deep into the cephalopod brain and its sometimes bizarre and poorly understood structures. Excited to share it with you friends—I think you'll enjoy it. Without further ado, here's my chat with Dr. Tessa Montague. A transcript of this episode is available . Notes and links 3:00 – For more on Dr. Montague’s recent expeditions to the Philippines, including photos, see . 7:30 – Dr. Montague has published two recent reviews of dynamic skin behaviors in cephalopods—see and . We previously discussed cephalopod intelligence in a with Dr. Alex Schnell and a with the novelist Ray Nayler. 18:30 – For discussion of a recent “renaissance” in new model organisms, see . 20:30 – For more on how chameleons change color, see . 25:00 – A on cuttlefish camouflage, featuring the researcher Dr. Robert Hanlon. 30:30 – A on the details of pattern matching in cuttlefish camouflage. 31:00 – For more on the mimicking plant Boquila trifoliolata, see this . See also our with Dr. Paco Calvo and Dr. Natalie Lawrence. 35:00 – A about the so-called mimic octopus. 40:00 – For the hypothesis about color discrimination via chromatic aberration and pupil shape, see . 44:00 – For more on the “split body” skin behaviors observed in some cuttlefish, see . 51:00 – For the David Attenborough clip about a cuttlefish hypnotizing a crab, see . For the recent New York Times article on cuttlefish hunting behavior, including videos, see . For the academic article that inspired the New York Times piece, see . 58:00 – A on the possibility of octopus skin activity during dreaming. A that helped popularize the idea of cephalopod skin activity as evidence of dreaming. Our on why we—and other creatures—dream. 1:06:00 – For a study on chromatophore development from the lab of Dr. Gilles Laurent, see . 1:11:00 – For more on papillae, including videos, see . 1:17:00 – To explore an animated model of the cuttlefish brain, see of Dr. Montague’s website, . Recommendations , Danna Staaf , Peter Godfrey-Smith , Roger Hanlon & John B. Messenger Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Our transcripts are created by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Twitter () or Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/40983785

Illuminating cave art 04/09/2026

Illuminating cave art Deep in our past, in the dark depths of caves, our ancestors did something strange and beautiful. Working by firelight, some doodled little designs. Others made hand stencils. Some saw a bulge of rock, or a crack in the wall, and thought to turn it into a horse or a bison. Why did they make this art? What did it mean to them? Who were these artists? These questions are old—very old—but thanks to new methods and new interpretive frameworks, archaeologists are beginning to see them in a new light. My guest today is . Izzy is an archaeologist at Aarhus University in Denmark, specializing in Paleolithic art. Here, Izzy and I talk about why we in the present are so drawn to cave art. We lay out the basic timeline, geography, and categories of Paleolithic art. We consider the difference between figurative and non-figurative art, and why it might be that non-figurative art came first. We discuss hand stencils. We talk about an ongoing shift in archaeology known as the "sensory turn." We dig into some of Izzy's work on the role of pareidolia, palimpsests, and children in cave art. And we touch on an ongoing project she is involved in trying to understand the earliest symbolic marks that our species made—and what they could have been used for. Along the way we touch on the site known as El Castillo, Werner Herzog, hunting magic, why hand stencils are so often missing fingers, graffiti, tectiforms and flutings, why depictions of humans are actually quite rare in cave art, stages in children's art production, the use of virtual reality as a research method, and the idea of archaeology as world-building. I think you'll enjoy this one friends. Who among us—after all—doesn't feel drawn to these caves, to these most enigmatic of human creations? Without further ado, here's my conversation with . Notes 3:00 – For more on El Castillo cave, see and . 9:00 – Werner Herzog’s film——is being briefly in April 2026. 12:00 – For some of Dr. Wisher’s popular writing on cave art, see and . 16:30 – One of a recent rock art finding in Sulawesi. 20:30 – Our with Dr. Eleanor Scerri and Dr. Manuel Will, in which we discuss the mostly retired idea of a “cognitive revolution” in Europe in the Upper Paleolithic. 22:00 – For more on the recently discovered rock art panel in Colombia, see news story and recent academic study. 25:00 – The relative rarity of humans in Paleolithic art has provoked much discussion, both among scholars and . 27:00 – On the idea that Venus figurines might be self-representations—made from the perspective of the artist viewing her own body—see . 29:00 – For a recent treatment of the “missing fingers” in hand stencils, with some overview of different hypotheses, see . For more on the idea that such stencils could constitute a system of hand-signs, see . 34:00 – A by Dr. Wisher about one example of portable art—a deer-tooth necklace with engraved designs. 36:00 – For a discussion of the earliest non-figurative art, see . For one account of the transition from non-figurative to figurative art, including discussion of hand stencils, see . 42:00 – A in which Dr. Wisher and a colleague discuss the “sensory turn” in archaeology and how her work contributes to it. 51:00 – Dr. Wisher’s studies on pareidolia are and 59:00 – For Dr. Wisher’s study of palimpsests in cave art, see . 1:07:00 – For an influential early study on cave marking by children, see . For Dr. Wisher’s recent study of children’s art in the caves, see . A by Dr. John Matthews on the development of drawing in children. 1:14:00 – The website of the eSYMB project is . An important early publication by this group is . A of the project and its context by Dr. Wisher and colleagues. 1:18:00 – A arguing that certain systems of marks represented a “phenological calendar.” Another providing evidence that certain Paleolithic marks constituted a system of conventional signs. 1:22:00 – The arguing that archaeology is “world-building.” Recommendations , by Rebecca Wragg Sykes (!) , by Paul Pettitt Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/40792020

What can AI teach us about the mind? 03/26/2026

What can AI teach us about the mind? Everyone is talking about AI these days. Often these conversations are about how AI might upend education, or work, or social life, or maybe civilization itself. But among cognitive scientists and psychologists the conversation inevitably drifts toward other questions. What does this latest generation of AI tell us about the human mind? Is it putting old ideas and theories to rest? Is it ushering in new ones? Will AI—in other words—also upend cognitive science? My guests today are and . Mike is a Professor of Psychology at Stanford University, where focuses on language learning and cognition in children. Gary is a Professor of Psychology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where studies language and its role in augmenting human cognition. Both Gary and Mike have more recently been thinking a lot about AI and how it is challenging and deepening our understanding of the human mind. In this conversation, we talk about being interested in AI as cognitive scientists—while also being concerned about the technology as people. We discuss the linguistic abilities of frontier LLMs compared to the linguistic abilities of adult humans. We talk about a glaring "data gap" here—the fact that, even though LLMs often rival human abilities, they require orders of magnitude more data to do so. We contrast the capabilities of large language models with so-called BabyLMs. We consider the fact that, as LLMs master language, they also master other abilities—capacities for mathematical reasoning, causal understanding, possibly theory of mind, and more. And we talk about why language might be an especially potent form of input for an AI. Along the way, we touch on reference and the symbol grounding problem, the Platonic Representation Hypothesis, stimulus computability, confabulated citations, pattern matching and jabberwocky, the poverty of the stimulus argument, congenital blindness, Quine's topiary, the limits of in principle demonstrations, the WEIRD problem, and what the astonishing sophistication of disembodied AIs might suggest about the role of bodily experience in human cognition. Before we get to it, one small request: we’re currently running of our listeners. You can find the link in our show notes. If you have a few minutes, we'd really love your input! Alright friends, here's my conversation with Mike Frank and Gary Lupyan. I think you'll enjoy it! Notes 5:00 – For more discussion of “stochastic parrots” and other ways of framing AI systems, see our with Melanie Mitchell. For the “octopus test,” see . 8:00 – “BabyLMs” are—in contrast to large LMs (aka LLMs)—models that are trained on a more human-scale amount of linguistic input. For more on the BabyLM community, see . 12:00 – For broad discussion of the use of AIs as “cognitive models,” see by Dr. Frank and a colleague. The same paper discusses the idea of “stimulus computability.” 18:00 – For Dr. Frank’s “baby steps” paper, see 20:00 – For more on how Claude understands line breaks, see Anthropic’s analysis of the issue . 23:00 – For work on human-like grammaticality judgments in LLMs, see by a team including Dr. Lupyan. 24:00 – See for an influential paper on, among other things, how LLMs refute the idea that syntax is unlearnable. The article titled ‘How linguistics learned to stop worrying and love the language models’ is ; Dr. Lupyan’s commentary—‘Large language models have learned to use language’—. 29:00 – For some of Dr. Lupyan’s work on the “abstractness” of even concrete concepts, see . 35:00 – For a classic paper on the so-called symbol grounding problem, see . 37:00 – For the preprint putting forth the “Platonic Representation Hypothesis,” see . 40:30 – For more on the data gap between children and LLMs—and what accounts for it—see Dr. Frank’s paper . 45:00 – For a sampling of Dr. Frank and colleagues’ work comparing language models to children, see , , and . For more on the LEVANTE project, a collaborative effort spearheaded by Dr. Frank, see . 48:00 – For the preprint—"The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Pattern Matching," by Dr. Lupyan and a colleague—see . 55:00 – For more on Dr. Lupyan’s perspective on the centrality of language in human cognition, see . See also this more , considering the question in light of LLMs. 58:00 – For our earlier episode with Dr. Marina Bedny, see . For the recent paper by Dr. Bedny and colleagues considering their research on congenital blindness in light of LLMs, see . 1:01:00 – For classic work on language learning in blind children, see . 1:02:00 – For a paper by Dr. Lupyan and colleagues on “hidden” individual differences, see . 1:03:00 – For more on “multiple realizability,” see . For our earlier episode with Dr. Eric Turkheimer, see . 1:09:00 – For more on the work of Dr. Frank’s collaborator, Dan Yamins, see . 1:14:00 – See our with Dr. M.J. Crockett for more discussion of the “WEIRD problem” around scientific uses of AI. In the same episode, we discussed how new scientific methods focus attention on questions that can be studied with those methods. Recommendations , by Jimmy Soni & Rob Goodman , by William Irvine , by Howard Margolis The (e.g., the ) Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/40634995

