Dr. Rudolph Tanzi is a titan in the field of neurogenetics, where his groundbreaking research is reshaping our understanding of Alzheimer’s disease. As the Director of the Genetics and Aging Research Unit at Massachusetts General Hospital, Co-Director of the McCance Center for Brain Health and the Joseph P. and Rose F. Kennedy Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School, he’s at the forefront of innovative Alzheimer’s research. His pioneering work includes the discovery of all three early-onset familial Alzheimer’s disease genes and the creation of the revolutionary “Alzheimer’s-in-a-Dish” model, which has catalyzed drug discovery for Alzheimer’s treatment. With his relentless pursuit of knowledge and novel treatments, Tanzi is a true game-changer, inspiring hope in the face of a devastating disease. Beyond his groundbreaking scientific contributions, Dr. Tanzi is also a New York Times bestselling author, co-authoring international bestsellers like “Super Brain”, “Super Genes”, and “The Healing Self” with Dr. Deepak Chopra. His unique ability to distill complex scientific concepts into accessible narratives has made these works invaluable resources for those seeking to understand the intricacies of the mind and health. Tanzi’s multifaceted brilliance – as a scientist, author, and communicator – continues to illuminate our path towards understanding and overcoming Alzheimer’s disease. In this interview, I speak to Dr. Rudolph Tanzi, one of the world’s foremost experts on Alzheimer’s disease and brain health. Our discussion navigates the terrain of brain evolution as we age, delving deep into the triggers, diagnosis methods, and potential remedies for Alzheimer’s disease. We shine a light on the groundbreaking research and promising therapies that hold the potential to mitigate the havoc wrought by this debilitating illness. Our exploration is a beacon of hope, illuminating the path towards a future less burdened by this devastating disease.

Thought Economics

A new dawn of brain tracking and hacking is coming. Will you be prepared for what comes next? Imagine a world where your brain can be interrogated to learn your political beliefs, your thoughts can be used as evidence of a crime, and your own feelings can be held against you. A world where people who suffer from epilepsy receive alerts moments before a seizure, and the average person can peer into their own mind to eliminate painful memories or cure addictions. Neuroscience has already made all this possible today, and neurotechnology will soon become the “universal controller” for all of our interactions with technology. This can benefit humanity immensely, but without safeguards, it can seriously threaten our fundamental human rights to privacy, freedom of thought, and self-determination. In this interview, I speak to Nita Farahany – widely considered to be one the foremost experts on the ethics of neuroscience. We discuss the battle for our brains – and why we need to defend the right to think freely in the age of neurotechnology.

Thought Economics

“No regrets.” You’ve heard people proclaim it as a philosophy of life. That’s nonsense, even dangerous, says New York Times Best Selling Author, Daniel H. Pink, in his latest bold and inspiring work, The Power of Regret. Everybody has regrets. They’re a fundamental part of our lives. And if we reckon with them in fresh and imaginative ways, we can enlist our regrets to make smarter decisions, perform better at work and school, and deepen our sense of meaning and purpose. Pink argues, operate as a “photographic negative” of the good life. By understanding what people regret the most, we can understand what they value the most. And by following the simple, science-based, three-step process that he sets out, we can transform our regrets in a positive force for working smarter and living better. In this interview, I speak to Daniel H. Pink on The Power of Regret and why regret, our most misunderstood emotion, can be the pathway to our best life. We talk about the types of regrets we have as individuals and societies, how we can best use regret to our advantage, and the extreme danger of no regrets culture.

Thought Economics

The information you receive from your senses makes up your world. But that world does not exist. What we perceive to be the absolute truth of the world around us is a complex reconstruction, a virtual reality created by the complex machinations of our minds in tandem with the wiring of our nervous systems. But what happens if that wiring goes awry? What happens if connections falter, or new and unexpected connections are made? Tiny shifts in the microbiology of our nervous systems can cause the world around us to shift and mutate, to become alien and unfamiliar. Professor Guy Leschziner is one of the world’s foremost clinical neurologists, and in his new book The Man Who Tasted Words, he explores the secrets of our senses, and how people with extraordinary sensory disturbances can teach us more about our own sensory experience. In this interview, I speak to Prof. Guy Leschziner about how our senses work, what we need to know about our senses, and how the science of sense is opening questions of philosophy, and about who we are.

