Cognitive Revolution

#108: Humanism and the conversation of the ages (feat. Sarah Bakewell)

14 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Ludwik Zamenhof was born in 1859 in a small city in Poland. His family was Jewish, and the area he grew up in also had factions of Germans, Russians, ...

#107: How a really good travel writer approaches her experiences abroad—and at home (feat. Erika Fatland)

25 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Person and the Situation is a book by social psychologists Lee Ross and Richard Nisbett, originally published in 1991. The argument made by Ross a...

#106: Rituals matter more than you think (feat. Dimitris Xygalatas)

18 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Denis Dutton was a philosopher of art and media. He was born in the US but moved to New Zealand when he was 40, where he became interested in Oceanic ...

#105: What can psychology tell us about meaning? (feat. Paul Bloom)

02 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Recently, I’ve been workshopping an idea. Basically, I don’t believe there is such thing as an activity that is intrinsically meaningful.Sure, the...

#104: Palentine's Day (feat. Robin Dunbar)

14 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

We pay a lot of attention to our romantic relationships. Whether it’s selecting a mate or maintaining one’s relationship with them. Apps make mill...

#103: Tired, scared, and busy: why can't we all just get along? (feat. Mónica Guzmán)

31 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

One of the central themes of this show is the importance of the stories we tell about ourselves. But in focusing on the egocentric stakes of storytell...

#102: Awe is the emotional component of meaning (feat. Dacher Keltner)

24 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

I collect concise definitions of the good life. There’s something I really like about the idea of having a one sentence mission statement. It’s a ...

#101: Finding meaning in the maybe (feat. John Kaag)

17 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

For many of us, life is a process of minimizing uncertainty. We spend our days trying to eliminate uncertainty from our lives. Find the right career p...

#100: I interviewed 90+ scientists about their career. These are the 12 biggest lessons I learned.

10 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The month before I began my PhD, in October 2019, I sat down with an idea. The concept was to reach out to people I admired—mostly academics and aut...

#99: There's a Reason You Can't Make Yourself Act like Everyone Else: You're Unique (feat. Chantel Prat)

03 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

For many of us, there are moments of realization we’ve had where we can’t look at our lives, or what we do in them, the same way ever again. I’v...

A Small Exercise in Gratitude

30 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

And a minor resolution about friendship. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus epi...

#98: A Cognitive Scientist Tries to Convince Me the Mind is Flat; I Don't Think He Succeeds (feat. Nick Chater)

27 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

My guest today is Nick Chater, a Professor of Behavioural Science at Warwick Business School. Nick is an influential cognitive scientist with a wide-r...

My Favorite Book of the Year

23 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

I believe when someone writes a perfect book, it deserves to sell a gazillion copies. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with...

#97: Is the Biggest Fish in the Pond Happy? (feat. W. David Marx)

20 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

One of my favorite psychology papers of all time is called “Telling More than We Can Know” by Richard Nisbett and Timothy Wilson. The argument of ...

Can Productivity Be Turned On Like a Faucet?

16 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Two competing theories of inspiration: the 9am-ers and the lions. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers o...

#96: How Words Get Their Meaning (feat. Gary Lupyan)

13 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Language—who can use it, and how well—has been in the news recently. If you haven’t heard, a recent AI language model was released for public us...

The Off-Policy Theory of Happiness

09 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Why the metrics we use to evaluate decisions are not the ones we should use to make them. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this ...

#95: The Value Landscape of Games—and How Companies Exploit It (feat. Adrian Hon)

06 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Right now, over the course of the next couple weeks, somewhere in the neighborhood of one billion people will tune in to the same event. This event is...

Introducing: Meaning Lab

02 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In a way, coming to the end of one’s PhD almost feels inappropriate. The pursuit of this degree gives a kind of structure to adult life—my life, a...

#91: How Technology Shapes Our Tastes — in Music and More (feat. Nick Seaver)

18 Oct 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Earlier this week, my colleague Adam Mastroianni published an essay on what he called "cultural oligopoly." An increasingly smaller number of artists ...

#94: Anxiety and the Hard Work of Being Human (feat. Tracy Dennis-Tiwary)

02 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Anxiety. It is the only emotion my body believes is truly necessary for me to experience at three o’clock in the morning. To be sure I’d rather be...

#93: Debate is a Battle of Beliefs — But Does It Have The Power To Change Them? (feat. Bo Seo)

26 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

My episode last week featured a conversation with author David McCraney about what it takes to change someone’s mind on a big, important topic like ...

