Cultural evolution has shaped human nature far more than we realize, and economist Robin Hanson and evolutionary biologist Joe Henrich reveal why ignoring this changes everything about policy, innovation, and our future. In this deep dive conversation, they explore how culture doesn't just influence behavior, it rewrites our preferences, beliefs, and even our cognitive machinery.

Joe Henrich, professor at Harvard and author of The WEIRDest People in the World, explains how humans evolved to be uniquely reliant on social learning, making us a cultural species first and foremost. Robin Hanson, economist at George Mason University and author of The Elephant in the Brain, challenges the implications: if cultural evolution can account for most of human nature, then far more has changed in the last hundred thousand years than conventional wisdom suggests—and far more could change in the near future.

Together, they tackle why economists bracket preferences instead of explaining them, how WEIRD psychology has dominated research while studying statistical outliers, why the collective brain hypothesis suggests innovation depends more on population size than individual genius, and why organizations systematically suppress innovation despite claiming to value it. They discuss marriage norms and kinship structures that literally reshape cognition across cultures, big gods and moral religions that enabled large-scale cooperation, and the uncomfortable selection pressures modern societies refuse to discuss openly.

This conversation bridges economics, evolutionary biology, anthropology, and policy—revealing why cultural evolution deserves far more attention than it receives in academia, government, and institutional design.⸻

TIMESTAMPS

00:00:04 – Introductions: Economics meets cultural evolution

00:01:26 – What is cultural evolution and why does it matter?

00:03:31 – The ambitious scope: explaining preferences, beliefs, and values

00:04:08 – Why economists bracket preferences—and why that's a problem

00:04:55 – Cultural evolution as a return to Darwinian thinking

00:06:26 – How genetic evolution shaped us to be cultural learners

00:07:45 – Why cultural evolution rarely enters policy discussions

00:12:00 – The WEIRD problem: most psychology research studies outliers

00:20:00 – Marriage norms, kinship, and cognitive differences across cultures

00:28:00 – The collective brain: why innovation depends on population size

00:38:00 – Can individuals or small groups out-innovate large populations?

00:48:00 – Religion, cooperation, and big gods that enforce moral norms

00:58:00 – Why societies struggle with explicit reasoning about cultural evolution

01:08:00 – Selection pressures we're not thinking about: fertility, values, migration

01:18:00 – The challenge of integrating cultural evolution into institutional design

01:24:30 – Cultural evolution's influence (or lack thereof) in economics

01:26:00 – Innovation: overwhelmingly important, surprisingly poorly understood

01:28:00 – Why organizations suppress innovation while claiming to promote it

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GUESTS

Robin Hanson – Economist, George Mason University

Author of The Elephant in the Brain and The Age of Em

https://overcomingbias.com/

http://mason.gmu.edu/~rhanson

Joe Henrich – Professor of Human Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University

Author of The WEIRDest People in the World and The Secret of Our Success

https://x.com/JoHenrich

https://henrich.fas.harvard.edu

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ABOUT CURIOSITY ENTANGLED

Curiosity Entangled pairs distinguished thinkers from different disciplines for unscripted conversations about consciousness, science, technology, and humanity's long-term future. Hosted by Accelerator Media, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to science storytelling and long-term thinking.

In this episode of Curiosity Entangled, professor @DrEricAnctil and science fiction author Daniel H. Wilson meet for a wide-ranging dialogue on artificial intelligence, human nature, and the uncertain futures we're building together. What begins as introductions between a media scholar and a roboticist-turned-storyteller unfolds into a profound exploration of how humans interface with technology, the cultural implications of AI, and whether our species can evolve alongside machines without losing what makes us fundamentally human.

Eric traces his academic journey from sports media and higher education to inventing his own role studying media, technology, and the cultural dimensions of innovation—focusing not on how machines are built, but on how humans engage with them. Daniel describes his path from growing up in the Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma through earning his robotics PhD at Carnegie Mellon to writing bestsellers like How to Survive a Robot Uprising, blending his technical expertise with indigenous perspectives and science fiction imagination. Together, they probe whether science fiction can help us navigate near-future scenarios, how different cultural frameworks might reshape our relationship with AI, and whether capitalism's profit motives can align with technologies that make us better people.

