
Within Reason (Alex J O'Connor)
Explore every episode of Within Reason
Pub. Date | Title | Duration | |
---|---|---|---|
16 Dec 2023 | #48 Edward Feser - Aristotle's Argument for God | 01:33:41 | |
Edward Feser is an American Catholic philosopher, and Associate Professor of Philosophy at Pasadena City College in California. He is the author of "Five Proofs of the Existence of God", and in this episode speaks about one of these: the Aristotelean argument from motion. | |||
13 Nov 2024 | #87 Cliffe and Stuart Knechtle - Biblical Slaves, Women, and the Unforgivable Sin | 02:46:18 | |
Cliffe and Stuart Knechtle run the extremely popular online Christian ministry 'Give Me an Answer'. In this episode they discuss troubling passages in the Old Testament, New Testament sexism, Job, doubting Thomas, the unforgivable sin (blaspheming the Holy Spirit), and more. | |||
31 Mar 2024 | #61 Sam Harris - Can Science Determine Moral Values? | 02:55:57 | |
Sam Harris is a neuroscientist, philosopher, New York Times best-selling author, host of Making Sense, and creator of Waking Up. | |||
13 Dec 2024 | #91 Filip Holm - What is Sufism? Islam and Mystical Experience | 01:24:03 | |
Filip Holm is the creator and host of "Lets Talk Religion", a YouTube channel which aims to educate on the subject of religion from an academic perspective. He joins the show to discuss Sufism, which can broadly be defined as the mystical tradition within Islam. | |||
11 Apr 2019 | #2 — Michael Shermer | Death, How To Avoid It, and Why You Shouldn't be Afraid | 01:03:21 | |
Dr Michael Shermer is an American historian of science, editor-in-chief of Skeptic magazine, and author of nearly 20 books, including Heavens On Earth, The Moral Arc, and Why People Believe Weird Things. He speaks to Alex about how we should respond to the inevitability of death, and why we shouldn't be afraid of it. | |||
09 Apr 2023 | #26 David Renton - No Free Speech for Fascists | 01:06:35 | |
David Renton is a barrister and historian. He is the author of "No Free Speech for Fascists", discussing the history of, and the case for, "no-platforming" fascist speakers (and only fascist speakers). To support the Within Reason Podcast and get early access to episodes, please visit support.withinreasonpodcast.com | |||
17 Mar 2025 | #99 Penn Badgley - My Religious Conflicts With Playing a Killer | 01:56:27 | |
Penn Badgley is an actor best known for his roles in Netflix’s You and the popular drama series Gossip Girl. He is less known as a podcaster and member of the Baháʼí Faith, a religion which teaches that there is a historical unity between major world religions and their prophets, having itself developed out of a branch of Twelver Shia Islam in the 19th century. | |||
20 Jan 2024 | #52 Jonathan Pageau - The Problem With Secular Architecture | 00:58:51 | |
Jonathan Pageau is a French Canadian icon carver, public speaker and YouTuber exploring the symbolic patterns that underlie our experience of the world, how these patterns emerge and come together, manifesting in religion, art and in popular culture. He's also the editor of the Orthodox Arts Journal and host of the Symbolic World blog and podcast. | |||
28 Aug 2019 | #8 — Andrew Copson | What Is Secularism? | 01:12:58 | |
Andrew Copson is is Chief Executive of Humanists UK and author of Oxford University Press' Very Short Introduction to Secularism. He speaks to Alex about the meaning of secularism, its distinction from humanism, liberalism and atheism, and how it might be achieved. | |||
30 Apr 2023 | #29 Richard Swinburne - Souls, Free Will and the Problem of Evil | 00:58:07 | |
Richard Swinburne is an Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at the University of Oxford, and author of a number of books on the philosophy of religion, the soul, and Christianity, amongst other subjects. To support the podcast, please visit support.withinreasonpodcast.com | |||
06 Nov 2023 | #45 Graham Oppy - Atheism Requires Justification Too | 01:17:36 | |
Graham Oppy is Professor of Philosophy and Associate Dean of Research at Monash University, CEO of the Australasian Association of Philosophy, Chief Editor of the Australasian Philosophical Review, Associate Editor of the Australasian Journal of Philosophy, and serves on the editorial boards of Philo, Philosopher's Compass, Religious Studies, and Sophia. He is one of the best known atheist thinkers in academia. You can buy "Atheism: the Basics" here. | |||
28 Nov 2024 | #89 The Cultural Tutor - The Philosophy and Ethics of Art | 01:01:43 | |