#92: People Don't Often Change Their Minds on Big Topics. Why? (feat. David McRaney)

19 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

I often say that the second best thing to happen to me was deciding to become a Christian. And the first best thing was deciding not to be a Christian...

#90: Stephen Kosslyn on How We Conceptualize the World

26 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#89: Tom Griffiths on Formalizing the Mind

25 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#88: Leyla Isik on Combining the Rigorous with the Realistic

20 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#87: Antonio Damasio on When Self Comes to Mind

12 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#86: Tom Pettigrew on How Experience Shapes Belief

04 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#85: Alan Fiske on Why It's Hard to Understand Humans

08 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#84: Elizabeth Loftus on the Societal Implications of Psychology

01 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#83: George Lakoff on a Life Lived by Metaphor

22 Feb 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#82: Annie Murphy Paul on Where the Mind Ends and the World Begins

15 Feb 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#81: Kevin Birmingham on Where Great Books Come From

08 Feb 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#80: Sam Gershman on the Structure of Cognitive Revolutions

01 Feb 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#79.5: Randy Gallistel on Upsetting Neuroscientists (The Story)

27 Jan 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#79: Randy Gallistel on Upsetting Neuroscientists (The Theory)

25 Jan 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#78: Philip Johnson-Laird on How Cognitive Scientists Improvise

18 Jan 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#77: Brian Christian on AI as a Human Problem, Part 2

11 Jan 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#76: Charles King on Taking the Outsider Perspective

21 Dec 2021

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#75: Susanna L. Harris on Building Community through Communication

14 Dec 2021

Contributed by Lukas

I've been a fan of Susanna for a long time following her on her social media. She's one of my favorite personalities in science communication, and it'...

#74: Nicole Barbaro on Judging a Book by its Cover

30 Nov 2021

Contributed by Lukas

I've been following Nicole's work for a long time, and I'm a big fan. She's developed a platform for her writing as well as a presence on social media...

#73: Tara Thiagarajan on Brains—All 7 Billion of Them

23 Nov 2021

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#72: Andy Luttrell on Consistent Quality

16 Nov 2021

Contributed by Lukas

This is Cognitive Revolution, my show about the personal side of the intellectual journey. Each week, I interview an eminent scientist, writer, or aca...

#71: David Edmonds on Turning Philosophy into a Career

09 Nov 2021

Contributed by Lukas

David Edmonds did his degrees in philosophy. Then he did something unexpected. He made money. I don't know how much. But, as far as I can tell, enough...

#70: Salma Mousa on Investing in Big Projects

26 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Salma Mousa is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Yale. She recently took that position after a post-doc in Stanford's Center for Democrac...

#69: Coltan Scrivner on First-Gen to Fame

19 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Coltan Scrivner: you may not know the name, but you will. Coltan is a first-gen college student, and one of the most impressive PhD students I've come...

#68: Alexandra Chesterfield on Being a Conservative in a Liberal Environment

12 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Alexandra Chesterfield is co-author of the book Poles Apart: Why People Turn Against Each Other, and How to Bring Them Together. It's a look at politi...

#67: Rebecca Saxe on the Beauty of the Mind

05 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

I have been a big fan of Rebecca and her work for a long time. She is the John W. Jarve (1978) Professor in Brain and Cognitive Sciences at MIT. She i...

#66: Gordon Allport, the 20th Century's Psychologist

28 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Gordon Allport was one of the most influential psychologists of the twentieth century. He was the progenitor of the modern forms of both social and pe...

#65: Elizabeth Ricker on Personalizing Your Creative Process

21 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

I really enjoyed this conversation with Elizabeth Ricker; it was one of those conversations where I felt as though I'd found a kindred spirit, someone...

#64: Azeem Azhar on the Exponential Age

14 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Azeem Azhar is a technologist and investor with a background in technology journalism. His newsletter, Exponential View, is enjoyed by ~200,000 reader...

#63: Jay Van Bavel on the Power of Us

07 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Jay Van Bavel is the closest thing social psychology has to a rock star. His official title is Associate Professor of Psychology and Neural Science a...

#62: Edward Slingerland on How to Drink Well

08 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Ted Slingerland is a professor at the University of British Columbia, where his interests and affiliations include East Asian studies, psychology, phi...

#61: Scott Atran on the Risks We're Willing to Take

01 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Wow. Scott Atran. What a guy. What a career. I'd be willing to bet that Scott has had the highest density of near-death encounters during his research...

#60: Wade Davis on Becoming an Entrepreneur of Knowledge

25 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Wade Davis makes his living being interesting. He is a cultural anthropologist and ethnobotanist by trade, and holds a position as the BC Leadership C...

