Hidden Brain Podcast Discussion

Date: 06/26/2023
Time: 1:00 pm-2:00 pm

Join us for our next personal growth series! In this four-week discussion group, we’ll use selected Hidden Brain podcasts to guide our discussions. Each week, we’ll listen on our own to a previously selected podcast (see schedule below) and then join together via Zoom at 1:00pm on Mondays to share our insights and opinions. You are welcome at your convenience; attend one session, all four, or pick and choose based on the podcast episode.

You only need to register once for this series to receive a Zoom link for all four weeks.

Register HERE.

Podcast Discussion Schedule:

June 26:

One Head, Two Brains

This week, we search for the answer to a deceptively simple question: why is the brain divided? Psychiatrist Iain McGilchrist explains why popular distinctions between the “left brain” and “right brain” aren’t supported by research. He argues that one hemisphere has come to shape Western society — to our detriment.

About Hidden Brain:

Hidden Brain Media is an independent production company that aims to help curious people understand the world, and themselves.

Our host and Executive Editor Shankar Vedantam has been reporting on human behavior and social science research for more than 25 years. In 2010, he published a book further exploring these topics and introducing the idea of “the hidden brain.”

What, exactly, is the “hidden brain”? This is a term Shankar created to describe a range of influences that manipulate us without our awareness. Some aspects of the hidden brain have to do with mental shortcuts or heuristics; others are related to errors in the way memory and attention work. Some deal with social dynamics and relationships. The “hidden brain,” in other words, is a metaphor, much like the “selfish gene.” Just as there are no strands of DNA that shout, “Me first!” no part of the human brain is disguised under sunglasses and fedora. By drawing a simple line between mental activities we are aware of and mental activities we are not aware of, the “hidden brain” subsumes many concepts in wide circulation: the unconscious, the subconscious, the implicit.

Our exploration of these ideas can be heard every week on the Hidden Brain podcast and radio show. Shankar and NPR launched the podcast in 2015, and it now receives millions of downloads per week, and is regularly listed as one of the top 20 podcasts in the world. Our radio show, which debuted in 2017, is heard on more than 400 public radio stations across the country.

In 2019, we launched Hidden Brain Media to allow us to connect more deeply with our audience and to experiment with new ways of telling Hidden Brain stories across a range of different platforms.