Closer To Truth
Closer To Truth features interviews with leading thinkers and scientists who explore fundamental questions about the cosmos, life, mind, and meaning. The podcast delves into topics such as the nature of reality, consciousness, and the universe. It aims to provide deep insights into humanity's most profound inquiries.
Episodes
Thomas Hertog on the Origin of Time
How did the universe begin—and what determines the laws of physics we observe?
In this conversation, Thomas Hertog discusses On the Origin of Time: Stephen Hawking’s Final Theory, presenting a new approach to cosmology developed through years of collaboration with Stephen Hawking. Exploring quantum cosmology, the multiverse, fine-tuning, and the “no-boundary” proposal, Hertog argues for a profound
David Chalmers on Virtual Worlds and the Problems of Philosophy
Can virtual worlds be genuinely real?
In this conversation, David Chalmers explores the philosophical implications of virtual reality, simulation theory, and digital existence. Discussing themes from his book Reality+, Chalmers examines whether we could be living in a simulation, whether virtual worlds can contain real meaning and value, and how emerging digital realities challenge our understandi
Anil Seth on a New Science of Consciousness
In this conversation, Anil Seth discusses a new scientific approach to consciousness — moving beyond the traditional “hard problem” toward explaining the actual properties of conscious experience. Robert Lawrence Kuhn and Seth explore phenomenology, neural correlates of consciousness, predictive perception, conscious selfhood, and why measuring consciousness may be essential for understanding it.
Why Philosophy of Evolutionary Biology?
Why do we need philosophy to understand evolution?
Robert Lawrence Kuhn explores the philosophy of evolutionary biology — not just how evolution works, but what its core concepts really mean. Through conversations with Elliott Sober, Richard Dawkins, Samir Okasha, John Dupré, Dennis Noble, and Michael Ruse, this episode examines natural selection, common ancestry, challenges to evolutionary theory
Arnold Zuboff on Why You Are Every Conscious Being
What if the boundaries between you and every other conscious being are an illusion? Philosopher Arnold Zuboff makes the case for Universalism — the radical view that first-person immediacy, not any particular body or origin, is what makes an experience yours. And if that's right, then you exist wherever consciousness exists.
Arnold Zuboff is an American philosopher known for his work on personal
Rebecca Newberger Goldstein on The Mattering Instinct
Philosopher Rebecca Newberger Goldstein introduces the idea of the “mattering instinct”—the deep human drive to see our lives as significant. In this conversation, she explores how our longing to matter may arise from the very material reality we often try to transcend.
Rebecca Newberger Goldstein is an award-winning philosopher, writer, and public intellectual. She is the author of 10 books of ac
What Is The Far Future Of Intelligence
What might intelligence become—not just in centuries, but across millions or even billions of years?
Robert explores the deepest questions about the far future of intelligence in the universe. While we often think in terms of decades, extending our perspective to vast cosmic timescales challenges our assumptions about meaning, purpose, and what may ultimately be real. If the future holds clues, ho
Roman Yampolskiy on How Dangerous Is Artificial Intelligence
We may be creating something a million times smarter than all of humanity combined — and we have no plan for what happens next. AI safety pioneer Roman Yampolskiy lays out the risks, the arguments, and whether any solution exists.
Roman V. Yampolskiy is a tenured Associate Professor of Computer Science at the University of Louisville's Speed School of Engineering, where he founded and directs th
Michael James on What the World Is According to Sri Ramana
Is the world we experience truly real, or is it more like a dream we haven't yet woken up from? Michael James, a leading scholar and translator of the teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi, explores how Ramana's philosophy challenges our most basic assumptions about the self, the world, and the nature of reality.
Michael James has spent nearly 50 years studying, practicing, and translating the works
Current Arguments for God
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I like arguments about God, whether based on science, philosophy or personal experience. I like to push and to be pushed, explore the possible existence of a Creator. I must also consider defeaters of God.
Featuring interviews with Rebecca Goldstein, Ian Barbour, John Polki
Can Brain Alone Explain Consciousness?
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Can physical facts about the brain account for mental experiences of the mind? Has philosophy of mind made progress? We take a 15-year journey with John Searle and David Chalmers.