#59: Christopher Bail on How Social Media Shapes Our Identity

18 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Chris Bail is a professor of sociology and public policy at Duke and directs the Polarization Lab. He's done a lot of great research in the last half ...

#58: Jeff Hawkins on Tackling the Big Problems

11 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Jeff Hawkins is one of my favorite neuroscientists ever. He does the kind of big, ambitious projects I love to see people going after. The driving que...

#57: Nancy Kanwisher on Finding Your Niche

04 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Nancy Kanwisher is a much beloved cognitive neuroscientist at MIT. She has published some of the most influential papers in her field (for example, th...

#56: Louis Menand on How to Write about Everything

27 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Louis Menand is the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of English at Harvard University. He has been a staff writer at the New Yorker since 1995. He...

#55: Brian Christian on AI as a Human Problem, Part 1

20 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Brian Christian probably has a better handle of the human aspects of artificial intelligence than any other writer today. He recently published The Al...

#54: Pedro Domingos on Making the Textbook Smaller

13 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

I first became familiar with Pedro's work through his 2015 book, The Master Algorithm. But as it turns out, his existence extends prior to my familiar...

#53: Liz Neeley on the Foundations of Good Stories

06 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Liz is a world-renown science communicator. She is founder and CEO of Liminal, a very exciting project which we get into in this conversation. We also...

#52: Benjamin Moser on the Performance of Everyday Life

30 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Ben Moser is the pulitzer prize winning author of the recent biography of Susan Sontag, innovatively entitled "Sontag." This is one of the most fun an...

#51: Damon Centola on How Anomalies Drive Scientific Progress

23 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Damon Centola is a professor in the Annenberg School for Communication, the School of Arts and Sciences, and the School of Engineering and Applied Sci...

#50: Ethan Kross on Harnessing the Voice in Your Head

16 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Ethan Kross is a Professor of Psychology and Management at the University of Michigan. His new book is "Chatter: the voice in our head, why it matters...

#49: Joseph Henrich on What History Can Tell Us About Psychology

09 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Joseph Henrich is Professor and Chair of the Department of Human Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University. He is the co-author of one of the most i...

#48: Sir Simon Baron-Cohen on Putting Together the Big Picture from the Details

02 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Sir Simon Baron-Cohen is professor of developmental psychopathology at the University of Cambridge, where he is Director of the Autism Research Centre...

#47: William Labov on What People Actually Say

23 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

William Labov is professor emeritus of linguistics at the University of Pennsylvania and founder of the field of sociolinguistics. In other words, he ...

#46: Nicholas Christakis on Mastering Skills

16 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

To say Nicholas Christakis has mastered a few skills throughout his career would almost certainly be underselling it. Nicholas is the Sterling Profess...

#45: Tanya Luhrmann on Writing about Culture, Belief, and Life

09 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Tanya Luhrmann is the Watkins University Professor in the Stanford Anthropology Department. Much of her work has taken an anthropological perspective ...

#44: Anil Seth on Interdisciplinarity in Practice

02 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Anil Seth is a Professor of Cognitive and Computational Neuroscience at the University of Sussex, where he is also Co-Director of the Sackler Centre f...

#43: Denise Sekaquaptewa on How to Make Universities Work For Everyone

19 Jan 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Denise Sekaquaptewa is the University Diversity and Social Transformation Professor of Psychology at the University of Michigan. She did her PhD at th...

#42: Richard Nisbett on Telling More Than He Can Know

05 Jan 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Richard Nisbett is the Theodore M. Newcomb Distinguished Professor of social psychology and co-director of the Culture and Cognition program at the Un...

#41: Michael McCullough on Why We Give a Damn

01 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Michael McCullough is a professor of psychology at University of California, San Diego, where he runs the Evolution and Human Behavior Lab. Mike and I...

Actually Against Academia

26 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

A couple of weeks ago, Mickey Inzlicht and Yoel Inbar, of the excellent podcast Two Psychologists Four Beers, released a discussion of theirs called '...

#40: Howard Gardner on the Synthesizing Mind

24 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Howard Gardner is the John H. and Elisabeth A. Hobbs Research Professor of Cognition and Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. He's b...

#39: Yael Niv on the Moral Obligations of Scientists

10 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Yael Niv is a professor in Princeton department of psychology and the Princeton Neuroscience Institute. She is also a discernibly high-quality human b...

#38: Barry Wellman on the Academic Social Network

03 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Barry Wellman was instrumental in developing the modern understanding of social networks. Barry co-founded the International Network for Social Networ...