Thought Economics

Today humanity is reaching new heights of scientific understanding – and appears to be losing its mind. How can a species that doubled its lifespan, sequenced its genome, and developed vaccines for Covid-19 in less than a year produce so much fake news, quack cures, conspiracy theories, and “post-truth” rhetoric? In this interview, I speak to Professor Steven Pinker about rationality. We discuss how he rejects the cynical cliché that humans are simply irrational cavemen out of time saddled with biases, fallacies, and illusions (after all, we discovered the laws of nature, and set out the benchmarks for rationality itself). We discuss how we (as a species) think in ways that are sensible in the low-tech contexts in which we spend most of our lives but fail to take advantage of the powerful tools of reasoning we’ve discovered over the millennia: logic, critical thinking, probability, correlation and causation, and optimal ways to update beliefs and commit to choices individually and with others
. Steven also takes time to discuss how the rational pursuit of self-interest, sectarian solidarity, and uplifting mythology can add up to crippling irrationality in a society.

Thought Economics

Anil Seth’s quest to understand the biological basis of conscious experience is one of the most exciting contributions to twenty-first-century science. What does it mean to “be you”—that is, to have a specific, conscious experience of the world around you and yourself within it? There may be no more elusive or fascinating question. Historically, humanity has considered the nature of consciousness to be a primarily spiritual or philosophical inquiry, but scientific research is now mapping out compelling biological theories and explanations for consciousness and selfhood. Anil Seth is Professor of cognitive and computational neuroscience at the University of Sussex, co-director of the Sackler Centre for Consciousness Science and in his new book, BEING YOU: A New Science of Consciousness, he argues that we do not perceive the world as it objectively is, but rather that we are prediction machines, constantly inventing our world and correcting our mistakes by the microsecond, and that we can now observe the biological mechanisms in the brain that accomplish this process of consciousness. In this interview, I speak to Anil Seth about the fundamental nature of consciousness, how we perceive the world around us, our selves, and how the science of consciousness is helping to unlock who we are.

Thought Economics

In The Extended Mind: The Power of Thinking Outside the Brain, acclaimed science writer Annie Murphy Paul explodes the myth that the brain is an all-powerful, all-purpose thinking machine that works best in silence and isolation. We are often told that the human brain is an awe-inspiring wonder, but its capacities are remarkably limited and specific. Humanity has achieved its most impressive feats only by thinking outside the brain: by “extending” the brain’s power with resources borrowed from the body, other people, and the material world. Annie’s research tells the stories of scientists and artists, authors and inventors, leaders, and entrepreneurs—Jackson Pollock, Charles Darwin, Jonas Salk, Friedrich Nietzsche, Watson and Crick, among others—who have mastered the art of thinking outside the brain. In this interview, I speak to Annie Murphy Paul on her ground-breaking work exploring how our minds work, how extra-neural resources play a role in our thinking, and how understanding the extended mind can give us ground-breaking insights into harnessing our potential.

Thought Economics

Angela Duckworth is the founder and CEO of Character Lab, a non-profit whose mission is to advance scientific insights that help children thrive. She is also the Rosa Lee and Egbert Chang Professor at the University of Pennsylvania, faculty co-director of the Penn-Wharton Behavior Change for Good Initiative, and faculty co-director of Wharton People Analytics. Angela’s TED talk is among the most viewed of all time. Her book Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance is a #1 New York Times best seller. Angela is also co-host, with Stephen Dubner, of the podcast No Stupid Questions. In this interview, I talk to Angela Duckworth about the true nature of grit, passion and perseverance. We talk about what it takes to succeed in life, to achieve great things, and the importance of goals in reaching the pinnacle of accomplishment.

Thought Economics

In this interview, I speak to Daniel Goleman, Ph.D., author of the New York Times bestseller Emotional Intelligence and Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships. Dr. Goleman is an internationally known psychologist who lectures frequently to professional groups, business audiences, and on college campuses. Working as a science journalist, Goleman reported on the brain and behavioral sciences for The New York Times for many years. His 1995 book, Emotional Intelligence (Bantam Books) was on The New York Times bestseller list for a year-and-a-half; it is available around the world in 40 languages, and has been a best seller in many countries. I speak to Daniel Goleman about the purpose of emotions, the importance of emotional intelligence and why leaders need to understand emotions & emotional intelligence.

Thought Economics

Double Academy Award winner Dr. Mark Sagar is the CEO and co-founder of Soul Machines – the world leader in humanizing AI to create astonishing Digital People. Driven by deep research into neuroscience, psychology and cognitive science- they create autonomous, hyper realistic, digital characters with whom we can interact like any other human being. Built around their Human OS platform, and with a patented Digital Brain, Soul Machines are at the forefront of some of the most exciting advances in computing. In this exclusive interview, I speak to Mark Sagar about creating digital people, how technology is helping us to understand humanity, and how interaction with intelligent machines will open up the next era of our civilisation.

Thought Economics

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