At the heart of the discussion lies a shared tension: we're living through a "wild west" moment with AI, simultaneously fascinated and terrified by what we're creating. The pair explore how social media addiction revealed humanity's vulnerability to engineered engagement, why "engaging" rather than "embracing" should be our stance toward new technologies, and how younger generations might inject different values into systems currently driven by shareholder interests. They also examine the anthropomorphization of AI in everything from autonomous vehicles to children's toys, and debate whether we can design AI companions that challenge us to be more empathetic rather than simply reinforcing our existing behaviors.

Through these exchanges, Eric and Daniel circle around an audacious hope: that despite the dangers ahead, humans can evolve together, retain their humanity, and create technologies that serve the greater good rather than merely extracting value.

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Learn More About the Guests

Daniel H. Wilson

Author and Roboticist | PhD, Carnegie Mellon University

Cherokee Nation Citizen | Author of Robopocalypse, The Andromeda Evolution, Pearl in the Sky

https://danielhwilson.com

Eric Anctil

Professor of Media and Technology, University of Portland

Founder, Cosmic North Studio | Author of Keep Evolving and Stay Human

https://cosmicnorth.studio

https://youtube.com/@UCjeiKRid_5RsYCWvMJ5KhVQ

https://ericanctil.com

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Timestamps

00:00:27 – Introductions: Robots, fiction, and the human side of AI

00:04:12 – How science fiction predicts and shapes the future

00:06:00 – Voyeurism, exhibitionism, and the psychology of social media

00:08:14 – The real “robopocalypse”: attention as the new battleground

00:10:47 – Consciousness, sentience, and the rise of AI companions

00:13:40 – Infotainment, learning, and the erosion of deep knowledge

00:15:45 – The domestication of robots and humans

00:17:18 – Psychosis, ego, and the hidden dangers of AI interaction

00:19:59 – Deifying machines and the illusion of digital gods

00:21:26 – Reciprocity, empathy, and losing our social reflexes

00:27:24 – Why machines flatter us and how it makes them dangerous

00:29:23 – Working inside the machine: morality, capitalism, and complicity

00:33:05 – Bezos, efficiency, and the dark logic of progress

00:36:25 – Hole in the Sky and the idea of Indigenous technology

00:39:51 – Is AI the new colonizer and are we its resources

00:42:31 – The peer-opticon: how we surveil each other for free

00:47:20 – Hive minds, utopias, and the illusion of collective intelligence

In this episode of Curiosity Entangled, philosopher Bernardo Kastrup and neuroscientist Christof Koch meet for a rare and wide-ranging dialogue on consciousness, physics, and the limits of materialism. What begins as an exchange between two leading proponents of Integrated Information Theory (IIT) unfolds into a profound exploration of what consciousness is, how it might arise, and whether it could extend beyond biology into machines and even quantum systems.

Christof traces his decades of work with Francis Crick and at the Allen Institute, developing tools to detect signs of consciousness in unresponsive patients. Bernardo describes his dual life as a computer engineer and philosopher of mind, bridging the technical and the metaphysical in search of a unified account of reality. Together, they probe whether artificial intelligence systems like ChatGPT merely mimic human awareness or could one day become truly conscious. Their conversation ranges from quantum entanglement and the ontology of information to the metaphysical implications of Integrated Information Theory.

At the heart of the discussion lies a shared question: can a theory of consciousness also illuminate the nature of the physical world? The pair discuss the idea of “ontological dust,” the possibility that quantum computers might possess a faint glimmer of experience, and how mystical or non-dual experiences challenge the boundaries of physicalism. They also touch briefly on anesthesiologist Stuart Hameroff’s theory of orchestrated objective reduction, which suggests that consciousness arises from quantum effects in microtubules, and debate its compatibility with IIT.

Through these exchanges, Bernardo and Christof circle around an audacious idea that mind and matter may not be two distinct domains but two perspectives on a single informational reality.