Sheehan Quirke is the Cultural Tutor, a writer with 1.7 million followers on X. His work on art, history, and architecture is some of the most widely-enjoyed in the world. He writes a newsletter called the Areopagus. | |||
16 Oct 2023 | #43 Peter Hitchens Storms Out of My Interview | 00:59:28 | |
Peter Hitchens is an author, broadcaster, journalist, and commentator. He writes for The Mail on Sunday. He has published numerous books, including The Abolition of Britain, The Rage Against God, The War We Never Fought and The Phoney Victory. | |||
30 Jun 2024 | #74 Rabbi David Wolpe - What is Judaism? | 01:19:26 | |
David Wolpe is an American rabbi, and Visiting Scholar at Harvard Divinity School. He was named the most influential Rabbi in America by Newsweek in 2012. | |||
09 Jun 2024 | #71 Unsolicited Advice - An Introduction to Nihilism | 01:19:51 | |
Joe Folley is the creator of the YouTube channel "Unsolicited Advice" which creates short, digestible philosophical videos on a wide range of topics. He joins me today to discuss nihilism: its history, its meaning, and its significance in philosophy. | |||
19 May 2024 | #68 Andrew Mark Henry - What is The Gospel of Thomas? | 01:23:57 | |
Andrew Mark Henry is a scholar of religious studies. His research focus is early Christianity and late Roman religion. He earned his PhD at Boston University. His YouTube channel is "Religion for Breakfast". | |||
19 Oct 2023 | #44 Just Stop Oil - How Far Will They Go? | 01:04:45 | |
Just Stop Oil are one of the most well-known and thoroughly hated political groups in the UK. You may recognise them as the brand behind stunts such as throwing soup over Van Gogh's Sunflowers, covering the felt of a snooker table at a world championship with orange powder, blocking traffic on busy roads, and, most recently, climbing on stage during a production of Les Misérables in London's West End. | |||
21 Jun 2020 | #14 — William Lane Craig | The Kalam Cosmological Argument | 01:15:28 | |
William Lane Craig is an American philosopher and Christian theologian. He holds two PHDs in philosophy and theology, and is a professor of philosophy at both Houston Baptist University and Talbot School of Theology at Biola University. | |||
11 Aug 2024 | #79 Elaine Pagels - The Origin of Satan | 01:08:42 | |
Elaine Pagels is an American historian of religion. She is the Harrington Spear Paine Professor of Religion at Princeton University. Pagels has conducted extensive research into early Christianity and Gnosticism. Buy "The Origin of Satan" by Elaine Pagels here. | |||
02 Mar 2025 | #97 Kipp Davis - What Are the Dead Sea Scrolls? | 02:15:07 | |
Kipp Davis (@DrKippDavis) is a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Agder in Kristiansand, Norway, where he specialises in the assignment and reconstruction of fragments from the Dead Sea Scrolls and their interpretation. (Google Books) The Dead Sea Scrolls are a set of ancient Jewish manuscripts from the Second Temple period. They were discovered over a period of 10 years, between 1946 and 1956, at the Qumran Caves near Ein Feshkha in the West Bank, on the northern shore of the Dead Sea. Dating from the 3rd century BCE to the 1st century CE, the Dead Sea Scrolls include the oldest surviving manuscripts of entire books later included in the biblical canons, including deuterocanonical manuscripts from late Second Temple Judaism and extrabiblical books. At the same time, they cast new light on the emergence of Christianity and of Rabbinic Judaism. (Wikipedia) | |||
20 Aug 2023 | #39 Andrew Doyle - The New Puritans | 01:28:24 | |
Andrew Doyle is a playwright, journalist, and political satirist. He has written for the fictional character Jonathan Pie and created the character Titania McGrath. Doyle joined GB News in 2021, and hosts a weekly show titled Free Speech Nation. He is the author of The New Puritans: How the Religion of Social Justice Captured the Western World | |||
19 Jun 2023 | #35 Bart Ehrman - Did Jesus Even Claim to be God? | 01:30:20 | |
Get Bart Ehrman's course, "Did Jesus Call Himself God?": https://www.bartehrman.com/godman Bart Ehrman is an American New Testament scholar focusing on textual criticism of the New Testament, the historical Jesus, and the origins and development of early Christianity. He has written and edited 30 books, including three college textbooks. He has also authored six New York Times bestsellers. (Wikipedia) | |||
28 Jan 2024 | #53 Jason Brennan - The Case Against Democracy | 00:57:47 | |
