The Michael Shermer Show

In this solo commentary, Michael Shermer reflects on the assassination of Charlie Kirk and places it in the larger context of political violence, the psychology of radicalization, the dangers of false beliefs, and the role of free speech in intellectual discourse.

Science writer Nicholas Wade explains how human nature continues to shape—and sometimes destabilize—modern civilization, and argues that ignoring the effects of human nature on politics is one of society’s greatest mistakes.

Drawing on anthropology, evolutionary biology, and history, Wade shows how deep-rooted traits not only shape the outcomes of certain political beliefs and systems, but also affect how people form families, religion, and social order.

Nicholas Wade has worked at Nature and Science, and, for many years, at The New York Times, where he was an editorial writer and science editor. He is the...

Parenting today often feels like an uphill battle, with technology invading every corner of our kids’ lives. From the rise of social media addiction to the growing mental health crisis among children and teens, parents are grappling with how they can create a healthy, balanced relationship with technology for their kids.

Drawing on her decades as a psychologist studying the impact of technology and mental health, Jean Twenge offers evidence-based advice for raising independent and well-rounded children.

Jean Twenge, a professor of psychology at San Diego State University and the author of more than 190 scientific pu...

In this episode of The Michael Shermer Show, Michael Shermer interviews Alan Stern, a prominent planetary scientist and astronaut. Stern discusses his recent suborbital flight, the differences between government and private space initiatives, and the scientific implications of UFO sightings. He also shares insights about the evolution and future of space exploration, including details about the rarely talked about upcoming termination of dozens of already paid-for NASA missions.

Alan Stern is a planetary scientist, astronaut, and author. NASA has selected him to be the first researcher NASA funded to fly to space as a crewmember aboard a...

In a radical new story about the birth of our species, evolutionary biologist Madeleine Beekman argues that it was not hunting, fighting, or tool-making that forced early humans to speak, but the inescapable need to care for our children.

Beekman reveals the “happy accidents” hidden in our molecular biology—DNA, chromosomes, and proteins—that led to one of the most fateful events in the history of life on Earth: our giving birth to babies earlier in their development than our hominid cousins the Neanderthals and Denisovans. Faced with highly dependent infants requiring years of nurturing and protection, early hu...

Economist Dean Spears explains the forces driving global population change, from past fears of overpopulation to today’s concerns about declining birth rates.

He contrasts the perspectives of biologists and economists on population growth and highlights the role of human ideas and innovation in sustaining progress. Spears also discusses misconceptions about zero-sum economics, the links between population, health, and economic well-being, and the rise of anti-natalism.

The conversation covers population size and environmental concerns, government policies on family planning, and why cultural attitudes toward reproduction may be as important as policy in addressing the challenges of...

Because brainwashing affects both the world and our observation of the world, we often don’t recognize it while it’s happening―unless we know where to look. As Rebecca Lemov writes in her new book The Instability of Truth, “Brainwashing erases itself.” What we call brainwashing is more common than we think; it is not so much what happens to other people as what can happen to anyone.

In her work, Lemov exposes the myriad ways our minds can be controlled against our will, from the brainwashing techniques used against American POWs in North Korea to the “soft”...

In an era of globalized education, where ideals of freedom and inquiry should thrive, an alarming trend has emerged: foreign authoritarian regimes influencing American academia.

In her new book Authoritarians in the Academy, Sarah McLaughlin reveals how higher education institutions—long considered bastions of free thought—are compromising their values for financial gain and international partnerships.

Her investigation uncovers the subtle yet sweeping influence of authoritarian governments, exposing university leaders who prioritize expansion and profit over the principles of free expression. She also describes incidents in which professors and administrators weighed the costs of offending repr...

In this conversation, Michael Shermer and Dr. Eric Topol discuss the realties of aging, with particular focus on the role of AI in enhancing patient care and disease prevention, the importance of lifestyle factors, and the limitations of genetic testing in predicting health outcomes.

