126 | David Stasavage on the Origin and History of Democracy

There is no human endeavor that does not have a theory of it — a set of ideas about what makes it work and how to do it well. Music is no exception, popular music included — there are reasons why cert...

22 Aug 20221h 11min

It's always a little humbling to think about what affects your words and actions might have on other people, not only right now but potentially well into the future. Now take that humble feeling and p...

15 Aug 20221h 42min

Evolution by natural selection is one of the rare scientific theories that resonates within the wider culture as much as it does within science. But as much as people know about evolution, we also fin...

8 Aug 20221h 17min

Welcome to the August 2022 Ask Me Anything episode of Mindscape! These monthly excursions are funded by Patreon supporters (who are also the ones asking the questions). We take questions asked by Patr...

1 Aug 20223h 6min

The idea of an "interest rate" might seem mundane and practical, in comparison to our usual topics around here, but there is a profound philosophical idea lurking in the background: if you lend me mon...

25 Jul 20221h 19min

Recent years have seen a revolution in the study of exoplanets, planets that orbit stars other than the Sun (or don't orbit stars at all). After a few tentative detections in the 1990s, dedicated inst...

18 Jul 20221h 15min

We describe the world using language — we can't help it. And we all know that ordinary language is an imperfect way of communicating rigorous scientific statements, but sometimes it's the best we can ...

11 Jul 20221h 24min

Welcome to the July 2022 Ask Me Anything episode of Mindscape! These monthly excursions are funded by Patreon supporters (who are also the ones asking the questions). I take the large number of questi...

4 Jul 20223h 26min