Jason Brennan is an American philosopher and business professo at the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University. Brennan writes about democratic theory, the ethics of voting, competence and power, freedom, and the moral foundations of commercial society. (Wikipedia.) He speaks in this episode about the faults and flaws of democracy, and why people are often not as good as voting as they think they are. Buy "Against Democracy" (affiliate link): https://amzn.to/3HBA5df Buy "Democracy: A Guided Tour": https://amzn.to/3udeuF2 | |||
24 Sep 2023 | #41 Justin Brierley - The Surprising Rebirth of Belief in God | 01:16:03 | |
Justin Brierley was, for 17 years, the host of "Unbelievable?" on Premier Christian Radio. He is a broadcaster, author, and Christian apologist whose latest book is "The Surprising Rebirth of Belief in God: Why new atheism grew old and secular thinkers are considering Christianity again". Get Justin's book here. | |||
25 Nov 2019 | #11 — Douglas Murray | Gender and Activism | 01:23:32 | |
Douglas Murray is a British conservative author and journalist, and associate editor of The Spectator. In 2017 Murray wrote The Strange Death of Europe, taking on the issue of the global immigration crisis, and now he returns with The Madness of Crowds, a book about identitarianism in four areas: 'gay', 'women', 'race' and 'trans'. | |||
24 May 2020 | #13 — Joey Carbstrong | Why Won't Vegans Just Shut Up? | 01:05:43 | |
Joey Carbstrong is an Australian animal rights activist and vegan. Formerly a criminal, Joey turned his life around and now campaigns for animals, his views having been widely syndicated across various platforms including national television, radio, and his own highly popular YouTube channel. | |||
07 Jun 2022 | #19 Genetically Modified Skeptic - Do We Still Feel the Same Way About Religion? | 01:02:58 | |
Drew McCoy is the host of the Genetically Modified Skeptic YouTube channel, which is, with now over 500,000 subscribers, perhaps the largest atheist YouTube channel in the world right now. | |||
26 Apr 2020 | #12 — David Benatar | Is It Immoral To Have Children? | 01:27:05 | |
Professor David Benatar is a South African philosopher, academic and author, and head of the philosophy department at the University of Cape Town in South Africa. He is best known for his defence of antinatalism, the view that it is immoral to have children (though more specifically, to bring new sentient beings into existence). | |||
15 Sep 2024 | #83 Esoterica - The History of the Demiurge | 01:49:51 | |
Justin Sledge is currently a part-time professor of philosophy and religion at several institutions in the Metro-Detroit area and a popular local educator. His YouTube channel is "Esoterica". | |||
05 Feb 2024 | #54 The Cultural Tutor - Why Is The Modern World So Ugly? | 01:49:37 | |
Sheehan Quirke is known online as the Cultural Tutor. With over 1.6 million followers on X, he writes daily threads about art, architecture, and history. | |||
12 Mar 2023 | #21 Trent Horn, Cameron Bertuzzi & Joe Schmid - The Problem of Evil | 01:13:50 | |
In this episode of the Cosmic Skeptic Podcast, Alex is joined by Joe Schmid, an agnostic, Cameron Bertuzzi, a (then) protestant, and Trent Horn, a catholic, to discuss the problem in detail, and analyse various responses to it. | |||
23 Apr 2023 | #28 Neil deGrasse Tyson - What Is Earth's Biggest Threat? | 00:46:35 | |
Neil deGrasse Tyson is an astrophysicist, director of the Hayden Planetarium, and one of the most recognisable communicators of science in the world. His most recent book is Starry Messenger: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilisation: https://amzn.to/40Cdkgi (affiliate link) | |||
04 Dec 2023 | #46 John Vervaeke - Escaping the Meaning Crisis | 01:32:37 | |
John Vervaeke is an award-winning professor of psychology, cognitive science, and Buddhist psychology at the University of Toronto. He is the creator of a fifty-hour series on YouTube called "Awakening From the Meaning Crisis". Dr. Vervaeke joins me to discuss why people are struggling to find meaning, how we might solve this problem, and whether death poses a series problem for believing in meaning. | |||
21 Apr 2024 | #64 Rory Stewart - We Are Addicted to a Sense of Crisis | 01:09:20 | |
Rory Stewart is a former UK Government minister, MP, and deputy governor in Iraq following the western invasion. He walked on foot for two years across Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan, India and Nepal in 2002. He was a private tutor to both Prince William and Prince Harry. He now co-hosts The Rest is Politics with Alastair Campbell, one of the UK's most popular shows. | |||
