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PODCAST

Reading Our Times

Reading Our Times is the podcast that explores the books and the ideas that are shaping us today. It is hosted by Nick Spencer, Senior Fellow at the think tank, Theos. We’re going to be talking to some of the world’s leading authors about issues like meritocracy, justice, populism, human rights, the brain, liberalism, and religion. Above all, we"ll be exploring what these books have to say about the times we live in and about the people we are. So listen with us, and we’ll introduce you to

society & culture philosophy

All Episodes

36:59

Does terrorism work? In conversation with Richard...

Reading Our Times ·

2022/11/15

Everyone knows that terrorism is wrong but - a tough question to answer objectively - does it work? And, depending on your answer to that question, how then should we respond to it? In this episode, Nick Spencer talks to Richard English about his book Does Terrorism Work?

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33:13

How is the digital world changing our brain? In...

Reading Our Times ·

2022/11/08

Whereas once we read books and newspapers, and read them whole, the world is now mediated to us through screens, usually in much smaller gobbets. What is this doing to our brains - and does it matter? In this episode, Nick Spencer talks to Maryanne Wolf about her book Reader, Come Home: The reading brain in a digital world

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36:07

What happened to the sexual revolution? In...

Reading Our Times ·

2022/11/01

The liberation of the sexual revolution is increasingly looking anything but liberating, particularly for young women who are suffering a culture of the endlessly commercialised female body, casual sex, and sometimes violent pornography. What is going on, why, and what can we do about it? In this episode, Nick Spencer talks to Louise Perry about her book The Case Against the Sexual Revolution

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36:10

What will the world look like in 2050? In...

Reading Our Times ·

2022/06/21

What will the world be like a generation from now? Warmer and more crowded, certainly. But… richer? More peaceful? Healthier? Better educated? On Mars? Or at war? Predicting the future is risky but also, arguably, necessary if we hope to navigate the path before us. In this episode, Nick Spencer talks to Hamish McCrae about his book The World in 2050: How to Think About the Future

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32:49

What is the soul? In conversation with John Cottingham

Reading Our Times ·

2022/06/14

Whatever else has happened to religious practice over the last 40 years, it doesn’t seem to have affected the way we talk about, or believe in, the soul, with as many people doing so today as they did 40 years ago. But what we mean by the ‘soul’ is far from clear. Is it a thing, a process, or just a figures of speech? In this episode, Nick Spencer speaks to Prof. John Cottingham about his book In Search of the Soul.

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31:59

What do men want? In conversation with Nina Power

Reading Our Times ·

2022/06/07

Even allowing for the fact that relationship between the sexes has never been easy, we surely live in strangely anxious times when it comes to such matters, with accusations of misogyny and toxic masculinity rife. Are men a problem? How do men and women differ? And what, if anything, do we want or need from each other? In this episode, Nick Spencer speaks to Nina Power about her book What do men want?: masculinity and its discontents.

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35:00

Where does science end and pseudoscience begin? In...

Reading Our Times ·

2022/05/31

Anti-vaxxers, creation science, astrology – for supposedly rational times, irrational and pseudoscientific beliefs appear to be doing quite well. Why? Which pseudosciences are flourishing, and for what reasons? And where even is the border between science and pseudoscience? In this episode, Nick Spencer speaks to Prof. Michael Gordin about his book On the Fringe: Where Science meets Pseudoscience.

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34:07

How did we get into this mess? In conversation with...

Reading Our Times ·

2022/05/24

We live in strange, unsettling, perhaps even exceptional times. How did we get here? In particular, how have our dependence on energy, our need for economic growth and our distrust in politics combined to shape our unstable 21st century. In this episode, Nick Spencer speaks to Prof. Helen Thompson about her book Disorder: Hard Times in the 21st Century.

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31:43

Where did religion come from (and where is it going)?...

Reading Our Times ·

2022/05/17

The more religion dies, the more it stays alive, predictions of its imminent demise being as popular now as they were a hundred years ago. Why? Where did religion come from? Why is it so deep rooted in human nature? And where, if anywhere, is it going? In this episode, Nick Spencer speaks to Prof. Robin Dunbar about his book How Religion Evolved and why it endures.

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35:27

Can spying ever be ethical? In conversation with...

Reading Our Times ·

2022/05/10

Strange as it may seem given what they do, ethics is very important to the intelligence services. But how do you – how even can you – spy ethically? In this episode, Nick Spencer speaks to Prof. Cécile Fabre about her book Spying Through a Glass Darkly: The Ethics of Espionage and Counter-Intelligence.

