Within Reason

Alex J O'Connor

For the curious.

A philosophy podcast that sometimes flirts with other disciplines, Within Reason has featured guests including Richard Dawkins, Douglas Murray, William Lane Craig, Peter Singer, Konstantin Kisin, and Neil deGrasse Tyson.

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159 episodes
Updated Friday
Explicit

Episodes159

Newest first

Apr 20, 2025 · 1 hr 52 min
#103 Rhett McLaughlin - Why I Left Christianity
Rhett McLaughlin is a comedian best known for creating the internet’s most-watched daily talk show, Good Mythical Morning along side Link Neal; their award-winning weekly podcast The pair also host a weekly podcast, Ear Biscuits; and the instant #1 New York Times bestseller Rhett & Link’s Book of Mythicality. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Apr 7, 2025 · 1 hr 55 min
#102 David Deutsch - You're Not Smarter Than a Caveman
David Deutsch is a British physicist at the University of Oxford, often described as the "father of quantum computing". 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) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Apr 2, 2025 · 1 hr 20 min
#101 Brian Greene - String Theory, Fine Tuning, and Divine Design
Brian Greene is a professor of physics and mathematics at Columbia University, director of its centre for theoretical physics, and the chairman of the World Science Festival. He is best known for his work on string theory, especially in his book “The Elegant Universe”, which turns 25 this year. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Mar 23, 2025 · 3 hr 8 min
#100 Philosopher Shootout - 16 Thinkers, Ranked (With Joe Folley)
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. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Mar 17, 2025 · 1 hr 56 min
#99 Penn Badgley - My Religious Conflicts With Playing a Killer
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. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Mar 10, 2025 · 2 hr 21 min
#98 Jacob Hansen - A Mormon Explains Mormonism
Jacob Hansen is a Mormon YouTuber at the channel Thoughtful Faith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Mar 2, 2025 · 2 hr 15 min
#97 Kipp Davis - What Are the Dead Sea Scrolls?
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) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Mar 1, 2025 · 1 hr 1 min
#96 Music, Mormonism, and Peter Hitchens - 1.25m Subsrciber Q&A
A Q&A to celebrate hitting 1.25 million subscribers on YouTube. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Jan 31, 2025 · 1 hr 23 min
#95 James McGrath: John the Baptist, the Bible's Most Mysterious Man
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". Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Jan 27, 2025 · 1 hr 19 min
#94 Dan McClellan - What Does the Bible Say About Abortion?
Dan McClellan is an American public scholar of the Bible and religion. His forthcoming book, "The Bible Says So", is available here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Jan 21, 2025 · 1 hr 9 min
#93 The Etymology Nerd - How Social Media is Transforming Our Language
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. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Dec 20, 2024 · 1 hr 1 min
#92 Bart Ehrman - The Dark Side of Christmas
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). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Dec 13, 2024 · 1 hr 24 min
#91 Filip Holm - What is Sufism? Islam and Mystical Experience
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. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Dec 6, 2024 · 1 hr 37 min
#90 Rainn Wilson - Reclaiming Spirituality From Traditional Religion
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. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Nov 28, 2024 · 1 hr 1 min
#89 The Cultural Tutor - The Philosophy and Ethics of Art
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. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Nov 22, 2024 · 1 hr 2 min
#88 Ayaan Hirsi Ali - Why I Converted To Christianity
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. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Nov 13, 2024 · 2 hr 46 min
#87 Cliffe and Stuart Knechtle - Biblical Slaves, Women, and the Unforgivable Sin
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. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Oct 31, 2024 · 1 hr 38 min
#86 Pre-Election Podcast - Destiny on Immigration, Trump, and Voter ID
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. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Oct 28, 2024 · 1 hr 36 min
#85 Magnify - 7 Translation Problems in Genesis
Magnify is a YouTube channel of mostly short-form content, covering interesting details across history, linguistics, and religion. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Sep 22, 2024 · 58 min
#84 David Nutt - The Truth About Drugs
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. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Within Reason

#103 Rhett McLaughlin - Why I Left Christianity

#102 David Deutsch - You're Not Smarter Than a Caveman

#101 Brian Greene - String Theory, Fine Tuning, and Divine Design

#100 Philosopher Shootout - 16 Thinkers, Ranked (With Joe Folley)

#99 Penn Badgley - My Religious Conflicts With Playing a Killer

#98 Jacob Hansen - A Mormon Explains Mormonism

#97 Kipp Davis - What Are the Dead Sea Scrolls?

#96 Music, Mormonism, and Peter Hitchens - 1.25m Subsrciber Q&A

#95 James McGrath: John the Baptist, the Bible's Most Mysterious Man

#94 Dan McClellan - What Does the Bible Say About Abortion?

#93 The Etymology Nerd - How Social Media is Transforming Our Language

#92 Bart Ehrman - The Dark Side of Christmas

#91 Filip Holm - What is Sufism? Islam and Mystical Experience

#90 Rainn Wilson - Reclaiming Spirituality From Traditional Religion

#89 The Cultural Tutor - The Philosophy and Ethics of Art

#88 Ayaan Hirsi Ali - Why I Converted To Christianity

#87 Cliffe and Stuart Knechtle - Biblical Slaves, Women, and the Unforgivable Sin

#86 Pre-Election Podcast - Destiny on Immigration, Trump, and Voter ID

#85 Magnify - 7 Translation Problems in Genesis

#84 David Nutt - The Truth About Drugs