24 Mar 2024 | #60 Carlo Rovelli - Time is Weirder Than You Think | 01:03:59 | |
Carlo Rovelli, an Italian theoretical physicist, is known mainly for his contributions to research in the field of quantum gravity. He is the author of Seven Brief Lessons on Physics, The Order of Time, and White Holes, amongst other works. | |||
07 Jan 2024 | #50 Sisyphus 55 - Nihilism and the Manosphere | 01:28:24 | |
Ben Thomas, better known online as Sisyphus 55, is a philosophy YouTuber with one million subscribers. His videos cover topics including nihilism, existentialism, love, relationships, and political philosophy. | |||
25 Jun 2023 | #36 Peter Boghossian - Having Better Conversations About Philosophy | 01:55:01 | |
Peter Boghossian is an American philosopher, a founding faculty member at the University of Austin, and coined the term "street epistemology" as a method of helping people to change their minds. Peter Boghossian's YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@drpeterboghossian | |||
30 Jul 2023 | #38 Carl Robichaud - Will There Be A Nuclear War? | 01:07:19 | |
Carl Robichaud co-leads Longview Philanthropy’s programme on nuclear weapons and existential risk. For over a decade, Carl led grant-making in nuclear security at the Carnegie Corporation of New York, a philanthropic fund which grants over $30 million annually to strengthen international peace and security. | |||
22 May 2023 | #32 Destiny - Testing Destiny's Ethics | 02:15:19 | |
Steven Kenneth Bonnell II, known online as Destiny, is an American internet personality and political commentator. Find Destiny on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/DESTINY | |||
22 Nov 2024 | #88 Ayaan Hirsi Ali - Why I Converted To Christianity | 01:02:38 | |
Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a Somali-born Dutch-American writer, activist and former politician. Once an advocate for the new atheist movement, she last year announced her conversion to Christianity. | |||
29 May 2023 | #33 Michael Jones - Does God Send People to Hell? | 01:09:57 | |
Michael Jones is the founder and director of the Christian YouTube channel "Inspiring Philosophy". He has previously debated Alex twice. Inspiring Philosophy on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5qDet6sa6rODi7t6wfpg8g Inspiring Philosophy, "Does God Send People to Hell?": https://youtu.be/tiYf6ITgWbk Michael's debate with Alex on the problem of evil: https://www.youtube.com/live/hNF9bTESZwE?feature=share Michael's debate with Alex on the moral argument for God: https://youtu.be/9Ulnmb-4v2M | |||
20 Dec 2024 | #92 Bart Ehrman - The Dark Side of Christmas | 01:01:17 | |
Bart Ehrman is a New Testament scholar focusing on textual criticism of the New Testament, the historical Jesus, and the origins and development of early Christianity. Get Bart Ehrman's new course, The Dark Side of Christmas (affiliate link). | |||
16 Jul 2024 | #76 Jonathan Pageau - Deconstructing the Fall of Adam and Eve | 01:59:02 | |
Jonathan Pageau is a French-Canadian icon carver, YouTuber and public speaker on symbolism, religion and the Orthodox faith. | |||
31 Oct 2024 | #86 Pre-Election Podcast - Destiny on Immigration, Trump, and Voter ID | 01:38:08 | |
Steven Bonnell II, known online as Destiny, is an American live streamer and political commentator. He joins me to talk about Trump, Kamala, Biden, Elon Musk, Tucker Carlson, Mark Zuckerberg, Voter ID, immigration, demographic change, and who to vote for in the upcoming election. | |||
05 May 2024 | #66 Coleman Hughes - Should We Take Race Out of Politics? | 00:59:20 | |
Coleman Hughes is an American writer and podcast host. He is the author of "The End of Race Politics: Arguments for a Colorblind America". | |||
14 Apr 2024 | #63 A.C. Grayling - Who Will Own the Moon? | 01:02:44 | |
A.C. Grayling is a British philosopher and author. In 2011 he founded and became the first Master of New College of the Humanities, an independent undergraduate college in London. | |||
07 Jul 2024 | #75 Destiny on Jordan Peterson, Voting, and Political Principles | 02:26:05 | |
Steven Bonnell II is a popular American political streamer known online as Destiny. | |||
21 Apr 2022 | #17 April 1st - Why I'm a Christian Now, with Stephen Woodford | 01:25:43 | |
Released on April 1st, this podcast details Alex's conversion to Christianity, a position he defends against the criticisms of Stephen Woodford (Rationality Rules). | |||
23 Dec 2023 | #49 Christmas Special with Bart Ehrman - Did Christmas Really Happen? | 01:03:44 | |