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33:53

Why trust science? In conversation with Naomi Oreskes

Reading Our Times ·

2022/05/03

Science is the basis of so much in the modern world that to ask why we should trust it seems unnecessary, even wrong. Yet, people do, and not all of them for the best motives. In this episode, Nick Spencer speaks to Prof. Naomi Oreskes about her book Why Trust Science? which answers ‘science sceptics’ of all stripes, and opens up new perspectives on the importance of diversity in science.

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33:58

How do pandemics shape history? In conversation with...

Reading Our Times ·

2021/12/21

Covid-19 was not the first pandemic in history, and it won’t be the last. We have lived with disease throughout our history, and our history has accordingly been shaped, sometimes transformed, by disease. But how? In the final episode of this series of Reading Our Times, Nick Spencer talks to the historian Kyle Harper about his new book Plagues upon the Earth: Disease and the Course of Human History.

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37:10

What actually is the Common Good? In conversation...

Reading Our Times ·

2021/12/14

The Common Good is a remarkably popular phrase, used widely by the left and the right, the religious and the secular. But does it actually mean anything? Is it so elastic as to have no real content? In this episode, Nick Spencer talks to Anna Rowlands about her new book Towards a Politics of Communion, about what the Common Good means and what it offers a society like ours.

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31:55

How on earth should we talk about God? In...

Reading Our Times ·

2021/12/07

Even as formal religious adherence wanes (at least in the West), people go on talking about God and spiritual matters. But how is that even possible? How can you talk about someone (or something) that is beyond language? Is all God-talk literally nonsense? In this episode, Nick Spencer speaks to Prof. Janet Soskice about her classic 'Metaphor and Religious Language' and her forthcoming 'Naming God' about how on earth we can hope to talk about God.

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32:26

Why is secularism failing? In conversation with...

Reading Our Times ·

2021/11/30

Secularism is supposed to epitomise reasonableness and fairness – the refusal to favour one (non/religious) group over another. Yet, it is coming under fierce pressure across the world. Why? In this episode Nick Spencer talks to Prof. Sumantra Bose about his book 'Secular States, Religious Politics' and looks at the future of secularism in the 21st century.

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38:15

What’s underneath the trans debate? In conversation...

Reading Our Times ·

2021/11/23

Debates around sex, gender and identity have emerged as some of the most important, and heated, of our time. But what are the issues – scientific, philosophical, ideological, anthropological – that lie beneath them? In this episode, Nick Spencer talks to the journalist and author Helen Joyce about her book Trans, and the tensions underlying the debate.

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32:31

What is “the matter with things”? In conversation...

Reading Our Times ·

2021/11/16

Iain McGilchrist rose to public prominence with his book 'The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World'. Now, in his long–awaited follow up ‘The Matter with Things’, he develops his ideas about the divided brain into a remarkably detailed and comprehensive vision of reality, “a whole philosophy – … [with] new answers to the questions of what the world is and who we are.” Nick Spencer talks to him about materialism, truth, humanity, and God.

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36:01

What can animals teach us about ourselves? In...

Reading Our Times ·

2021/11/09

There was a time (and not so long ago) we thought animals were 'mere machines’, incapable of inner life or emotions. Now we know better and are beginning to understand the extraordinarily rich inner life of primates and some other species. In the first episode of this series of Reading Our Times, Nick Spencer talks to the eminent primatologist Frans de Waal about his book 'Mama's Last Hug' which explores the moving and fascinating world of animal emotions and what they tell us about ourselves.

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27:11

What comes after liberalism? In conversation with...

Reading Our Times ·

2021/07/13

The last 30 years have seen liberalism fall from heights of triumph at the end of the Cold War to a place of genuine fragility. Both in Western countries and even more so elsewhere, liberalism appears to be in retreat. What comes next? Some argue that liberalism will bounce back. Others that populism or authoritarianism are set to dominate things for the foreseeable future. But still others have argued for a ‘postliberal’ alternative, which spans the traditional left and right, and integrates the

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32:40

What does “being spiritual” actually mean? In...

Reading Our Times ·

2021/07/06

People today often like to be considered “spiritual but not religious”. But what could that actually mean? All too often, the spiritual is juxtaposed against the material. But in reality, the two are inseparably linked. In this episode of Reading our Times, Nick Spencer talks to Rowan Williams about his latest book [Looking East in Winter](https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/looking-east-in-winter-9781472989246/), in a conversation that covers the spiritual life, the potential for politics, and the need

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96 results

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