Big Ideas

Prove It! Elizabeth Finkel's Scientific Guide for the Post-Truth Era

08 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

If a stiff dose of medical misinformation is what you're after, look no further than the White House right now. And, on social media and in online fo...

John Lennon and Paul McCartney — a partnership that changed cultural history

07 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The Beatles shook the world to its core in the 1960's and, to this day, new generations continue to fall in love with their songs and their story. At...

'Militarism gone mad' — Labor firebrand hits out at party’s support of AUKUS

06 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The world feels more dangerous and unpredictable, but with Australia wedged between our traditional ally, America, and our biggest trading partner, C...

Genocides are everyone's business, not no-one's business — Gareth Evans, Yassmin Khadra, Daniel Abot's urgent plea for peace

02 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

A frank and impassioned plea for peace by Gareth Evans. As Australia's former Foreign Minister and former president of the International Crisis Group...

Vale Dr Jane Goodall — why the renowned primatologist and environmentalist held onto hope

02 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Primatologist Jane Goodall once said: "It actually doesn't take much to be a difficult woman. That's why there are so many of us." She spoke up. For ...

Is AI the new coloniser? How to create more life-centred AI before it's too late

01 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

AI is an incredible tool, but is AI also a new coloniser? Is there actually anything new or artificial about artificial intelligence? Join Natasha Mi...

Condoleezza Rice on how to fix the break-up of global cooperation

30 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Former US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice assesses the break-up of globalisation and the world order. The way in which countries such as the Unit...

The rise of Spotify and the costs of the perfect playlist — with music journalist Liz Pelly

29 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

American music journalist Liz Pelly interrogates the ways Spotify and other streaming giants are reshaping music, not just for listeners, but also fo...

Yolngu power — art, culture, country, law — with Marcia Langton and Clare Wright

25 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Australian Indigenous art is celebrated around the world – but how much is understood about its pivotal role in Indigenous culture, country, politi...

Nobel scientist Jennifer Doudna with Natasha Mitchell — the gene editing revolution, radical ethics, and what's next? [Archive episode]

24 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Join a full house at the Sydney Opera House with Nobel winning scientist Jennifer Doudna and Big Ideas' presenter Natasha Mitchell to discuss the hug...

Helen Vatsikopoulos — when the stories of migrants in Australia are silenced it's bad for all of us

23 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Stories help us to understand what is happening in the world and how it impacts us. Stories help us to relate to the experience of 'the Other' and th...

The power of essays — with David Marr, Esther Anatolitis, Brooke Boland and Ashleigh Wilson

22 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

For 85 years, Meanjin has published the essays of Australian writers. The magazine's founding editor, Clem Christesen, wanted Meanjin's writers 'to r...

Fleeced — unravelling the history of wool and war

18 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It's water and fireproof, versatile, warm and tough wearing. Wool not only expanded the British Empire, and created prosperity in the colonies, it al...

What's up with dieting Doc? Rethinking the obesity obsession in healthcare

17 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Has your doctor ever told you to go on a diet? Does that conversation put you off going to them in the first place, even if you need treatment for so...

Doing business ethically in turbulent times — with Helen Clark

16 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In a world where rules are increasingly being broken, what role should business play in upholding human rights, international and domestic law, and e...

Jimmy Barnes – tells it all

15 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Rock star and maverick Jimmy Barnes celebrates heritage, family, friends, music and the adventure of a grand life on stage. Get up close to the lead ...

Hanna Rosin on what’s happened to the end of men in Trump’s America

11 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Thirteen years ago, US political journalist Hanna Roisin wrote a book called The End of Men: and the Rise of Women. Since then, there's been Presiden...

Nuked or not? The politics and power play over nuclear energy as a climate fix

10 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Nuclear power is banned in Australia, and has been for decades, whilst some countries tilt towards nuclear energy again. Should or could Australia? ...

Heart-to-heart with John Wamsley and David Lindenmayer — why these trailblazing environmentalists won't back off

09 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Meet two men on a lifelong mission. They've ruffled a lot of feathers along the way. Some revere them, others revile them. John Wamsley set up Austra...