Asking Ultimate Questions
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We like pushing boundaries, trying to discern existence, searching the foundations of reality, knowing all that can be known. Overly ambitious? Sophomoric? We don't care. We do it anyway. Here are ultimate questions.
Featuring interviews with Lawrence Krauss, John Les
Why a Landscape of Consciousness?
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Explore diverse theories of consciousness, like materialism, dualism, panpsychism, idealism, and diverse ways of thinking about consciousness, like neuroscience, philosophy, wisdom traditions. Compare theories of consciousness on a ‘Landscape of Consciousness'.
What Life Might Come After Death?
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What kinds of afterlives do the world’s religions offer? Soul/spirit in heaven or hell, with or apart from God? Reincarnation with innumerable rebirths, seeking liberation and nirvana? Resurrection of the body, reuniting with a soul/spirit?
Could Theories of Consciousness Affect Life After Death?
Life after death is a haunting and deeply personal longing. Can we explore life after death in relation to theories of consciousness, ranging from strict materialism to imaginative philosophy to ancient wisdom traditions?
Raymond Tallis on the Mystery of Human Beings
Explicitness is one of the fundamental mysteries in which our lives are wrapped. Our capacity, as conscious subjects, to make things explicit, so that what-is presents itself as “that-it-is” or “that-it-is-the-case” is at the heart of the mystery of human being. Philosopher Raymond Tallis explores how explicitness connects with fundamental ontological, metaphysical, and epistemological questions.
What do Theories of Consciousness Mean?
What causes consciousness, our inner felt experience, like the smell of garlic cooking in olive oil? Explore diverse theories from quantum consciousness to consciousness as fundamental reality. We seek the edges of consciousness.
Can Art Harmonize Diverse Religions?
Almost all religions use art in their sacred spaces and many use art forms in their worship rituals. Certainly, there is powerful social cohesion at work. Can cross-religion communications in art, largely nonverbal, work to enhance similarities and mitigate differences among religions that, at least superficially, have significant differences? Can art be a much-needed unifier? Featuring interviews
Vlatko Vedral on Portals to a New Reality
Oxford physicist Vlatko Vedral seeks to shatter complacency in modern physics and show why five revolutionary experiments in quantum physics promise to open the gates separating us from a true understanding of the universe. They may sound very strange—one essentially involves entangling a human with Schrödinger’s cat—but they lay bare elements of our theories that are particularly problematic, suc
Can Art Affect Belief Systems?
Many belief systems, religions in particular, use art for promoting their messages and furthering their missions. What makes art so effective in building and solidifying religious traditions? Can art attract and motivate converts? Is affecting or changing belief systems a proper use of art?
Featuring interviews with Justin Barrett, Marlene Altenmüller, Mario Gollwitzer, Jamal Elias, Robin Jensen
Roger Penrose on Cosmology, Quantum Mechanics, and Deep Reality
Throughout his career, Penrose has challenged conventional wisdom in physics, mathematics, and the philosophy of science. He has tackled some of the most profound questions of the universe: How do quantum mechanics and cosmology shape our understanding of reality? Can human consciousness be fully explained by physical laws, or does it transcend computation? This wide-ranging conversation spans Pen
Toward a Cognitive Science of Transcendence
Understanding the nature of transcendence requires careful experimentation and innovative ways to reveal essence and tease out aspects of aesthetics. What are key characteristics of transcendence? Tracking imperceptible eye movements, or brain blood flow during mental activity, reflect neural activity, which is always ready to spring surprise.
Featuring interviews with Elisabeth Schellekens, H
Dean Radin on The Science of Magic and The Fabric of Reality
There is an idea that shakes the core of our scientific principles: That our consciousness participates in creating our physical reality. It’s an idea that runs counter to the materialist worldview we’re all taught in school. But the outer edges of scientific inquiry bleed into what can only be called ‘magic.’ With a uniquely science-backed approach, parapsychologist Dean Radin explores the "magic
Is Mathematics Invented or Discovered?
Mathematics describes the real world of atoms and acorns, stars and stairs, with remarkable precision. So is mathematics invented by humans—like chisels and hammers and pieces of music? Or is mathematics discovered—always out there, somewhere, like mysterious islands waiting to be found? Whenever mathematics is will help define reality itself.