Topol also explains the dangers of ultra-processed foods, their link to inflammation, and the role of GLP-1 drugs in promoting healthier eating habits. The conversation also covers diet, particularly the differences between chicken and red meat, and the significance of sleep for overall health. Plus, consumption of microplastics, cholesterol management and statins, the...

Isabelle Boemeke explains how nuclear energy is our best option for ensuring the future of the planet—it can power cities, desalinate water, create carbon-free fertilizer, and heat homes, all with the smallest environmental footprint of any energy source. She also discusses common objections to nuclear energy, including safety concerns and waste management, the potential of microreactors, and the importance of nuclear energy in space exploration.

Isabelle Boemeke is a nuclear electricity educator. Her new book is Rad Future: The Untold Story of Nuclear Electricity and How it Will Save the World.

In his new book Coming Clean, Eric Heinze rejects the idea that we should be less woke. In fact, we need more wokeness, but of a new kind. Yes, we must teach about classism, racism, colonialism, patriarchy, and other gross injustices, but we must also educate the public about the left’s own support for regimes that damaged and destroyed millions of lives for over a century—Stalin in the Soviet Union, Mao Zedong in China, Pol Pot in Cambodia, or the Kim dynasty in North Korea.

Criticisms of Western wrongdoing are certainly important, yet Heinze explains that...

Traditional religion in the United States has suffered huge losses in recent decades. The number of Americans identifying as “not religious” has increased remarkably. Religious affiliation, service attendance, and belief in God have declined. More and more people claim to be “spiritual but not religious.” Religious organizations have been reeling from revelations of sexual and financial scandals and cover-ups. Public trust in “organized religion” has declined significantly. Crucially, these religious losses are concentrated among younger generations. This means that, barring unlikely religious revivals among youth, the losses will continue and accelerate in time, as less-religious younger Americans replace older more-religio...

In this episode, Michael Shermer speaks with historian Sophia Rosenfeld about how modern notions of personal choice—from Amazon shopping to Tinder swipes—emerged from centuries of cultural, religious, political, and economic transformation. Was there ever a time when choice wasn’t synonymous with freedom? Why were early ideas of “common sense” and “free will” so limited? And what happens when choice itself becomes overwhelming?

From Enlightenment ideals to the sexual revolution and the abortion debate, Rosenfeld traces how our expanding range of options—and the meaning we attach to them—has shaped everything from our romantic lives to our polit...

What can a lifetime of scientific discovery teach us about the universe—and ourselves? In this wide-ranging conversation, Michael Shermer sits down with Lord Martin Rees, renowned cosmologist, astrophysicist, and former Astronomer Royal, to reflect on the forces that shape scientific success, from personal luck to cultural context. Rees shares insights on the mysteries of cosmology, the search for extraterrestrial life, and the paradoxes that still puzzle humanity.

Rees also shares intimate reflections on his friend and Cambridge colleague Stephen Hawking, thoughts on Fermi’s Paradox, and why some truths may forever lie beyond human comprehension.

Th...

When you are faced with a decision, do you consider the best outcome, or do you consider your deepest values about which actions are appropriate? Steven Sloman contrasts these two primary strategies for making decisions: consequentialism or prioritizing one’s sacred values. He argues that, while both modes of decision making are necessary tools for a good decision maker, people err by deploying sacred values more often than they should, especially when it comes to sociopolitical issues. As a result, we oversimplify, grow disgusted and angry, and act in ways that contribute to social polarization.

Drawing on hi...

Michael Shermer in conversation with Debra Soh at FreedomFest 2025 in Palm Springs, CA.

Video courtesy of FreedomFest. Additional FreedomFest videos can be viewed on CiVL.

Drawing from intensive on-the-ground reporting in Israel, Gaza, and Lebanon, Douglas Murray places the latest violence in its proper historical context. He takes listeners on a harrowing journey through the aftermath of the October 7 massacre, piecing together the exclusive accounts from victims, survivors, and even the terrorists responsible for the atrocities.

