Philosophy For Our Times

18 Aug 2026

Is it truly the beginning of the end of Western dominance? Where did it all go wrong? And is this more than just an upheaval of the status quo? For centuries, Western powers dominated the global

11 Aug 2026

Is the populist right opposed to liberalism and the free market? Does this mark a change in what it is to be right-wing, or was it a mistake to see populism as far right in the first place? Or is

4 Aug 2026

What do voyeurs want? What can the Greeks teach us about love? Why do we pursue those who we now are going to hurt us? Despite our longing for lasting connection, love often falters on the rocks of

28 Jul 2026

Is the future one where we accept tribalism and conflict as inherent in the human condition, where moral and scientific beliefs based on reason are badges, shaped by class, nation, ethnicity and

21 Jul 2026

For most scientists, the mind is little more than a machine. With the rise of AI, some now claim that computers may themselves become conscious. For acclaimed neuroscientist, psychiatrist, and

14 Jul 2026

Is anxiety something to be embraced, rather than fixed? Why are more and more of us feeling the 'soul's itch'? How we can start living more meaningfully? Anxiety is often understood as a problem to

7 Jul 2026

Is beauty a reliable indicator of scientific truth? Or is it merely a distraction? Some of the best scientists throughout history have equated beauty with truth. But is this a mistake? Join

30 Jun 2026

Is this the end of liberalism, or just another temporary crisis? If it is the end, what will follow it? And where did it all go wrong? Since the end of WWII, the Western world has been governed by

23 Jun 2026

What does originality mean in the age of AI? Why should artists resist the temptation to fear AI? What role will human creativity play in the future we're building? Jaron Lanier, a visionary computer

16 Jun 2026

What makes you 'you'? If scientists made a digital replica of your mind, would this new 'you' be conscious? And what does this all mean for what it means to exist? Whole-brain emulation (often called

9 Jun 2026

Is materialism mistaken in its understanding of consciousness? How can dividing experience into the phenomenal and the transcendent provide a new angle from which to view consciousness? Have you ever

2 Jun 2026

Is this the end of Britain's two-party system? How has Reform brought together seemingly contradictory left- and right-wing ideas? Why do they think that we should get used to climate change instead

26 May 2026

Does philosophy still matter in today's world? If so, why are students less and less interested in studying in it? In a special episode from the IAI archives, Mary Midgley addresses the declining

19 May 2026

Why has gender identity become such a controversial talking point in modern politics? Judith Butler, pioneering gender theorist whose changed the way we think about gender and sexuality, explores the

12 May 2026

Nadine Dijkstra is a Principal Investigator at the Institute of Neurology at UCL. Her research in Imaging Neuroscience explores how the brain generates mental images and differentiates them from

5 May 2026

Is the brain actually productive? Or is it instead permissive, simply acting as a filter through which consciousness passes? Can near death experiences help us to get closer to understanding the true

28 Apr 2026

Is evolutionary psychology merely a way of excusing outdated behaviours? Is it instead culture which really defines how we behave? As with the animal kingdom, we see human behaviour as the product of

21 Apr 2026

Does the past even exist anymore? Quantum mechanics has long unsettled our understanding of matter and measurement. But what if its implications reach further — into history, politics, and the very

14 Apr 2026

Did analytic philosophy ruin the entire discipline? For more than a century there has been a divide in Western philosophy between two distinct approaches, often described as analytic and continental

6 Apr 2026

Do we need a moral reawakening? Is animal suffering simply a fact of life or can it be avoided? How did the US Navy break whale protection laws? Is there more to animal suffering than just pain?

31 Mar 2026

Universities, long celebrated as sanctuaries of free thought and intellectual rigour, have for centuries been regarded as the best way to educate and conduct research. But increasingly, this

24 Mar 2026

What do the Soviet Union and the current British economy have in common? What can studying the philosophy of science reveal about our economic systems? Is the depoliticisation of economics a

17 Mar 2026

Who are we? Why are we here? Does life have a meaning beyond itself? Join former Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, and groundbreaking psychiatrist, literary scholar and author of 'The Matter

10 Mar 2026

Should everyone be treated equally? Many see populism with its focus on immigration and nationalism as not only politically dangerous but morally wrong. This reflects the universalist morality of the

3 Mar 2026

How do we acquire knowledge? We tend to think that knowledge is produced by experts through established institutions, progressing over time towards a single truth. But Steve Fuller challenges this

