We surprise some of the world's brightest minds with ideas they're not at all prepared to discuss. With host Jason Gots and special guests Alan Alda, Salman Rushdie, Mary-Louise Parker, Richard Dawkins, Margaret Atwood, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett, Saul Williams, Henry Rollins, Bill Nye, George Takei, Maria Popova, and many more . . .
You've got 10 minutes with Einstein. What do you talk about? Black holes? Time travel?
Why not gambling? The Art of War? Contemporary parenting?
Some of the best conversations happen when we're pushed outside of our comfort zones. So each week on Think Again, we surprise smart people you've probably heard of with hand-picked gems from Big Think's interview archives on every imaginable subject. The conversation could go anywhere.
SINCE 2008, BIG THINK has captured on video the best ideas of the world’s leading thinkers and doers in every field, renowned experts including neurologist Oliver Sacks, physicist Stephen Hawking, behavioral psychologist Daniel Kahneman, authors Margaret Atwood and Marylinne Robinson, entrepreneur Sir Richard Branson, painter Chuck Close, and philosopher Daniel Dennett.
For thousands of years, all over the world, we've told tales of monsters and the undead. Why? Aaron Mahnke, creator of the 'Lore' podcast, on the hunger for mystery.
47 Min
Oct 7, 2017
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Author Claire Messud on childhood, growing up, and how we contain the things that scare us.
53 Min
Sep 16, 2017
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Author Salman Rushdie on the secret life of cities and so much more.
56 Min
Sep 9, 2017
The deepest, funniest, strangest moments from the past year of the Think Again podcast. Featuring Kory Stamper, Teju Cole, George Saunders, Slavoj Zizek, Jennifer Doudna, and Timothy Spall.
The deepest, funniest, strangest moments from the past year of the Think Again podcast. Featuring Daniel Dennett, Sarah Goldhagen, Ian McEwan, Alison Gopnik, Erik Kandel, and Alan Alda.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Biologist Richard Dawkins on speaking plainly, animal cruelty, Christopher Hitchens and so much more.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Comic Ari Shaffir talks about outrageousness in comedy, bipartisan e-rage on social media, and growing up and growing out of bad habits.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Oxford historian Peter Frankopan on two millennia of the flow of germs, ideas, commerce, and more from East to West and vice versa.
In one of our wildest episodes ever, comedian Jeff Garlin cuts the surprise clip short to call B.S. on neuroscience and complexity.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Authors Neal Stephenson & Nicole Galland on blurring the lines between science and magic.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Actor and author Alan Alda on the art of communication (for good and evil), social anxiety, the mind of a billionaire, and more.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Geneticist Jennifer Doudna on the profound implications of her CRISPR-Cas-9 gene editing technology for the future of humanity.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Actor Timothy Spall on the layers of contradictions and complexities that define a person, and what's underneath.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Poet, playwright, and arts educator Liza Jessie Peterson on lessons learned teaching incarcerated youth on Rikers Island.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Writer Paul Theroux on tyrannical mothers, colonizing Mars, and an important difference between humans and cockroaches.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Writer Ariel Levy on the silence around the animal facts of women's physical lives, her comically awkward experience with the shamanic hallucinogen Ayahuasca, and much more.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson on the mind-boggling awesomeness of space.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Author Mary Gaitskill on vulnerability, alienation, and Cerebus the Aardvark.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Physicist Lawrence Krauss on why neutrinos are his favorite particles, light as the protagonist of modern physics, and more.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Neuroscientist Dean Buonomano on how the brain tells time and whether time exists at all.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Architecture critic Sarah W. Goldhagen on how the built environment shapes our lives.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Lexicographer Kory Stamper on the slipperiness of language and how the sausage of dictionaries is made.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Joyce Carol Oates on America, idealism, and the shackles we can and can't shake off.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Social Psychologist Adam Alter on the behavioral addictions we all now live with.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Turkish-American writer Elif Batuman on truth in fiction, how language shapes us, and more.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Philosopher of mind Daniel Dennett waxing wise and wicked about consciousness, dolphins, and more.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Comedy writer and producer Scott Aukerman on Michael Bolton, transgression in comedy, and cultural turmoil in the USA.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. NY Times bestselling author George Saunders on ghosts and ego and loving your enemy.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Fiction writer and essayist Gish Jen on how fundamental East-West differences in the sense of self play out in art, culture, business, education, and more.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Historian Yuval Noah Harari, bestselling author of Sapiens and Homo Deus, on the dizzying ethical questions that surround what's coming next.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Author Ayelet Waldman on parenting, identity, and how LSD microdosing changed her life for the better.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Rolling Stone political journalist Matt Taibbi on the media and political circus of the 2016 campaign trail, the search for happiness, and where we go from here.
Spontaneous talk on unexpected topics. Philosopher and Filmmaker "BHL" on torture, the question of evil, and the tipping point at which democracy becomes something else.
