Intelligence Squared

Intelligence Squared is the home of lively debate and deep-dive discussion. Follow Intelligence Squared wherever you get your podcasts and enjoy four regular episodes per week taking you to the heart of the issues that matter in the company of the world’s great minds. We’d love to hear your feedback and what you think we should talk about next, who we should have on and what our future debates should be. Send us an email or voice note with your thoughts to podcasts@intelligencesquared.com or Tweet us @intelligence2. 

And if you’d like to support our mission to foster honest debate and compelling conversations, as well as ad-free podcasts, exclusive bonus content, early access and much more, become a supporter of Intelligence Squared today. Just visit intelligencesquared.com/membership to find out more. 


Society & Culture
Arts
News Commentary
1001
Ultras: Among The World's Most Extreme Fans, wi...
Ultras are football fans like no others. A hugely visible and controversial part of the sporting game. This movement of extreme fandom and politics is also one of the largest youth movements in the world. In this episode, James Montague, autho...
45 min
1002
Coronavirus and the Stats: Your Questions Answered
Feeling confused by all the data and metrics about coronavirus that are flying around? In this episode, Britain’s most eminent statistician David Spiegelhalter, biometrics expert Sheila Bird, and the American scientist John Ioannidis, who has ...
58 min
1003
Who We Listen To And Who We Don't, with Stephen...
Why are self-confident ignoramuses so often believed? Why are thoughtful experts so often given the cold shoulder? And why do apparently irrelevant details such as a person’s height, their relative wealth, or their Facebook photo influence whether or n...
32 min
1004
Coronavirus and the Economy: Your Questions Ans...
What will the long-term economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic be? For the fourth in a new series of interactive events from Intelligence Squared - Coronavirus: Your Questions Answered - we brought together a...
61 min
1005
Hype, Smoke and Mirrors, with Gemma Milne and C...
Hype has a dark side. It can mislead, distract and blinker us from seeing what is actually going on. In this episode we are joined by Gemma Milne, tech journalist and author of Smoke and Mirrors: How Hype Obscures the Future and How t...
53 min
1006
Coronavirus and Global Politics: Your Questions...
The coronavirus pandemic threatens to remake the world's political systems. But how exactly?In the third in a new series of interactive events from Intelligence Squared - Coronavirus: Your Questions Answered - we brought toget...
68 min
1007
The Unravelling of the Modern Middle East, with...
It all started in 1979. According to Kim Ghattas, the former BBC journalist and author of Black Wave: Saudi Arabia, Iran and the Rivalry That Unravelled the Middle East, this was the pivotal year that kickstarted a f...
38 min
1008
Mind, Matter and Meaning, with Brian Greene and...
In both time and space, the cosmos is astoundingly vast, and yet is governed by simple, elegant, universal mathematical laws. In this episode we are joined by Brian Greene, theoretical physicist and author of Until The End of Time, in conversa...
40 min
1009
Coronavirus: Your Questions Answered
How can we protect ourselves from coronavirus? How long will the current situation last? Why has the death rate been so high in Italy? And why have some other countries apparently been more successful at reducing the spread of the vir...
69 min
1010
Coronavirus and Morality: Rabbi Jonathan Sacks ...
The UK's former Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks appears in this special episode of the Intelligence Squared podcast, recorded remotely while he self-isolates in his home. In an in-depth discussion with the BBC's Ritula Shah, he discusses how our s...
46 min
1011
A Century of Conflict, with Rashid Khalidi and ...
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been raging for decades, with seemingly no end in sight. In this episode, we are joined by Rashid Khalidi, Palestinian-American historian and Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies at Colum...
65 min
1012
Radical Uncertainty, with Mervyn King, John Kay...
In these incredibly uncertain times, we're exploring the concept of 'radical uncertainty' in this episode with Mervyn King, the former Governor of the Bank of England, alongside renowned economist John Kay and Jesse Norman MP. Mervyn and...
52 min
1013
Kate Murphy and Ros Urwin on the Importance of ...
When was the last time you listened to someone, or someone really listened to you? At work, we’re taught to lead the conversation. On social media, we shape our personal narratives. At parties, we talk over one another. So do our politicians. We’re not...
46 min
1014
Eighty Is The New Thirty: A Guide To Getting Ol...
What are the most effective ways to keep our brains fit? Should we be learning a new language or using cognitive training apps? Should we ever retire? Will we soon be able to slow down the ageing process by taking special pills that work at the level o...
22 min
1015
One Of Them, with Michael Cashman and Razia Iqbal
Michael Cashman has been an actor, a politician and one of the pioneers of the struggle for LGBT equality in the UK. He is the author of a new book titled One Of Them: From Albert Square to Parliament Square and in this episode of the podcast he was in...
41 min
1016
Difficult Women: The Defining Fights of Feminis...
In this episode of the Intelligence Squared podcast we are joined by Helen Lewis, staff writer for the Atlantic, who claims that too many pioneers of women’s rights have been whitewashed or forgotten because society likes its heroines to be cu...
60 min
1017
Why Myanmar Matters, with Thant Myint-U and Ros...
In this episode we are joined by Thant Myint-U, the Burmese historian, former adviser to the President of Myanmar, and author of The Hidden History of Burma: Race, Capitalism, and the Crisis of Democracy in the 21st Century. ...
48 min
1018
Armando Iannucci, Jess Phillips and Jan Ravens ...
Has satire lost its power in this new world of fake news and ‘alternative facts’ - when our leaders lie so blatantly and frequently, and still manage to get away with it? Or is humour a more important tool than ever to hold those in power to account?...
61 min
1019
How Humanity Can Survive the Climate Crisis, wi...
38 min
1020
To Stop Climate Collapse, We Must End Capitalism
George Monbiot, Farhana Yamin, Adair Turner and Tony Juniper debated the single most important issue we face as a civilisation.
65 min
1021
More From Less, with Andrew McAfee and Hugo Lin...
In this episode we are joined by Andrew McAfee, the co-director of the MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy and author of More From Less: The Surprising Story of How We Learned to Prosper Using Fewer Resources. In a...
36 min
1022
Zombie Economics, with Paul Krugman and Linda Yueh
In this episode we are joined by Paul Krugman, Nobel prize-winning economist and author of Arguing With Zombies: Economics, Politics and the Fight for a Better Future. In a conversation with economist and broadcaster Linda Yueh, Krugm...
35 min
1023
Social Mobility and Making It in Modern Britain...
This episode is an exploration of social mobility and inequality in contemporary Britain, featuring Hashi Mohamed, author of People Like Us. Hashi came to the UK aged nine, a refugee from the Somali civil wa...
41 min
1024
Trailblazers: Letters to my Younger Self
In the second installment of our Trailblazers series, Intelligence Squared partnered with gal-dem to bring together a collection of outstanding women – and their letters – to our stage – from playwright Bonnie Greer to footballer Eni Aluko and comedian Shappi Khorsandi.
82 min
1025
The Power of the Scrum, with JJ Sutherland and ...
In this episode, we are joined by JJ Sutherland, the business expert and author of The Scrum Fieldbook. In conversation with the journalist Hugo Lindgren, he explores his ...
32 min