In this Christmas special of Within Reason, New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman explores the history and narrative of Jesus' birthday, and demonstrates where the accounts seem to contradict. Get Bart Erhman's courses here. | |||
24 Jul 2023 | #37 T.M. Luhrmann - How Does God Become Real? | 01:05:24 | |
Tanya Marie Luhrmann is an American psychological anthropologist known for her studies of modern-day witches, charismatic Christians, and studies of how culture shapes psychotic, dissociative, and related experiences. She is the author of How God Becomes Real, which asks what it means to say that a person 'believes' in gods, how and why this kind of belief is so different from mundane beliefs about the normal world, and how these gods become vividly real to some people. | |||
17 Mar 2024 | #59 William Lane Craig - Is Biblical Slaughter Ethical? | 01:06:01 | |
William Lane Craig is a Christian philosopher and public speaker, who today makes his third appearance on Within Reason. We discuss why Richard Dawkins refuses to debate him, and whether Old Testament slaughter can be justified. | |||
21 Apr 2022 | #18 Ed Winters - Veganism Reconsidered | 01:16:25 | |
Ed Winters ("Earthling Ed") is a vegan educator, best-selling author, public speaker and content creator, widely known for his viral debates, speeches, and video essays. | |||
31 Jan 2025 | #95 James McGrath: John the Baptist, the Bible's Most Mysterious Man | 01:23:48 | |
James Frank McGrath is the Clarence L. Goodwin Chair in New Testament Language and Literature at Butler University. He is the author of two books on John the Baptist: "John of History, Baptist of Faith: The Quest for the Historical Baptiser", and "Christmaker: A Life of John the Baptist". | |||
20 Nov 2020 | #16 Alex Hershaft - Surviving the Holocaust | 01:04:45 | |
Dr. Alex Hershaft is a Holocaust survivor, animal rights activist, and co-founder and president of the Farm Animal Rights Movement (FARM). He has previously had a 30-year career in materials science, and holds a PHD in inorganic chemistry. | |||
26 May 2024 | #69 Iain McGilchrist - The Mind is More Than a Machine | 01:40:29 | |
Iain McGilchrist is a psychiatrist, writer, and former Oxford literary scholar. McGilchrist came to prominence after the publication of his book The Master and His Emissary, subtitled The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World. | |||
09 Sep 2020 | #15 — Michael Sandel | The Tyranny of Merit | 00:54:26 | |
Michael J. Sandel is an American political philosopher, and Professor of Government Theory at Harvard University Law School. His public lectures have been viewed by tens of millions of people around the world, including in China, where Sandel was named the "most influential foreign figure of the year". | |||
21 Jan 2025 | #93 The Etymology Nerd - How Social Media is Transforming Our Language | 01:09:40 | |
Adam Aleksic is a linguist known online as "The Etymology Nerd". His educational videos are watched regularly by millions. His forthcoming book "Algospeak" is currently available for preorder. | |||
14 May 2023 | #31 Peter Singer - The Limits of Utilitarianism | 01:03:52 | |
Peter Singer is an Australian moral philosopher often credited as the father of the modern animal rights movement. Purchase Animal Liberation Now: https://amzn.to/450BB3e Peter Singer's upcoming speaking tour: | |||
27 Jan 2025 | #94 Dan McClellan - What Does the Bible Say About Abortion? | 01:19:57 | |
Dan McClellan is an American public scholar of the Bible and religion. His forthcoming book, "The Bible Says So", is available here. | |||
19 Mar 2023 | #23 Konstantin Kisin - Free Speech and Reparations | 01:03:57 | |
Konstantin Kisin is a satirist, comedian, journalist, and co-host of the Triggernometry Podcast. He recently went viral for a speech delivered at the Oxford Union arguing that "wokeness has gone too far", which has since been viewed over 100,000,000 times across various social media platforms. Konstantin talks to host Alex O'Connor about the limits of free speech, whether he considers himself to be a conservative or right-wing, and whether there can be a sensible case made for reparations for historical injustices such as slavery. | |||
17 Jun 2022 | #20 Joe Schmid - Arguments For God Tier List | 01:54:57 | |
Joe Schmid is the owner of the Majesty of Reason YouTube channel, a platform dedicated to the analysis of a variety of philosophical topics. He is the author of "The Majesty of Reason: A Short Guide to Critical Thinking in Philosophy", and in this episode joins Alex to rank eight arguments for the existence of God, and discuss them in depth. | |||