Spontaneous talk on unexpected topics. Comedian and author Isy Suttie on the terrors of adulthood and more. Surprise ideas from Paul Bloom, Maysoon Zayid, and Slavoj Žižek.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Media entrepreneur Amani Al-Khatatbeh and host Jason Gots wrestle with tough questions about identity, power, and Islamic feminism.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Psychologist Paul Bloom wants us to abandon empathy as a guide to moral decision making. He's probably right.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Philosopher Peter Godfrey-Smith on octopus consciousness, free will, and an extinct sea-worm he'd like to resurrect.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. "Vampire Chronicles" author Anne Rice on superstition, science, and why, in spite of everything, she believes humanity's going to figure things out.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Author, Podcaster, and "Human Guinea Pig" Tim Ferriss on death, ignoring most of the news, and sake as a secret weapon for podcasting.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Artist David Salle on how even to begin figuring out what "works" in art.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Jace Clayton AKA DJ/Rupture on sleuthing for beauty and surprise in the digital-musical landscape.
Spontaneous talk on surprise topics. Fiction writer and environmentalist T.C. Boyle on the crazy, contested world we might not be able to inhabit much longer, and what we'll do after that.
The voluble Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Žižek on why tolerance is the wrong way to deal with terrorism, the refugee crisis, and all the other problems we face.
Spontaneous, deep talk on surprise topics. Historian and New Yorker writer Jelani Cobb on interspecies ethics, the limits of civil discourse, and mathematical symmetry as the defining principle of the universe.
Spontaneous, deep talk on surprise topics. Author Margaret Atwood on genomes in the cloud, Bob Dylan's Nobel prize, the elusiveness of dead authors, and why technology's a three-edged sword.
Spontaneous, deep talk on surprise topics. Author Jodi Picoult and host Jason Gots talk comic books, social justice, and why white Americans need to take the risk (and the consequences) of talking honestly about race and class privilege.
Spontaneous, deep talk on surprise topics. In this extra feisty episode of Think Again - A Big Think Podcast, actor and author William Shatner and host Jason Gots take sides on whether or not it's a dog-eat-dog world out there.
Spontaneous, deep talk on surprise topics. James Gleick, author of Time Travel - a History, talks with host Jason Gots about why we're so obsessed with something that's evidently impossible.
Spontaneous, deep fun. Celebrity chef Alton Brown and host Jason Gots talk about fire, their mutual childhood lust for the Betty Crocker Easy-Bake Oven and how everything worth doing might get you killed.
Spontaneous, deep fun. Novelist Ian McEwan and host Jason Gots discuss Hamlet, moral quandaries, and how to set boundaries in a world that wants to pull you in every direction.
Conversations on surprise topics with some of the world's most creative thinkers. In this episode, host Jason Gots selects some of the most memorable bits of writerly wit and wisdom from the first year of Think Again - a Big Think Podcast
On this week's episode, Eric Kandel and host Jason Gots discuss abstract art, memory, identity, and the nature of evil.
Host Jason Gots curates the best moments thus far of Think Again - a Big Think Podcast, with excerpts from conversations with Paul F. Tompkins, Ethan Hawke, Amanda Palmer, and Chris Gethard
Alison Gopnik, one of the world's foremost experts on child cognition, learning, and development, and host Jason Gots discuss play, artificial intelligence, and the trouble with "parenting" as a verb.
Spontaneous, deep talk on surprise topics. Nigerian-born novelist, essayist, and NYTimes photography critic Teju Cole and host Jason Gots discuss first drafts, the complexities of home, and the greatest innovation in human history.
Spontaneous, deep talk on surprise topics. National Book Award-winning Author Jacqueline Woodson and host Jason Gots discuss collective amnesia, organized religion, the power of photographs, and why never being bored is bad for for kids.
In the second of two "year one in review" mixtapes, host Jason Gots curates the best moments thus far of Think Again - a Big Think Podcast, with excerpts from conversations with Henry Rollins, Kate Tempest, Sarah Jones, Mary-Louise Parker, and A.O. Scott
The Best of Year One, part 1: with Sam Harris, Junot Diaz, Maria Popova, Saul Williams & Jesse Ventura
Playing many different characters, Tony and Obie award-winner Sarah Jones responds to surprise "big ideas" in Think Again podcast's first ever live show at NYC Podfest
Spirituality, steroids, drone warfare and the complicated past America has left behind.
Death, Bob Marley, parenthood, gratitude, and what to do in the face of incalculable suffering.
"Cult" Comic Chris Gethard talks authenticity, the power of small communities, con artists, improv, and more.
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, National Book Award Winner James McBride
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, 20 year old educational activist and author Nikhil Goyal.
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, Maria Popova of Brain Pickings
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, Musician and Artist Amanda Palmer
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, 'Life of Pi' Author Yann Martel
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, NY Times Chief Film Critic A.O. Scott.
We surprise the smartest people you know with ideas they're not prepared to discuss. This week, Marc Goodman, author of FUTURE CRIMES.
We surprise the smartest people you know with ideas they're not prepared to discuss. This week, neurosurgeon James Doty.
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, playwright and screenwriter Sir David Hare.
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, musician and neuroscientist Daniel Levitin.
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, philosopher and neuroscientist Sam Harris.
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, genre-bending artist Maira Kalman.
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, Nobel Laureate Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk.
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, actor and New Orleans native son Wendell Pierce
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, the incendiary, luminous Saul Williams.
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, the multitalented Jesse Ventura.
We surprise the world's sharpest minds with unexpected topics. This week, longtime Gourmet Magazine editor and New York Times food critic Ruth Reichl.
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, the mighty, mighty Junot Díaz.
Smart people. Surprise topics. Deep fun. This week, legendary TV producer Norman Lear.