Mutualisms all the way down 03/11/2026

Mutualisms all the way down No one is an island. We all depend on each other in critical, often tangled ways. And when I say "we" and "each other" I don't just mean humans. Yes, we humans rely on other humans. But we also rely on bees, yeasts, dogs, bacteria, and countless other creatures big and small. These interspecies dependencies—or mutualisms, as biologists call them—have deflected and inflected our history. And there's no doubt they will also inflect our future. My guest today is . Rob is Professor of Applied Ecology at North Carolina State University, where he studies the creatures and ecologies all around us—in our homes, in our foods, in our belly buttons. He's the author of eight books, including, most recently, . This book is the focus of our conversation today. Rob and I talk about the idea of mutualism—in which two or more species benefit each other—and how human life is sustained by mutualisms all the way down. We consider how the benefits of mutualism are measured—whether in terms of biological fitness, or longevity, or pleasure. We talk about the best-documented cases of humans collaborating with other species to find honey or hunt fish. We consider how our liaisons with yeasts have shaped human history—and how we might even say that yeasts domesticated us. We linger on our relationships with dogs and cats and the benefits we get from them, some obvious and some less so. Finally, we talk about what it would mean to more fully embrace our mutualisms, what it would mean to create what Rob calls "a less lonely future." Along the way, Rob and I talk about cheese, worms, and maggots; bread, beer, and honey; face mites and armpits; parasites, inquilines, and commensals; what sauerkraut does to our immune systems; honeyguides and dolphins, leopards and house cats; morbid curiosity; and how dogs might give us a kind of access to our subconscious. This is a fun one folks. But, before we get to it, a couple of announcements. First: Applications are now open for the . This is a three-week intensive, transdisciplinary exploration of the different forms of mind and intelligence that animate our world. If you like the themes we talk about on this show, you would almost certainly get a kick out of DISI. More info at . That's d-i-s-i. org. Review of applications begins pretty soon, so don't dither! Second: We have just put out our first ever ! Whether you're a longtime superfan or just an occasional listener, we would love to hear from you. Your input will help guide the show as we consider our next chapter. Alright, friends—without further ado, on to my conversation with Rob Dunn. Enjoy! Notes 4:00 – For the fuller story of Menocchio, see , by Carlo Ginzburg. 7:00 – Dr. Dunn’s lab has been involved in public-facing projects about fermented foods—see for a series of webinars. 10:00 – The Sardinian cheese we discuss is called . 14:00 – A by Dr. Dunn and colleagues about human face mites. This is not the only aspect of bodily geography he and colleagues have examined: see also this of the organisms in our belly buttons. 18:30 – For a primer on honeyguide birds, see . 21:30 – For more on the calls humans use to communicate with honeyguides, see . 24:30 – For more on human-dolphin collaborative hunting, see this . 27:30 – For more about the theologian Aminah Al-Attas Bradford, a researcher in Dr. Dunn’s lab, see . 33:00 – We also discussed fermentation at length in an earlier episode . 35:00 – A by Dr. Dunn and colleagues on the microbial composition of sourdough starters. 37:00 – For more on our—and other animals’—relationships with alcohol, see our . 40:00 – A by Dr. Dunn and colleagues on the evolution of sour taste in humans. 42:00 – For more on the domestication of chickens, see . 49:00 – For more on the concept of “morbid curiosity,” see . 55:00 – For more on our armpits—and the bacterial communities we harbor therein—see by Dr. Dunn and colleagues. 1:04:00 – The by Dr. Dunn and colleagues about the spiders in people’s homes. The by Kobayashi Issa. Recommendations and , by Ed Yong (!) by Anton Chekhov by Kobayashi Issa Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/40406780

Seven metaphors for AI 02/26/2026

Seven metaphors for AI If you wanted a petri dish for understanding metaphors—how they emerge and evolve and jostle with each other—it would be hard to do better than the world of AI. We talk about AI systems variously as coaches or co-pilots, little genies or alien intelligences. Some researchers claim that AIs "grow," that they're entering their phase of "adolescence." Critics deride AI products as slop and dismiss LLMs as a kind of autocomplete on steroids. What's behind these different characterizations? Which ones are accurate and which are unfair? And are our metaphors mostly colorful rhetoric or do they matter? Are they shaping how we understand, adopt, and ultimately regulate these new technologies? My guest today is . Melanie is a computer scientist and Professor at the Santa Fe Institute. She is the author of the book, and she writes a by the same name. This episode is a bit of a companion to with Steve Flusberg. In that episode, Steve and I attempted a kind of crash course on metaphor and the human mind. Here, Melanie and I sit down for more of an extended case study: how metaphors are guiding, galvanizing, and maybe deceiving us in the contested realm of AI discourse. We unpack seven of the most widely used metaphors in this space. We consider how these metaphors are shaping not only our everyday understandings of AI, but also law and policy. We also talk about the metaphor and analogy capabilities of AI itself. Can these systems reason abstractly in the way that humans can? Along the way, Melanie and I touch on: AI-generated poetry, anthropomorphism, the original sin of AI research, the myth of Narcissus, psychometric testing and its pitfalls, metaphors for AI that are a bit hard to spot, and the question of whether an AI has ever come up with a decent analogy for itself. Longtime fans of the show will know that we've had Melanie on the show . We invited her back, not only because she's thought about metaphor and analogy in AI discourse for decades, but because she's a voice of calm insight in an area that’s increasingly awash in hype and polemic. Longtime fans of the show may also note that we are now celebrating our 6th birthday at Many Minds. That's right, the show launched in February 2020. If you'd like to support us as we recognize this milestone, you can leave us a rating or a review, recommend us to a friend, or give us a shout out on social media. Your support is always appreciated. Without further ado, on to my conversation with Dr. Melanie Mitchell. Enjoy! Notes 3:30 – For an overview of Douglas Hofstadter’s work on analogy, see . 8:00 – Much of our discussion in this interview draws on Dr. Mitchell’s piece on the in Science magazine. 13:30 – For earlier discussions of anthropomorphism on the show, see our earlier episodes and . 16:00 – See for the original discussion of LLMs as “stochastic parrots.” 17:00 – See for the original discussion of ChatGPT as a “blurry jpeg.” 18:30 – See for the original discussion of LLMs as role players. 22:00 – See for one use of the “LLMs as crowds” metaphor. See also a discussion of this metaphor (and other metaphors for AI) . 25:00 – For one discussion of AI as a “cultural technology” by Alison Gopnik and colleagues, see . For a more recent discussion of the same metaphor by Henry Farrell, Alison Gopnik and others, see . 27:00 – For the podcast series on intelligence that Dr. Mitchell co-hosted for the Santa Fe Institute, see . 28:00 – See for an influential formulation of the idea that AI is an “alien intelligence.” 29:00 – For philosopher Shannon Vallor’s book about AI as “mirror,” see . 31:00 – For the recent study on users’ metaphors for AI systems, see . 33:00 – For more on the rise of social AI, see our earlier episode . 38:00 – For more on what AI researchers might learn from developmental and comparative psychologists, see Dr. Mitchell’s (summarizing her keynote at NeurIPs). 42:00 – For more on the ARC (Abstraction and Reasoning Corpus) and the research that Dr. Mitchell and colleagues have been doing with it, see and . 48:30 – For the study on humans' preference for AI-generated poetry, see . 50:30 – For Brigitte Nerlich’s documentation and discussion of various metaphors for AI (including AI’s metaphors for itself), see . Recommendations , by Shannon Vallor ‘,’ by Murray Shanahan (!) et al. ‘,’ by Henry Farrell et al. Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/40235890

Origins of the kiss 02/12/2026

Origins of the kiss Humans do some pretty weird things. Some of us will sit in searingly hot rooms or jump into icy ponds. Others risk their lives trying to climb to new heights or dive to new depths. And every once in a while, two otherwise normal-seeming humans will lean in close to each other, open mouths, lock lips, and swap a hearty helping of microbes. You may even know people who've done this. But why? Are we the only animals who kiss? What could be the deeper origins of this truly bizarre behavior? My guest today is Dr. . Matilda is an Evolutionary Biologist at the University of Oxford. She's interested in understanding the origins of behaviors and traits across the animal kingdom. But it's not just any traits she's interested in—she tends to favor those that are a bit risque. Here, Matilda and I talk about the puzzle at the heart of human kissing behavior. We discuss the possible adaptive functions of kissing—and of romantic kissing in particular. We walk through her in which—drawing on observations across primates species—she and her colleagues reconstructed the phylogeny of kissing behavior. They found that kissing is present in almost all the Great Apes—and also in several species of monkeys—and that it may go back around 20 million years. We sketch different proposals for how kissing may have evolved, such as the idea that it originally grew out of “premastication”—the practice of chewing up food for infants and transferring that food by mouth. And, of course, we consider the cultural side of kissing—and how to make sense of the fact that, despite these ancient roots in the primate lineage, romantic kissing is by no means universal to all human groups. Hope you enjoy this one, friends—offered in spirit of Valentine's Day, of course. Kissing may seem like a light-hearted or frivolous topic, but—as I hope you'll appreciate—it opens up some big, thorny, compelling questions. And, in fact, it's finally attracting serious attention from scholars of all kinds interested in the different dimensions of social behavior. Without further ado, here's my interview with Dr. Matilda Brindle. Notes 3:00 – Dr. Brindle’s paper, ‘,’ coauthored with Dr. Catherine Talbot and Dr. Stuart West. 10:00 – An of “postcopulatory sexual selection.” 15:45 – The examining the convergence of oral microbiota in kissing couples. The same study quantified the amount of microbial transfer during kissing. 18:00 – For more on the “grass-in-ear” phenomenon among chimpanzees and other such arbitrary-seeming animal behaviors, see our about animal cultures. For the more recent “grass-in-bum” phenomenon, see . 21:30 – For Dr. Brindle’s work on the adaptive functions of masturbation in primates, see . 32:00 – For popular coverage of Dr. Brindle’s work, highlighting the likelihood that humans and Neanderthals kissed, see . 39:00 – The book, , by Bruce Bagemihl. 43:00 – For the study on the presence of romantic kissing across cultures, see . 47:00 – For indirect (linguistic) evidence for the prevalence of “smell-kissing” across Southeast Asia, see . For more on this style of greeting, see Kensy's post . 50:00 – For the proposal that kissing is rooted in “oral grooming,” see . 58:00 – For the larger special issue on the origins of kissing, of which Dr. Brindle’s paper is part, see . 1:00:30 – For Dr. Brindle’s work on “bacula” (aka “penis bones”), see . Recommendations , by Ella Al-Shamahi , by Cat Bohannon , by Alan Dixson Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/40081125

