572. Navigating Education, Ideology, and Children | Answer the Call
Michaela hosts a call-in episode with her father, where they answer listener questions about homeschooling, the corruption of K-12 education, ideological capture of schools, art education, and the limits of changing IQ. They discuss how parents can socialize homeschooled children, evaluate and supplement institutional schooling, inoculate kids against woke ideology through broad political and historical education, and the importance of teachers explaining why subjects matter. The episode closes with a reflection on IQ as largely stable, the difficulty of increasing it directly, and the greater importance of building character, wisdom, and motivation through challenging experiences.
How to stop AI from killing your critical thinking | Advait Sarkar
Researcher Advett Sarkar argues that current AI tools risk turning knowledge workers into passive validators, weakening creativity, critical thinking, memory, and metacognition. He proposes a different paradigm where AI is designed as a "tool for thought" that preserves material engagement, offers productive resistance, and scaffolds thinking. Using a prototype scenario, he shows how AI provocations, lenses, and structured outlining can help people work faster while actually thinking more deeply, and he closes with a call to prioritize human agency and cognitive flourishing in AI design.
Selects: How Personality Tests Work
Josh and Chuck explore the history and mechanics of personality tests, focusing on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), the Big Five traits, the Rorschach test, and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI). They discuss how these instruments were developed, how they are used in workplaces and legal settings, and the major scientific criticisms around their validity, reliability, and potential for misuse. The episode also touches on how people relate to labels, why these tests feel accurate, and ends with an email about anxiety, productivity guilt, and stepping away from television.
What Happens When You Turn 20
Stephen Dubner first reads the new foreword to the 20th anniversary edition of the book Freakonomics, reflecting on his long partnership with economist Steve Levitt, the unexpected success of their work, and how the world and their own lives have changed over two decades. He then has a live onstage conversation with PBS NewsHour host Jeff Bennett at Sixth and I in Washington, D.C., discussing journalism, data, incentives, curiosity without cynicism, the evolution of Freakonomics Radio, the role of government data and politics, and how to think more clearly in an age of noise, misinformation, and emerging technologies like AI. Audience questions prompt Dubner to talk about riskier findings, career choices, updating past research, decency, and the future of technology and investing.
TIP765: What the World's Great Philosophers Can Still Teach Us About Wealth and Wisdom w/ Kyle Grieve
Host Kyle Grieve explores how ideas from major philosophers can improve investing decisions, emotional control, and definitions of success. Drawing on Ethan Everett's book 'The Investment Philosophers', he connects thinkers like Spinoza, Nietzsche, Hume, Voltaire, Pascal, William James, Baudrillard, Schopenhauer, Montaigne, Kierkegaard, Camus, Martin Buber, and Bruce Lee to practical investing mindsets and behaviors. The episode blends philosophical concepts with real investing examples from Kyle and well-known investors such as Warren Buffett, Howard Marks, George Soros, and David Einhorn.
Love 2.0: How to Move On
Host Shankar Vedantam speaks with psychologist Antonio Pascual Leone about why breakups are so difficult, the emotional mistakes people commonly make when relationships end, and practical therapeutic tools such as structured grief lists, narrative reframing, letter writing, and empty-chair dialogues to help people process loss and create their own sense of closure. In the second half, cognitive scientist Phil Fernback discusses the illusion of knowledge-why we routinely overestimate how much we understand, how this affects domains like politics, medicine, and everyday decision-making, and how to cultivate greater intellectual humility and curiosity in conversations with others.
Can AI make us more human? A social psychologist and a business leader answer | Heidi Grant and Barry Cooper
Host Elise Hu introduces a conversation from the TED Intersections series in which social psychologist Heidi Grant and business leader Barry Cooper discuss how AI can support human learning, decision-making, and connection. They explore the importance of a growth mindset in a rapidly changing AI-driven workplace, how AI can transform feedback and training, and the emerging skill of prompt engineering. They also reflect on AI's role in personal habits, social media, and creative content, and where human empathy and shared experience will remain essential.