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Can Evolution Explain Our Politics? Nicholas Wade Thinks So

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Manage episode 513348051 series 2581659
Content provided by The Free Press. All podcast content including episodes, graphics, and podcast descriptions are uploaded and provided directly by The Free Press or their podcast platform partner. If you believe someone is using your copyrighted work without your permission, you can follow the process outlined here https://podcastplayer.com/legal.

Nicholas Wade is a former science writer for The New York Times and author of several books on human evolution, including A Troublesome Inheritance: Genes, Race, and Human History and his new book, The Origin of Politics: How Evolution and Ideology Shape the Fate of Nations.

Today, I invite Wade on to discuss some of the toughest topics in modern science: the controversial territory of race and genetics, and whether there are fundamental genetic differences between right-wingers and left-wingers. We also dig into the fertility crisis. Birth rates across the developed world have collapsed below replacement level, and no country except religious Georgia has figured out how to reverse the trend. Wade explains why modern economic progress makes having children less appealing, and why the breakdown of the family matters.

Finally, we talk about how the modern nation-state stamped out tribalism, why the academic establishment refuses to engage honestly with genetics research, what evolutionary psychology tells us about foreign policy, and much more.

Whether you find Wade’s evolutionary framework persuasive or not, I hope our conversation raises questions that most political leaders and academics prefer to ignore.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

  continue reading

316 episodes

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iconShare
 
Manage episode 513348051 series 2581659
Content provided by The Free Press. All podcast content including episodes, graphics, and podcast descriptions are uploaded and provided directly by The Free Press or their podcast platform partner. If you believe someone is using your copyrighted work without your permission, you can follow the process outlined here https://podcastplayer.com/legal.

Nicholas Wade is a former science writer for The New York Times and author of several books on human evolution, including A Troublesome Inheritance: Genes, Race, and Human History and his new book, The Origin of Politics: How Evolution and Ideology Shape the Fate of Nations.

Today, I invite Wade on to discuss some of the toughest topics in modern science: the controversial territory of race and genetics, and whether there are fundamental genetic differences between right-wingers and left-wingers. We also dig into the fertility crisis. Birth rates across the developed world have collapsed below replacement level, and no country except religious Georgia has figured out how to reverse the trend. Wade explains why modern economic progress makes having children less appealing, and why the breakdown of the family matters.

Finally, we talk about how the modern nation-state stamped out tribalism, why the academic establishment refuses to engage honestly with genetics research, what evolutionary psychology tells us about foreign policy, and much more.

Whether you find Wade’s evolutionary framework persuasive or not, I hope our conversation raises questions that most political leaders and academics prefer to ignore.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

  continue reading

316 episodes

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