Category: podcast

The Infinite Monkey Cage: L.A. edition

July 14, 2015 • 1:15 pm

by Grania

Just a heads up that the next episode of The Infinite Monkey Cage is now available.

This was the one with astrophysicist Sean Carroll who needs no introduction on this website,  comedian Joe Rogan, Eric Idle (who likewise should need no introduction here) and David X. Cohen (The Simpsons & Futurama).

You can stream or download the mp3 here.

timcla

 

Eric Idle recently recorded a song for TIMC*, but here’s an old favorite of mine.

 

* Postscript: if you watched Eric’s TIMC song and quirked a quizzical brow at the curious references by Brian Cox & Robin Ince to strawberries and actual monkey cages, the answer is Listener Email. You can listen to that episode here, also hilarious for what it’s worth.

Sam Harris does another Ask Me Anything

July 12, 2015 • 9:00 am

by Grania

Sam Harris recently did his second podcast on The Tim Ferriss Experiment, it’s a very enjoyable listen for a Sunday morning.

From the show notes, these are the questions discussed.

  • What are five books you think everyone should read? [6:53]
  • In The End of Faith, you briefly discuss the challenging reality of having children. Why did you decide to have children? [18:58]
  • Why have you stopped doing public debates? Who would you like to debate? [23:18]
  • Could you talk about one of your differences with Christopher Hitchens on? Specifically, his pro-life stance. [29:03]
  • What fact/event has made you change your mind recently? [32:53]
  • What are Sam Harris’s morning rituals? I would especially like to know his meditation rituals. [36:03]
  • If you had to recommend one thing for brain health outside meditation or exercise, what would that be? [46:18]
  • Your first book, The End of Faith, featured a blistering attack on religious moderates. Now you strive to encourage religious moderation in the Islamic world. Have you changed your mind on religious moderation? [49:48]
  • Would you push the fat man in the trolley scenario? Do you think a society could occupy a peak on the moral landscape if it’s inhabitants would all push the fat man? [55:28]

You can download or stream here.

If you want to listen to the first podcast Sam did with Tim, the link is on the same page, just a little further down.

The Infinite Monkey Cage: USA tour

July 7, 2015 • 11:00 am

by Grania

As some of you already know The Infinite Monkey Cage is a much-loved BBC Radio 4 radio show and podcast on science hosted by physicist Brian Cox and comedian Robin Ince with weekly guests including such luminaries as Matthew Cobb and, more recently, Jerry Coyne. It’s usually hilarious, fast-paced and covers a range of subjects, usually within a specific theme. The show doesn’t try to comprehensively cover any topic in detail; its aim is to introduce subjects to the audience and whet appetites.

Programme Name: The Infinite Monkey Cage - TX: 19/01/2015 - Episode: n/a (No. n/a) - Picture Shows: (L-R) Professor Brian Cox, Robin Ince - (C) BBC - Photographer: Richard Ansett
Programme Name: The Infinite Monkey Cage – TX: 19/01/2015  – Picture Shows: (L-R) Professor Brian Cox, Robin Ince – (C) BBC – Photographer: Richard Ansett

The reception has been so positive that they took the show over to the United States recently, and the episodes are finally coming available as of yesterday.

The first episode from New York is now available to listen or download as an mp3 to here.

Keep checking here for updates, and of course we will let you know when the Chicago episode goes up too.

Publicity: I espouse nonbelief in National Geographic, and a podcast with Godless Spellchecker

June 1, 2015 • 11:40 am

The round of books and articles connected with Faith versus Fact continues, and I’ll highlight some reviews later as they come in. I recognize that readers may not want to look at all this book-related stuff, as some of it is repetitive, but I’m putting the links here for those who wish to know what is posted.

A while back, National Geographic kindly interviewed me for their “Book Talk” section, and has just posted my Q&A in an article called “In age of science, is religion ‘harmful superstition’?” I was grateful to appear in its pages, as this is not traditionally the kind of thing that National Geographic handles. But remember when you read it that it is the unedited transcript of a phone conversation, which explains why my answers aren’t in perfect prose. (Of course, they would have been were I Steve Pinker!) Here’s a bit of the Q&A (I’ve asked them to correct the spelling of T. S. Eliot):

Do you have a spiritual life? If so, what does it look like?

Spiritual is an amorphous term. I study evolution and every day I read something that strikes me as amazingly wonderful. If you call that spiritual, then, yeah, I’m spiritual. Richard Dawkins says the same thing. Spirituality can run the gamut from amazement at nature to a feeling that there’s something beyond the material universe.

But I don’t like the use of the word “spiritual” unless you define it clearly. I am spiritual in the sense that I have this awe and wonder before nature. I love James Joyce and T.S. Elliott, I’m moved by Dylan Thomas. It doesn’t have anything to do with God. It has to do with a commonality of feeling prompted by nature and the arts. So I prefer to use the word humanist rather than spiritual. The minute you say you’re spiritual, people automatically start thinking you’re religious.

*******

And Stephen Knight, aka “Godless Spellchecker,” had an hourlong conversation with me about the book—but also about other stuff, notably the idea of “trigger warnings,” whose discussion is at the end of the podcast.

Godless Spellchecker’s website is here; you may remember this blogger and podcaster as one of the people who exposed C. J. Werleman as a serial plagiarist (see here and here)—a fine piece of detective work.

 

 

My conversation with Sam Harris

May 20, 2015 • 9:00 am

A few weeks ago Brother Sam was kind enough to have an hour’s discussion with me about my new book. Well, that was the intention, but it quickly turned into a discursive conversation about many other things: Islam, political correctness, theology, free will, and so on. That was fine with me: after all, I’ll do plenty of talking about the Albatross in the next few weeks.

Sam’s posted the podcast on his site, and you can listen to it here. I won’t be doing that, as I can’t bear to hear the sound of my own voice in these situations! The audio (a Skype call) was wonky, but I suspect Sam has edited out the parts where I couldn’t hear him.

My Little Atoms podcast

July 4, 2012 • 5:57 am

As I’ve mentioned before, Neil Denny, a British writer and podcaster, just did a three-week road trip across America, exploring the state of science in America. He writes about his adventures for the Guardian and puts up his interviews on the Little Atoms “roadtrip” website. The one-month trip ended on June 9, but its aim was this:

Neil will be interviewing scientists working on ground-breaking, cutting edge science, educators combatting the encroachment of anti-science and irrationality into politics and the classroom, and writers attempting to popularise amazing ideas and concepts to the wider public. And he’s going to explore some major scientific (and some not so scientific) sites of interest along the way.

Back in England, Neil is gradually editing and putting up his interviews, and his 50-minute chat with me can be heard here. (I haven’t yet listened to it; the Feedburner site is here). The topic is, naturally, why scientists accept evolution as fact but many laypeople don’t.

There are eleven podcasts so far, and a fair few to come. The ones currently posted include Eugenie Scott, the physicist Sean Carroll, and a group of people from the Freethought Alliance Annual Conference.

Neil was a delightful guy and asked intelligent questions—and he’d actually read my book!

A podcast avec moi

March 4, 2012 • 12:13 pm

Last Friday I did a short (15-minute) podcast on Skype with Steve Platek, professor of psychology at Georgia Gwinnett College, editor of Frontiers in Evolutionary Neuroscience and co-editor of Evolutionary Psychology; he also is one of the editors of the evolution website This View of Life.

I can’t remember what I said, and I can’t bear to watch myself on video, but offer it for your delectation/amusement/repugnance.