12 Mar 2023 | #22 Bishop Robert Barron - Seeking Meaning, Finding God? | 01:07:19 | |
Bishop Robert Barron is the bishop of the Diocese of Winona-Rochester and the founder of Word on Fire Catholic Ministries. His website, WordOnFire.org, reaches millions of people each year, and he is one of the world’s most followed Catholics on social media. Bishop Barron joins host Alex O'Connor to discuss the "crisis of meaning" we might be living through, the reducibility of purpose to evolutionary drives, the conditions for salvation on Christianity, and whether God can be accurately described as analogous to a tyrannical dictator. | |||
12 Jun 2019 | #5 — Justin Brierley | Why I'm Still a Christian | 01:48:03 | |
Justin Brierley is the host of the popular radio show 'Unbelievable?' which platforms debates between Christians and non-Christians. He is the author of 'Unbelievable: Why, After Ten Years of Talking With Atheists, I’m Still a Christian'. He speaks to Alex about his reasons for retaining his faith, and the nature of reason. | |||
28 Apr 2024 | #65 Esoterica - The History of Yahweh | 01:44:31 | |
Justin Sledge is currently a part-time professor of philosophy and religion at several institutions in the Metro-Detroit area and a popular local educator. His YouTube channel is "Esoterica". | |||
28 Oct 2024 | #85 Magnify - 7 Translation Problems in Genesis | 01:36:37 | |
Magnify is a YouTube channel of mostly short-form content, covering interesting details across history, linguistics, and religion. | |||
09 Sep 2024 | #82 Joe Folley - 9 Questions Atheists Cannot Answer | 02:30:00 | |
oe Folley runs the YouTube channel Unsolicited Advice. he graduated from Cambridge University with an MPhil in Philosophy, specialising in logic, in 2023. | |||
02 Apr 2023 | #25 Andrew Mark Henry - What is Religion? | 01:11:12 | |
Andrew Mark Henry is a scholar of religion specialising in early Christianity and the religions of the late Roman Empire. He is also the host of "Religion for Breakfast", a YouTube channel with over 600,000 subscribers producing informative videos on a variety of topics related to religion. Dr. Henry joins host Alex O'Connor to discuss a number of questions: what is religion? Where does it come from? Why is it so ubiquitous? To support Within Reason, please consider signing up at support.withinreasonpodcast.com | |||
10 Mar 2025 | #98 Jacob Hansen - A Mormon Explains Mormonism | 02:21:54 | |
Jacob Hansen is a Mormon YouTuber at the channel Thoughtful Faith. | |||
25 Aug 2024 | #80 The Moustache,The Bible, and The Kalam - 850k QnA | 00:52:30 | |
Thank you for 850,000 subscribers! | |||
06 Dec 2024 | #90 Rainn Wilson - Reclaiming Spirituality From Traditional Religion | 01:37:14 | |
Rainn Wilson is the actor and comedian best known for his role as Dwight Schrute on the The Office (US), for which he received three consecutive Emmy Award nominations for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series. He is also the host of Soul Boom, a podcast discussing spirituality, and authored a book of the same name exploring how we can use spiritual tools to help solve some of life's problems. | |||
08 Sep 2023 | #40 Slavoj Žižek - Sex, Drugs, and Commodity Fetishism | 01:48:21 | |
Slavoj Žižek is a Slovenian-born political philosopher and cultural critic. He was described by British literary theorist, Terry Eagleton, as the “most formidably brilliant” recent theorist to have emerged from Continental Europe. (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy) | |||
22 Sep 2024 | #84 David Nutt - The Truth About Drugs | 00:58:55 | |
David Nutt is an English neuropsychopharmacologist specialising in the research of drugs that affect the brain and conditions such as addiction, anxiety, and sleep. He was the UK Government's chief advisor on drug policy. He was fired in 2009 after criticising the Government's approach to drug harms. | |||
02 Jun 2024 | #70 Philosophize This! - A Beginner's Guide to Philosophy | 01:19:13 | |
Steven West is the host of "Philosophize This!" one of the world's most popular philosophy podcasts. Listen to it here. | |||
13 May 2024 | #67 Elaine Pagels | What Are The Gnostic Gospels? | 01:09:08 | |
Elaine Pagels is an American historian of religion. She is the Harrington Spear Paine Professor of Religion at Princeton University. Pagels has conducted extensive research into early Christianity and Gnosticism. See me speak at Level Up in Atlanta this June: http://levelupconferences.org/ | |||