The aura of metaphor 01/29/2026

The aura of metaphor Metaphors matter. They enliven our speech and our prose; they animate our arguments and stir our passions. Some metaphors power political movements; others propel scientific revolutions. These little figures of speech delight, provoke, captivate, shock, amuse, and galvanize us. In one way or another, metaphors just seem to help us make sense of a messy world. But how do they do all this? Whence their peculiar powers? What does it say about the human mind that we just can’t escape our metaphors—and frankly don’t want to? My guest today is . Steve is an Assistant Professor of Cognitive Science at Vassar College, where he directs the Framing, Reasoning, And Metaphor (FRAME) Lab. Here, Steve and I talk about what metaphors are and why we’re so drawn to them. We discuss some of the misleading ideas about metaphor you may remember from middle school literature class. We consider why some metaphors work and others flop. We talk about the metaphors we use for climate change and prevalence and potency of war metaphors across different realms of public discourse. We consider how metaphor operates in science and in scientific theorizing. Finally, we talk about the question of whether there are some ideas that we simply can’t grasp literally, concepts we can only approach through metaphor. Along the way, Steve and I talk about: “aura farming”; nautical metaphors and textile metaphors; the outmoded idea that metaphors are mere adornments; metaphor versus analogy; dead metaphors and how to resuscitate them; shadows and footprints; Dan Dennett’s technique of metaphorical triangulation; and the brain-as-computer metaphor—and whether it is actually a metaphor. Alright, friends this is a fun one. Steve has spent his entire career exploring this fascinating terrain—and, as you’ll see, he’s a lively and affable guide. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did. Without further ado, here’s my conversation with Dr. Steve Flusberg. Notes 3:00 – For more on “beige flags,” see . For more on “aura farming,” see . 8:00 – For an overview of metaphor in communication and thought, see for an article by Dr. Flusberg and co-authors. 18:00 – The “life is a journey” (or “career is a journey”) metaphor—as well as other examples we discuss—are treated at length in the classic book, . 24:00 – For a detailed academic treatment of the relationship between metaphor and analogy, see . 32:00 – Some of the best-studied “orientational metaphors” are those found in the domain of time. See and . 37:00 – For more on metaphors used in discussions of environmental issues, see a paper by Dr. Flusberg and a colleague . 42:00 – For more on the idea of the “climate shadow,” see . 46:00 – The by Dr. Flusberg and colleagues comparing the effects of race and war metaphors for climate change. 55:00 – The by Dr. Flusberg and colleagues on the role of war metaphors across different areas of public discourse. 1:04:00 – For an influential discussion of the role of metaphors and analogies in science, see . For Kensy’s take on Darwin’s metaphors for natural selection, see . For discussion of whether the “brain-as-computer” metaphor is actually a metaphor, see and . 1:12:00 – For more on the history of metaphors in the English language—including analyses of which source domains have historically been the most fruitful—see . 1:14:00 – For discussion of the (disputed) idea of “dead metaphors,” see and . 1:17:00 – The idea of “theory-constitutive metaphors” in science is discussed in a chapter by Richard Boyd in . 1:19:00 – For a preview of Dr. Flusberg’s in-progress paper on the philosopher Daniel Dennett and his technique of “metaphorical triangulation,” see . 1:33:00 – For the (extremely short) Borges’ story on maps that are too accurate to be useful, see . Recommendations , by George Lakoff & Mark Johnson , by Daniel Dennett , by Cynthia Barrett Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/39925900

From the archive: How should we think about IQ? 01/14/2026

From the archive: How should we think about IQ? Hello friends, and happy new year! We're gearing up for a new run of episodes starting later in January. In the meanwhile, enjoy this pick from our archives. ------ [originally aired October 16, 2024] IQ is, to say the least, a fraught concept. Psychologists have studied IQ—or g for “general cognitive ability”—maybe more than any other psychological construct. And they’ve learned some interesting things about it. That it's remarkably stable over the lifespan. That it really is general: people who ace one test of intellectual ability tend to ace others. And that IQs have risen markedly over the last century. At the same time, IQ seems to be met with increasing squeamishness, if not outright disdain, in many circles. It's often seen as crude, misguided, reductive—maybe a whole lot worse. There's no question, after all, that IQ has been misused—that it still gets misused—for all kinds of racist, classist, colonialist purposes. As if this wasn't all thorny enough, the study of IQ is also intimately bound up with the study of genetics. It's right there in the roiling center of debates about how genes and environment make us who we are. So, yeah, what to make of all this? How should we be thinking about IQ? My guest today is . Eric is Professor of Psychology at the University of Virginia. He has studied intelligence and many other complex human traits for decades, and he's a major figure in the field of “behavior genetics.” Eric also has a new book out this fall—which I highly recommend—titled . In a field that has sometimes been accused of rampant optimism, Eric is—as you'll hear—a bit more measured. In this conversation, Eric and I focus on intelligence and its putatively genetic basis. We talk about why Eric doubts that we are anywhere close to an account of the biology of IQ. We discuss what makes intelligence such a formidable construct in psychology and why essentialist understandings of it are so intuitive. We talk about Francis Galton and the long shadow he’s cast on the study of human behavior. We discuss the classic era of Twin Studies—an era in which researchers started to derive quantitative estimates of the heritability of complex traits. We talk about how the main takeaway from that era was that genes are quite important indeed, and about how more recent genetic techniques suggest that takeaway may have been a bit simplistic. Along the way, Eric and I touch on spelling ability, child prodigies, the chemical composition of money, the shared quirks of twins reared apart, the Flynn Effect, the Reverse Flynn Effect, birth order, the genetics of height, the problem of missing heritability, whether we should still be using IQ scores, and the role of behavior genetics in the broader social sciences. Alright folks, lots in here—let's just get to it. On to my conversation with Dr. Eric Turkheimer. Enjoy! A transcript of this episode is available . Notes and links 3:30 – The 1994 book The Bell Curve, by Richard Herrnstein a Charles Murray, dealt largely with the putative social implications of IQ research. It was extremely controversial and widely discussed. For an overview of the book and controversy, see the Wikipedia article . 6:00 – For discussion of the “all parents are environmentalists…” quip, see . 12:00 – The notion of “multiple intelligences” was popularized by the psychologist Howard Gardner—see for an overview. See for an attempt to test the claims of the “multiple intelligences” framework using some of the methods of traditional IQ research. For work on EQ (or Emotional Intelligence) see . 19:00 – Dr. Turkheimer has also laid out his spelling test analogy in . 22:30 – Dr. Turkheimer’s 1998 paper, “.” 24:30 – For an in-passing treatment of the processing efficiency idea, see p. 195 of Daniel Nettle’s book . See also Richard Haier’s book, . 26:00 – The on the relationship between pupil size and intelligence. A more recent study that those findings. 31:00 – For an argument that child prodigies constitute an argument for “nature,” see . For a memorable narrative account of one child prodigy, see . 32:00 – A of the Flynn effect. We have previously discussed the Flynn Effect in an with Michael Muthukrishna. 37:00 – James Flynn’s book, On the reversal of the Flynn Effect, see . 40:00 – The phrase “nature-nurture” originally comes from Shakespeare and was picked up by Francis Galton. In The Tempest, Prospero describes Caliban as “a born devil on whose nature/ Nurture can never stick.” 41:00 – For a biography of Galton, see . For an article-length account of Galton’s role in the birth of eugenics, see . 50:00 – For an account of R.A. Fisher’s 1918 paper and its continuing influence, see . 55:00 – See Dr. Turkheimer’s on the “nonshared environment”—E in the ACE model. 57:00 – A coming out of the Minnesota Study of Twins reared apart. A New York Times recounting some of the interesting anecdata in the Minnesota Study. 1:00:00 – See Dr. Turkheimer’s 2000 on the “three laws of behavior genetics.” Note that this is not, in fact, Dr. Turkheimer’s most cited paper (though it is very well cited). 1:03:00 – For another view of the state of behavior genetics in the postgenomic era, see . 1:11:00 – For Dr. Turkheimer’s work on poverty, heritability, and IQ, see . 1:13:00 – A recent of birth order effects on personality. 1:16:00 – For Dr. Turkheimer’s take on the missing heritability problem, see and . 1:19:00 – A recent on the missing heritability problem in the case of height. 1:30:00 – On the dark side of IQ, see Chapter 9 of Dr. Turkheimer’s book. See also Radiolab’s . 1:31:00 – See Dr. Turkheimer’s Substack, . Recommendations , Kathryn Paige Harden , Stuart Ritchie , Richard Nisbett (Ted talk), James Flynn Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Our transcripts are created by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: . For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Twitter () or Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/39735520

