AI research endured years of failure and frustration before new techniques in deep learning unleashed the swift, astonishing progress of the last decade. Michael’s recent book A Brief History of Artificial Intelligence explores what we can lear

Iris Berent on Innate Knowledge and Why We Are Blind to Ourselves

Jan 28th, 2021 1h 8m

The idea we have ‘innate knowledge’ seems quite wrong to most of us. But we do! And the intuitions leading us astray here also blind us to other aspects of human nature. We are all ‘blind storytellers’. Professor Iris Berent reveals what misle

Ann-Sophie Barwich on the Surprising Neuroscience of Smell

Dec 20th, 2020 49m 13s

Vision is the best understood sensory domain. But smell is turning out to be wonderfully strange and even more complex than sight. Dr Ann-Sophie Barwich joins me to explore ideas from her recent book Smellosophy. How is vomit related to parmesa

Matthew Cobb - Why Neuroscience Still Can’t Explain Much

Nov 22nd, 2020 1h 4m

Despite multi-million dollar research programmes and impressive technical progress, neuroscience still can’t explain basic systems - like a maggot’s tiny brain or the grinding of a lobster’s stomach. Professor Matthew Cobb joins me to discuss t

Edward Bullmore on the ‘inflamed mind’ theory of depression

Jan 30th, 2020 56m 37s

Could depression be caused by inflammation? Cambridge psychiatrist Ed Bullmore makes the case for his radical new theory, from his bestselling book The Inflamed Mind. Here's the breakdown... 6:12 There’s a Cartesian divide in the way we practi

Keith Frankish Exposes the Illusion of Consciousness

Dec 1st, 2019 1h 12m

‘Qualia’, the subjective qualities of experience, are the bedrock of some theories of consciousness - but they are a fiction according to my guest in this episode. With great charm and passion, Keith Frankish makes the case for ‘illusionism’. 0

Joseph LeDoux on the 4 Billion Year Journey to Our Conscious Selves

Oct 27th, 2019 1h 2m

Joseph LeDoux is a celebrated neuroscientist whose latest book is a work of quite staggering ambition - it traces the ‘Four Billion Year Story of How We Got Conscious Brains’. He reveals the profound similarities between us and bacteria, as wel

Patricia Churchland on How We Evolved A Conscience

Sep 15th, 2019 1h

Patricia Churchland is the queen of neurophilosophy. She’s on fine form in this interview - charming, funny and occasionally savage as we range over her views on the nature of philosophy, the neuroscience and evolution of morality, and consider

Gina Rippon on the Myth of the Gendered Brain

Mar 15th, 2019 1h 7m

Do men and women have different brains? Jordan Peterson and the Google memo guy are pretty sure they do. Different chromosomes, different hormones = different brains. Right? Professor Gina Rippon disagrees. Biology, she argues, is not destiny a

Jules Montague on Dementia, Memory and Identity

Feb 12th, 2019 56m 11s

This episode features a neurologist with some striking tales to tell about who we become when our brains start to break. What happens when memories are gradually destroyed by Alzheimer's, when our personality is drastically transformed by demen

Kevin Mitchell on How The Wiring of Our Brains Shapes Who We Are

Jan 29th, 2019 1h

My guest in this episode is a neurogeneticist who is unafraid to tackle some of the most politically charged questions in science. Dr Kevin Mitchell is an associate professor at the Institute of Neuroscience at Trinity College Dublin. His recen

Raymond Tallis on the Uniqueness of Human Consciousness

Dec 16th, 2018 55m 50s

My guest in this episode could be described as a medical doctor who thinks we transcend our biology, or as a neuroscientist who thinks there is much more to us than our brains. Raymond Tallis spent many years as an NHS consultant and Professor

Lucy Johnstone Against Psychiatric Diagnosis

Dec 11th, 2018 1h 7m

In this episode I meet a controversial clinical psychologist who thinks that mainstream mental health services are bad for us. Dr Lucy Johnstone has worked for many years on the frontline of adult mental health services - helping those who may

Philip Goff on why consciousness may be fundamental to reality

Dec 10th, 2018 55m 53s

Panpsychism can seem like a bonkers theory of consciousness, but according to Philip Goff and a growing chorus of leading thinkers - from philosophers to neuroscientists - it might just be right… In this episode we discuss why Philip rates panp