Douglas Murray is a bestselling author and journalist. His books include the Sunday Times number-one bestsellers The War on the West: How to Prevail in the Age of Unreason; The Strange Death of Europe: Immigration, Identity and Islam; and The Madness of Crowds: Gender, Race and...

Do any of us really care about truth when it comes to politics? Should we? In a world of big lies, denialism, and conspiracy theories, democracies are experiencing two interlocked crises: a loss of confidence in democracy itself and the growing sense among many that politics is only about power—not truth.

In his new book, Michael Patrick Lynch argues that truth not only can—but must—matter in politics. He shows why truth is an essential democratic value—a value we need to sustain our democratic way of life—and how it can be strengthened.

Despite...

A debate on the mind, soul, consciousness, and the afterlife.

Michael Egnor, MD, is Professor of Neurosurgery and Pediatrics at the Renaissance School of Medicine at Stony Brook University. He received his medical degree from the College of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbia University and trained in neurosurgery at the University of Miami. He has been on faculty at Stony Brook since 1991. He is the neurosurgery residency director and has served as the director of pediatric neurosurgery and as vice-chairman of neurosurgery at Stony Brook Medicine. He has a strong interest in Thomistic philosophy, philosophy of mind...

When award-winning science writer Amy Alkon was blindsided by her first hot flash, it kicked off a cascade of symptoms—drenching night sweats, insomnia, and a rage she couldn’t explain. But what shocked her more was how little real science her doctor had to offer.

In this episode, Alkon shares what she uncovered in her deep dive into the research on menopause and perimenopause—the critical yet often neglected years leading up to menopause when millions of women are misdiagnosed, dismissed, or simply told to “wait it out.” Drawing from her new book Going Menopostal, she explains w...

What began as a call for justice has, in many cases, become an engine of conformity. In this searching conversation, Andrew Doyle (author, satirist, and cultural critic) joins Michael Shermer to unpack the trajectory of the woke movement: from its roots in anti-bigotry and awareness to its current entanglement with censorship, identitarian dogma, and ideological rigidity.

Drawing on his new book, The End of Woke Doyle traces the intellectual history of contemporary activism, explores the authoritarian impulses emerging on both the left and the right, and makes the case for a return to classical liberalism as a...

Since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, capitalism has unleashed unimaginable growth in opportunity and prosperity. And yet, at key points in American history, economic disruption has led to a greater role for government, ostensibly to protect against capitalism’s excesses. Today, government regulates, mandates, subsidizes and controls a growing share of the American economy.

Today on the show, retired U.S. Senator Phil Gramm, one of America’s premier public policy advocates, and noted economist Donald J. Boudreaux look at the seven events and issues in American history that define, for most Americans, the role of gove...

By most popular accounts, the universe started with a bang some 13.8 billion years ago. But what happened before the Big Bang? And how do we know it happened at all?

Cosmologist Niayesh Afshordi and science communicator Phil Halper offer a tour of the peculiar possibilities: bouncing and cyclic universes, time loops, creations from nothing, multiverses, black hole births, string theories, and holograms.

Incorporating insights from Afshordi’s cutting-edge research and Halper’s original interviews with scientists like Stephen Hawking, Roger Penrose, and Alan Guth, Afshordi and Halper compare these models for the origin of our orig...

In 2010, in a small New Hampshire town, next door to a copy center and framing shop, a ghost lab opened. The Kitt Research Initiative’s mission was to use the scientific method to document the existence of spirits. Founder Andy Kitt was known as a straight-shooter; he was unafraid—perhaps eager—to offend other paranormal investigators by exposing the fraudulence of their less advanced techniques. But when KRI started to lose money, Kitt began to seek funding from the paranormal community, attracting flocks of psychics, alien abductees, witches, mediums, ghost hunters, UFOlogists, cryptozoologists and warlocks from all over New Englan...

