Intelligence Squared
Ideas shape the world. Intelligence Squared brings you the conversations that explain them.
In every episode, we bring together leading thinkers, writers, scientists, policymakers and entrepreneurs, to challenge assumptions, test ideas and debate the questions shaping our future. If you want to think more clearly about the world and where it's heading, you're in the right place.
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1201
Deepfakes and the Infocalypse with Nina Schick ...
In this week's podcast Nina Schick speaks to Carl Miller about the rise of Deepfakes and what she believes is an impending 'Infocalypse'. Advances in AI mean that by scanning images of a person (for example using Facebook), a powerful ma...
43 min
1202
Niall Ferguson On What History Can Teach Us Abo...
There are few big thinkers better placed to explain the implications of the Covid-19 pandemic than historian Niall Ferguson. In addition to his profound understanding of past crises, since early March he has been meticulously collatin...
56 min
1203
An Artificial Revolution, with Ivana Bartoletti...
In this week's episode world-leading privacy expert Ivana Bartoletti speaks about the reality behind the AI revolution, from the low-paid workers who train algorithms to recognise cancerous polyps, to the rise of data violence and the sym...
42 min
1204
Slavoj Žižek and Shahidha Bari on Hegel in a Wi...
In celebration of the 250th anniversary of the birth of G.W.F. Hegel, Slavoj Žižek speaks to Shahidha Bari about the philosophical giant that changed our way of thinking about posthumanism. Together they investigate what he might have...
40 min
1205
Tony Blair and Andrew Adonis on Ernest Bevin, B...
In this rare public appearance together, chaired by the BBC’s Rajini Vaidyanathan, the former Labour prime minister Tony Blair and cabinet minister Andrew Adonis discussed how the man known as ‘the working-class John Bull’ grew to become one of this co...
45 min
1206
Science Fictions, with Stuart Ritchie and Tom W...
Medicine, education, health, parenting – wherever it really matters, we look to science for guidance and answers. In this episode Stuart Ritchie discusses his new book 'Science Fictions' and reveals the disturbing flaws that undermine our und...
41 min
1207
Sex Robots & Vegan Meat, with Jenny Kleeman and...
Award-winning journalist and documentary-maker Jenny Kleeman takes us on a journey into the world of the people who are changing what it means to be human. Focusing on the central pillars of the human experience–birth, food, ...
42 min
1208
Angrynomics: Why The World is So Angry, with Ma...
Why are measures of stress and anxiety on the rise, when economists and politicians tell us we have never had it so good? While statistics tell us that the vast majority of people are getting steadily richer the world most of us experience day-in and d...
41 min
1209
Outraged: Why Everyone is Shouting and No One i...
In this week's episode BBC presenter and DJ Ashley 'Dotty' Charles joins us to discuss her new book 'Outrage' and the insatiable appetite for anger in today's world. In conversation with Ash Sarkar, she explores how outrag...
45 min
1210
Putin's People with Catherine Belton and Edward...
Former Moscow correspondent and investigative journalist Catherine Belton reveals the untold story of how Vladimir Putin and his entourage of KGB men seized power in Russia and built a new league of oligarchs.Through exclusive inte...
45 min
1211
Debate: Iran Is Not Our Enemy
Is Iran an enemy to be confronted or a potential ally to engage with? In this week's podcast we debate 'Iran is not our enemy' with Mehdi Hasan, Azadeh Moaveni, Daniel Hannan and Salman Al-Ansari. The debate was chaired by the BBC's...
60 min
1212
City on Fire: The Fight for Hong Kong, With Ant...
In this week's episode writer and lawyer Antony Dapiran joins us from Hong Kong to discuss the protests and turmoil that have engulfed the city since the summer of 2019. He spoke to political economist Shirley Yu. Together they d...
65 min
1213
The Reckoning: Kwame Kwei-Armah and Idris Elba ...
A great reckoning is taking place in the wake of the brutal killing of George Floyd and the protests that followed his death. Companies and organisations are looking afresh at how they can do a better job of combatting institutional bias and racism. Em...
58 min
1214
We Need To Talk: Me and White Supremacy, with L...
Amidst the current global conversation around police brutality in the United States and the experience of black people the world over, this week we speak to Layla Saad to investigate the role each of us has to play in dismantling white supremacy.&n...
64 min
1215
Unravelling Unconscious Bias, with Dr Pragya Ag...
In the wake of sweeping protests about racism and police brutality, this week we speak to Dr Pragya Agarwal to unravel the way our implicit or 'unintentional' biases affect the way we communicate and perceive the wo...
46 min
1216
Why do Evangelicals Worship at the Altar of Don...
Why does Donald Trump have such a good relationship with white evangelical christians despite his questionable conservative credentials? In this week's episode Sarah Posner, author of 'Unholy: Why White Evangelicals Worship ...
47 min
1217
Statues, Slavery and the Struggle for Equality ...
Following the death of George Floyd, global Black Lives Matter protests, and debates raging over statues from Colston to Churchill, Intelligence Squared hosted an online discussion with historian David Olusoga, Labour MP Dawn Butler, and philosopher Su...
71 min
1218
The New Long Life: Flourishing in a Changing Wo...
If we live to 100, will we ever really stop working? And how will an aging society change the way we love, manage and learn from others? In this week's episode Andrew J Scott and Lynda Gratton speak to Tom Whipple about their book 'The New Lo...
49 min
1219
Anand Giridharadas on Capitalism in the Time of...
In his 2019 book Winners Take All, Anand Giridharadas launched a searing attack on the global elites. Now he turns his thoughts to the post-pandemic world. Is the crisis an opportunity to create a more egalitarian society? Ho...
57 min
1220
The Passion Economy with Adam Davidson and Hugo...
Are the middle classes really dying off? Will robots really take our jobs? Contrary to common belief Adam Davidson argues the twenty-first-century economic paradigm offers new ways of making money, fresh paths toward professional fulfillment, and unpre...
62 min
1221
Together: The Healing Power of Human Connection...
In this week's episode former Surgeon General of the United States, Dr Vivek Murthy speaks to Ros Urwin about how he discovered first hand how loneliness lies behind some of our greatest personal and societal challenges,...
55 min
1222
Nervous States: How Feeling Took Over the World...
Why do so many of us no longer trust experts, facts and statistics? Why has politics become so fractious and warlike? And how can the history of ideas help us understand our present? In this episode Professor Will Davies, aut...
52 min
1223
Putting Peer Pressure to Work with Robert H Fra...
In this week's episode Robert H. Frank, author of 'Under the Influence: Putting Peer Pressure to Work' speaks to Linda Yueh about how our social environments influence our behaviour more than we think. They discuss why ...
43 min
1224
No Visible Bruises: Why What we don't know abou...
In this week's episode award-winning journalist Rachel Louise Snyder speaks to Helen Lewis about some common misconceptions about domestic violence: that it happens to an unlucky few; that it's a matter of poor choices; that if things are dir...
50 min
1225
The Dragons and the Snakes: How the Rest Learne...
In this episode, leading soldier-scholar David Kilcullen speaks to Carl Miller about how the West’s opponents have learned from twenty-first-century conflict and explains how their cutting-edge tactics and adaptability pose a serious threat to America ...
53 min