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5 Questions This Episode Might Leave You With

1. Can consciousness arise from non-biological systems—or is it unique to life?

2. What connects Integrated Information Theory and quantum information theory?

3. Are “things” in the world truly distinct, or are they convenient fictions of perception?

4. Could future technologies enable minds to merge or expand through physical connection?

5. If consciousness is intrinsic to the universe, what does that mean for science itself?

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Learn More About the Guests

Bernardo Kastrup

Philosopher & Computer Engineer | Executive Director, Essentia Foundation

Author, The Idea of the World; Analytic Idealism

https://bernardokastrup.com

Christof Koch

Neuroscientist & Meritorious Investigator, Allen Institute for Brain Science

Co-developer of Integrated Information Theory

Former Chief Scientist & President, Allen Institute

https://christofkoch.com

https://alleninstitute.org

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Timestamps

00:00:27 – Introductions: From neuroscience to philosophy and AI

00:05:12 – Integrated Information Theory and the illusion of AI consciousness

00:08:45 – Quantum computers, entanglement, and the possibility of artificial feeling

00:10:00 – Beyond Physicalism: Consciousness, physics, and metaphysical challenges

00:15:40 – Information as the bridge between mind and matter

00:19:00 – Split-brain experiments and instantaneous shifts in consciousness00:27:00 – Are objects real, or conceptual conveniences?00:33:00 – Why panpsychism isn’t enough

00:38:30 – Particles as ripples, not things: rethinking matter

00:45:00 – The power and peril of scientific “convenient fictions”

00:49:00 – Experimenting with shared consciousness and Neuralink interfaces

00:53:00 – Consciousness in the cosmos and possible ways to detect it

00:56:00 – Dissociative identity, unconscious knowledge, and the multiplicity of mind

01:02:00 – Closing reflections on mind, matter, and mystery

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In this episode of Curiosity Entangled, philosopher and psychologist Báyò Akómoláfé joins theologian Catherine Keller for a searching dialogue on artificial intelligence, theology, and what it means to be human at the crossroads of technology. What begins with the question of AI’s place in creation unfolds into a meditation on race, mortality, authority, and the fragile line between the natural and the artificial.Bayo invokes the Garden of Eden, crossroads in Yoruba cosmology, and his idea of “becoming dust” to reimagine AI not as a tool but as a disruptive force unsettling human identity and mastery. Catherine draws from process theology and her work on apocalyptic hope to probe whether AI is a new instrument of denial or a chalice through which unexpected solidarities and forms of life might emerge. Together, they wrestle with risk, death, and transformation, asking whether we are witnessing the end of “the human” or the unveiling of new ways of being entangled with each other and the more than human world .5 Questions This Episode Might Leave You With1. Is AI a threat to human identity, or an invitation to rethink what being human means?2. What can Yoruba crossroads, biblical dust, and apocalyptic theology teach us about decision and risk in an age of AI?3. Does naming the world bring care, or does it foreclose possibility?4. Can AI be a tool for denying death, or a companion in embracing finitude?5. How might solidarity and possibility be cultivated at the crossroads of technology, theology, and ecological crisis?Learn More About the GuestsBayo AkomolafePhilosopher, Psychologist, Poet | Author, These Wilds Beyond Our FencesFounder, The Emergence Networkhttps://www.emergencenetwork.org/https://bayoakomolafe.netCatherine KellerTheologian | Author, Facing Apocalypse: Climate, Democracy, and Other Last ChancesProfessor of Constructive Theology, Drew Universityhttps://catherineekeller.com/Timestamps00:00:27 - Opening and the invitation to speak about AI00:03:05 - Creation and destruction as a single intensifying moment00:05:27 - Eden, naming, and taxonomy as care or closure00:13:09 - Crossroads versus intersectionality and the risk of decision00:20:14 - Becoming dust, mortality, and species level vulnerability00:27:13 - Transhumanist dreams, immortality quests, and denial of death00:31:13 - Entanglement, weathering bodies, and the work of solidarity00:40:16 - Authorship and authority reimagined in the age of AI00:51:24 - AI as chalice, poetics, and naming the unnamable01:07:02 - Regulation, safety, and the reinforcement of colonial dynamicsFollow Accelerator Mediahttps://x.com/xceleratormediahttps://instagram.com/xcelerator.media/https://linkedin.com/company/accelerator-media-org

