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The Big Think Interview

184 episodes

Intimate interviews with the world’s biggest thinkers.

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All Episodes (184)

A weathered metal sign reading "PROGRESS" with an arrow stands in a barren desert landscape under a blue sky.

The moment every civilization fears: the growth plateau

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14 min

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Why skill plateaus are inevitable – and how to push past them

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8 min

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with

A petri dish with a red agar medium shows various colonies of bacteria growing, with dense streaks on the right and scattered colonies on the left.

How chance and error shaped every living being on Earth

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13 min

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with

Sean B. Carroll

A timeline diagram showing portraits of various scientists, documents, and equations connected by arrows, illustrating the historical development of quantum mechanics.

Why general relativity would’ve been discovered without Einstein

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17 min

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with

A black and white soccer ball floats on the surface of the ocean under a partly cloudy sky.

How the myth of destiny distorts our decisions

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10 min

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A close up of a hand.

We doubled human lifespans in the last 200 years. Can we do it again?

A rat stands on a concrete floor, casting a shadow on the wall that resembles the shape of a sheep.

How facing adversity can help you live a deeper, more meaningful life

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9 min

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with

Oliver Burkeman

A person stands alone on calm water with the word "STILLNESS" in bold letters over the scene.

How accepting impermanence can end the struggle to “fix” your life

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21 min

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with

Robert Waldinger

A black background with white text and red lines.

Why 2025 is the single most pivotal year in our lifetime

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15 min

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Are we blinded by our desire to find extraterrestrial life?

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25 min

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with

Black and white cutout of a smiling man's face with red heart shapes drawn over his eyes on a black background.

The ancient origins of partnering and romantic love

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17 min

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Sean Carroll: Can we ever escape the logic of a clockwork universe?

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9 min

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with

A person is leaping between two buildings against a clear blue sky.

The alarm bells are sounding for young men. Will we listen?

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21 min

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with

A Möbius strip made from paper with printed text is displayed against a dark background.

Lawrence Wright: Fiction goes where reporting cannot follow

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16 min

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Lawrence Wright

A person with curly brown hair wearing a black shirt and gray t-shirt sits against a plain white background, gesturing with both hands raised near their chest.

Jesse Eisenberg: How to rewire your anxiety into authenticity

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11 min

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with

Jesse Eisenberg

A digitally rendered black hole with a dark center and a glowing, distorted ring of light surrounding it.

Brian Cox: The bizarre history of black holes

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23 min

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Why the American dream no longer moves upward

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15 min

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with

A silhouette of a human head with swirling arrows inside the brain, illustrating a concept of circular thought or mental processes.

How to train your nervous system for optimal performance

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9 min

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with

Two men in suits face each other against a yellow background, one yelling with a clenched fist, the other pointing and appearing angry.

The 4 hidden forces underneath every argument

Your brain: the most important sex organ in the body

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9 min

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with

A triangle labeled "The Fraud Triangle" with its three sides named Incentive, Opportunity, and Rationalization, on an orange background.

Inside the mind of a white-collar criminal

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32 min

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with

Kelly Richmond Pope

An older man with long white hair and a suit looks at the camera, standing in front of a blurred background with bookshelves.

Michio Kaku: Why we don’t even rank on the Kardashev scale

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12 min

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A person walks barefoot on a slackline stretched high above the ocean, with one arm raised for balance and cliffs visible at each end.

Nate Silver: Habits of highly successful risk-takers

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5 min

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Two red-toned, woodcut-style portraits side by side: one of a gorilla and one of an older man with a beard, on a beige background.

The history of natural selection, in 7 minutes

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8 min

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with

Silhouette of a person overlaid with a sunset sky and a full moon, with tall grass in the foreground.

Sam Harris: Experience emotions without being consumed by them

Use the Triple Check Method to jumpstart your brain

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7 min

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with

Anne-Laure Le Cunff

A hand holding a sealed envelope emerges from turbulent ocean waves against a black background.

Yuval Noah Harari: How to safeguard your mind in the age of junk information

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13 min

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with

Yuval Noah Harari

A man looking at a meteorite.

How two freak accidents shaped human evolution

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20 min

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with

Sean B. Carroll

Two torn paper cutouts of open mouths are positioned against a black background, both appearing to be yelling or shouting.

The true cost of always needing to win an argument

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6 min

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with

Jefferson Fisher

A red flower with a green stem and leaf drawn using overlapping scribbled lines on a black background.

Anxiety gives you an advantage. Unlock it with neuroplasticity

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18 min

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with

Related

Silhouette of a human figure made up of colorful dots with a cloud-like mist behind it, set against a dark background.

95% of the universe is invisible. Here’s why that should fill us with wonder

Everything ever seen — every star, mountain, and face — makes up less than 5 percent of the universe. Astrophysicist Janna Levin reminds us that the rest — dark matter and dark energy — is invisible, mysterious, and everywhere. We are the luminous exception in a universe of darkness.

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13 min

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with

A man sits on a chair in front of a wall featuring abstract black silhouettes of two opposing heads and interconnected lines between them.

How large language models view our world

“What’s really interesting about neural networks is the way that they think or the way that they operate is a lot like human intuition”

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58 min

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A man in a suit sits on a chair in front of a white backdrop in a modern library, with bookshelves, large windows, and a side table with a glass of water.

The strongest arguments for and against the existence of God

“I think that there are very good arguments to believe that there are some kind of foundational principle of the universe, some necessarily existing being, some first cause.”

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1:26:10 min

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with

Alex O’Connor

A stylized illustration of a large eye closely observing a red sphere through a magnifying glass against a blue background.

The spiritual practice of paying attention

Reflecting on the final moments she spent with her mother, and the weeks afterwards spent cataloging her life in objects and memories, Poet Laureate of the Ordinary Kelly Corrigan shares how important it is to attune, to behold, and to notice — even if it’s difficult or uncomfortable:

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10 min

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Close-up of a person's brown eye with a double exposure effect on the left; starry sky with light streaks on the right.

Is searching for purpose an inherent human trait? These experts say yes.

From science to philosophy, three perspectives explore why humans can’t stop asking “why.” Our search for purpose, they suggest, is less about finding answers and more about learning how to move forward.

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3 min

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