Brave New World -- hosted by Vasant Dhar – Details, episodes & analysis

Useful Resources:

1. Deepak Chopra
2. Donald D. Hoffman
3. Awakening: The Path to Freedom and Enlightenment - Deepak Chopra
4. Seymour Reichlin
5. Digital Dharma: How AI Can Elevate Spiritual Intelligence and Personal Wellbeing - Deepak Chopra
6. The Hard Problem Of Consciousness
7. Rosalyn Yalow
8. Neuropeptides
9. Psychoneuroimmunology
10. Candace Pert
11. Molecules of Emotion - Candace Pert
12. Richard Dawkins
13. The Physics of Consciousness - Richard Dawkins & Brian Greene
14. Naïve realism
15. Stephen Hawking
16. Qualia
17. Panpsychism
18. Advaita Vedanta
19. Sufism
20. What is Life?: With Mind and Matter and Autobiographical Sketches -  Erwin Schrodinger
21. Brave New World Episode 94: Anil Seth On The Science of Consciousness.
22. Wayne Dyer
23. Ludwig Wittgenstein
24. Jill Bolte Taylor
25. My Stroke Of Insight - Jill Bolte Taylor
26. TED - My stroke of insight: Jill Bolte Taylor
27. Scott Galloway

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Episode 100 of Brave New World features David Ko, CEO of Calm, a digital health company focused on mental wellness and mindfulness. From experiencing panic attacks as a teenager to being the driving force behind Calm, his journey is an inspiring exploration of resilience, purpose, and the intersection of vulnerability and innovation.

Useful Resources:

1. David Ko, CEO of Calm
2. Recharge: Boosting Your Mental Battery, One Conversation at a Time - David Ko
3. Jonathan Haidt
4. Brave New World Episode 08: How Social Media Threatens Society
5. Severance
6. Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams
7. Recharge with David Ko

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Memory, consciousness and the self aren't what you think they are. Michael Levin joins Vasant Dhar in episode 91 of Brave New World to explain why the distinction between machines and organisms will soon fall apart.

Useful resources
1. Michael Levin at Tufts, Wikipedia, Twitter, Google Scholar and The Levin Lab.
2. There's Plenty of Room Right Here: Biological Systems as Evolved, Overloaded, Multi-scale Machines -- Joshua Bondard and Michael Levin.
3. Self-Improvising Memory: A Perspective on Memories as Agential, Dynamically Reinterpreting Cognitive Glue -- Michael Levin.
4. The Space Of Possible Minds -- Michael Levin.
5. Endless forms most beautiful 2.0 -- Wesley Clawson and Michael Levin.
6. My Octopus Teacher — Pippa Ehrlich and James Reed.
7. Pippa Ehrlich on the Mysteries of the Sea -- Episode 77 of Brave New World.
8. Turing Patterns.
9. Mark Solms' theory of consciousness -- SelfAwarePatterns.
10. Mark Solms on Consciousness.

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We take it for granted -- but we shouldn't: smell is incredibly powerful and plays a critical role in our lives.

Sandeep Robert Datta joins Vasant Dhar in episode 90 of Brave New World to discuss what neuroscience has taught him about the power of smell.

Useful resources:
1. Sandeep Robert Datta at Harvard, Datta Lab, LinkedIn and Google Scholar.
2. Alex Wiltschko on the Sense of Smell -- Episode 81 of Brave New World.
3. Dmitry Rinberg on the Mysteries of Smell -- Episode 62 of Brave New World.

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There's always risk at the cutting edge of technology. Driverless cars are awesome -- but can we rely on the tech? Missy Cummings joins Vasant Dhar in episode 89 of Brave New World to share her insights on why we need to proceed with caution.

Also check out:
1. Missy Cummings on LinkedIn, Wikipedia, GMU and Google Scholar.
2. California Bans GM's Cruise Robotaxis After Near-Fatal Pedestrian Accident -- Justin Banner.
3. Setbacks and Prospects for Autonomous Vehicles -- Henry Petroski.
4. Joshua Brown, Who Died in Self-Driving Accident, Tested Limits of His Tesla -- Rachel Abrams & Annalyn Kurtz.

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He lifted The Stern School of Business up significantly in the rankings, and is now making NYU a major global player in higher education. Raghu Sundaram joins Vasant Dhar in episode 88 of Brave New World to share his learnings about higher education where so much is changing, and yet, some foundational truths persist.