From 'On Humans': Can the brain understand itself? 12/31/2025

In search of names 12/18/2025

In search of names Alright, friends—we’ve come to the end of the 2025 run of Many Minds! Our final episode of the year is an audio essay by yours truly. This is a classic format for the show, one that we only do every so often. Today’s essay is about names. It’s about the question of whether animals have something like names for each other. And it’s also about a deeper question: What even is a name? How do humans use names? How does the historical and ethnographic record kind of complicate our everyday understanding of what names are. I had a lot of fun putting this together, and I do hope you enjoy it. Now, the holiday season is a time when people might be shopping around for new podcasts to listen to. That makes it a great time to recommend us to your friends and family and colleagues. You can think of it as an especially thoughtful gift, one that’s absolutely free, and that keeps on giving throughout the year. Speaking of gifts, as an addendum to this episode you’ll find a little stocking stuffer after the credits. It’s a reading of a poem that figures prominently in today’s essay. Without further ado, here is my essay—‘In search of names.’ Enjoy! A text version of this essay is available . Notes 2:00 – The text of ‘The Naming of Cats' by T.S. Eliot is . See also the full collection, . The lines about cats’ taste preferences and cats having different kinds of minds comes from another poem in the collection, ‘.’ 3:00 – The finding that cats know their names, and the showing that cats know the names of their friends. 4:00 – For an overview of research on dolphin “signature whistles,” see . 5:00 – For the 2024 study reporting name-like rumbles in elephants, see . 6:00 – For the 2024 study reporting vocal labels for individuals in marmosets, see . A critical response to the study is ; the authors’ response to the criticism is . 12:00 – For overviews of cross-cultural variation in names and naming practices, see , , , and . Richard Alford’s 1988 study, published in book form, is . 13:30 – The study reporting name signs in Kata Kolok is 15:00 – For research on expectations based on the sounds of people’s names, see and . 16:00 – For recent work on the “face-name matching effect,” see . For the study on “nominative determinism” in the medical profession, see . (Note that, while this latter study does report empirical data, its rigor is questionable. And, yet, at least has reported similar findings.) 17:30 – For the example of over-used names in Scotland, see . 19:30 – For discussion of names in New Guinea, see . For examples of research on “teknonymy,” see and . For discussion of Penan “necronyms,” see . 20:30 – For an overview of name taboos, see . For more on “alexinomia,” see . 22:30 – For an example of recent work on “name uniqueness,” see . 23:00 – William Safire’s column on dog names is . The study of gravestones in the world’s oldest pet cemetery is . Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/39448715

The value of animal cultures 12/04/2025

The value of animal cultures Not long ago culture was considered rare in nature, maybe even uniquely human. But that's changed. We now know that the tree of life is buzzing with culture—and not just on a few lonely branches. Creatures great and small learn songs, migration routes, and feeding techniques from each other. Many species build up reservoirs of knowledge over generations. This has profound implications, not just for our understanding of the natural world, but also for our efforts to protect it. My guest today is . Philippa is an Honorary Lecturer at the University of Exeter, with one foot in science and another in conservation. She's both a behavioral ecologist, focusing on whales and dolphins, and a leading voice—for more than a decade now—urging conservationists to take animal cultures seriously. Here, Philippa and I talk about how researchers define culture and social learning in animals. We tour the mounting evidence for culture across species—in birds, in apes, in fish, possibly even in insects. We discuss the methods that scientists use to infer that behaviors are socially learned. We consider how animal culture complicates the conservation enterprise. We also discuss the idea that animal cultures have intrinsic value—not value for us humans, not value that can be easily quantified, but value for the animals themselves. Along the way Philippa and I talk about the notion of "cultural rescue"; indigenous understandings of animal culture; cases where social learning is maladaptive; human-animal mutualism; fashion trends; the idea of conserving "cultural capacity"; elephant matriarchs and other "keystone individuals"; golden lion tamarins, herring, and regent honey-eaters; and the question of why some orcas wear salmon as hats. Alright friends, this topic has been on our wish list for a while now. Hope you enjoy it! Notes 2:30 – For academic articles by Dr. Brakes and colleagues on the importance of animal culture for conservation, see , , and . The last of these is the introduction to a recent on the topic. Many of the topics discussed in this episode are also covered in this issue. 3:30 – The case of the golden lion tamarins is discussed . 5:00 – For more about the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species (or CMS) of Wild Animals, see . 9:00 – For a classic paper on social learning in animals, see . For a relatively recent, detailed overview of animal culture, see . For a short primer on animal culture, see . 10:00 – For discussion of the riskiness of long-line depredation, see . 12:00 – For a study by Dr. Sonja Wild and colleagues on bottlenose dolphin declines following a heat wave—and how these declines may have been buffered by tool-using traditions—see . 15:00 – For the review of cetacean foraging tactics by Dr. Taylor Hersh and colleagues, see . 17:00 – For a primer on honeyguides (and their mutualism with honey hunters), see . 20:00 – For a recent review of culture and social learning in birds, see . For a review of conservation of avian song culture, see . 25:00 – For a review of (the conservation of) chimpanzee culture, see . 28:00 – For the initial report of chimpanzees putting grass in their ears, see . For more on the phenomenon of orcas wearing salmon hats, see . 33:00 – For a recent review of culture and social learning in fish, see . 35:00 – For the recent study on “collective memory loss” in herring, see . 39:00 – For more on the possibility of social learning in insects, see . For a video of the puzzle box experiment in bees, see . 44:00 – For a recent review of the “methodological toolkit” used by researchers in the study of social learning in animals, see . 47:00 – For the study using network-based diffusion analysis to understand the spread of feeding strategies in humpback whales, see . 49:00 – For the original 2000 study on the spread of humpback whale song, see . For a more recent study of “revolutions” in whale song, see . 53:00 – For an example of work looking at changes in whale song as a result of human noise, see . 55:00 – For more on the idea of “keystone individuals” in the case of elephants, see . For more on menopause and the so-called grandmother hypothesis, see our with Alison Gopnik. 1:05:00 – A recent calling for the protection of animal cultural heritage under UNESCO. Recommendations , by Hal Whitehead and Luke Rendell edited by Frans de Waal and Peter Tyack , by Darren P. Croft et al. , by Jonathan Birch (featured on an ) Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/39262715

What is memory for? 11/20/2025

What is memory for? Everyone loves a good evolutionary puzzle. Why do we have appendices? Why do we dream? Why do we blush? At first glance, memory would not seem to be in this category. It's clearly useful to remember stuff, after all—to know where to find food, to remember your mistakes so you don't repeat them, to recall who’s friendly and who’s fierce. In fact, though, certain aspects of memory—when you hold them up to the light—turn out to be quite puzzling indeed. My guests today are and . Ali is a philosopher at the London School of Economics (LSE); Johannes is a philosopher at York University, in Toronto. Both have written extensively about the functions of memory, and, in particular, about the functions of episodic memory—that capacity for calling up specific events and experiences from our own lives. Here, Ali, Johannes and I lay out the textbook taxonomy of memory, and discuss how episodic memory has drawn the lion's share of philosophical interest. We pick apart the relationship between episodic memory and another major type of long-term memory, semantic memory. We sketch a range of different accounts of the evolved functions of episodic memory, including Johannes's proposal that episodic memory serves communication and Ali's proposal that it fuels semantic memory. And, finally, we consider what this all means for our understanding of memory in children and in animals. Along the way, we touch on Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory, infantile amnesia, evidential systems in language, imagination, “simulationist” theories of episodic memory, what it feels like to remember, collective memory, the hippocampus, cryptomnesia, and the cow's digestive system as a metaphor for memory. If you're enjoying Many Minds, you might consider leaving us a rating or review on your platform of choice, or maybe giving us a shout-out on social media. Thanks so much in advance for supporting us, friends! Notes 4:30 – For a broad orientation to memory research in the cognitive sciences, see . For a broad orientation to the philosophy of memory, see . 13:00 – See for Dr. Boyle’s paper on the “impure phenomenology” of episodic memory. 16:30 – For more on the idea of “WEIRD”-ness and the “WEIRD problem” in psychology, see our and our on childhood across cultures. 20:00 – For more on metaphors for memory in the cognitive sciences, see (in which an apparently different “cow stomach” metaphor for memory is discussed). Note that cows do not, in fact, have four stomachs, but rather a single stomach with four distinct chambers. 24:00 – For an overview of the cognitive neuroscience of episodic memory, see . 31:30 – For a discussion of the commonsense “mnemonic view” of episodic memory, see Dr. Boyle’s . 37:00 – For one influential articulation of a “simulationist” account of episodic memory, see . 40:00 – For the proposal by Dr. Mahr and his colleague that episodic memory is for communication, see and . 45:00 – For more on evidential systems in language, see and . 48:00 – For the study by Dr. Mahr and colleagues on source memory in children, see . 51:30 – For Dr. Boyle’s proposal that episodic memory is for semantic memory, see . For another of Dr. Boyle’s discussions of the functions of episodic memory, see . 1:02:00 – For more of Dr. Mahr’s ideas about the cultural evolution of the “epistemic tag” that distinguishes episodic memory, see . 1:03:00 – Partially digested stomach contents are sometimes known as “.” 1:07:00 – A about recent findings on infantile amnesia. 1:08:00 – A recent about Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory. 1:12:00 – An on the phenomenology of “cryptomnesia.” 1:15:00 – For a recent discussion of episodic memory in animals, see this by Dr. Boyle and a colleague. Examples of Dr. Boyle’s other work on memory in animals are and . Recommendations , by Thomas Suddendorf, Jonathan Redshaw, & Adam Bulley (see also featuring this book) , by Daniel Schacter , by Hugo Mercier & Dan Sperber Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/39104365