24 Feb 2026

How can taking on the role of someone else help us to understand ourselves? Does the hermit know himself better than the socialite? And where is the line between our true, authentic selves and the

17 Feb 2026

Alex Gómez-Marín is a controversial figure in contemporary neuroscience, known for challenging the materialist framework that dominates scientific accounts of consciousness. He argues that Near

10 Feb 2026

The self and the world We tend to think of ourselves as observers of the world and experience as something different from the material stuff that makes up reality. Yet at the same time as human

27 Jan 2026

An individual "is responsible for everything he does," claimed Sartre. And from criminal justice to creative expression, free will and responsibility are central to our culture and our personal

13 Jan 2026

Are we living in the moment? Are we really free? How can we transcend the constant anxieties of our mind? Throughout history, certain people in the West and the East have claimed that the human mind

6 Jan 2026

The good, the bad, and the transgressive Is the transgression of norms and rules what brings history forward and allows for creativity and change? OR is the fetishization of transgression an

30 Dec 2025

What is rationality? Why is it or is it not important? And where does perversity fit in? Join psychologist Paul Bloom in this interview where he discusses his research on these themes and defends his

16 Dec 2025

Why is the world moving away from liberalism and towards conservatism? One of Britain’s most provocative thinkers, John Gray is a political philosopher known for dismantling liberalism and exposing

9 Dec 2025

The future of European thought What is analytic philosophy and what is continental philosophy? And, perhaps most importantly, does this distinction make any sense? The division between these two

4 Dec 2025

Language shapes how we think, remember, and reason. But does it help us to uncover the fundamental nature of reality? Join the author of Language vs. Reality and linguistic anthropologist, Nick

28 Nov 2025

Philosophers cannot stop talking about consciousness - what are its limits? What is it made of? What does it allow us? This podcast is part of that conversation, but from a more experimental

25 Nov 2025

Why we worship without knowing it What should be included within the remit of philosophy? Religion? Love? Hair? Join well-known public speakers and writers Alain de Botton and Alex O'Connor as they

12 Nov 2025

Over the past decades, neuroscience has blossomed, positioning itself as a kind of master discipline over everything else. For who understands the brain surely understands all of human activity and

6 Nov 2025

What is nothing? Can it be defined, either philosophically or scientifically? Or will the exploration of nothing bring, ultimately, to nothing? The philosophical exploration of nothingness is an

31 Oct 2025

Why are we fascinated by apocalyptic stories? Join the team at the IAI for a reading of four Halloween-themed articles, written by historian and philosopher Natalie Lawrence, professor of political

28 Oct 2025

Einstein was called “slow” at school, J. K. Rowling collected a dozen rejections, and Walt Disney was once fired for “lacking imagination.” We love stories of perseverance—but what’s the

20 Oct 2025

Slavoj Žižek is back in a new interview where he takes us through his thoughts on the role of philosophy, the future of sex, his fear and love of AI and, as always, so much more. Tune in to hear

14 Oct 2025

What should time mean to us? Peter Sjöstedt-Hughes is a philosopher of mind who specialises in the thought of Alfred North Whitehead, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Benedict de Spinoza, and in fields

10 Oct 2025

Hugely influential in the latter decades of the 20th century, postmodernism transformed many academic disciplines and culture at large. Associated with an attack on objective truth and the uniqueness

6 Oct 2025

As ChatGPT and AI increase their presence in our lives, have we interrogated enough what this means for, and about, our collective psyche? In one of the most original critiques of ChatGPT, Slovenian

29 Sep 2025

The Enlightenment has faced a lot of criticism in recent years - its defenders and detractors often come head to head, scrambling to articulate its ultimate value or lack thereof to contemporary

16 Sep 2025

We all want to live the good life. But how many of us can claim to be truly content? Join philosopher and evolutionary biologist Massimo Pigliucci as he argues that pleasure, character, and a healthy

12 Sep 2025

Truth, delusion and psychedelic reality Do psychedelics reveal hidden layers of reality, or are we simply tripping? Psychedelics are back in the cultural zeitgeist, this time as a treatment for

9 Sep 2025

The unconscious has become a well-known feature of our human lived experience since Freud. We often refer to unwanted impulses, suppressed thoughts, unconscious desires, and the like. But what IS the

2 Sep 2025

Will we ever reach a conclusive, agreed-upon theory of consciousness? Over the millennia of recorded history, countless stories, theories, and arguments have emerged to explain the origins of