Converging Dialogues

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with John Keane about demagogues and despots. They talk about the rise of demagogues in the modern era, why democracies have been infiltrated with demagogues, despots, tools that demagogues use, demagogues in the future, and many more topics. John Keane is Professor of Politics at the University of Sydney and renowned globally for his creative thinking about politics, history, media and democracy. His books include The Shortest History of Democracy, The Life and Death of Democracy, and his latest book, Demagogues and Despots: democracies on the brink. <...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Robin Waterfield and John Sellars on their new translation of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics. They discuss translating Aristotle’s ethics for a modern audience, Aristotelian Greek vs. other forms of Greek, different works of ethics, Aristotle’s eudaimonia, the good life, Aristotle’s virtues, using reason for ethics, friendship, and many other topics. Robin Waterfield is a British classical scholar, translator, and editor, specializing in Ancient Greek philosophy. He has written and/or translated many works, including the recent English translation of Nicomachean Ethics.John Sellars is Reade...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Romain Brette about the brain and various theoretical concepts in neuroscience. They talk about the idea of the brain as a computer, memory and reality, functionalism, connectionism, and computational theory of mind, and the extended mind. They also discuss perception, representations, anticipation, Friston, free energy, and active interferences, emotions, the brain as a complex biological ecosystem, panpsychism, and many more topics. Romain Brette is a neuroscientist at the Institute of Intelligent Systems and Robotics, Paris. He has worked on neuronal biophysics, neuroinformatics, auditory neuroscience, philosophy of neuroscience, and...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Sarah Pearsall about the global perspectives of the American Revolution. They discuss American independence in a global context, freedom, Indigenous nations pushing for revolution, Canada not joining the colonies, Hessians, Six indigenous nations, Cuba, and many more topics. Sarah M. S. Pearsall is an award-winning historian with degrees from Yale, Harvard, and Cambridge, where she taught for nearly a decade. She is a professor and Chair of the Department of History at Johns Hopkins. She is a National Endowment for the Humanities Public Scholar and Distinguished Fellow in...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with David Daley about gerrymandering and political redistricting in the United States. They discuss political redistricting in the modern era, defining redistricting, how states redraw the political map, 2026 midterms, gerrymandering in 2028, 2030 census, fixing gerrymandering, and many more topics. David Daley is a Senior Fellow at FairVote. He is the author of the national best-seller “Ratf**ked: Why Your Vote Doesn’t Count,” which has been credited with sparking the modern drive to reform redistricting and end partisan gerrymandering, and the basis for the award-winning documentary “Slay The Dragon.” His second boo...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Mark Solms on Freud and the curative power of psychoanalysis. They discuss how he edited the complete psychological works of Freud, translation differences, and Lacan on Freud. They talk about how Freud developed his theory, subjective experiences vs. consciousness, Freud’s topographical model, neuroscience rediscovering Freud, Friston’s free energy principle, Freud’s drives and Panksepp’s drives, sex, pleasure, and libido, psychoanalysis as curative, and many more topics. Mark Solms is a neuropsychologist and psychoanalyst. He holds the chair of neuropsychology at the University of Cape Town in South...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Lixing Sun about the origins of sex in many species. They discuss the origins of sex, asexual reproduction, sexual reproduction, and “flip-flopping.” They discuss large and small gametes, varieties of biological sex, Dawkins and the selfish gene, sex chromosomes, changing sex, intersex, mate choice and mate competition, sexual identity, and many more topics. Lixing Sun is a distinguished research professor at Central Washington University and a 2024–2025 Radcliffe fellow at Harvard University. He is author of The Liars of Natureand the Nature of Liars, The Fairness Instinct, and On the Or...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Samuel Moyn about gerontocracy in America. They discuss how we live in a gerontocracy, coalitions, older institutions, avoiding ageism, oligarchies, elites and democracy, long term view, abundance, and many more topics. Samuel Moyn is Chancellor Kent Professor of Law and History at Yale University. He has his law degree from Harvard University and his PhD in modern European history from University of California, Berkeley. He is fellow at Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft and has received fellowships from the American Council of Learned Societies, the Berggruen Institute, and...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Marc Dunkelman about progressives and policy ideas for growth. They discuss shared interests of collective and individual interests, progressives on big ideas, Hamiltonian and Jeffersonian progressive styles, pragmatic institutionalism, new ideas in the 21st century, elites, visionary leadership, and many more topics. Marc J. Dunkelman is a resident scholar at the Searchlight Institute and a fellow at Brown University’s Watson School for International and Public Affairs. During more than a decade working in politics, he worked for Democratic members of both the Senate and the House of Re...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Tamim Ansary about a global history of humans through time. They discuss the main theme of interconnectedness, language, symbols, and culture, origins and nomadic peoples, early trading, rise of city states, religion and belief systems, the Crusades, Mongol Empire, Ottoman Empire, colonialism, empires and nation states, and many more topics. Tamim Ansary is the author of many books, including Destiny Disrupted and The Invention of Yesterday. He has published essays and commentary in the San Francisco Chronicle, Salon, the Los Angeles Times, and more. Born in Afghanistan in 1948...