In this episode of Curiosity Entangled, author and philosopher Gurcharan Das joins political economist Milan Vaishnav for a wide-ranging conversation on the ethics of war, the future of liberalism, and the enduring tensions between statecraft and morality. What begins as a thought experiment—could the targeted assassination of a tyrant prevent a full-scale war?—unfolds into a rich dialogue spanning geopolitics, ancient Indian philosophy, and the fragile norms holding the global order together.

Gurcharan draws on the Bhagavad Gita, his utilitarian leanings, and his new AI-powered book project to explore modern warfare, drone ethics, and whether Gandhi and Himmler could really have drawn wisdom from the same sacred text. Milan weaves in contemporary case studies—from Gaza to Gujarat, from Tamil Nadu’s manufacturing boom to the shortcomings of India’s liberal opposition—offering sharp analysis on state capacity, democracy, and economic reform. Together, they examine what it means to wield power responsibly in an era of deep polarization and technological acceleration.

5 Questions This Episode Might Leave You With

1. Could targeted assassinations of wartime instigators reduce human suffering—or create dangerous moral precedents?

2. Can the Bhagavad Gita guide ethical decision-making in modern warfare and politics?

3. Is the liberal international order unraveling, or are we taking its historic gains for granted?

4. What lessons can India learn from Tamil Nadu’s manufacturing success and China’s bureaucratic incentives?

5. Can moral imagination and institutional reform revive democracy in an age of cynicism?

Learn More About the Guests

Gurcharan Das

Author, India Unbound and The Difficulty of Being GoodHarvard-Educated Philosopher | Former CEO, Procter & Gamble India

https://gurcharandas.org

https://x.com/gurcharandas

Milan Vaishnav

Director, South Asia Program, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Author, When Crime Pays | Host, Grand Tamasha

https://carnegieendowment.org/people/milan-vaishnav

https://x.com/milanv

Timestamps

00:00:27 – Introducing the concept: AI book on the Bhagavad Gita and modern warfare

00:05:31 – Drone strikes, utilitarian ethics, and the seduction of surgical warfare00:11:49 – What if the Buddha had guided Arjuna instead of Krishna?

00:16:20 – Gandhi, Himmler, and the duality of interpreting the Gita

00:20:23 – The moral hazards of targeted assassinations

00:24:46 – Kant’s Perpetual Peace and the UN’s mixed legacy

00:30:11 – Why liberalism still matters—despite its critics

00:34:54 – The need for community: liberalism and the rise of nationalism

00:37:17 – India’s economic reforms: missing political champions?

00:41:29 – India’s missed industrial revolution—and hope in Tamil Nadu

00:45:17 – iPhones, incentives, and the future of Indian manufacturing

00:50:27 – Education reform and the politics of short-term thinking

00:54:10 – A silent education revolution underway?

00:58:16 – Institutions, norms, and fragile democracies

01:03:28 – When (if ever) is assassination justifiable?

01:07:32 – The need for global legitimacy in precision warfare

01:10:46 – Is this the best period in human history—and will we realize it too late?

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In this episode of Curiosity Entangled, evolutionary biologist Sean B. Carroll and paleontologist Andrew H. Knoll dive deep into the intertwined story of life and Earth—how genetics and geology, extinction and emergence, have sculpted the living world as we know it. From early microbial life and the Cambrian explosion to mass extinctions and planetary evolution, this conversation maps billions of years of change and discovery.

Sean and Andy reflect on how their once-separate disciplines—evo-devo and paleontology—came together to unlock new understandings of form, function, and time. They explore the episodic history of water on Mars, the transformative role of oxygen in animal evolution, the legacy of the Mars Rover, and the very real consequences of global environmental change today. Along the way, they share personal stories of fossil-hunting, career pivots, and the emotional pull of scientific storytelling. For anyone curious about Earth’s past, present, and precarious future, this episode is a time capsule and a call to curiosity.

