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May 22, 2023

Sam Harris speaks with Shamil Chandaria about how the brain constructs a vision of the self and the world. They discuss the brain from first principles; Bayesian inference; hierarchical predictive processing; the construction of vision; psychedelics and neuroplasticity; beliefs and prior probabilities; the interaction between psychedelics and meditation; the risks and benefits of psychedelics; Sam’s recent experience with MDMA; non-duality; love, gratitude, and bliss; the self model; the Buddhist concept of emptiness; human flourishing; effective altruism; and other topics.

Dr. Shamil Chandaria is a philanthropist, serial entrepreneur, technologist, and academic with multidisciplinary research interests spanning computational neuroscience, machine learning and artificial intelligence, and the philosophy and science of human wellbeing. His PhD from the London School of Economics was in mathematical modeling of economic systems using stochastic differential equations and optimal control theory. Later he completed an MA in philosophy with distinction from University College London, where he developed an interest in philosophy of science and philosophical issues in biology, neuroscience, and ethics.

In 2018, Dr. Chandaria helped to endow the Global Priorities Institute at Oxford University, an interdisciplinary research institute focusing on the most important issues facing humanity. In 2019 he was a founder of the Centre for Psychedelic Research in the department of Brain Sciences at Imperial College London, a neuroscience research institute investigating psychedelic therapies for a number of conditions including treatment resistant depression. He has also funded research on the neuroscience of meditation at Harvard, and at the University of California in Berkeley.

Twitter: @shamilch

YouTube: @ShamilChandaria

May 15, 2023

Sam Harris speaks with David Auerbach about the problematic structure of online networks. They discuss the tradeoffs between liberty and cooperation, the impossibility of fighting misinformation, bottom-up vs top-down influences, recent developments in AI, deepfakes, the instability of skepticism, the future of social media, the weaknesses of LLMs, breaking up digital bubbles, online identity and privacy, and other topics.

David B. Auerbach is a writer, technologist, and software engineer. He previously worked as a software engineer at Google and Microsoft for many years before turning to writing. He has written on technology, literature, and philosophy for many publications and is the author of MEGANETS: How Digital Forces Beyond Our Control Commandeer Our Lives and Inner Realities and BITWISE: A Life in Code.

Website: https://auerstack.substack.com/

Twitter: @AuerbachKeller

June 5, 2023

Sam Harris speaks with David Edmonds about the life and philosophy of Derek Parfit. They discuss Parfit’s work on identity, time bias, the “non-identity problem,” population ethics and “the Repugnant Conclusion,” the ethical importance of future people, Effective Altruism, moral truth, and other topics.

David Edmonds is a Distinguished Research Fellow at the Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics at Oxford University and a former BBC radio journalist. He is the author or editor of many books which together have been translated into over two dozen languages. His books include (with John Eidinow) the international best seller Wittgenstein’s Poker and, most recently, a biography, Parfit: A Philosopher and his Mission to Save Morality. David is also the host of a couple of philosophy podcasts including Philosophy Bites, which he creates with Nigel Warburton.

Twitter: @DavidEdmonds100

Website: www.davidedmonds.info

Sam Harris speaks with Andy Clark about the predictive brain, embodied cognition, and the extended mind. They discuss the structure of perception, novelty, precision, pain, psychedelics, emotion, ways to hack our predictions, hypnosis, meditation, artificial intelligence, consciousness, and other topics.

Andy Clark is Professor of Cognitive Philosophy at the University of Sussex. He is the author of several books including Surfing Uncertainty, Mindware, Supersizing the Mind, Being There, and most recently, The Experience Machine. His academic interests include artificial intelligence, embodied and extended cognition, robotics, and computational neuroscience.

Twitter: @CogsAndy

Website: https://profiles.sussex.ac.uk/p493-andy-clark