Are the reading wars really over?

08 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It's estimated that one third of Australian school children can't read proficiently, and debates about the best way to teach reading have raged for y...

Is our university system broken?

04 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Students are dropping out, academics are burning out, so is enough being done to save higher education? It's a multibillion-dollar sector, employing ...

The radicalisation of boys — Jess Hill, George Megalogenis, Thomas Mayo with Natasha Mitchell at Byron Writers Festival

03 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Some boys are being radicalised by misogynist online subcultures like the 'Manosphere' and the 'incel' (involuntarily celibate) scene. Parents are an...

The AI Con — unpacking the artificial intelligence hype machine

02 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Is the world really in the midst of an AI revolution, or is it all just clever marketing, powered by immense amounts of money, capital and hype? This...

Barry Jones and Kerry O'Brien — on complexity, politics and love

01 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Barry Jones and Kerry O'Brien - Two titans of Australian political and social commentary share insights into how to think well, how to act well and h...

Tradwives — cosy cottage core fantasy, or something more sinister? With Megan Agnew, Rosie Waterland, Beverley Wang and Nakkiah Lui

28 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

They cook, make babies, and look impossibly perfect while doing it.Tradwives are using social media to redefine femininity and womanhood… or are th...

My Sister and Other Lovers — Esther Freud with Natasha Mitchell at Byron Writers Festival

27 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Esther Freud’s first semi-autobiographical novel Hideous Kinky became a film starring Kate Winslet and told the wild story of two little girls livi...

When dreams speak truth — exploring the relationship between our realities and the subconscious

26 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

What happens when the harsh realities of our daily lives — death, war, illness, hardship — invade that most private of realms — our sleep? Four...

The US was meant to pivot to Asia — has Donald Trump changed course?

25 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

With Donald Trump mediating conflicts in Europe and the Middle East, what has become of the United States' strategy in the Asia Pacific region?The ev...

Alison Lester and Jane Godwin on how children’s books change lives

21 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Even years later, children's books can hold a special place in our hearts, and they also teach, comfort, inspire, and grow young minds, and set kids ...

From devil horns to deep listening — Maxine Beneba Clark, Debra Dank, Damon Young on the power of communication

20 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

From  finding the right language to connect to Country, making the world a more poetic place for kids, to a Vulcan salute between two lovers — com...

How a picnic started the fall of the Iron Curtain

19 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

A brass band, goulash cooking in giant pots over open flames, people dancing around a bonfire — a pan-European picnic at the border between Hungary...

Anna Funder — Bears out there, writing in the age of bots and broligarchs

18 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Without permission, or payment, artificial intelligence has stolen the published words of thousands of Australian writers, and it seems that they hav...

The remarkable life of Marie Curie and the women scientists she inspired — with Dava Sobel

14 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Marie Curie is arguably the most famous scientist in history, for her breakthroughs in the field of radioactivity. But Curie also redefined what was ...

Wellness influencers will outlive us all! The Science Smackdown Debate at World Science Festival Brisbane

13 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It's Team Wellness Warriors versus Team Medical Miracles. Hear the arguments and you decide! The wellness industry is booming. It's worth billions an...

How to live an experimental life

12 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The American essayist, philosopher and poet Ralph Waldo Emerson famously said that all life is an experiment, and the more experiments you make, the ...

Dugongs — up close and personal

11 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Their closest relative is the elephant; they eat about 60 kg of sea grass per day; and there are only three dugongs in captivity in the world. One in...

Do you know the size of your material footprint? 

07 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In your daily life you use more material than you think: metals, stones, wood, ceramics – the list goes on. We have sufficient resources to support...

Sarah Wilson reckons with our civilisational collapse

06 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

If you knew the world as we know it was on the verge of collapse, would that change the way you live your life? Author, activist and podcaster Sarah ...

Mike Burgess — Espionage is a growing and costly threat to Australia

05 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Foreign spies attempt to infiltrate media organisations, break into restricted laboratories, target public servants on sites such as LinkedIn, approa...

Plummeting vaccination rates threaten public health

04 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

For the first time in human history, we have the scientific know-how to vaccinate against most of the infectious diseases that killed our ancestors....