Featuring interviews with Roger Penrose, Stephen Wol
Global Philosophy: Why Inner Life Practices?
Compare inner-life practices among diverse religions/traditions. Islamic prayer as the core of Muslim belief. Buddhist meditation calms the mind. Hindu meditation can be theistic-devotional or non-dual inner exploration. Embodied practices in Chinese traditions.
Featuring interviews with Helen De Cruz, Venerable Dr. Yifa, Swami Sarvapriyananda, Franklin Perkins, Aaron Segal, and Hamza Yusuf.
Blaise Agüera y Arcas: What is Intelligence in an AI Future?
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What is intelligence, and how is AI emergence a natural consequence of evolution? In his book "What Is Intelligence?" and in this conversation, Google's Blaise Agüera y Arcas takes up the idea that prediction is fundamental not only to intelligence and the brain but to life itself, and explores the wide-ra
Global Philosophy: What is the Person?
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How do diverse religions/traditions treat the “person,” present status and afterlife future? Buddhism’s no self. Hinduism’s soul illuminating the mind. Prior lives in Eastern and African traditions. Body and soul, resurrection and judg
Stephen Wolfram on The Concept of the Ruliad
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The Ruliad is a term that Stephen Wolfram developed, which he describes as the entangled limit of everything that is computationally possible, the result of following all possible computational rules in all possible ways.
Stephen Wolfram is a British-American computer scienti
Global Philosophy: Is God Ultimate?
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Concepts of God/deities/ultimates in diverse, non-Western religions/traditions: Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, African. Is God/deities a “person?” Islam’s one transcendent God. Hinduism’s many schools: personal, impersonal, both. Buddhism’s no God but many deities.
Featuring
Daniel Whiteson on Aliens, Physics, and the Nature of Reaity
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When the long-awaited day dawns and the aliens finally arrive on Earth, they might eat us and destroy the planet―or, just maybe, they might share the secrets of the Universe with us. When that time comes, will we be able to cross the communicatio
Death, Life After Death, & Reincarnation
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What happens after we die? Is there life after death? If so, what kind of life? From heaven and hell to systems and cycles of reincarnation, we explore Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, Judaism, and Chinese traditions, as well as Christianity.
Featuring interviews with Hamza
Is Consciousness Ultimate?
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How do different religions/traditions address consciousness, our inner mental awareness? Is consciousness ultimate, as in Eastern traditions, or created by God, as in Abrahamic traditions? If ultimate, what is the relationship between personal and cosmic consciousness?
Roger Penrose on Deep Reality and Quantum Mechanics
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In the first two installments of a brand new, six-part interview series with Nobel Laureate Sir Roger Penrose, we explore his approach to the deep nature of reality. Trace the intellectual and scientific history of each of his major contributions
Is Mathematics Eternal?
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Mathematics is like nothing else. The truths of math seem to be unrelated to anything else—independent of human beings, independent of the universe. The sum of 2 + 3 = 5 cannot not be true; this means that 3 + 2 = 5 would be true even if there were never any human bein
What is Global Philosophy of Religion?
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Global Philosophy of Religion seeks diverse views and fresh ways of thinking from different religions/traditions about Ultimate Questions: God, consciousness, person/self, evil/suffering, afterlife/reincarnation, world to come. It does not avoid hard differences; it celeb
Stephen Wolfram on Physics and Computation
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Physicist and computer scientist Stephen Wolfram explores how simple rules can generate complex realities, offering a bold new vision of fundamental physics and the structure of the universe. Additionally, from the foundations of cellular automata to the discovery of surp
What Does Transhumanism Foreshadow?
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Humanity’s future is now framed by artificial intelligence (AI) and increasing interventions in the body to enhance features and functions. This is transhumanism. Considering the stakes, and the dangers, a philosophical perspective is impe
Can We Explore Transcendence Via Art and Mind?
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What is the three-way relationship among mind, art, and transcendence? What is it about art that can elicit the sense of transcendence, going beyond the self, bursting the constraining bonds of semantic language? What is it about transcendence that it can be expressed b
Can Philosophy Discern Sex and Gender?
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Sexual questions abound. What is “normal” sexual behavior in light of diverse sexual variations? LGBTQ+ issues? Is sex in animal models relevant for human sexuality? A philosophical perspective can provide clarity.