Of breeds and brains 11/06/2025

Of breeds and brains It's hard to say exactly when, but some tens of thousands of years ago, our best friends were born. I'm referring, of course, to dogs. This didn't happen overnight—it was a long process. And it not only changed how those canids behaved and what they looked like, it also changed their brains. As wolves gave way to proto-dogs, and proto-dogs gave way to dingoes and dalmatians and Dobermanns and all the rest, their brains have continued to change. What can we learn from this singular saga? What does it tell us about dogs, about domestication, and about brains? My guest today is . Erin is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Human Evolutionary Biology at Harvard, where she directs the . Here Erin and I talk about how dogs are the most anatomically diverse species on the planet—and how their brains are no exception. We sketch the different waves in the dog domestication saga and discuss scenarios for how that saga got underway. We talk about how brains change as they get bigger and about how they change during domestication. We discuss a recent study by Erin and colleagues comparing the brains of modern dogs with the brains of pre-modern dogs like village dogs and New Guinea singing dogs. We also talk about a new study from Erin's lab finding that domestic dogs share with humans a key language-related structure. Along the way we talk about the Russian Farm Fox experiment, the stereotype of the gentle giant, the left lateralization of language, the respiratory condition known as BOAS, the dog personality inventory known as C-BARQ, the limitations of the idea of a "domestication syndrome," and the puppy kidnapping hypothesis. Longtime listeners will recall that we had Erin on the show to talk about her work on . Given how much fun we had with that one, it was only a matter of time before we had her back to talk about her main line of research on dog brains. So here you go friends—hope you enjoy it! Notes 4:30 – For one recent study of the early domestication of dogs, see . For a review of leading hypotheses about what drove the wolf-to-dog transition, see . 13:00 – For Dr. Hecht’s initial 2019 study of brain variation across domestic dog breeds, see . 20:00 – For a classic paper on the neurodevelopmental scaling by Dr. Barbara Finlay and colleagues, see . 23:00 – For more of Dr. Hecht’s work on neurodevelopmental scaling laws as they apply to dogs, see . For a study reporting correlations between body size and personality in dogs, see . 29:00 – See Dr. Hecht and colleagues' on the evolutionary neuroscience of domestication. 31:00 – See Dr. Hecht and colleagues' on brain changes seen in the Russian farm-fox experiment. 37:00 – For more on the idea of “domestication syndrome,” see with Dr. Kevin Lala and . For a classic treatment of the idea that domestication involves reduction in brain size, see . 41:00 – For the recent study by Dr. Hecht and colleagues comparing the brains of modern and pre-modern dog breeds, see . 43:00 – For video of a New Guinea Singing Dog singing, see . 47:00 – For more about the dog personality inventory known as the C-BARQ, see . 51:00 – For Dr. Hecht and colleagues’ recent study on an analog to the “arcuate fasciculus” in dogs, see . 58:00 – For Dr. Hecht and colleagues’ study on arcuate fasciculus in chimpanzees (and its relationship to communicative behavior), see . For more discussion of the hemispheric lateralization of language, see with Dr. Ev Federenko. 1:04:00 – The of the Functional Dog Collaborative. Recommendations , Raymond & Lorna Coppinger , John Allman /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/38932225

Monsters and their makers 10/23/2025

Monsters and their makers It seems we've always had monsters among us. We've long been enthralled by dragons and giants, by the likes of Frankenstein and Godzilla and Dracula, by witches and werewolves and countless others. They roam our maps and creation myths; they crop up in our dreams, in our children's books, in our political rhetoric. Where do these beings spring from? What do they do for us? How have they changed over time? And, ultimately, what do our monsters say about their makers? My guests today are and . Both are historians of science and authors of recent books on monsters: Natalie's book is . Surekha's book is . Here, Surekha, Natalie, and I talk about monsters as category breakers and boundary walkers—and about how monstrosity is in the eye of the beholder. We walk through a menagerie of monsters—from the apocryphal blemmyes of old travelogues, to a hairy-faced girl in 16th century France, to the figure of Caliban in The Tempest. We discuss the psychological and cultural forces that generate monsters. And we talk about whether anyone would want to live in a world without them. Along the way, we touch on the "monstrification" of social groups; psychoanalysis; our primal fear of snakes; curiosity cabinets; therianthropes and the Cave of the Three Brothers; the relationship between monstrosity and geography; our long fascination with so-called monstrous births; the Muppet Show; dinosaurs and sea creatures; and the question of what monsters might do for children in particular. Alright friends, it's the monstrous season and this is a fun one to help you celebrate. Enjoy! Notes 3:00 – Grendel's mother has often been a subject of critical discussion and adaptation. See, for instance, the 2018 novel, . 12:30 – For a classic history-of-science treatment of “wonders” (including monsters) and our conceptions of nature, see . 18:30 – For those unfamiliar with muppets, of the Muppet Show, which premiered in 1976. 24:00 – The blemmyes were often the subjects of illustration—for examples, see . 26:00 – For more on Sir Walter Raleigh and the blemmyes, see Dr. Davies’ recent . 29:00 – One example of monsters at the margins of maps can be seen in the . 32:00 – For more on Cave of the Trois-Frères and the Sorcerer, see . 34:00 – For more on shamanism, see our with Manvir Singh. 37:00 – Therianthropes are relatively rare in cave art, but have nonetheless been widely discussed. For an example, see . 39:00 – For more on Antonietta Gonsalvus and her family, including examples of how she was represented in paintings of the era, see . 45:00 – The trope of monsters in creation stories is often called “.” 47:00 – The meanings of Medusa have been widely discussed and debated. See for an example. 52:00 – For more about Caliban, and the racial and colonial dimensions of the Tempest, see . 57:00 – The Steinbeck quote comes from his book, Recommendations , edited by Asa Simon Mittman & Peter J. Dendle , by Nadja Durbach , by Philip Ball , by J.R.R. Tolkien , by Marina Warner , by Maurice Sendak Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/38750090

The age of social AI 10/08/2025

The age of social AI AI therapists and caregivers. Digital tutors and advisors and friends. Artificial lovers. Griefbots trained to imitate dead loved ones. Welcome, to the bustling world of AI-powered chatbots. This was once the stuff of science fiction, but it's becoming just the stuff of everyday life. What will these systems do to our society, to our relationships, to our social skills and motivations? Are these bots destined to leave us hollowed out, socially stunted, screen-addicted, and wary of good-old-fashioned, in-the-flesh human interaction? Or could they actually be harnessed for good? My guest today is . Henry is a philosopher and AI ethicist at the at Cambridge University. In a series of recent papers, Henry has been exploring this brave new world of "social AI" and its philosophical, ethical, and psychological dimensions. Here, Henry and I sketch the current landscape of social AI—from dedicated platforms like Replika and CharacterAI to the more subtly social uses of ChatGPT and Claude. We consider several tragic cases that have recently rocketed these kinds of services into public awareness. We talk about what's changed about AI systems—quite recently—that’s now made them capable of sustained relationships. We linger on the possible risks of social AI and, perhaps less obviously, on the possible benefits. And we consider the prospects for regulation. Along the way, Henry and I also talk about his 81-year-old father, his teenage self, and, of course, the kids these days; we consider whether social AI, in its potential harms, is more like social media or more like violent video games; we talk about "deskilling" and it's opposite "upskilling"; and we of course take stock of a certain elephant in the room. Alright friends, this is a fun one. We've been wanting to explore this dawning age of social AI for some time. And we finally found, in Henry, the right person to do it with. Enjoy! Notes 3:00 – The piece in The Guardian—''—by Jacy Reece Anthis. 5:00 – The Replika . 9:30 – of recent research on the bedside manner of AI systems. 10:30 – For a recent paper on AI by the philosopher Ophelia Deroy, see . 11:30 – For some of Dr. Shevlin's recent writing about "social AI", see and . 13:30 – OpenAI’s recent report, ''. 16:30 – For examples of popular media coverage of recent (tragic) cases involving chatbots, see , , , and . 21:00 – The by Rose Guingrich and Michael Graziano on how users describe their relationships with chatbots. 24:00 – The precise quote by Mark Twain is: “Nothing so needs reforming as other people’s habits.” 25:30 – The on Mary’s room by Frank Jackson. 27:00 – Dr. Shevlin has also worked on questions about animal minds (e.g., ), as well as a number of issues in AI beyond “social AI” (e.g., , ). 30:00 – The by Isaiah Berlin on hedgehogs and foxes. 32:00 – The on ELIZA, introduced by Joseph Weizenbaum in 1966. A of ELIZA that you can interact with. For work by Sherry Turkle, see . 34:00 – Dr. Shevlin’s about the “anthropomimetic turn” in contemporary AI. 41:00 – For recent work on whether current chatbots pass a version of the Turing test, see . 45:00 – Ted Chiang’s story, ‘The Lifecycle of Software Objects,’ was re-published as part his collection of short fiction, . 46:00 – For Dr. Shevlin’s recent writing on machine consciousness, see . 48:00 – For more on the possibility of consciousness in borderline cases (like AI systems), see our past episodes and . 52:00 – The on whether people attribute consciousness to LLMs. 54:30 – A on griefbots by scholars at the University of Cambridge. A about the phenomenon. 55:30 – A describing the so-called DigiDan experiment. 1:00:00 – Some of the potentially positive social qualities of AIs are discussed in by Paul Bloom. 1:19:30 – For more on Iain Banks’ culture series, see . 1:20:30 – A on the phenomenon of hikikomori. Recommendations The collection The new podcast, Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/38518695