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Davis Samson on the evolution of sleep. They discuss various sleep misconceptions, why we need sleep, stages of sleep, and the physiological and social aspects of sleep. They also talk about the evolution of circadian rhythms, napping, evolutionary differences, dreams, paleo sleep, and many more topics. David R. Samson is associate professor of evolutionary anthropology at the University of Toronto and the author of Our Tribal Future: How to Channel Our Foundational Human Instincts into a Force for Good. His pioneering research has been featured in National Geographic...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Katja Hoyer about the Weimar Republic. They give an overview of the Weimar Republic, voting and role of economics, major figures, how Hitler won his election, Nazi rule under Weimar Republic, negative views against Jews, Weimar after World War II, and many more topics. Katja Hoyer is a historian and journalist who is visiting research fellow at King’s College London and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. She is also Global Opinions contributing columnist for The Washington Post. Her main research area is the history of mo...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Donna Jackson Nakazawa about rumination. They define rumination, talk about belonging, the Default Mode Network, MIST framework, therapy, various techniques, and many more topics. Donna Jackson Nakazawa is the author and writer of many books that explore the intersection of neuroscience, immunology, and emotion, including The Angel and the Assassin, named one of the best books of 2020 by Wired magazine, and Childhood Disrupted, which was a finalist for the Books for a Better Life Award. Her work has appeared in Wired, Stat, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Peter Mancall about the early years of North America. They discuss what is America, importance of Maize and landscape of pre-Columbian America, Native Peoples in the middle of the 15th century, Norse discoveries, Columbus, French in Canada, Cortes in Mexico, British involvement, religion, slavery, and the legacy of early North American history. Peter C. Mancall is Distinguished Professor; the Andrew W. Mellon Professor of the Humanities; Professor of History, Anthropology, and Economics; and the Linda and Harlan Martens Director of the USC-Huntington Early Modern Studies Institute. He is...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Adrian Goldsworthy about the history of Athens and Sparta. They provide an overview of Athens and Sparta, Aegean history, and city-states in Ancient Greece. They talk about why tyranny did not work in these early city-states, Persian War with Greece, Peloponnesian War, Alexander the Great, legacies of Athens and Sparta, and many more topics. Adrian Goldsworthy is a historian and author. He has his DPhil from Oxford University and has conducted research at Cardiff University and taught at King’s College London and University of Notre Dame. He is...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with H.W. Brands about the life of George Washington. They discuss Washington as an enigma, his social and political statue, his upbringing and temperament, and his relationship with his wife and his relationship with slavery. They also talk about Washington as a general, as president, and the legacy of Washington.H. W. Brands holds the Jack S. Blanton Sr. Chair in History at the University of Texas at Austin. He has written more than a dozen biographies and histories, including The General vs. the President, a New York...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Ayşe Baltacıoğlu-Brammer about belonging among various ethnic and religious groups in the early and middle Ottoman period. They discuss the landscape of religious and sectarian divides in the early Ottoman Empire, Turkic origins of the Safavids and Sufis, the Qizilbash, and various sociocultural variables. They talk about immigration between the Safavids and the Ottomans, the Safavid’s turn from Sufi to Shia, Qizilbash documents and Ottoman surveillance, remnants today, and many more topics. Ayşe Baltacıoğlu-Brammer is Assistant Professor of History and Middle Eastern...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Roderick Beaton about the history of Europe. They discuss how Europe is defined, origins of Europe from ancient Greece, the Roman Empire, Turkey, European history as Christian history, Europe during WWI and WWII, the European Union, and the future of Europe. Roderick Beaton is a professor emeritus at King’s College London. He has written several books on Greek and European history, including The Greeks and Greece: Biography of a Modern Nation, which was shortlisted for the Cundill History Prize. He is the four-time winner of the prestigious Runciman Award, an...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Andrew Knoll about the four billion years of life on earth. They discuss geobiology, carbon and the carbon cycle, nitrogen and phosphorus, sulfur, and metals in the human body. They also talk about plate tectonics, habitability, minerals, climate change, life on other planets, and the future of life on earth. Andrew Knoll is the Fisher Research Professor of Natural History and Earth and Planetary Sciences, Emeritus, at Harvard University. He is the recipient of the International Prize for Biology and the Crafoord Prize in Geosciences and member of...

In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with David Stuart about the ancient Maya. They provide an overview of the Maya, Mayan language, beginnings of the Mayan civilization, Mayan creation myth, early collapse of the ancient Maya, dynasties in the classic Mayan period, Teotihuacán, the four heavens, Spanish conquest, and many more topics. David Stuart is the David and Linda Schele Professor of Mesoamerican Art and Writing and director of the Mesoamerica Center at the University of Texas at Austin. His books include Palenque: Eternal City of the Maya, The Order of Days: Unlocking the S...