In this episode of the Waking Up podcast Sam Harris speaks with Tamler Sommers about cultures of honor. They discuss the difference between honor and dignity, “justice porn,” honor killings, honor and interpersonal violence, prison and gang culture, collective responsibility and collective punishment, retributive vs restorative justice, the ethics of forgiveness and redemption, #metoo, and … Continued

In this episode of the Waking Up podcast, Sam Harris speaks to Bart Ehrman about his experience of being a born-again Christian, his academic training in New Testament scholarship, his loss of faith, the most convincing argument in defense of Christianity, the status of miracles, the composition of the New Testament, the resurrection of Jesus, … Continued

In this episode of the Waking Up podcast, Sam Harris speaks with Sean Carroll about our understanding of reality. They discuss consciousness, the many worlds view of quantum mechanics, the arrow of time, free will, facts and values, and other topics. Sean Carroll is a theoretical physicist at CalTech. He received his PhD from Harvard … Continued

In this episode of the Waking Up podcast, Sam Harris speaks with Ezra Klein, Editor-at-Large for Vox Media, about racism, identity politics, intellectual honesty, and the controversy over his podcast with Charles Murray (Waking Up #73). Ezra Klein is the editor-at-large and founder of Vox. Before that, he was columnist and editor at the Washington … Continued

In this episode of the Waking Up podcast, Sam Harris responds to the ongoing controversy over his interview with Charles Murray and discusses his upcoming conversation with Ezra Klein. He also announces a change he will be making to the format of the podcast.

In this episode of the Waking Up podcast, Sam Harris speaks with Christian Picciolini about his experience as a neo-Nazi skinhead. They discuss how Christian got out of the movement, the limits of shame and forgiveness, the cult-like dynamics of white supremacy, the alt-Right, Russian support for white supremacy in the US, “fake news”, the … Continued

In this episode of the Waking Up podcast, Sam Harris speaks with Rebecca Goldstein and Max Tegmark about the foundations of human knowledge and morality. Rebecca Goldstein is a MacArthur Fellow, a professor of philosophy, and the author of five novels and a collection of short stories. She lives in Boston, Massachusetts. Her latest book is Plato … Continued

In this episode of the Waking Up podcast, Sam Harris speaks with Robin Hanson about our hidden motives in everyday life. They discuss selfishness, hypocrisy, norms and meta-norms, cheating, deception, self-deception, education, the evolutionary logic of conversation, social status, signaling and counter-signaling, common knowledge, AI, and many other topics. Robin Hanson is an associate professor … Continued

In this episode of the Waking Up podcast, Sam Harris speaks with Preet Bharara about President Trump and the Russia investigation. Preet Bharara is an American lawyer who served as U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York from 2009 to 2017. His office prosecuted cases involving terrorism, narcotics and arms trafficking, financial and healthcare … Continued