Not drowning waving, a modern media tale — with Geraldine Doogue

31 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The decline of the mainstream media has forced many outlets to try new things to keep audiences engaged and informed. So what works, and what is the ...

From Con the Fruiterer to East West 101 — the changing face of Australian TV

31 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Australia is a multicultural country, but up until recently, when you turned on the telly, you wouldn't know it. So what role has TV played in Austra...

FAT is not an F-word! The radical practice of fat joy

30 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Join Big Ideas host Natasha Mitchell with three women embracing the radical practice of finding joy in big bodies. Fat bodies are often stigmatised, ...

How animals use natural medicine to heal themselves

29 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Meet apes that swallow leaves to dislodge worms and sparrows that use cigarette butts to repel parasites. Many animals use medicine to treat themselv...

The dark side of collaboration — when thinking together goes wrong

28 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

At face value, collaboration sounds like a good thing: collaboration in the classroom, with colleagues, or between nations. But throughout history, c...

Adam Liaw on what spaghetti bolognese tells us about Australian life

24 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Food is essential to human life, but are we taking it for granted? Popular chef, writer and broadcaster Adam Liaw is an advocate for good food for ev...

Mao and Stalin — did they lead the way for tyrannical leaders like Trump?

23 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Books on tyrants, dictators, and authoritarian leaders are suddenly bestsellers again as we all try to make sense of the tilt towards tyrannical lead...

One land, two laws, it’s black and white — with Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander Social Justice Commissioner Katie Kiss

22 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

At a time when governments are retreating from promises of progress for First Nations people, what can be achieved through legal and human rights mec...

Doctor Who turns 60 — why the world still loves you

21 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Doctor Who has acted as a mirror to more than six decades of social, technological and cultural change. It's been able to evolve and adapt more rad...

Is AI our modern-day Frankenstein? Jeanette Winterson and Toby Walsh

17 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Acclaimed British author Jeanette Winterson argues that 200 years ago, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, was a message in a bottle, a prophesy, of today's...

ABC's CITIZEN JURY — Would you live inside a modern power station? These people will, and want to be heard

16 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Citizen Jury is ABC Radio National's experiment in citizen-led democracy. The ingredients? A gnarly issue + a jury of citizens = conversations + idea...

Radical economics — what can we learn from the life of John Maynard Keynes

15 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

John Maynard Keynes was an economist whose dreams went beyond balance sheets and into political ideas and cultural movements.He advised world leaders...

Life behind the lens — with photojournalists Lorrie Graham, Rick Stevens and Mike Bowers

14 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Photojournalism can define a moment, a movement, an era or even a whole generation. It can lift a weary spirit, move opinions, or change the way we v...

Can citizen juries put the people back in democracy?

10 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Australia faces many big challenges, but is our democracy up to the job of solving these, or are we experiencing a decision deadlock?One process that...

Join Jodi Edwards and her Sea Kin on a journey that flows like salt water — you won't see the sea in the same way

09 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

We bathe in the amniotic fluid our mother's womb. Our cells are full of water. For Walbanja woman, artist, educator and researcher Dr Jodi Edwards, t...

Behrouz Boochani and Arnold Zable on the radical act of friendship

08 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The Kurdish poet Behrouz Boochani and the Australian writer Arnold Zable explore the power of friendship as an act of resistance, nourishment and hea...

Where to now — transforming anger into action after the Voice referendum

07 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In October 2023, Australians voted no to a Voice to Parliament for First Nations people. In this panel from the 2025 Melbourne Writers Festival, four...

What would a feminist utopia look like?

03 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

What would religion, work, sex or technology look like if we lived in a truly feminist world? In a perfect world would the messy stuff make the cut? ...

Dark tourism, death, design, and the macabre — should some places stay untouched?

02 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Dark tourism is increasingly popular. Sites of suffering like old gaols, asylums, orphanages hold a certain allure. Can we honour their dark heart an...

Is language power? With American linguist John McWhorter

01 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Language is always evolving, and reflecting back to us our society, politics and identity. From profanity, to personal pronouns, to the politics of t...

