Sam Harris speaks with Frank Ostaseski about death and dying—and about how the awareness of death can improve our lives in each moment. If the Making Sense podcast logo in your player is BLACK, you can SUBSCRIBE to gain access to all full-length episodes at samharris.org/subscribe.

Sam Harris speaks with Kurt Andersen about the American aptitude for unfounded belief, the religious lunacy of the Puritans, populist mistrust of authority, the link between postmodernism and religious fundamentalism, the unique history of American religious entrepreneurship, the Trump phenomenon, the effect of fame on politics, and other topics. If the Making Sense podcast logo in your player is BLACK, you can SUBSCRIBE to gain access to all full-length episodes at samharris.org/subscribe.

Sam Harris speaks with Robert Wright about his book Why Buddhism is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment. If the Making Sense podcast logo in your player is BLACK, you can SUBSCRIBE to gain access to all full-length episodes at samharris.org/subscribe.

Sam Harris speaks with Cass Sunstein about the polarization and fragmentation of American society, “choice architecture,” the importance of face-to-face interactions for problem solving, group polarization and identity politics, virtuous extremism, the wisdom of crowds, direct democracy, the limits of free speech, the process of Presidential impeachment, and other topics.  If the Making Sense podcast logo in your player is BLACK, you can SUBSCRIBE to gain access to all full-length episodes at samharris.org/subscribe.

Sam Harris speaks with Nicholas Christakis about mob behavior, moral panics, and current threats to free speech. They discuss the importance of free speech, the failure of institutions, controversial Halloween costume guidelines at Yale, and the alienation of minority students.

This podcast features an interview with Sam Harris and Rob Reid where they discuss publishing, psychedelics, terrorism, meditation, free speech, and the dangers of superintelligent AI. They also touch on topics like the reach of podcasts vs books, misconceptions surrounding Islamophobia, the flaws in lie detector technology, and the spread of extreme ideas.

Sam Harris speaks with Mark Lilla about the fate of political liberalism in the United States, the emergence of a new identity politics, the role of class in American society, wealth inequality, and other topics. If the Making Sense podcast logo in your player is BLACK, you can SUBSCRIBE to gain access to all full-length episodes at samharris.org/subscribe.

Sam Harris speaks with Siddhartha Mukherjee, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Emperor of All Maladies, about different facets of cancer, from diagnosis to treatment. They discuss the challenges faced by oncologists, delivering bad news, the professionalization of empathy in medicine, and understanding the experience of cancer patients and treatment decisions.

Filmmakers Ken Burns and Lynn Novick discuss their 10-year-long journey creating The Vietnam War documentary series. They highlight the abundance of war footage, interviews with veterans, and the documentary's relevance due to the passage of time. They also discuss the challenges of storytelling from multiple perspectives and the importance of sound design. The podcast explores the collaborative process of documentary filmmaking, the impact of music on the protest movement, and reflects on moral relativism and the ambiguity of war.

Sam Harris speaks with Thomas Metzinger about the scientific and experiential understanding of consciousness. They also talk about the significance of WWII for the history of ideas, the role of intuition in science, the ethics of building conscious AI, the self as an hallucination, how we identify with our thoughts, attention as the root of the feeling of self, the place of Eastern philosophy in Western science, and the limitations of secular humanism. If the Making Sense podcast logo in your player is BLACK, you can SUBSCRIBE to gain access to all full-length episodes at samharris.org/subscribe.