Brains of a feather 09/24/2025

Brains of a feather Birds do the darnedest things. They fly, of course. They sing. They hunt in pitch darkness. They hide their food and remember where they put it. They use tools and migrate over astonishingly vast distances—sometimes even sleeping while in flight. How do they do all this? What's going on in their brains that makes these and other remarkable behaviors possible? How did their evolutionary path mold them into the incredible creatures they are today? My guests today are and . Andrew is a comparative neuroscientist and Associate Professor at the University of Lethbridge in Canada. Georg is a Professor of Neurobiology and Behavior at the University of California, Irvine. Together they are the authors of the new book, (available open access ). Here, Georg, Andrew, and I consider the deep history of birds—how they skirted the mass extinction event that felled the dinosaurs, and then radiated out into the 11,000 plus species we know today. We talk about how bird brains differ from those of mammals and reptiles—in terms of their size, but also in terms of their major structures, and in terms of their wrinkliness. We tour some of the most peculiar and perplexing bird behaviors, and consider their neural and anatomical underpinnings. Finally, we consider what we can learn from bird brains, not just about birds but about brains in general—how they evolve, how they get wired up, how they do and do not vary. Along the way we touch on barn owls, hummingbirds, megapodes, mallards, pigeons, parrots, starlings, and underestimated waterfowl; we touch on how birds' brains change with the seasons; the enduring mystery of magnetoreception; the possibility of olfactory maps; the optocollic reflex; the social intelligence hypothesis and the extractive foraging hypothesis; precocial versus altricial bird species; split-body gynandromorphy; and the future of non-invasive work in bird neuroscience. Season 7 of Many Minds is now gathering steam. We've got some great episodes in the works for you. Just a little reminder that we'd be grateful—thrilled, even—if you could help us get the word out about our show. You might do this by leaving a rating or a review, or by telling a colleague about us. We really appreciate the support, friends! Without further ado, here's my conversation with Dr. Georg Striedter and Dr. Andrew Iwaniuk. Enjoy! Notes 8:00 – For more on the deep history of the brains of birds and other vertebrates, see: Dr. Striedter’s book (co-authored with R. Glenn Northcutt), ; this authored by Dr. Striedter and colleagues; and authored by Dr. Iwaniuk and colleagues. 9:30 – The on neuron density in birds, by Dr. Pavel Němec and colleagues. 20:00 – For more about Dr. Striedter and colleagues revising some of the terminology for bird brain structures, see and . 24:00 – A by Dr. Striedter and colleagues on cortical folding. 34:00 – A describing seasonal neurogenesis in European starlings. 38:00 – A on the phenomenon of unihemispheric sleep across species. 42:00 – A demonstrating the optocollic reflex in a bird. 45:00 – A on the puzzles of magnetoreception in birds and other animals. 51:00 – A on sound localization in barn owls. 54:00 – A by Dr. Iwaniuk and colleagues showing that harriers have an auditory system much like the (better-studied) owl. 58:00 – For more on place cells, the hippocampus, and cognitive maps, see our with Dr. Hugo Spiers. For more on the evolution of the hippocampus in birds and reptiles, see Dr. Striedter’s paper . 1:02:00 – For images of gynandromorphy in birds, see and . 1:10:00 – For a recent paper on “parental provisioning,” the precocial-altricial spectrum, and brain size in birds, see . 1:13:00 – For examples of research on the social intelligence hypothesis in birds and other animals, see and . 1:18:00 – For work by Dr. Iwaniuk and colleagues on some of the most interesting features of parrot brains, see . 1:27:00 – The Recommendations , by Rebecca Heisman , by Ed Yong [!] , by Bernd Heinrich , by Nathan Emery , by Carl Zimmer Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/38347170

How nature restores the mind 09/10/2025

How nature restores the mind One afternoon you decide to snub your responsibilities and go for a hike. You spend a few hours in the woods or the mountains. You study the bark of trees, you bathe in birdsong, you let your eyes roam along a distant ridgeline. And you come back feeling better, restored somehow—like you have more energy, more patience, more bandwidth. We've all, I'm guessing, had experiences like this. But what's behind these effects? Why would nature restore us? What's the evidence that it really does? And what is even being restored, actually? My guest today is . Marc is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Chicago where he directs the . Marc is also the author of a new book, . Here, Marc and I talk about Attention Restoration Theory—the idea that nature experiences restore our limited capacity for directed attention. We discuss the broader field of "environmental neuroscience," which Marc helped kickstart and continues to lead. We range across studies from Marc's lab that show nature's beneficial effects—on attention, on mood, and on health. We talk about what the active ingredients in nature seem to be. And we discuss the field's prospects for understanding how nature impacts not just the mind, but the brain itself. Along the way, Marc and I touch on: soft versus harsh fascination; the elusive concept of "mental energy"; trees, wood, fire, and rain; the architect and theorist Christopher Alexander; the value of fake plants; fractalness in space and time; curvature and spirituality; and how nature tends to steer our thoughts in certain directions. Needless to say, we're stoked to be kicking off a new season of Many Minds. If you're new to the show, welcome! If you're already a fan, perhaps you'd consider leaving us a rating or a review on your platform of choice. It really does help us reach new listeners. Alright friends, on to my conversation w/ Dr. Marc Berman. Enjoy! Notes and links 7:00 – For more on Attention Restoration Theory and the distinctions it makes between directed attention and involuntary attention, see by Dr. Stephen Kaplan. For more on the construct of “directed attention” in general, see by Dr. Kaplan and Dr. Berman. 12:00 – For an overview of the aims and scope of “environmental neuroscience,” see by Dr. Berman and colleagues. 17:00 – The 1989 book by Dr. Stephen Kaplan and Dr. Rachel Kaplan, 21:30 – For the “walk in the park” study that kickstarted Dr. Berman’s research on environmental neuroscience, see . 25:30 – For some of Dr. Berman and colleagues’ work on nature sounds, see and . 27:00 – For a study on the possible benefits of nature for children with ADHD, see . 30:00 – For more on the Garden of the Phoenix (aka the Osaka Garden) in Chicago, see . For a news article about the benefits of “tiny forests,” see . 34:00 – See for the follow-up to the “walk in the park” study with people experiencing depression. 38:00 – For the study on the relationship between tree cover and cardiometabolic health in Toronto, see . 44:00 – For the classic study by Dr. Roger Ulrich on how the view from one's hospital room may impact recovery, see . 47:00 – For more on the link between crime and nature in apartment complexes in Chicago, see . 49:00 – A preprint by Dr. Berman and colleagues on the “compressibility” and memorability of natural images is . 55:00 – For some of Dr. Berman’s earliest work on the "low-level" visual features of natural scenes, see . 57:00 – For the work, led by Kathryn Schertz, on how natural (or non-natural) images with curved edges direct our thoughts, see . 1:01:00 – The firelight talk paper is . 1:02:30 – For the study by Dr. Schertz, Dr. Berman, and colleagues comparing thoughts in the conservatory and at the mall, see . 1:05:00 – For the study on a historical increase in the use of the generic term “tree” in English, see . 1:06:00 – Christopher Alexander, the architect and theorist, is perhaps best known for his (co-authored) book, . For the study by Alex Coburn, Dr. Berman, and colleagues, see . 1:09:30 – To get a visual flavor of La Sagrada Familia, see . 1:18:00 – The on whether people can reliably predict how much they will enjoy a walk in nature. 1:20:00 – For some of Dr. Berman and colleagues’ initial work on temporal “fractalness” in the brain, see . Recommendations Greg Bratman et al., ‘’ Kim Doell et al., ‘’ Lucia Mason et al., ‘’ Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/38174280

From the archive: Revisiting the dawn of human cognition 09/04/2025

From the archive: Revisiting the dawn of human cognition Hi friends! We're taking a much-needed summer pause—we'll have new episodes for you later in September. In the meanwhile, enjoy this pick from our archives! ------- [originally aired June 1, 2023] There's a common story about the human past that goes something like this. For a few hundred thousand years during the Stone Age we were kind of limping along as a species, in a bit of a cognitive rut, let’s say. But then, quite suddenly, around 30 or 40 thousand years ago in Europe, we really started to come into our own. All of a sudden we became masters of art and ornament, of symbolism and abstract thinking. This story of a kind of "cognitive revolution" in the Upper Paleolithic has been a mainstay of popular discourse for decades. I’m guessing you’re familiar with it. It's been discussed in influential books by Jared Diamond and Yuval Harari; you can read about it on Wikipedia. What you may not know is that this story, compelling as it may be, is almost certainly wrong. My first guest today is , an archaeologist at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, where she heads the Pan-African Evolution research group. My second guest is , an archaeologist and Lecturer at the University of Tübingen in Germany. Together, Eleanor and Manuel are authors of a new paper titled In the paper, they pull together a wealth of evidence showing that there really was no cognitive revolution—no one watershed moment in time and space. Rather, the origins of modern human cognition and culture are to be found not in one part of Europe but across Africa. And they’re also to be found much earlier than that classic picture suggests. Here, we talk about the “cognitive revolution" model and why it has endured. We discuss a seminal paper from the year 2000 that first influentially challenged the revolution model. We talk about the latest evidence of complex cognition from the Middle Stone Age in Africa—including the perforation of marine shells to make necklaces; and the use of ochre for engraving, painting, and even sunblock. We discuss how, though the same complex cognitive abilities were likely in place for the last few hundred thousand years, those abilities were often expressed patchily in different parts of the world at different times. And we consider the factors that led to this patchy expression, especially changes in population size. I confess I was always a bit taken with this whole "cognitive revolution" idea. It had a certain mystery and allure. This new picture that’s taking its place is certainly a bit messier, but no less fascinating. And, more importantly, it’s truer to the complexities of the human saga. Alright friends, on to my conversation with Eleanor Scerri & Manuel Will. Enjoy! A transcript of this episode is available . Notes and links 3:30 – The paper by Dr. Scerri and Dr. Will we discuss in this episode is . Their paper updates and pays tribute to a classic by McBrearty and Brooks, published in 2000. 6:00 – The classic “cognitive revolution” model sometimes discussed under the banner of “” or the “Great Leap Forward.” It has been recently featured, for instance, in Harari’s . 11:00 – Dr. Scerri has written extensively on debates about where humans evolved within Africa—see, e.g., this . 18:00 – A of perforated marine shells in North Africa during the Middle Stone Age. A by Dr. Will and colleagues about the use of various marine resources during this period. 23:00 – A describing the uses of ochre across Africa during the Middle Stone Age. Another describing evidence for ochre processing 100,000 years ago at Blombos Cave in South Africa. At the same site, have been found. 27:00 – A examining the evidence that ochre was used as an adhesive. 30:00 – For a recent review of the concept of “cumulative culture,” see . We discussed the concept of “cumulative culture” in our with Dr. Cristine Legare. 37:00 – For an overview of the career of the human brain and the timing of various changes, see our with Dr. Jeremy DeSilva. 38:00 – An on the role of demography in the emergence of complex human behavior. 41:00 – On the idea that distinctive human intelligence is due in large part to culture and our abilities to acquire cultural knowledge, see Henrich’s . See also our with Dr. Michael Muthukrishna. 45:00 – For discussion of the Neanderthals and why they may have died out, see our with Dr. Rebecca Wragg Sykes. Recommendations Dr. Scerri recommends research on the oldest Homo sapiens fossils, found in Morocco and described , and new research on the evidence for the widespread burning of landscapes in Malawi, described . Dr. Will recommends the forthcoming update of Peter Mitchell’s book, . See Twitter for more updates from and . Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Our transcripts are created by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Twitter () or Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/38089030