5 Questions This Episode Might Leave You With

1. How did common genetic toolkits shape life’s diversity across wildly different species?

2. What does Mars’s episodic climate history suggest about life beyond Earth?

3. How did a collaboration between evo-devo and paleontology unlock new insights into evolution?

4. What caused Earth’s great mass extinctions—and what can they teach us today?

5. Can scientific storytelling help shift how we think about the planet’s future?

Learn More About the Guests

Sean B. Carroll –Distinguished University Professor of Biology, University of Maryland

Executive Producer, HHMI Tangled Bank Studios

Professor Emeritus of Molecular Biology & Genetics, University of Wisconsin–Madison

https://tangledbankstudios.org

https://www.seanbcarroll.com/

Andrew H. Knoll –Fisher Research Professor of Natural History

Research Professor of Earth & Planetary Sciences, Harvard University

https://eps.harvard.edu/people/andrew-h-knoll

https://www.amazon.com/Brief-History-Earth-Billion-Chapters/dp/0062853910

Timestamps

00:00:50 – Mars’s climate history: wet–dry–wet again?

00:05:25 – Andy’s pivot from engineering to geology and biology

00:11:09 – Bridging disciplines: paleontology meets evo-devo

00:15:27 – Discovering shared genetics across the animal kingdom

00:19:20 – Fossil hunting in the Arctic and unearthing deep time

00:24:28 – Oxygen, tectonics, and the rise of large animals

00:27:25 – Sean’s childhood fascination with salamanders

00:35:15 – Why scientists are never bored

00:39:12 – Sean’s leap from researcher to writer and filmmaker

00:45:17 – Writing to think: how books reshape scientific thought

00:51:02 – Global collaboration in science and the joy of mentorship

00:54:27 – The climate parallels between past mass extinctions and today

01:00:25 – Volcanism, CO₂, and the End-Permian extinction

01:04:11 – Stories of recovery: hope in biodiversity conservation

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This podcast is produced by volunteers at Accelerator Media, a nonprofit educational media organization. Our work is supported by listeners and viewers like you. If you’d like to help us ignite curiosity and inspire long-term thinking about our shared future, please consider making a donation: https://acceleratormedia.org/donate/

In this episode of Curiosity Entangled, theoretical computer scientist Scott Aaronson and writer Zvi Mowshowitz confront one of the biggest questions of our time: what happens when humanity builds tools that can outthink us? In a wide-ranging and unsparing conversation, they explore the realities of AI risk, gradual human disempowerment, the complexities of steering technological progress, and why alignment efforts may fall short when it matters most.

Scott and Zvi examine the unique nature of the AI revolution—how it’s different from past technological shifts—and why traditional assumptions about progress and control may no longer apply. They tackle the pitfalls of today’s AI safety approaches, the psychological challenge of thinking clearly about diffuse, slow-moving risks, and the educational, societal, and epistemic shifts that the AI era demands. This is a conversation for anyone grappling with the future of intelligence, agency, and civilization itself.

5 Questions This Episode Might Leave You With

1. How could AI lead to humanity’s gradual loss of agency without an obvious “takeover” moment?

2. Why is it so difficult to steer or slow down transformative technologies once they are unleashed?

3. What makes today’s AI fundamentally different from previous technological revolutions?

4. Are current AI safety and interpretability efforts enough—or are we fooling ourselves?

5. How can we cultivate deeper skepticism, clearer thinking, and better education in the age of AI?

Learn more about the guests

Scott Aaronson – Professor of Computer Science at the University of Texas at Austin, expert in quantum computing and theoretical foundations of AI alignment. https://scottaaronson.blog/

Zvi Mowshowitz – Writer and strategic thinker focusing on decision theory, AI forecasting, and the societal impact of emerging technologies.