23 Mar 2025 | #100 Philosopher Shootout - 16 Thinkers, Ranked (With Joe Folley) | 03:08:47 | |
For episode 100 of Within Reason, I'm joined by Joe Folley, from the YouTube Channel "Unsolicited Advice", to tackle a completely arbitrary and ridiculous tournament of thinkers, each of whom are to some degree relevant to the show. Joe graduated from Cambridge University with an MPhil in Philosophy, specialising in logic, in 2023. | |||
15 Jan 2024 | #51 Richard Dawkins - Religion is (Still) Appalling | 01:04:35 | |
Richard Dawkins is an evolutionary biologist and author of books including The Selfish Gene and The God Delusion. | |||
13 Sep 2019 | #9 — Earthling Ed | Veganism Can Be Complicated | 01:55:23 | |
Ed Winters, known online as Earthling Ed, is a vegan educator and public speaker, co-founder and co-director of Surge, which founded the annual Official Animal Rights March, producer of the documentary Land of Hope and Glory, and my most requested podcast guest to date. | |||
03 Apr 2019 | #1 — Armin Navabi | Free Speech and Leaving Islam | 01:24:33 | |
Armin Navabi is an Iranian Canadian ex-Muslim and secular activist, author, podcaster, and founder of Atheist Republic. He speaks to Alex about the troubles he faces spreading his secular message and how to find meaning in a world without God. | |||
30 Apr 2019 | #3 — Matt Dillahunty | Meta-Ethics and Veganism | 02:06:23 | |
Matt Dillahunty is an American atheist activist, former president of the Atheist Community of Austin, and host of The Atheist Experience. He is a magician, public speaker, and debater, having shared stages with the likes of Richard Dawkins, Jordan Peterson, and Sam Harris. | |||
26 Mar 2023 | #24 William Lane Craig - Did Jesus Rise From The Dead? | 01:03:41 | |
William Lane Craig is a Christian philosopher, author, and debater. He speaks to host Alex O'Connor about secularism in the US and UK, argument vs emotion in coming to faith in God, and the historical case for the resurrection of Jesus. | |||
09 Aug 2019 | #7 — Anthony Magnabosco | How To Change Minds | 00:52:42 | |
Anthony Magnabosco is the founder and executive director of Street Epistemology International, a non-profit organisation formed to encourage critical thinking and scepticism while providing people around the world with the resources needed to develop and promote Street Epistemology. He speaks to Alex about how to get people to rethink their beliefs and discard of falsities they might hold to. | |||
21 Jul 2019 | #6 — Peter Singer | Utilitarianism and Animals | 01:30:57 | |
Peter Singer is an Australian moral philosopher and author of the seminal Animal Liberation, a book credited with initiating the modern animal rights movement. He speaks to Alex about utilitarianism and how we might apply it to all sentient creatures. | |||
05 Mar 2024 | #57 David Deutsch - The Multiverse is Real | 01:35:41 | |
David Deutsch is a British physicist at the University of Oxford. He is a visiting professor in the Department of Atomic and Laser Physics at the Centre for Quantum Computation in the Clarendon Laboratory of the University of Oxford. (Wikipedia.) Buy David Deutsch's book, The Beginning of Infinity | |||
19 Sep 2019 | #10 — Richard Dawkins | Outgrowing God | 00:44:45 | |
Richard Dawkins is the world-famous evolutionary biologist, New York Times bestselling science writer, emeritus fellow of New College, Oxford, and previously Oxford University's Professor for Public Understanding of Science. Professor Dawkins speaks to Alex about the meaning of atheism, the labelling of children as 'atheists', the evolutionary and social bases of morality, and the usefulness of theology as a discipline. | |||
16 Jun 2024 | #72 John Nelson - What Did Jesus Really Look Like? | 01:04:33 | |
John Nelson holds a PhD in Biblical Studies from the University of Edinburgh. His thesis is the first book-length study of Jesus' physical appearance in the Gospels. He runs a weekly Substack called "Behind the Gospels" which aims to make Biblical studies accessible to all. | |||
07 May 2023 | #30 Joshua Bowen - How the Bible Supports Slavery | 01:38:44 | |
Joshua Bowen is an Assyriologist, YouTuber, and author of the book, "Did the Old Testament Endorse Slavery?" Links: | |||
29 Jul 2024 | #78 Rory Sutherland - Why Logical Thinking is Illogical | 01:48:48 | |
Rory Sutherland is a British advertising executive, and vice chairman of the Ogilvy & Mather group of companies. | |||
09 Dec 2023 | #47 Josh Rasmussen - Why is Consciousness a Philosophical Problem? | 01:32:14 | |