Hard new world — our post-American future, with Hugh White and Allan Behm

30 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Under Donald Trump's second presidency, America's retreat from global leadership has been swift and erratic. With Russia's war in Ukraine still ragin...

Baby boycott — the fertility crisis and the big decision

26 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When you enter your childbearing years, it can feel like everyone from the treasurer, your mum, and probably your Instagram reels really wants you to...

Love your gut — understanding the microbiome

25 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Are fermented foods really good for us? Do antibiotics destroy our gut flora? And have you heard about poo transplants?Our gut is teeming with trilli...

Adapt or collapse — can we meet the moment of environmental peril

24 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Do humans really have what it takes to change our lives – our world – to arrest climate collapse?It might be the defining question we face as a s...

Kate McClymont on the complete insanity of investigative journalism

23 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Murderers, fraudsters, mobsters, dodgy doctors, and corrupt politicians. Kate McClymont has exposed all manner of shady characters, and lives to tell...

The second coming of quantum — the next scientific revolution is here

19 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

There are some leaps in science and technology that change everything. Scientists say we’re living through the second quantum revolution, so we're ...

The past is a foreign country — Santilla Chingaipe, Sita Sargeant, Steve Vizard with Natasha Mitchell

18 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When Santilla Chingaipe stumbled on the names of enslaved Africans who arrived on the First Fleet in 1788 she couldn't look away. For Steve Vizard, a...

Will American democracy survive the Dark Enlightenment? Sarah Churchwell on Gone with the Wind and the roots of extremism

17 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Sarah Churchwell takes you on a gripping and confronting journey into America's recent past to explain its extraordinary present, starting with dark ...

We are the evidence — empowering change in Indigenous Australia

16 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2017, the Uluru Statement called for Voice, Treaty and Truth as a roadmap to reconciliation. With the Voice defeated, what is the path now to mean...

From Bangalore to Balmain – Padma Raman’s lifelong advocacy for women and girls

12 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The racism and resilience Padma Raman’s parents experienced lit a social justice fire in her early on. She landed on the sunny shores of Sydney in ...

Fashion's fails — we can fix its toxic legacy! Kit Willow, Natasha Mitchell, and guests 

11 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Australians have a hardcore addiction to fast fashion. That means dyes in our waterways, microplastics in our bodies, and hundreds of thousands of to...

Warren Ellis on why he bought a Sumatran wildlife sanctuary — with Justin Kurzel and Zan Rowe

10 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Warren Ellis is best known as the charismatic violinist with legendary Australian instrumental rock trio Dirty Three and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds....

To infinity – who's in charge of outer space?

09 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

How do nations work together to control access to our vast universe, negotiate who gets what resources, or even who gets to set up new colonies on fa...

Being Jewish after the destruction of Gaza — with Peter Beinart and Sarah Schwartz

05 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

What's happening in Gaza is horrifying and shocking. As the world watches on, how are different Jewish communities reckoning with a war being waged i...

We asked for workers and got people — inside the temporary visa scheme putting food on your plate

04 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

A workforce we rarely hear about, lives in limbo, and stories from the coalface. From economic gains and cultural exchanges to exploitation and absco...

The unbearable intimacy of voicing someone’s words — with Forced Entertainment

03 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Words can mean everything, or nothing at all: it all depends on how they're delivered. This relationship between writer, script, actor and audience c...

Gina Chick on what dark nights of the soul can teach us about life and living

02 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Gina Chick made her name as the inaugural winner of Alone Australia, but her story begins a long time before that. It involves unimaginable hardship,...

Safe at home – who profits when you’re afraid of your neighbours?

29 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Your personal safety is big business, so much so that it’s given rise to “security capitalism”, a phenomenon where attempts to buy personal saf...

The ghosts are here — Tasma Walton, Darren Rix, Craig Cormick, Anthony Sharwood with Natasha Mitchell

28 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The ghost people arrived by boat. They never left. But the stories of first encounters and what came next live large, 250 years later, in First Natio...