#37: Susan Goldin-Meadow on Being a World-Class Listener

27 Oct 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Susan Goldin-Meadow is the 2021 recipient for the Rumelhart prize, the highest award in cognitive science. She has amassed an amazing body of research...

#36: Richard Shweder on How to Observe the World

20 Oct 2020

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode I talk to Richard Shweder, one of the founders of the field of cultural psychology. He has had a wide-ranging and interdisciplinary ca...

#35: Annie Duke on Betting on Your Best Self

13 Oct 2020

Contributed by Lukas

One thing that's immediately clear about Annie Duke is that her best self is pretty damn awesome. In this conversation, we get deep into the story of ...

#34: Don Norman

06 Oct 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Don Norman is a cognitive scientist and designer. He is perhaps best known for his book "The Design of Everyday Things." This was a landmark work whic...

#33: Mahzarin Banaji

29 Sep 2020

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode, I go in-depth with Mahzarin Banaji on her life story. Mahzarin started off just about as far away from life as a Harvard professor as...

#32: Sade Abiodun

15 Sep 2020

Contributed by Lukas

This week's guest is neuroscientist, filmmaker, and inimitable personality Sade Abiodun. She is a first year PhD student the Princeton Neuroscience In...

Chapter 1: Warsaw

10 Sep 2020

Contributed by Lukas

En route to World Cup 2018. "You're an American."Full transcript: https://www.codykommers.com/notes-from-the-field This is a public episode. If you wo...

#31: Sir Nigel Shadbolt

08 Sep 2020

Contributed by Lukas

The name "Nigel Shadbolt" is spoken in my corner of the world with hushed tones and much reverence. This is not only because he is a big deal generall...

Introduction: "Dear Haily"

27 Aug 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Welcome to Season 1 of Notes from the Field with Cody Kommers.Full transcript at: https://www.codykommers.com/notes-from-the-field This is a public ep...

#30: Daniel Everett on Being Fully Immersed

30 Jun 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Dan Everett is the closest thing we have to a real life Indiana Jones. He is an academic whose work has mostly taken place in the far reaches of the j...

#29: Maria Konnikova on Doing the Work

23 Jun 2020

Contributed by Lukas

One of Maria's biggest influence as an undergrad was Steven Pinker, who she studied under while at Harvard. The family resemblance is easy to see. She...

#28: Steven Pinker on Career Uncertainty

16 Jun 2020

Contributed by Lukas

"Uncertainty" would not exactly be the first word that comes to mind when one thinks of Steven Pinker's current position in the world. But that wasn't...

#27: Mark Granovetter on Why There Are Revolutions

09 Jun 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Mark and I recorded this interview about a month ago, before the outbreak of protests across the world in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. ...

#26: Alan Baddeley on Proceeding Logically

19 May 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Alan Baddeley is a professor of psychology at the University of York. He is best known for his model of working memory, which essentially won out in t...

#25: Michèle Lamont on Building Big Ideas

12 May 2020

Contributed by Lukas

This week's guest is someone very special. Michèle Lamont has had a huge impact on my own thinking as a psychologist. She is the Robert I. Goldma...

#24: Michael Inzlicht on the Optimal Number of Beers per Psychologist

05 May 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Mickey Inzlicht wanted to be a dentist when he grew up. But unfortunately he only made it as far as Professor in the Department of Psychology at the U...

#23: Brad Love on Lifelong Exploration

28 Apr 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Little known fact about Brad Love: he holds the world record for the youngest sounding voice for any fully grown adult male. Okay, that might not lite...

#22: Rob Henderson on the Search for Stability

21 Apr 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Rob is a Gates scholar at Cambridge, doing his PhD in Psychology. He's written for such venerable outlets as the New York Times and Quillette. As you'...

#21: Olga Khazan on the Power of Outsiders

07 Apr 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Olga's family moved to America when she was four years old. They were a Jewish family from Russia. Growing up in small town Texas, let's just say that...

Lab Lockdown #3: Steve Rathje

03 Apr 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Steve is a PhD student in social psychology at Cambridge. He recently published an article on Psychology Today about the implications of the COVID-19 ...

#20: Julia Shaw on Who We Are and Why It Matters

01 Apr 2020

Contributed by Lukas

This is probably the most interesting interview I've done on Cognitive Revolution to date (sorry, Paul Bloom). To call Dr Julia Shaw by her title of p...

Lab Lockdown #2: Jeffrey Lees

20 Mar 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Jeff is a PhD at Harvard Business School. He's been working from home for years. And now that the rest of us are in the same position, he recently sha...