Josh Rasmussen is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at Azusa Pacific University, with an expertise in analytic metaphysics. He is author of several books, including Defending the Correspondence Theory of Truth, Necessary Existence, How Reason Can Lead to God, and Is God the Best Explanation of Things . He is also the founder of the Worldview Design YouTube channel, which helps people use reason to address the big questions of life. | |||
11 Feb 2024 | #55 Robert Sapolsky - Free Will Doesn't Exist. Now What? | 00:56:56 | |
Robert Sapolsky is an American neuroendocrinology researcher and author. He is a professor of biology, neurology, neurological sciences, and neurosurgery at Stanford University. He is the author of "Determined: A Science of Life Without Free Will", which you can purchase here. | |||
18 Feb 2024 | #56 Susan Neiman - Left is Not Woke | 00:52:57 | |
Susan Neiman is an American moral philosopher, cultural commentator, and essayist. She is the author of "Left is Not Woke", available here. | |||
07 Jun 2023 | #34 Anil Seth - A New Science of Consciousness | 01:40:12 | |
Anil Seth is a professor of Cognitive and Computational Neuroscience at the University of Sussex. He is the author of "Being You: A New Science of Consciousness". Purchase "Being You: A New Science of Consciousness": https://amzn.to/3NgKD53 Anil Seth's website: https://www.anilseth.com/ The Perception Census: https://perceptioncensus.dreamachine.world/ | |||
21 Jul 2024 | #77 Bart Ehrman - What is the Gospel of Judas? | 01:50:39 | |
Bart Ehrman is a New Testament scholar focusing on textual criticism of the New Testament, the historical Jesus, and the origins and development of early Christianity. He was one of the first people in the world to see the rediscovered manuscript of the Gospel of Judas, when he was asked by National Geographic to join a small team of experts who verified its authenticity. Study Bart Ehrman's courses and support the show at https://www.bartehrman.com/alex | |||
01 Sep 2024 | #81 Nick Bostrom - How To Prevent AI Catastrophe | 01:01:57 | |
Nick Bostrom is a philosopher known for his work on existential risk, the anthropic principle, human enhancement ethics, whole brain emulation, and superintelligence risks. His recent book, Deep Utopia, explores what might happen if we get AI development right. | |||
01 Mar 2025 | #96 Music, Mormonism, and Peter Hitchens - 1.25m Subsrciber Q&A | 01:01:47 | |
A Q&A to celebrate hitting 1.25 million subscribers on YouTube. | |||
09 May 2019 | #4 — Rationality Rules | Is Morality Objective? | 01:44:30 | |
Stephen Woodford is the owner of the YouTube channel 'Rationality Rules'. He is an atheist, moral objectivist and graphic designer, has given public talks on morality, and found considerable success with his regular online videos. He and Alex have had an ongoing disagreement about ethics since 2017, and in this podcast common ground is finally reached, as the two conclude the episode in agreement. | |||
18 Apr 2023 | #27 Philip Goff - Is Everything Conscious? | 02:06:37 | |
Philip Goff is an Associate Professor at Durham University whose research focuses on philosophy of mind and consciousness. He is one of the world's most prominent proponents of "panpsychism", the view that consciousness is a fundamental and ubiquitous property of the universe. Buy Galileo's Error: Foundations for a New Science of Consciousness (affiliate link, which supports my work): https://amzn.to/3MTfKnu To support the Within Reason Podcast financially, please visit support.withinreasonpodcast.com | |||
04 Oct 2023 | #42 Genetically Modified Skeptic - Why Satanism is Making a Comeback | 01:01:53 | |
Drew McCoy is the creator and host of the YouTube channel Genetically Modified Skeptic. His videos cover topics including atheism, cults, satanism, and Biblical scholarship. | |||
23 Jun 2024 | #73 Arguments for Atheism Tier List w/ Joe Schmid! | 02:35:56 | |
Joe Schmid is a PhD student in philosophy at Princeton University. He graduated with a B.A. in philosophy from Purdue University in 2022. He has published articles in metaphysics, philosophy of religion, and philosophy of time, and the author of books including "Existential Inertia and Classical Theistic Proofs". He runs the YouTube channel, "Majesty of Reason". | |||
07 Apr 2024 | #62 750,000 Subscriber QnA | 00:34:45 | |
Thank you all for 750,000 subscribers on YouTube! | |||
10 Mar 2024 | #58 Michael Knowles - Is America a Christian Nation? | 01:24:13 | |
Michael Knowles is an American conservative Catholic political commentator and media host. He has worked for the Daily Wire since 2016. |