Words to sing the world alive — waking up First Nations languages

27 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

At the time of colonisation, there were more than 250 Indigenous languages spoken in Australia, but these days, all are considered endangered. Many F...

From vulture bone flutes to ‘organised sound’— Andrew Ford's short history of music

26 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Music has been around for at least as long as humans, and possibly even longer. How have forces like religion, the economy, society and technology, s...

If it bleeds it leads – Bruce Shapiro on documenting the violence of modern life

22 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

From wars with global consequences to violent crimes in the suburbs, trauma underpins so much of the news cycle. It’s something award-winning journ...

Live to 150? David Sinclair on why we age — and why he thinks we don't have to

21 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

What if we could turn back time on our biological clock and slow down — even reverse — aging? High profile Harvard scientist David Sinclair is co...

Australia and the spectre of war — from Vietnam to today

20 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It's been 60 years since then Australian Prime Minister Robert Menzies sent Australians to fight in the Vietnam War. Since that time, the defence for...

Australia votes — what message should we take from this election result?

19 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

If democracy is the will of the people, what does this federal election result say about Australia? In his election night victory speech, Prime Minis...

What are you wearing? Why we aren’t buying Australian made fashion

15 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Australians are now the biggest consumers per capita of clothes in the world. But just three per cent of clothing is made here in Australia. So is it...

Mark Zuckerberg claims corporations are culturally neutered — are they? Men, women, work, and the manosphere

14 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Meta's Mark Zuckerberg has said “a lot of the corporate world has become culturally neutered” and that it needs more “masculine energy”? Has ...

History lessons — historians Orlando Figes, Bettany Hughes, Matthew Longo and Dava Sobel with Annabelle Quince

13 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Democracies in retreat, attacks on science, border disputes, death and destruction. It can feel like we are living in unprecedented times - but here'...

Chatting with 2025 Grammy winner Ruthie Foster

12 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

After five nominations, Ruthie Foster has taken home the 2025 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album - affirming her status as an American mu...

Vladimir Putin’s Russia — with exiled journalist and author Mikhail Zygar

08 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The exiled founder of Russia's only independent television news channel, Mikhail Zygar, takes us inside Vladimir Putin's Russia, with a firsthand acc...

Rituals, rats, and reeded vertebrae! The mysteries of Machu Picchu and Ancient Peru revealed

07 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

A story of continents crashing and cleaving apart, the making of a civilisation, the language of the dead, and ... a mummified rat makes a cameo too....

Mental ill-health and the power of words

06 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The language used to talk about mental ill-health can play a key role in reducing or enforcing stigma. And it's constantly evolving. But what terms s...

Worried about the future? A mosquito could help you to live in the present

05 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

What can a mosquito teach us about time? Noone likes a mosquito bite — but for a brief moment when it stings you, you know you are alive. Humans ar...

Australia votes— are our political parties on the nose?

01 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This election has been described as a boring campaign, but with some fascinating contests. So just what is going on in the minds of voters as Austral...

Has the world lost the plot? John Lyons, Greg Sheridan, Emma Shortis, Josh Taylor with Natasha Mitchell

30 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Are we living through a key turning point in world history? How do we make sense of this present moment, and what's on the horizon?Trump's trade wars...

The painting that changed Australia — the story of Blue Poles

29 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It's been called a coming-of-age story for a nation. The Whitlam Government's purchase of Jackson Pollock's Blue Poles in 1973 helped to bring down t...

Are Donald Trump and US politics bringing global health to its knees?

28 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Until recently, the USA provided about 30% of global health funding. It was dominant in supplying HIV/AIDS medication and funded a major part of medi...

Sir Simon Schama — On antisemitism

24 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Acclaimed British historian Sir Simon Schama reflects on the history of antisemitism, the Holocaust and contemporary culture. He says that for millen...

How do we make cancer treatment worth it, work better, and less harmful?

23 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Cancer is common and chemo and radiotherapies can save or extend our lives. But sometimes they don't, or they stop working, or they come with disabli...

Pankaj Mishra — the world after Gaza

22 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

For the past 18 months, Israel's war in Gaza has polarised the world. The Indian author and essayist Pankaj Mishra reckons with the conflict through ...