From the archive: Of molecules and memories 08/21/2025

From the archive: Of molecules and memories Hi friends! We're taking a much-needed August pause—we'll have new episodes for you in September. In the meanwhile, enjoy this pick from our archives! _____ [originally aired February 8, 2024] Where do memories live in the brain? If you've ever taken a neuroscience class, you probably learned that they're stored in our synapses, in the connections between our neurons. The basic idea is that, whenever we have an experience, the neurons involved fire together in time, and the synaptic connections between them get stronger. In this way, our memories for those experiences become minutely etched into our brains. This is what might be called the synaptic view of memory—it's the story you'll find in textbooks, and it's often treated as settled fact. But some reject this account entirely. The real storehouses of memory, they argue, lie elsewhere. My guest today is Dr. Sam Gershman. Sam is Professor of Psychology at Harvard University, and the director of the Computational Cognitive Neuroscience Lab there. In a recent paper, he marshals a wide-ranging critique of the synaptic view. He makes a compelling case that synapses can't be the whole story—that we also have to look inside the neurons themselves. Here, Sam and I first discuss the synaptic view and the evidence that seems to support it. We then talk about some of the problems with this classic picture. We consider, for example, cases where memories survive the radical destruction of synapses; and, more provocatively, cases where memories are formed in single-celled organisms that lack synapses altogether. We talk about the dissenting view, long lurking in the margins, that intracellular molecules like RNA could be the real storage sites of memory. Finally, we talk about Sam's new account—a synthesis that posits a role for both synapses and molecules. Along the way we touch on planaria and paramecia; spike-timing dependent plasticity; the patient H.M.; metamorphosis, hibernation, and memory transfer; the pioneering work of Beatrice Gelber; unfairly maligned ideas; and much, much more. Before we get to it, one important announcement: Applications are now open for the 2024 Diverse Intelligences Summer Institute (or DISI)! The event will be held in beautiful, seaside St Andrews, Scotland, from June 30 to July 20. If you like this show—if you like the conversations we have and the questions we ask—it's a safe bet that you'd like DISI. You can find more info at —that's . Review of applications will begin on Mar 1, so don't delay. Alright friends, on to my conversation about the biological basis of memory with Dr. Sam Gershman. Enjoy! Notes and links 4:00 - A on planarian memory transfer experiments and the scientist who conducted them, James V. McConnell. 8:00 - For more on Dr. Gershman’s research and general approach, see his and the on his lab website. 9:30 - A explaining long-term potentiation. An of “Hebbian Learning.” The phrase “neurons that fire together wire together” was, contrary to widespread misattribution, coined by Dr. Carla Shatz . 12:30 - The of Dr. Jeremy Gunawardena, Associate Professor of Systems Biology at Harvard University. A from Dr. Gunawardena’s lab on the avoidance behaviors exhibited by the single-celled organism Stentor (which vindicates some disputed, century-old findings). 14:00 - A by C. R. Gallistel describing some of his views on the biological basis of memory. 19:00 - The term “engram” refers to the physical trace of a memory. See recent reviews about the so-called search for the engram , , and . 20:00 - An on the importance of H.M. in neuroscience. 28:00 - A about the phenomenon of spike-timing dependent plasticity. 33:00 - An , co-authored by former guest , on the evidence for memory persistence despite radical remodeling of brain structures. See our episode with Dr. Levin . 35:00 - A reporting the persistence of memories in decapitated planarians. A about these findings. 36:30 - An reviewing one chapter in the memory transfer history. Another reviewing evidence for “vertical” memory transfer (between generations). 39:00 - For more recent demonstrations of memory transfer, see and . 40:00 - A by Dr. Gershman, Dr. Gunawardena, and colleagues reconsidering the evidence for learning in single cells and describing the contributions of Dr. Beatrice Gelber. A about Gelber following the publication of the paper by Dr. Gershman and colleagues. 45:00 – A arguing for the need to understand computation in single-celled organisms to understand how computation evolved more generally. 46:30 – of classical conditioning in paramecia, led by Dr. Todd Hennessey. 49:00 – For more on plant signaling, see with Dr. Paco Calvo and Dr. Natalie Lawrence. 56:00 – A on “serial reversal learning” and its neuroscientific basis. 1:07:00 – A demonstrating a role for methylation in memory. Recommendations , by Herbert Spencer Jennings , by C. R. Gallistel and Adam Philip King , by Dennis Bray Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Our transcripts are created by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Twitter () or Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/37915420

From the archive: Consider the spider 08/07/2025

From the archive: Consider the spider Hi friends! We're taking a much-needed August pause—we'll have new episodes for you in September. In the meanwhile, enjoy this pick from our archives! _____ [originally aired May 30, 2024] Maybe your idea of spiders is a bit like mine was. You probably know that they have eight legs, that some are hairy. Perhaps you imagine them spending most of their time sitting in their webs—those classic-looking ones, of course—waiting for snacks to arrive. Maybe you consider them vaguely menacing, or even dangerous. Now this is not all completely inaccurate—spiders do have eight legs, after all—but it's a woefully incomplete and drab caricature. Your idea of spiders, in other words, may be due for a refresh. My guest today is , Professor in the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Canterbury, in New Zealand. Ximena is the author of the new book, . It’s an accessible and stunningly illustrated survey of spider behavior, ecology, and cognition. In this conversation, Ximena and I do a bit of ‘Spiders 101’. We talk about spider senses—especially how spiders use hairs to detect the minutest of vibrations and how they see, usually, with four pairs of eyes. We talk about web-making—which, by the way, the majority of spiders don't do—and silk-making—which all do, but for more reasons than you may realize. We talk about how spiders hunt, jump, dance, pounce, plan, decorate, cache, balloon, and possibly count. We talk about why so many spiders mimic ants. We take up the puzzle of “stabilimenta”. We talk about whether webs constitute an extended sensory apparatus—like a gigantic ear—and why spiders are an under-appreciated group of animals for thinking about the evolution of mind, brain, and behavior. Alright friends, this one is an absolute feast. So let's get to it. On to my conversation with Dr. Ximena Nelson. Enjoy! A transcript of this episode is available . Notes and links 3:00 – A about our “collective arachnid aversion” to spiders. 8:00 – An by Dr. Nelson about jumping spider behavior. 8:30 – In addition to spiders, Dr. Nelson also studies kea parrots (e.g., ). 12:00 – A about the thousands of spider species known to science—and the thousands that remain unknown. 16:30 – A about a mostly vegetarian spider, Bagheera kiplingi. 18:00 – For the mating dance of the peacock spider, see . 20:00 – A on spider “hearing” via their webs. 24:00 – The iNaturalist profile of the . 29:30 – A of extended sensing in humans during tool use. 33:00 – A of vision (and other senses) in jumping spiders. 40:00 – An earlier of spider webs and silk. 45:00 – For a primer on bird’s nests, see . 48:00 – An describing the original work on how various drugs alter spiders’ webs. 49:00 – A in the long-standing stabilimenta debate. 54:00 – A about “ballooning” in spiders. 57:00 – An by Dr. Nelson and a colleague about jumping spiders as an important group for studies in comparative cognition. 1:01:00 – A of reversal learning in jumping spiders, which found large individual differences. 1:07:00 – A of larder monitoring in orb weaver spiders. 1:10:00 – A by Dr. Nelson and a colleague on numerical competence in Portia spiders. 1:16:00 – An on the so-called insect apocalypse. Recommendations , by M. Herberstein ‘,’ by F. Barth ‘’, by H. Japyassú and K. Lala Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Our transcripts are created by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. s For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Twitter () or Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/37721105

The shaman with a thousand faces 07/24/2025

The shaman with a thousand faces When you hear the word "shaman," I'm guessing a web of associations starts to form in your mind. Perhaps you imagine strange ceremonies and strong substances; maybe you think of an earlier time when magic and superstition reigned. But shamanism is not just some relic of the past, or a curio from exotic lands. It's part of our present, and it will almost certainly be part of our future. This is because the roots of shamanism lie within us all. My guest today is . Manvir is an Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Davis and to The New Yorker. He's also the author of a new book—. Here, Manvir and I talk about his fieldwork with Mentawai shamans in Indonesia. We discuss what makes a shaman a shaman and consider the cognitive building blocks that make shamanism so widespread and so appealing. We discuss the shamanic origins of Abrahamic religions. We consider how, over the course of history, shamanism has repeatedly resurged, despite attempts to snuff it out. And we also talk about the various forms and flavors that shamanism takes in contemporary Western societies. Along the way, Manvir and I touch on: drumming, fasting, and the “dark tent”; Jesus; experimental Edens; witches, prophets, and messiahs; glossolalia; disenchantment and re-enchantment; the rise of neoshamanism; Paleolithic rock art; hedge wizards and tech CEOs; Western exceptionalism; and the routinization of charisma. If you enjoy this episode, I highly recommend that you check out Manvir's book—it's a captivating blend of narrative and ideas and it goes far beyond what we were able to talk about here. I'll also flag that this is Manvir's second time on Many Minds. Back in July of 2020 we had —broader in scope—where we talked about shamanism but also Manvir's work on witches, stories, and music. So you might check that one out as well. Alright friends, on to my conversation with Dr. Manvir Singh. Enjoy! A transcript of this episode is available . Notes and links 4:00 – For video examples of shamanic rituals from around the world, see Dr. Singh’s recent thread on / . 12:30 – On the idea of “cultural attraction” and “cultural attractors,” see and . For a recent treatment of the idea of “super-attractors,” see Dr. Singh’s preprint . 16:00 – On the case of cultural loss among the Northern Aché, see the by Dr. Singh and a colleague. 17:30 – For more on Dr. Singh’s theoretical framework for understanding shamanism, see his earlier . 19:00 – The of altered states of consciousness by Vaitl et al. For more on psychedelics and altered states, see with Chris Letheby. 29:00 – Mircea Eliade’s classic work on shamanism—. 34:00 – For the book by Martin Riesebrodt on the nature of religion, see . 36:00 – For more on the human propensity for ritual, see with Dimitris Xygalatas. 43:00 – For one influential interpretation of Paleolithic rock art as evidence for shamanism, see David Lewis-Williams’ book, . 52:00 – For a discussion of psychedelics and organized religion that touches on the “routinization of charisma,” see by Michael Pollan. 54:00 – For more about the case of Alice Auma, see Dr. Singh’s in The New Yorker. 1:00:30 – For more about neoshamanism and Michael Harner, see the website of the Foundation for Shamanic Studies—. 1:04:00 – For the analysis of financial managers by Samuel Johnson, see . 1:06:00 – For more on the quasi-shamanic flavor of tech CEOs, see Rakesh Khurana’s book, . 1:08:00 – See, again, Dr. Singh’s in The New Yorker in which he discusses Trump and prophet-like status. 1:13:00 – For Dr. Singh’s work on other complex cultural traditions, see the website for . Recommendations , by Gilbert Herdt , by Davi Kopenawa & Bruce Albert Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Our transcripts are created by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. s For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Twitter () or Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/37533095