Featuring interviews with Nathan Lents, Joshua Swamidass, Rachell Powell, Lis
Can Near-Death Experiences Affect Consciousness Theories?
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Many people believe that out-of-the-body experiences (OBEs) and near-death experiences (NDEs) are real. We do not assess the evidence and arguments, pro or con. We do explore what OBEs and NDEs would mean, if real, for theories of consciousness.
This episode features interviews with Ber
Evolution vs. Religion: Anything New?
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Two kinds of questions probe evolution vs. religion. The first explores discrepancies, even contradictions, between the science of evolution and the beliefs of religion. The second examines how religion itself evolved.
Featuring interviews with Richard Dawkins, Michae
Clément Vidal on Life's Biggest Questions
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Clement Vidal, philosopher of science and astrobiologist, discusses the idea of something rather than nothing, differing religious worldviews, fine tuning and metaphysics, and more.
Watch more CTT Chats here.
Dr. Clément Vidal is a philosopher with a background in logic and cognitive sciences. H
How did Cognition and Emotion Evolve?
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What can evolution reveal about the developmental history of thinking and feeling? How did cognition and emotion (affect) co-develop over evolutionary time? Can evolution help solve the mystery of consciousness?
Featuring interviews with Peter Godfrey-Smith, S. Joshua Swamidass, Rachell Powell, De
Mark Bailey on AI: Consciousness, Dangers, and Morality
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Dr. Mark Bailey writes about the intersection between artificial intelligence, complexity, and national security. He is an associate professor at the National Intelligence University, where he is the Department Chair for Cyber Intelligence and Data Science, as well as the Director of the Data S
What is Human Nature?
What is “human” nature? While human beings are animals, we believe we are special, radically different from other animals. Why? What traits are unique to humans? Are we sure? How to explore human nature from an evolutionary perspective?
Featuring interviews with Quayshawn Spencer, Alexander Rosenberg, Massimo Pigliucci, Rachell Powell, Helen De Cruz, Paul E. Griffiths, and John Dupré.
Make
Julia Mossbridge on AI: Is There a Soul in the Machine?
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How do we define a soul? Can AI become consciousness? Julia Mossbridge discusses these questions along with the main trends in parapsychology, transpersonal psychology, and ESP research over the last decade.
Dr. Julia Mossbridge is an American cognitive neuroscientist, auth
How do Reductionism and Emergence Dance?
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Two big ideas in biology: the evolution of species via mutation, fitness and natural selection; and the embryological development of individuals, from fertilized egg to whole organisms. How do these two big ideas—“Evo-Dev,” as it’s called—relate? What novel ideas emerge?
Featuring
James Hughes on AI Consciousness: Buddhism & Posthuman Futures
James Hughes Ph.D. is the Executive Director of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, and a bioethicist and sociologist who serves as the Associate Provost for Institutional Research, Assessment and Planning for the University of Massachusetts Boston. He holds a doctorate in sociology from the University of Chicago, where he also taught bioethics at the MacLean Center for Clinical Me
What are Units or Levels of Selection?
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While evolution is how life on earth came to be, where does the evolution occur? At what level of the hierarchy of life—from genes to individuals to groups to species—does evolution work its selection magic? Is it multilevel?
Featuring interviews with Richard Dawkins, L
Zoltan Istvan on AI: Transhumanism and Deepfakes
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How will AI-generated deepfakes reshape truth, trust, and society? Can AI someday merge with human consciousness? Futurist Zoltan Istvan explores the disruptive power of synthetic media—from political deception to personal identity—and what it means for the future of ethi
How Can Philosophy Probe Evolutionary Biology?
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Explore evolution—its scope and depth. How did life on earth come to be as it is, and how did humans come to be as we are? What are the deep principles driving evolution? What are evolution’s challenges and open questions?
Featuring interviews
Chris French on the Science of Weird Shit
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Chris French discusses his latest book, The Science of Weird Shit, where he convincingly debunks ESP, communicating with the dead, and alien abduction claims, among other phenomena. All the while, however, French maintains that our belief in such phenomena is neither ridi
What Would Alien Life & Intelligences Mean?
