Iain McGilchrist, Part 1: Right-Brain Thinking

In this episode, we take a journey into the mind, traversing both the left and right hemispheres, but mostly the left, as we engage with the truly mind-bending insights of British psychiatrist-philosopher-neuroscientist-theologian-author Iain McGilchrist. Best known for his 2009 book "The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World" but also a much lauded academic and sensemaker. We outline McGilchrist’s extremely complicated thesis that the two hemispheres of the brain reflect fundamentally different “ways of being” and that this is reflected in individuals and civilisations that rely more on one side than the other. This is, of course, not merely a crude binary. As McGilchrist repeatedly emphasises, it would be quite wrong to suggest he is simply valorising everything he likes (religion, poetry, classic literature, wood-panelled interiors, sense-making chats) and attributing them to the products of a profound and integrative right hemisphere. Similarly, he does not simply want to denigrate materialists as reductive left-brain thinkers who cannot appreciate art, beauty, or love because they are too busy thinking about atoms. There is definitely none of that in his chat with Alex O'Connor (AKA CosmicSkeptic). Expect neuroanatomy, metaphysics, and extended reflections on the nature of love. In other words, a completely standard Decoding the Gurus episode. Links Alex O' Connor: Why Evolution Gave You Two Brains - Iain McGilchrist Iain McGilchrist's website. Spezio, M. (2019). McGilchrist and hemisphere lateralization: a neuroscientific and metaanalytic assessment. Religion, Brain & Behavior , 9 (4), 387–399. Lamm, C., Decety, J., & Singer, T. (2011). Meta-analytic evidence for common and distinct neural networks associated with directly experienced pain and empathy for pain. Neuroimage , 54 (3), 2492-2502. Stavrova, O., & Ehlebracht, D. (2019). The cynical genius illusion: Exploring and debunking lay beliefs about cynicism and competence. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin , 45 (2), 254-269. Lindquist, K. A., Wager, T. D., Kober, H., Bliss-Moreau, E., & Barrett, L. F. (2012). The brain basis of emotion: a meta-analytic review. Behavioral and brain sciences , 35 (3), 121-143.

You can listen to Iain McGilchrist, Part 1: Right-Brain Thinking online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

Iain McGilchrist, Part 1: Right-Brain Thinking is an episode from Decoding the Gurus by Christopher Kavanagh and Matthew Browne.

This episode is 02:03:39 long.

This episode was published on Apr 11, 2026.

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