Useful resources:
1. Raghu Sundaram on LinkedIn, Wikipedia, Google Scholar and NYY Stern.
2. Nandan Nilekani on an Egalitarian Internet — Episode 15 of Brave New World.
3. The Future of Liberal Education — Episode 11 of Brave New World (w Michael S Roth).
4. Indebted: How Families Make College Work at Any Cost — Caitlin Zaloom.
5. Caitlin Zaloom on the Explosion of Student Debt -- Episode 37 of Brave New World.
6. Susan Dynarski's papers on education and student debt.
7. Degrees of Return: Estimating Internal Rates of Return for College Majors Using Quantile Regression -- Liang Zhang, Xiangmin Liu and Yitong Hu.
8. Law and Education in Our Modern World — Episode 5 of Brave New World (w John Sexton).

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What does it mean to be geeky -- and how are geeks changing the world? Andrew McAfee joins Vasant Dhar in episode 87 of Brave New World to share his insights on how geeks have created a brave new innovation culture.

Useful resources:
1. Andrew McAfee on Twitter, LinkedIn, Amazon, MIT and his own website.
2. The Geek Way -- Andrew McAfee.
3. The Second Machine Age -- Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee.
4. Elon Musk -- Walter Isaacson.
5. No Rules Rules -- Reed Hastings and Erin Meyer.
6. Regional Advantage: Culture and Competition in Silicon Valley and Route 128 -- AnnaLee Saxenian.
7. The New Argonauts -- AnnaLee Saxenian.
8. What the Dormouse Said -- John Markoff.
9. John's Markoff's interview of Raj Reddy.
10. The Secret of Our Success -- Joseph Henrich.
11. The Knowledge Machine -- Michael Strevens.
12. When It Comes to Culture, Does Your Company Walk the Talk? -- Donald Sull, Stefano Turconi and Charles Sull.
13. The Paradigm Shifts in Artificial Intelligence -- Vasant Dhar.

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Imagine an America where the government provides a floor for all our needs, from housing to health care to college to an income. Natalie Foster joins Vasant Dhar in episode 86 of Brave New World to argue that such a shift is possible -- and the time to make it is now.

Useful resources:
1. Natalie Foster on Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, the Economic Security Project, the Aspen Institute and her own website.
2. The Guarantee: Inside the Fight for America's Next Economy -- Natalie Foster.
3. The Economic Security Project.
4. Pulp Fiction and Dirty Dancing.
5. The Narrow Corridor -- Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson.
6. James Robinson on What Makes a Successful State — Episode 19 of Brave New World.
7. Pippa Ehrlich on the Mysteries of the Sea -- Episode 77 of Brave New World.
8. Recoding America: Why Government Is Failing in the Digital Age and How We Can Do Better -- Jennifer Pahlka.
9. File your taxes for free -- Internal Revenue Service.
10. Code for America.
11. The FAFSA Fiasco.
12. Caitlin Zaloom on the Explosion of Student Debt — Episode 37 of Brave New World.
13. Indebted: How Families Make College Work at Any Cost — Caitlin Zaloom.
14. The Submerged State -- Suzanne Mettler.
15. Why We Sleep -- Matthew Walker.
16. Andrew Yang on the New Politics America Needs — Episode 27 of Brave New World.
17. Albert Wenger on the World After Capital — Episode 29 of Brave New World.
18. Paul Sheard Demystifies Money -- Episode 73 of Brave New World.
19. Capital in the Twenty-First Century -- Thomas Piketty.
20. The Political Economy of Education, Financial Literacy, and the Racial Wealth Gap -- Darrick Hamilton and William Darity Jr.

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Does life exist outside our planet? Are we alone in the universe? Seth Shostak joins Vasant Dhar in episode 85 of Brave New World to describe his search for the answers.

Useful resources:
1. Seth Shostak at The Seti Institute, Wikipedia, TED, Amazon and his own website.
2. Life in the Universe -- Jeffrey Bennett, Seth Shostak, Nicholas Schneider and Meredith MacGregor.
3. Sharing the Universe: Perspectives on Extraterrestrial Life -- Seth Shostak.
4. Confessions of an Alien Hunter -- Seth Shostak.
5. The Copernican Revolution -- Thomas Kuhn.
6. Peter Ward on Life on Earth -- Episode 76 of Brave New World.
7. Rare Earth: Why Complex Life is Uncommon in the Universe -- Peter Ward and Donald Brownlee.
8. The Drake Equation.
9. The Gaia Hypothesis.
10. Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth -- James Lovelock.
11. Kevin Mitchell Makes a Case for Free Will -- Episode 80 of Brave New World.
12. The Kessler Syndrome.

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He came to America as a ten-year old, and became invested in both the country and its world of finance. Vlad Barbalat joins Vasant Dhar in episode 84 of Brave New World to discuss his life and learnings.

Useful resources:
1. Vlad Barbalat on LinkedIn and Liberty Mutual Investments.
2. The Story Of My Experiments With Truth -- MK Gandhi.
3. The Coddling of the American Mind -- Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt.
4. The Future of Liberal Education -- Episode 11 of Brave New World (w Michael S Roth).

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