https://thezvi.substack.com/https://x.com/TheZvi

https://www.balsaresearch.com/

Timestamps

00:00:50 – Why this technological revolution leaves no obvious human niche

00:04:00 – How Zvi’s writing method mirrors real-time information processing

00:09:54 – Rethinking AI risk: gradual disempowerment vs. sudden takeover

00:14:10 – Why AI disruption is uniquely hard to govern—and harder to discuss

00:17:00 – GPT-4o, AI as research assistant, and the shifting cognitive landscape

00:21:15 – Why steering is harder than halting in technological revolutions

00:26:05 – Verifying claims and detecting “crank” proofs with AI

00:34:50 – Concrete examples vs. abstract theorizing about AI risk

00:37:10 – Strategic deception: when AIs learn to lie convincingly

00:43:50 – Lessons from past technological disruptions—and why AI is different

00:50:00 – The future of AI alignment: Scott’s new center at UT Austin

00:55:00 – Why pouring cold water on false hope matters for alignment

01:00:25 – Out-of-distribution reasoning: what models guess when data is scarce

01:11:00 – Education in an AI-saturated world: challenges and possibilities

01:17:00 – Learning, motivation, and the loss of intellectual environments

01:23:20 – Oscillating extremism, cultural breakdown, and the AI era

01:30:00 – Keeping focus: resisting distractions in a world of manufactured outrage

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Can artificial intelligence awaken something akin to spiritual consciousness? Can humanity collaborate at planetary scale? In this episode of Curiosity Entangled, historian David Christian (author of Origin Story and Future Stories) and futurist Kevin Kelly (co-founder of Wired, author of Excellent Advice for Living) navigate a conversation that spans from evolutionary psychology and Buddhism to artificial aliens and the blood bias of media.

Together, they explore whether the next Axial Age will be catalyzed not by gods descending from the heavens—but by intelligence we’ve created ourselves.

🔗 Links & Resources

– Kevin Kelly’s work: https://kk.org

– David Christian’s Big History course on The Great Courses https://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/big-history-the-big-bang-life-on-earth-and-the-rise-of-humanity

Timestamps:

01:06 – Reflections on living across oceans and finding the galactic center

02:21 – Knowledge, inefficiency, and curiosity as drivers of human progress

05:13 – “Technology can do the hard work. We can do the important work.”

07:21 – What technology gives us that ancestors never had

09:56 – How tech expands opportunity for genius to emerge

12:02 – Evolutionary psychology, Buddhism, and the challenge of living well

14:50 – What comes after survival? Maslow’s hierarchy and AI’s future

17:03 – Will we bond with AI like we bond with pets?

18:29 – Are machines just faking consciousness? Does it matter?

19:41 – Could AI provoke a new Axial Age of belief and meaning?

23:17 – How ancient technologies created global networks and cosmologies

27:42 – Is Earth becoming conscious through us—and AI?

30:16 – A planetary nervous system and the idea of AI-to-AI communication

31:24 – Self-domestication and the duality of being both creator and created

33:04 – Can we collaborate as 8 billion humans?

35:19 – Introducing the idea of “public intelligence”—a shared, open AI

38:32 – “Better Wi-Fi”: a universal human desire

41:01 – Rethinking education and self-identity beyond national boundaries

43:13 – Travel and the case for a universal right of mobility

45:03 – The blood bias of media and storytelling’s dystopian defaults

46:21 – Educating for progress, not just conflict

48:50 – Are we wired to respond more to crisis than to hope?

50:10 – Cooperation as the human default—if given the chance

51:12 – Why understanding the past helps us shape a better future

55:07 – Are we any better at predicting the future than 2000 years ago?

56:11 – “We can get better at the future by becoming better at history."

Photo Credit: Photo of Kevin Kelly courtesy of Christopher Michel – https://www.christophermichel.com/New-Heroes/Kevin-Kelly

Photo of David Christian courtesy of The Australian https://www.theaustralian.com.au/

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This podcast is produced by volunteers at Accelerator Media, a nonprofit educational media organization. Our work is supported by listeners and viewers like you. If you’d like to help us ignite curiosity and inspire long-term thinking about our shared future, please consider making a donation: https://acceleratormedia.org/donate/