145. Michael Gazzaniga (neuroscientist) – The Impossible Problem

145. Michael Gazzaniga (neuroscientist) – The Impossible Problem

Author: Big Think / Panoply April 28, 2018 Duration: 45:54
Je pense donc je suis. (I think, therefore I am.) Huh? Who is this I? How do I know that it is thinking? What does it even mean to say that I am—that I exist, if it's this mysterious,  untrustworthy Ithat says  so? To be fair, René Descartes didn't invent these problems. but In the centuries after his death, his thought experiments sent philosophers, psychologists and later on, neuroscientists reeling and spiraling down a seemingly bottomless chasm In search of Consciousness. What is it? Where is it? How did it get there? Surely that icky grey-green stuff can't fully account for the sublime perfection of Beethoven's Ninth! If you've ever heard that there are differences between the left and the right brain, you can blame my guest today, Michael Gazzaniga, who did many of the pioneering studies in this area. Now he's after even bigger game. In his new book The Consciousness Instinct he lays a conceptual framework for closing the gap between the meat of the brain and the magic of Consciousness, and maybe saving us a lot of future headaches.  Surprise conversation-starter clips in this episode: Leonard Mlodinow on your brain and original thinking Johann Hari on inequality and depression/anxiety Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Imagine having just a few minutes with a brilliant thinker, but instead of asking them about their usual expertise, you steer the conversation somewhere entirely unexpected. That’s the core experience of Think Again-a Big Think Podcast. Host Jason Gots sits down with an extraordinary roster of guests-from Neil Gaiman and Margaret Atwood to Richard Dawkins and Bill Nye-and presents them with ideas and questions they aren’t prepared to discuss. The result is a series of spontaneous, revealing conversations that go far beyond typical interviews. You’ll hear authors, scientists, artists, and cultural icons like Alan Alda, Salman Rushdie, and George Takei thinking out loud, grappling with new concepts, and often surprising themselves. This podcast lives in the unscripted moments where curiosity meets expertise, covering a wide terrain of arts, culture, and societal questions. It’s about the joy of a mental detour, the kind that happens if you had ten minutes with Einstein and decided to talk about something other than physics. Each episode is an invitation to step off the well-worn path and discover what happens when great minds are asked to, well, think again.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

Think Again - a Big Think Podcast
Podcast Episodes
155. Lauren Groff (writer) – We Should Die of That Roar [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 43:10
The places we live in shape us. I don’t care who you are how indomitable your will…your spirit is in dialogue with the place you live. For example, I live in New York City, a place I wrapped around me like a second skin…
154. Jonathan Safran Foer (writer) – One Thing We Can All Agree Upon [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 48:51
What is food? It’s nourishment. It’s comfort. It’s culture. It’s art. For millions of people, it’s not something you waste much time thinking about. You eat what you’ve always eaten. What everyone around you eats. What y…
153. Guns: The Genie and the Bottle – Priya Satia (Historian) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 49:53
When you think of the industrial revolution what comes to mind? Steam engines probably. Lone genius inventors. Factories and coal mines, perhaps. And depending on your professional interests and political leanings, eithe…
151. Jessica Abel (cartoonist, creative coach) – Practical Magic [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:04:04
On an earlier episode of this show the Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk said something that I’ve never forgotten. He said that writing programs shouldn’t teach about plots or characters or how to structure a story. Instead,…
150. David Sedaris (humorist) – Sir David of the Spotless Roadways [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:01:14
Life is full of horrible things. I dare you to deny it. Things like death, sickness, and alcoholism. And did I mention death, which lies in wait for us all? But if you talk about these things at dinner parties, or at wor…
148. Jonathan Lethem (writer) – Batman's Greatest Enemy [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 57:33
There’s a famous line from a Bob Dylan song that goes “she’s got everything she needs...she’s an artist...she don’t look back.” As a person who loves art—music and literature especially—I’ve always been haunted by that l…