Varieties of childhood 07/10/2025

Varieties of childhood Childhood is a special time, a strange time. Children are adored and catered to—they're given their own menus and bedrooms. They're considered delicate and precious, and so we cushion them from every imaginable risk. Kids are encouraged to play, of course—but very often it's under the watchful eye of anxious adults. This, anyway, is how childhood looks in much of the United States today. But is this the way childhood looks everywhere? Is this the way human childhoods have always been? My guests today are and . Dorsa is an Assistant Professor of Psychology & Neuroscience at Duke University, where she runs the . Sheina is an Associate Professor of Psychology at Durham University in the UK, where she co-directs the research group. Both Sheina and Dorsa have spent much of their careers thinking about how childhoods differ across cultures—and why. In this conversation, I talk with Dorsa and Sheina about their fieldwork with indigenous groups in Ecuador and the Congo, respectively. We discuss the different ways that childhood differs in these places—for instance, in terms of parents' attitudes toward risk, in terms of the social structures and activities in which kids are embedded, and in terms of the freedom that children are granted. We discuss developmental psychology's "WEIRD problem." We talk about the quasi-autonomous cultures that children create among themselves—sometimes called "peer cultures"—and discuss how these kid-driven cultures end up shaping and benefit the larger community. Along the way, we touch on adult supremacy, adverse childhood experiences, walking the forest and climbing papaya trees, parenting norms, ding dong ditch and "nananabooboo", the pioneering work of the folklorists Iona and Peter Opie, teaching, toys, and the enduring question of what childhood is for. Alright friends, lots to think about here. On to my conversation with Sheina Lew-Levy and Dorsa Amir. Enjoy! A transcript of this episode is available . Notes and links 9:30 – For an overview of work on how culture shapes motor development, see . 11:00 – The by Dr. Lew-Levy’s and a colleague about “walking the forest.” 16:00 – Dr. Amir’s TedX talk, ‘.’ 17:30 – For some of Dr. Amir’s work on risk across cultures, see . 35:00 – For a recent paper by Dr. Lew-Levy and colleagues about the evolution of childhood, see . 39:00 – The by Ann Gibbons, ‘The Birth of Childhood.’ 41:00 – For the idea of the “patriarch hypothesis,” see . 42:00 – For more on the “WEIRD problem” in developmental psychology, see . 48:00 – A by Dr. Lew-Levy and colleagues about toys in hunter-gatherer groups. For more on the material culture of childhood, see our with Michelle Langley. 52:00 – A by Dr. Lew-Levy on the prevalence of “child-to-child” teaching. 56:00 – A by Dr. Amir and a colleague about the concept of “adverse childhood experiences” in cross-cultural perspective. 1:04:00 – The by Dr. Amir and Dr. Lew-Levy on “peer cultures” and children as agents of cultural adaptation. 1:08:00 – For more on the idea of children as the "research and development" wing of the species, see our with Alison Gopnik. 1:10:00 – For more on the Opies, see . 1:13:00 – For the work of () Olivier Morin on children’s culture, see . 1:23:00 – For the paper by Dr. Camilla Morelli, ‘The River Echoes with Laughter,’ see . Recommendations , by Iona and Peter Opie by Alison Gopnik by David Lancy , by Barry Hewlett Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Our transcripts are created by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Twitter () or Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/37363365

Science, AI, and illusions of understanding 06/26/2025

Science, AI, and illusions of understanding AI will fundamentally transform science. It will supercharge the research process, making it faster and more efficient and broader in scope. It will make scientists themselves vastly more productive, more objective, maybe more creative. It will make many human participants—and probably some human scientists—obsolete… Or at least these are some of the claims we are hearing these days. There is no question that various AI tools could radically reshape how science is done, and how much science is done. What we stand to gain in all this is pretty clear. What we stand to lose is less obvious, but no less important. My guest today is . Molly is a Professor in the Department of Psychology and the University Center for Human Values at Princeton University. In a recent , Molly and the anthropologist presented a framework for thinking about the different roles that are being imagined for AI in science. And they argue that, when we adopt AI in these ways, we become vulnerable to certain illusions. Here, Molly and I talk about four visions of AI in science that are currently circulating: AI as an Oracle, as a Surrogate, as a Quant, and as an Arbiter. We talk about the very real problems in the scientific process that AI promises to help us solve. We consider the ethics and challenges of using Large Language Models as experimental subjects. We talk about three illusions of understanding the crop up when we uncritically adopt AI into the research pipeline—an illusion that we understand more than we actually do; an illusion that we're covering a larger swath of a research space than we actually are; and the illusion that AI makes our work more objective. We also talk about how ideas from Science and Technology Studies (or STS) can help us make sense of this AI-driven transformation that, like it or not, is already upon us. Along the way Molly and I touch on: AI therapists and AI tutors, anthropomorphism, the culture and ideology of Silicon Valley, Amazon's Mechanical Turk, fMRI, objectivity, quantification, Molly's mid-career crisis, monocultures, and the squishy parts of human experience. Without further ado, on to my conversation with Dr. Molly Crockett. Enjoy! A transcript of this episode is available . Notes and links 5:00 – For more on LLMs—and the question of whether we understand how they work—see our with Murray Shanahan. 9:00 – For the paper by Dr. Crockett and colleagues about the social/behavioral sciences and the COVID-19 pandemic, see . 11:30 – For Dr. Crockett and colleagues’ work on outrage on social media, see this . 18:00 – For a recent exchange on the prospects of using LLMs in scientific peer review, see . 20:30 – Donna Haraway’s essay, 'Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective’, is . See also Dr. Haraway's book, . 22:00 – For the recent essay by Henry Farrell and others on AI as a cultural technology, see . 23:00 – For a recent report on chatbots driving people to mental health crises, see . 25:30 – For the already-classic “stochastic parrots” article, see . 33:00 – For the study by Ryan Carlson and Dr. Crockett on using crowd-workers to study altruism, see . 34:00 – For more on the “illusion of explanatory depth,” see with Tania Lombrozo. 53:00 – For more about Ohio State’s plans to incorporate AI in the classroom, see . For a recent essay by Dr. Crockett on the idea of “techno-optimism,” see . Recommendations , by Adam Becker , by L. A. Paul , by Miranda Fricker Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Our transcripts are created by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Twitter () or Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/37169140

The primeval soil of play 06/12/2025

The primeval soil of play Puppies wrestling and mock-biting each other. Toddlers playing hide and seek. Kittens pouncing—repeatedly—on a toy mouse. You've no doubt looked on at scenes like this with amusement. And you've no doubt seen some of those viral videos—of ravens sledding down hills, of bumble bees playing with balls. All these moments make us smile, maybe even giggle. But the scientific questions they raise merit serious attention. Where do we see play in the animal kingdom? Where do we not? What functions does play serve? Do we—and many other creatures—have an elemental need for play? My guest today is . Gordon is a longtime Professor in the Department of Psychology and the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Tennessee. For decades now, Gordon has been a pioneer in the study of animal play, with a particular focus on play in reptiles and other animals not usually considered playful. His 2005 book, , remains a landmark in the field. Here, Gordon and I talk about the major types of play: locomotor play, object play, and social play. We discuss the five criteria he has proposed for recognizing play across animal taxa. We survey several of the functions of play that have been proposed over the decades, and discuss how—in the end—play doesn't seem to have just one function. We also talk about human play—about what sets it apart, and about the possibility that play lies at the root of many of the capacities and institutions we think of as distinctively, impressively human. Along the way, Gordon and I touch on play in bears, pythons, turtles, fruit flies, and octopuses. We consider play between members of taxonomically distant species. We talk about “self-handicapping”; the surplus resource theory of play; the importance of "risky play" and "free play"; the immersive quality of play; bodily and vocal play signals in mammals; and whether human play is increasingly endangered. Without further ado, here's my conversation with Dr. Gordon Burghardt. Enjoy! A transcript of this episode is available . Notes and links 3:00 – A on the finding of “play-like” behavior in fruit flies. The original . 4:30 – For recent reviews of play by Dr. Burghardt and colleagues, covering the three major types of play, the five criteria for recognizing play, and many other topics, see , , and . 12:00 – For more on Dr. Burghardt’s early research and hand-rearing of black bears, see . 23:30 – For the recent study on ball play in bumble bees, see . 26:00 – For an example of studies examining self-handicapping, see on belugas. 27:00 – For a video of a bull and goat butting heads, see . For more on cross-species play, see this by Dr. Burghardt and a colleague. 31:00 – For more on the “relaxed open mouth expression” and “play face,” see our on the origins of the smile. For a recent study about such expressions possibly attested in dolphins, see . 44:00 – For the book by Johan Huizinga, see . For some of Dr. Burghardt’s ideas about the connections between play and certain aspects of human culture, see . 54:00 – For research on the value of “risky play,” see work by . For an article connecting “free play” and children’s mental health, see . Recommendations , by David Toomey Many Minds is a project of the , which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by , with help from Assistant Producer and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by . Our transcripts are created by . Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter ! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit or follow us on Twitter () or Bluesky (). /episode/index/show/manyminds/id/36977840

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