Consider the spider
Maybe your idea of spiders is a bit like mine was. You probably know that they have eight legs, that some are hairy. Perhaps you imagine them spending most of their time sitting in their webs—those classic-looking ones,…
Many Minds
There's a quiet revolution happening in how we understand intelligence, and it's not just about humans. Many Minds, hosted by Kensy Cooperrider of the Diverse Intelligences Summer Institute, digs into this expansive idea. Each episode is a journey into the inner worlds of creatures and creations we share the planet with. You'll hear from researchers who decode the complex social minds of crows, who map the sensory universe of an octopus, or who grapple with the emerging cognition of artificial systems. This isn't a dry lecture series; it's a collection of thoughtful conversations that feel like pulling up a chair with experts who are genuinely redefining what it means to think, feel, and learn. The Many Minds podcast operates from a simple but profound premise: to grasp our own human experience, we need to listen to the many other kinds of minds around us. Tune in every other week for explorations that are as much about philosophy and wonder as they are about science and education, all grounded in rigorous research and a deep curiosity about the beings-animal, human, and artificial-that fill our world.
Episodes
Can we measure consciousness?
A cluster of brain cells in a dish, pulsing with electrical activity. A bee buzzing its way through a garden in bloom. A newborn baby staring up into his mother's eyes. What all these entities have in common is that we d…
Rehabilitating placebo
Welcome back friends! Today we've got a first for you: our very first audio essay by... not me. I would call it a guest essay, but it's by our longtime Assistant Producer, Urte Laukaityte. If you're a regular listener of…
Cosmopolitan carnivores
They tend to move under the cover of darkness. As night descends, they come for your gardens and compost piles, for your trash cans and attic spaces. They are raccoons, skunks, and coyotes. And if you live in urban North…
From the archive: Myths, robots, and the origins of AI
Hi friends, we're busy with some spring cleaning this week. We'll have a new episode for you in two weeks. In the meanwhile, enjoy this pick from our archives! _____ [originally aired Nov 30, 2022] When we talk about AI,…
The borderlands of perception
We've all seen those illusions. The dots seem to dance, when in fact they're completely still. The lines look like they bend, but in reality they're perfectly straight. Here's the thing: It doesn't matter that you know t…
Social memory in our closest cousins
If you want to have a rich social life, you're going to need to know who's who. You'll need to distinguish friend from foe, sister from stranger. And you're going to need to hold those distinctions in your head— for at l…
Fermentation, fire, and our big brains
Brains are not cheap. It takes a lot of calories to run a brain, and the bigger your brain, the more calories it takes. So how is it that, over the last couple million years, the human brain tripled in size. How could we…
Of molecules and memories
Where do memories live in the brain? If you've ever taken a neuroscience class, you probably learned that they're stored in our synapses, in the connections between our neurons. The basic idea is that, whenever we have a…
Energy, cooperation, and our species' future
Welcome back folks! The new season of Many Minds is quickly ramping up. On today's episode we're thrilled to be rejoined by Dr. Michael Muthukrishna. Michael is Associate Professor of Economic Psychology at the London Sc…