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What could life be as we don’t know it? Three transitions in astrobiology. Non-life to life. Life to intelligent life. Intelligent life to technological civilization. For alien life, would Darwinian evolution hold? Fermi’s Paradox is profound: with at least 10 22 planets
Jonathan Schooler on the Psychology of Artificial Intelligence
Jonathan Schooler is an American psychologist and Distinguished Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences at the University of California, Santa Barbara, who researches various topics that intersect aspects of both cognitive psychology and philosophy such as: Belief in free will, meta-awareness, mindfulness, mind-Wandering, memory, creativity, and emotion. Schooler is also known for his someti
Joseph Corabi: Could Superintelligent AI Defeat Itself?
Can superintelligent AI destroy humanity—or will it collapse under its own philosophical doubts? Professor Joseph Corabi, Chair of Philosophy at Saint Joseph’s University, joins Robert Lawrence Kuhn at MindFest 2025 to explore the limits of artificial intelligence, consciousness, and the metaphysics of mind.
Drawing from his presentation, "A Collapsing Superintelligent AI?", Corabi argues that f
Eastern Traditions: What are Ultimate Existence and Essence?
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How do Buddhism, Chinese traditions, and Hinduism address the ultimate essence of all things, the ground of being? What are transcendence, oneness, interconnectivity, ineffability? Compare Dao in Daoism to Brahman in Hinduism. Compare Wu in Daoi
Zorana Pringle on the Science of Creativity & Decision-Making
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Anyone who has ever participated in a brainstorming session will know that most of us do not lack ideas. Yet, many people never breathe life into these ideas. To turn inspiration into real achievement, you must decide to act—and then decide to act again
Can Dualism Explain Consciousness?
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Dualism claims reality has two parts, a physical and a nonphysical (mental or spiritual), both equally real. Dualism is believed by most people but rejected by most philosophers and scientists.
Featuring interviews with Yujin Nagasawa, Richard Swinburne, Jaron Lanier, Bede Rundle, and Peter Forrest.
Watch the e
Robin Hanson on the Age of AI and Large Language Models
Innovative economist Robin Hanson discusses the age of artificial intelligence, decision making and predictive markets, astrobiology, and AI consciousness.
Robin Hanson is an author, economist, and associate professor of economics at George Mason University and a former research associate at the Future of Humanity Institute of Oxford University. His bestselling book, The Elephant in the Brain, i
Terry Sejnowski on ChatGPT and the Future of AI
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Terry Sejnowski offers a nuanced exploration of large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT and what their future holds. How should we go about understanding LLMs? Do these language models truly understand what they are saying? Or is it possible that what appears to b
What is the Philosophy of Scientific Breakthroughs?
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To explore scientific Breakthroughs is to find theories or discoveries that challenge conventional wisdom, change patterns of thought, provide novel frameworks for research. What is the deep essence or general nature of scientific breakthroughs?
Aspects of Consciousness
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We offer distinctive approaches to consciousness including cognitive science, phenomenology, and even the implications of aesthetics like fiction and films. We observe the richness of consciousness studies.v
This episode features interviews with Judith Wolfe, Stacie Friend,
What is Extended Mind?
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What is extended mind? How does the mind work? It’s not obvious. Where does the mind stop and the rest of the world begin? What is extended mind? What is embodied mind?
Featuring interviews with David Chalmers, Andy Clark, and Raymond Tallis.
Does a Fine-Tuned Universe Lead to God?
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We human beings sit roughly midway between atoms and galaxies, and both must be so perfectly structured for us to exist. It's called "fine tuning" and it's all so breathtakingly precise that it cries out for explanation. To some, fine-tuning leads to God. To others, there are non-supernatural explanations.
Featur
Annaka Harria on Consciousness and the Cosmos
In a follow-up to her seminal book, "Conscious", Annaka Harris' new audio original documentary offers beginners and experts alike a chance to unravel some of humankind’s most enduring puzzles. Where "Conscious"presents new questions about felt experience, Lights On seeks to find the answers.
Lights On: How Understanding Consciousness Helps Us Understand the Universe is available for purchase now
Do Human Brains Have Free Will?
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Free will seems the simplest of notions. Why then is free will so vexing to philosophers? Here's why: no one knows how free will works! Science, seemingly, permits no "gaps" in which free will can operate.