This is the inside story of the CIA’s secret mind control project, MKULTRA, using never-before-seen testimony from the perpetrators themselves.

Sidney Gottlieb was the CIA’s most cunning chemist. As head of the infamous MKULTRA project, he oversaw an assortment of dangerous―even deadly―experiments. Among them: dosing unwitting strangers with mind-bending drugs, torturing mental patients through sensory deprivation, and steering the movements of animals via electrodes implanted into their brains. His goal was to develop methods of mind control that could turn someone into a real-life “Manchurian candidate.”

In conjunction with MKULTRA, Gottlieb also plotted...

In this eye-opening episode, Michael Shermer chats with evolutionist Telmo Pievani about the surprising coexistence—and hybridization—of Neanderthals and Homo sapiens.

They discuss recent scientific discoveries, the evolving understanding of race and biology, and the crucial role of serendipity in advancing scientific knowledge.

This episode offers a nuanced perspective on how unexpected findings continue to reshape our understanding of human origins and the scientific process itself.

Telmo Pievani is Full Professor in the Department of Biology at the University of Padua, where he covers the first Italian chair of Philosophy of Biological Scie...

Amid rising concerns about AI, inequality, trade wars, and globalization, New Yorker staff writer and Pulitzer Prize finalist John Cassidy takes a bold approach: he tells the story of capitalism through its most influential critics.

From the Luddites and early communists to the Wages for Housework movement and modern degrowth advocates, Cassidy’s global narrative features both iconic thinkers—Smith, Marx, Keynes—and lesser-known voices like Flora Tristan, J.C. Kumarappa, and Samir Amin.

John Cassidy has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 1995. He writes a regular column, The Financial Page. He holds...

What does your diet have to do with your mood? Is mercury in fish really dangerous? Psychiatrist Dr. Drew Ramsey joins Michael Shermer to discuss the science behind nutritional psychiatry and how food, sleep, exercise, and social habits influence brain health. They explore why mental health issues are rising—especially among teens—and what role parenting, social media, and modern lifestyles play.

The conversation also covers the effectiveness of SSRIs and other treatments, the role of inflammation in mental health, and the importance of sleep and tracking sleep quality.

Drew Ramsey, MD is a board-certified psyc...

Jacob Mchangama, author of Free Speech: A History from Socrates to Social Media, joins Michael to examine the evolving landscape of free expression amid rising political and cultural tensions. They discuss how far governments, universities, and tech platforms should go in regulating speech, and what’s at stake when they do.

In this episode:

Jacob Mchangama is the foun...

Is it really possible to change your entire personality in a year? An award-winning journalist experiments with her own personality to find out—and reveals the science behind lasting change.

Research shows that you can alter your personality traits by behaving in ways that align with the kind of person you’d like to be—a process that can make you happier, healthier, and more successful. Olga embarked on an “experiment” to see whether it’s possible to go from dwelling in dread to radiating joy. For one year, she clicked “yes” on a bucket list of new experiences—...

The ways that statisticians and governments measure the economy were developed in the 1940s, when the urgent economic problems were entirely different from those of today. Diane Coyle argues that the framework underpinning today’s economic statistics is so outdated that it functions as a distorting lens, or even a set of blinkers. When policymakers rely on such an antiquated conceptual tool, how can they measure, understand, and respond with any precision to what is happening in today’s digital economy?

Coyle argues that to understand the current economy, we need different data collected in a different fram...

David Zweig’s new book An Abundance of Caution (MIT Press) is an account of the decision-making process behind the extended closures of public schools during the pandemic. In fascinating and meticulously reported detail, Zweig shows how some of the most trusted members of society—from Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists to eminent health officials—repeatedly made fundamental errors in their assessment and presentation of evidence.

By fall 2020, many students in Europe were already back in classrooms—and so were their peers in private schools in America and in public schools across mostly “red” states and districts. Yet millions of other chi...

