The Roman Road to the Ruin of its Republic: Michelle Berenfeld’s Lessons from Antiquity
“The Romans did that many, many times — until normal had changed so radically that there was nothing left of the republic to protect.” — Mic...
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Keen On
The daily show about books, writers, and big ideas. Hosted by Andrew Keen.
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20 of 2,106 episodes
The Yesterday of the Jackal: Joby Warrick Meets Carlos, the World’s Original Super-Terrorist
“He’s not a trustworthy witness to his own story. Everything is ten times bigger and better than it really was — except when he was accused...
The Deadly Americans: Adam Isacson & John Walsh on MAGA's Killing Rampage in Latin America
“Each one of these is individually a crime scene, and the United States is the responsible actor.” — John Walsh With America preoccupied (as...
Are They Dead Yet? Sam Roberts on the Art of the Obit
“Obituaries are about life, about the lives that people have lived. Death only figures in one sentence.” — Sam Roberts This is, remarkably,...
Is Jurassic Park Playing in Silicon Valley? Renée Jones on the Unicorn Stampede in Startup Finance.
“By operating in secrecy, they’re able to avoid or evade accountability — and, in many instances, engage in anticompetitive behavior or even...
Three Deadly Days in August: James M. Scott on Truman, Hirohito & the Two Bombs That Ended the War
“There is a big chasm between defeat and surrender. Surrender is inherently a political decision.” — James M. Scott Exactly eighty-one years...
Let Them Eat Intelligence: A Silicon Valley Eulogy for the Working Class
“Intelligence is 100 percent human. AI is a tool created by humans to distill, digest, and distribute intelligence.” — Keith Teare The worki...
The United States of Protest: Gloria Browne-Marshall on the Engine Room of American Democracy
“Democracy didn’t fall out of the sky. It was earned. It was created, and it was made manifest through protest.” — Gloria Browne-Marshall Ye...
The Banality of the Deal: Casey Michel on the United States of Oligarchy
“Jared Kushner is one of the most powerful American diplomats of the twenty-first century — and he has no skill set to speak of that I can s...
Is Google Evil? Claire Stapleton on Bad Bosses, Bullshit Jobs, and Her Great Escape from Big Tech
“We were still trying to change the world from the inside… and the empire struck back.” — Claire Stapleton on the Google Walkout Earlier thi...
The Only Certainty Is Uncertainty: Stuart Firestein on Science in the Age of Tony Fauci
“Uncertainty is what tells you that science is reliable. It’s the people who are absolutely certain that you have to watch out for.” — Stuar...
How to Say No to Fascism: Curtis White’s Anti-Manifesto of Resistance
“Misbehave, make something beautiful, and try to win.” — Curtis White’s motto for resistance How to say no to fascism? Curtis White , the li...
Who’s Afraid of the AI-Enabled Author? On “Real” Creativity & Cheating in Our Age of AI Slop
“The human part is 99 percent. The AI part is maybe 1 percent — even if 100 percent of the manuscript was dumped onto the page by AI.” — Kei...
No, Not Everybody Needs a Therapist: Amy Morin on America's Epidemic of Mental Weakness
“Not everybody needs therapy. I’m a therapist and I’ll tell you first.” — Amy Morin Is an epidemic of mental weakness sweeping America? Read...
The Robin Hood of the Book Biz: How Andy Hunter's Bookshop.org Is Standing Up to Amazon.
“Evil is reductive. But the impact of the business is evil, even if the intent isn’t.” — Andy Hunter on Amazon Network effects transformed A...
Should the American Pope Debate the American President? Jack Hanson on the Radical Reformation of the Catholic Church
Should the American Pope debate the American president about good and evil? The shameless Trump, one suspects, would relish a noisy cage mat...
Why Volodymyr Zelensky Is the World’s Only Living Statesman: Steven B. Smith on the Leadership America Lacks
“The statesman is an educator who leads through language — who gives a people the language they need to think about themselves.” — Steven B....
An American Circus of Skulls: Paul Stob on Phrenology, the P.T. Barnum of Pseudosciences
“It’s too easy to look back at sciences of the past and say they were all fools. The exact same thing is gonna happen two hundred years from...
How to Walk from Mumbai to San Francisco: Saumya Roy Navigates the Cracks in the American Dream
“There is the burden of being homeless and the burden of being judged for it.” — Saumya Roy on poverty in America How does the world look at...
Kill Bill or Kill Keith? Why Using AI to Author Books Might Not Be in the Interest of Man
“It’s a realization of my individual self, not an alienation of it.” — Keith Teare on the book he wrote with AI in a week Welcome to episode...