This episode features interviews with John Searle, Rodolfo Llinas, Eran Zaidel, Roger Walsh, Mike Merzenich,
Janna Levin on Cosmology: Black Holes, the Big Bang, and More
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Astrophysicist and science visionary Janna Levin discusses all things cosmology: black holes, gravitational waves, the James Webb Space Telescope discoveries, early galaxies, and more.
Janna J. Levin is a theoretical cosmologist and a professor of physics and astronomy at Barnard College. She r
Implications of Cosmology?
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The universe is strange and wondrous—dauntingly vast, menacingly violent, infinitely complex. The origin of the universe is equally fascinating. There are explanations, but is there a final explanation?
Featuring interviews with Alan H. Guth, Andrei Linde, George F. Smoot III, Robert Spitzer, Jill Tarter, and Dou
Philip Goff and Helen De Cruz on Finding (and Losing) Their Religion
Two notable Closer To Truth contributors—and two good friends—discuss their intellectual and spiritual journeys in what seems to be opposite directions: one toward a form of Christianity and the other away from it.
Philip Goff is a British author, idealist philosopher, and professor at Durham University whose research focuses on philosophy of mind and consciousness. Specifically, it foc
Why Explore Consciousness and Cosmos?
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Cosmos and consciousness seem utterly different, the former encompassing the vast universe, the latter emerging from tiny brains. Yet consciousness founds most religions, and some cosmologists speak quietly, profoundly, about consciousness.
Featuring interviews with David Chalmers, Alexander Vilenkin, David Brin,
Nathan Lents on The Sexual Evolution
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Evolutionary biologist Nathan Lents argues that many of our supposedly modern ideas about gender and human sexuality are, in fact, deeply rooted in our animal ancestors. In this Chat, Lents discusses his new book, "The Sexual Evolution: How 500 Million Year
The Ultimate Questions of Existence
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We like pushing boundaries, trying to discern existence, searching the foundations of reality, knowing all that can be known. Overly ambitious? Sophomoric? WeI don't care. We do it anyway. Here are ultimate questions.
Featuring interviews with Lawrence Krauss, John Leslie, Max Tegmark,
Why is the Quantum So Strange?
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What is quantum theory and why is it so strange? To know reality, one must confront the quantum. It is how our world works at the deepest level. What's the quantum? It is bizarre, defying all common sense.
Featuring interviews with Wojciech Zurek, Nima Arkani-Hamed, Lee Smolin, and Seth Lloyd.
Richard Swinburne on Evil, Atonement, and Evidence Against God
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Robert Lawrence Kuhn sits down with philosopher Richard Swinburne to embark on a retrospective of his views and arguments over his illustrious career. In this episode, they'll explore the problem of evil, atonement, resurrection, and more.
Richard G
Robert Lawrence Kuhn on "A Landscape of Consciousness"
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Closer To Truth host Robert Lawrence Kuhn recently published an extensive new article titled "A Landscape of Consciousness: Toward a taxonomy of explanations and implications". The paper covers the field of consciousness studies in its entirety as well as the consequences of consci
How is God the Creator?
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If God exists, did God create everything? Did God create out of literally "nothing"? Suppose there was no beginning to the cosmos, just the universe going through endless cycles, what then? And what about "abstract objects" like logic and numbers
What's Real About Time?
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Time seems natural and absolute: the flow of moments one following another from the unknown past to the knife's edge present to the unknowable future. But this is not so
Arguments Against God?
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All who affirm that God does exist should examine the strong attacks of those who conclude that God does not exist, and then assess the sharp counterattacks of scholarly believers. Belief in God is too important to be determined by cultural circumstances.
Featuring interviews wi
What is the Large-Scale Structure of the Universe?
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Galaxies and clusters of galaxies, untold billions of them, adorn the cosmos. How did such large-scale structure of the universe come about?
Featuring interviews with John Richard Gott III, Abraham Loeb, George Smoot, and Saul Perlmutter.
Solutions to the Mind-Body Problem?
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Are human beings purely physical? Evolved at random and destined to die, extinguished forever? Or are we something more? A spirit or a soul, with existence beyond? What's the relationship between our brains and our consciousness, between the stuff in our skulls and the essence in our minds
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