It’s tempting to see ourselves as damaged or powerless—defined by past traumas, overwhelming emotions, and daily struggles. But is that really the most helpful way to understand ourselves? Does seeing ourselves as victims lead to growth?

Psychologist and author Scott Barry Kaufman joins us to examine how popular narratives around sensitivity, self-esteem, and emotional regulation may be holding us back. He unpacks the psychological costs of coddling (vs. empowerment), the rise of risk aversion, and how modern parenting, education, and therapy shape our sense of self.

With insight, empathy, and humor, Kaufman offers a ti...

Why do ordinary people carry out extraordinary harm when simply told to do so? From the Holocaust to the genocides in Rwanda, Bosnia, and Cambodia, history shows how obedience to authority can lead to unimaginable acts. But what’s happening in the brain when we follow orders—even ones that conflict with our morals?

In this episode, we speak with neuroscientist Emilie Caspar, whose groundbreaking research explores how authority influences cognition and behavior. Drawing from real-life accounts of genocide perpetrators and cutting-edge neuroscience, Caspar reveals how obedience can short-circuit independent decision-making—often without us realizing it.

Emil...

Amanda Knox spent nearly four years in prison and eight years on trial for a murder she didn’t commit—and became a notorious tabloid story in the process. Though she was exonerated, it’s taken more than a decade for her to reclaim her identity and truly feel free.

Amanda’s new book, Free recounts how she survived prison, the mistakes she made and misadventures she had reintegrating into society, culminating in the untold story of her return to Italy and the extraordinary relationship she’s built with the man who sent her to prison.

Amanda t...

Albert Einstein remains renowned around the world for revolutionizing our understanding of the cosmos, but very few realize that the celebrated scientist had a deep spiritual side. Einstein believed that one wondrous force was woven through all things everywhere—and this sense of the pervasive sacred influenced every aspect of his existence, from his marvelous science to his passionate pacifism.

Kieran Fox studied medicine at Stanford University and holds a doctorate in cognitive neuroscience from the University of British Columbia. He is a physician-scientist at the The University of California, San Francisco, where his research centers on th...

Outside of the academics and activists whose ideology came to dominate the West in the second decade of the twenty-first century, arguably no group influenced public discourse as much as the Intellectual Dark Web.

Challenging the intellectual and cultural orthodoxies that engulfed universities, the media, and big tech, this group—a loose collective of politically diverse intellectuals, commentators, and scholars critical of political correctness, identity politics, and cancel culture—relied on alternative platforms like podcasts, digital magazines, and YouTube to promote free speech, universal rights, and individual liberty.

While the term is most commonly identified with...

In all animals, mating is a deal. But few creatures behave as if sex is a simple, even mutually beneficial, transaction. Many more treat it with reverence, suspicion, angst, and violence.

Matt Ridley revisits Darwin’s revelatory theory of mate choice through the close study of the peculiar rituals of birds, and considers how this mating process complicates our own view of human evolution.

Ridley also explores the scientific research into the evolution of bright colors, exotic ornaments, and elaborate displays in birds around the world. Charles Darwin thought the purpose of such displays was to...

Phil Tinline, author of the new book Ghosts of Iron Mountain, explores the origins of the infamous Report from Iron Mountain, its role in conspiracy culture, and its lasting influence on perceptions of the military-industrial complex. The conversation also examines Holocaust denial, nativism, and the evolution of deep state conspiracies, highlighting the power of narratives in shaping democracy and public trust.

Tinline is a British freelance writer and documentarian. His book The Death of Consensus: 100 Years of British Political Nightmares was named The Times (London) Politics Book of the Year. Over two decades at the BBC, he...

A few reflections on religion following The Free Press debate in Austin, TX on February 27, 2025.

Michael Shermer and Adam Carolla (atheists) faced off against Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Ross Douthat (Christians).

You can watch the debate here: https://www.thefp.com/p/watch-does-the-west-need-a-religious