Making Sense with Sam Harris
By Waking Up with Sam Harris
Join neuroscientist, philosopher, and five-time New York Times best-selling author Sam Harris as he explores important and controversial questions about the mind, society, current events, moral philosophy, religion, and rationality—with an overarching focus on how a growing understanding of ourselves and the world is changing our sense of how we should live. Sam is also the creator of the Waking Up app. Combining Sam's decades of mindfulness practice, profound wisdom from varied philosophical and contemplative traditions, and a commitment to a secular, scientific worldview, Waking Up is a resource for anyone interested in living a more examined, fulfilling life—and a new operating system for the mind. Waking Up offers free subscriptions to anyone who can't afford one, and donates a minimum of 10% of profits to the most effective charities around the world. To learn more, please go to WakingUp.com. Sam Harris received a degree in philosophy from Stanford University and a Ph.D. in neuroscience from UCLA.
25 episodes
All Episodes
Financial Ingenuity's Unseen Costs: Systemic Risk and Inequality
Financial ingenuity creates unseen costs, widening inequality and eroding trust. Understand how market mechanisms, designed to manage risk, can inadvertently destabilize systems and produce outcomes opposite of their intent.
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Loyalty Over Competence: How Ideology Erodes Reality
Loyalty replaces competence, enabling policy instability and corruption. Understand these dynamics to anticipate disruptions and navigate a polarized information environment.
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Liberalism's Internal Contradictions Undermine Its Own Foundations
Liberal democracy's strengths, when taken to extremes, paradoxically create internal contradictions that undermine its own foundations, paving the way for illiberalism.
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Emanuel: Nostalgia Hinders America's Global Stance, Democratic Party
America's focus on Iran empowered China and alienated allies, while domestic identity politics distract from crucial educational reform.
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The Intelligence Curse: AI Race Undermines Human Flourishing
AGI's race to automate all cognitive labor threatens an "anti-human future" by concentrating power and risking uncontrollability. Prioritizing safety over acceleration is urgent.
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Conventional Wisdom Fails Amidst Compounding Complexity and Misinformation
Conventional wisdom fails in complex systems, turning quick fixes into compounding problems and unchecked doubt into cultural corrosion. Learn to navigate this with strategic discomfort and delayed gratification.
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Effective Altruism's Counter-Intuitive Consequences and Expanded Scope
Effective altruism reveals counter-intuitive costs and benefits, urging a broader scope beyond immediate gains to navigate complex systems and unlock future flourishing.
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Technology's Harmful Impact: Polarization, Anomie, and Truth Erosion
Technology's promise of connection erodes trust and amplifies polarization, creating societal fissures. Understand the hidden costs and how AI reshapes human interaction.
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Geopolitical Blunders Stem from Communication Failures and Ideological Misunderstandings
Uncover how incompetent communication and misunderstood ideologies create devastating geopolitical blunders. Master navigating complex consequences for a strategic advantage.
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California's Progressive Governance: Unintended Consequences and Pragmatic Solutions
California's progressive policies, though well-intentioned, create systemic inefficiencies and unintended consequences, hindering tangible improvements and eroding public trust.
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Deep Vision Debacle: How Good Intentions Created Existential Bioweapons Risk
Well-intentioned virus hunting programs can inadvertently create existential risks by publishing dangerous pathogen blueprints, empowering malicious actors and increasing accidental release potential.
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Transactional Politics Erodes Global Stability and Normalizes Extremism
Transactional politics erodes global stability by emboldening dangerous ideologies and alienating allies. Reinvesting in international cooperation and ethical leadership is critical.
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Authoritarians Broadcast Intentions--Democracy's Danger Is Ignoring Them
Authoritarians broadcast their intentions; dismissals of their plans as bluster are the greatest threat to democracy. Learn to anticipate and counter tactics by listening to what is explicitly said.
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Politicization Erodes Institutions, Incentivizing Fringe Over Governance
Political parties appease extreme bases, eroding institutions and trust. This dynamic weakens democratic norms, creating missed opportunities for competitive elections and genuine governance.
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White-Collar Professions Face Rapid Automation Within 18 Months
White-collar jobs face rapid automation within 18 months, challenging the value of higher education and demanding immediate workforce adaptation to avoid disruption.
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Political Tribalism Rationalizes Hypocrisy and Erodes Truth
Political tribalism overrides truth, enabling "good people" to support bad actors by rationalizing hypocrisy and prioritizing belonging over objective reality.
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Navigating Culpability: Distinguishing Association from Criminality
Distinguish between varying degrees of culpability in scandals to avoid disproportionate reputational damage and foster more equitable evaluations.
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Rauch: Fascism's Characteristics Manifest in Trump's Norm Demolition
Fascism's core tactics--norm demolition, glorifying violence, and ideological capture--are actively reshaping politics, demanding a new framework for understanding and resisting its insidious rise.
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Hidden Consequences: Ideological Rigidity Fuels Societal Crises
Discover how immediate reactions obscure deeper issues, leading to missed opportunities and delayed repercussions across politics, crises, and climate change. Understand the hidden costs of ideological rigidity.
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Fascist-Style Governance Normalized Through State Violence and Misinformation
State violence and deliberate misinformation normalize aberrant governance, eroding trust and potentially leading to radicalization.
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LLMs Deflect From AGI; Recursive Self-Improvement Poses Existential Risk
Current LLMs fail to advance toward AGI, summarizing human models instead of discovering them. Scaling alone won't achieve true intelligence, posing existential risks due to a lack of causal reasoning and control.
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Woke Ideology's Entrenched Damage in Academia and Arts
"Woke" ideology's damage is entrenched in academia and arts, driving punitive actions and distorting reality through social media amplification, not disappearing but rebranding.
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Mastering Attention Through Mindfulness Reclaims Presence From Digital Distraction
Master your attention with mindfulness to reclaim presence from digital distraction and improve focus, relationships, and overall ease in life.
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Fractured Reality Prevents Global Cooperation on Existential AI Risks
A fractured reality and political polarization cripple our ability to manage AI risks and climate change, risking self-destruction despite technological potential.
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AI-Driven Abundance Risks Human Debasement and Obsolescence
AI-driven upheaval and digital disembodiment create an evolutionary bottleneck, risking human obsolescence and necessitating societal reinvention to avoid widespread debasement.
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