Patrick Radden Keefe is an award winning writer known for his ability to tell complex stories in ways that are compelling and revealing. 

Author of the bestsellers Empire of Pain—a shocking exposé of the Sackler family and their involvement in the opioid crisis—and Say Nothing, his award-winning...

What do our Google searches reveal about who we really are?

For a new book, What We Ask Google, data analyst Simon Rogers explores the world’s biggest dataset - billions of searches carried out over two decades - to provide a revealing portrait of our collective brain.

In this episode, he speak...

AI models now advise on everything from war, crop output, and marriages. Algorithms determine whether we can get a loan, a job, an apartment, or an organ transplant.

Carissa Véliz, Associate Professor at the Institute for Ethics in AI at the University of Oxford, argues that today’s computer sci...

The town of Weimar looms large in German history. This ancient town nestled in the heart of the country was home to some of Europe's greatest thinkers, Goethe and Schiller, Liszt and Nietzsche among them. It gave its name to the ambitious Weimar Republic crafted in the aftermath of the First Worl...

Kae Tempest is widely regarded as one of Britain’s greatest wordsmiths. In a career of ferocious creativity, he has received multiple prizes and critical recognition across the many forms he works in.

Beginning as a lyricist and songwriter in his teens, Tempest threw himself fully into whicheve...

How close are we to a new global conflict?

In this episode, journalist Hannah Lucinda Smith speaks with global defence commentator Peter Apps about his new book The Next World War: The New Age of Global Conflict and the Fight to Stop It. From Ukraine to Taiwan, and from cyber warfare to space, A...

Dr Radha Modgil is joined by endurance athlete, investor and author Ken Rideout for an inspiring Intelligence Squared conversation on what it really takes to transform your life. Drawing on the ideas in his book Everything You Want Is On The Other Side of Hard, Rideout argues that growth, confide...

On August 20, 1940, in a quiet study in Mexico, one of the 20th century’s most consequential political exiles was assassinated with an ice pick. The killing of Leon Trotsky marked the culmination of a relentless campaign orchestrated by Joseph Stalin, stretching across continents and years of pur...

Populism has been winning big in recent years. It is the wave that has buoyed Donald Trump’s second term in office, Marine Le Pen’s popularity in France, and Reform UK’s recent leaps and bounds in British polling. Across the West, authoritarian populists now govern one-quarter of the world's demo...

What Do Wolves, Caribou, and Global Superpowers Have in Common?

In this episode, Professor Helen Czerski speaks to journalist and author Neil Shea about the Arctic’s changing face and the struggles that its indigenous wildlife must now endure.

In this expansive yet intimate revelation, Shea ex...

In an age of grinding wars, nuclear brinkmanship, and political volatility, what does strategy really mean - and how do leaders make decisions when the world feels chaotic?

In this episode, Lawrence Freedman draws on decades of scholarship and his experience as official historian of the Falkland...

Dr Gwen Adshead is one of Britain’s leading forensic psychiatrists. She is the author of The Sunday Times bestseller, The Devil You Know, which inspired her series of BBC Reith Lectures in 2024.

In February 2026, she came to the Kiln Theatre for a compelling conversation about trauma, resilienc...

Humans are animals. 40,000 years ago our ancestors considered themselves inseparable from the landscape and the wild animals that lived alongside them. But over generations, we developed an idea that still shapes modern life: the belief that we are separate from, and superior to, other species. ...

According to Great British Bake Off judge and national treasure Prue Leith the secret to a happy life lies in embracing everyday with joy while accepting our inevitable end.

Prue has had an exhilarating career. She has been a Michelin-starred restaurateur, author, broadcaster, and beloved Bake O...

Are Pagan Traditions Shaping a New British Identity?

In this episode, Academic, broadcaster and critic Shahidha Bari speaks to journalist, DJ and author Zakia Sewell about her book Finding Albion: Myth, Folklore and the Quest for a Hidden Britain which has been longlisted for the Women’s Prize f...

Before sex evolved on our planet, two billion years ago, all reproduction happened asexually. So why and how did sexual reproduction evolve?

Dr Lixing Sun is Distinguished Research Professor in behavior and evolution at Central Washington University. In a new book, On the Origin of Sex, he explo...

How deeply was the British Crown involved in the transatlantic slave trade? New research by historian Brooke Newman argues that, from the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, until well into the 19th century, the Crown and its navy helped expand, finance and protect the trade in enslaved African people.

...

Could one of Renoir’s most iconic paintings conceal one of the most astonishing true stories of scandal and tragedy in Golden Age Paris?

In 1881, Pierre-Auguste Renoir painted two young sisters from a Jewish banking dynasty at their home in Paris’s grand 8th arrondissement. Pink and Blue, a port...

More people are being labelled with medical conditions than ever before. Diagnoses of autism, ADHD, allergies, and long COVID have skyrocketed - but are we actually getting less healthy? 

In this episode, neurologist Dr Suzanne O’Sullivan speaks to Dr Güneş Taylor about an impending crisis of ov...

Hundreds of millions of people now talk to AI, such as ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini every day. They organise their finances and holidays, ask advice, seek therapy and find love – via machines. Almost overnight, chatbots are transforming society, politics and business. This is one of the biggest and ...

What does it mean to translate some of the most recognisable and revered works in the English language? When the wordplay, poetry, and syntax of Shakespeare are all changed, is it still truly Shakespeare?

In this episode, host Mythili Rao speaks with translator Daniel Hahn about his new book If ...