The Great Antidote
Adam Smith said, "Science is the great antidote to the poison of enthusiasm and superstition." So join us for interviews with the leading experts on today's biggest issues to learn more about economics, policy, and much more.
Episodes
221 episodes
Ryan Streeter on the Civitas Institute and Cultural Communities
Ryan Streeter is the executive director of the Civitas Institute at the University of Texas at Austin. Today, he tells us...
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54:23
Douglas Den Uyl and Douglas Rasmussen on Ayn Rand: What She Gets Right and Where She Goes Too Far
We’ve talked about objectivism before on the podcast, but that was fairly introductory. Today, for the first time ever, I h...
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51:35
Daniel Hannan on Executive and Legislative Power
Join us today for a fun conversation about all things government, UK and US, with Lord Daniel Hannan of Kingsclere! Lord Hannan is a member of the House of Lords. Today, we talk about how the...
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56:52
Bob Ewing on Personal and Professional Success
Bob Ewing is the founder of the Ewing School and hosts a Substack called Talking Big Ideas (go check it out). He has also gifted me most of the great books that I’ve read. Today, we talk about how he got started and how many of the ...
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59:22
Rachel Ferguson on Neighborhood Stabilization and Civil Society
We talk a lot about civil society and the importance of local, communal networks which hold us up when we’re down and inspire us to be good, striving members of society. But what does that actually look like? How do civil institutions get built...
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54:40
Jo Jensen on Anxiety, Audiences, and Action
Jo Jensen is the founder of MovieGoer and she’s currently the SVP of Digital and Entertainment Strategy at Touchdown Strategies, a PR firm. and is an Aspen Institute Civil Society Fellow. Since all fellows have ventures over there, she’s curren...
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1:04:03
Peter Van Doren on Universal Basic Income
What is Universal Basic Income (UBI) and why is it so popular among economists and freedom lovers relative to other types of poverty policy solutions? What does it even mean to “solve a problem” or to “learn” in the social sciences? <...
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45:44
Charlotte Thomas on Learning and the Liberal Arts
Welcome back. Continuing our ongoing exploration of what it means to be an individual living in a liberal society, today I am happy to host Charlotte Thomas to talk to us about what it means to learn and the importance of the liberal arts. ...
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51:43
Brad Wilcox on Get Married
The most common statistic cited regarding marriage and relationships in the United States is that the 50% of all marriages end in divorce. Another one that is gaining traction is that more Americans than ever before will end up unmarried and al...
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50:10
Cara Rogers Stevens on Thomas Jefferson and Slavery
Thomas Jefferson was a complicated figure. Essential to the start of our country and the university I attend, he is impossible to ignore. Yet, he held slaves, and at the same tim...
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50:34
Douglas Irwin on Talking about Trade and Commerce
Trade is all the rage these days. Or, at least, raging about trade is. Today, we unpack what trade and free trade are, and how to talk about it. We also address the abund...
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51:45
Anna Claire Flowers on F. A. Hayek and Social Structures
Today, I am excited to host Anna Claire Flowers to discuss F. A. Hayek and the mesocosmos. The m...
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50:17
Eric Leeper on Volcker, Friedman, and the Fiscal Theory of the Price Level
Welcome back! Happy New Year! Glad to be back! Come one, come all! Eric Leeper is the Paul Goodloe McIntire Professor in Economics at the University of Virginia. He also...
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55:26
David Beito on Rose Lane Says: Thoughts on Race, Liberty, and Equality
Not often do we find people who make the case for how race, liberty, and equality belong together. Even less often do we find them making arguments in the height of racially and economically troubled times. And EVEN LESS do we find audio clips ...
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45:30
Sarah Skwire on Adam Smith and Grief
Adam Smith was a man who read the Stoics. He liked them, too, talking them up in The Theory of Moral Sentiments, particularl...
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55:42
David Henderson on the 2024 Nobel Prize in Economics
This year’s Nobel Prize winners in economics are Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson, and James Robinson, who wrote on the importance of inclusive institutions to economic growth. ...
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46:20
Samuel Gregg on National Security and Industrial Policy
Picture a policy conversation, perhaps in Washington, about national security. Who’s sitting around the table? It might be the President, national security advisors, military personnel, or generals, but not economists. And yet, national securit...
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54:58
Tawni Hunt Ferrarini on Teaching Hayek
How do you teach about a man who does not fit neatly into a box? Hayek is one such man, and today, we tackle the difficult task of putting him in a box. We conclude that we cannot put someone like
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44:56
Bruce Caldwell on Hayek: A Life
It’s often said that if you want to get to know someone, you should look through their garbage. Now, I don’t recommend this method of getting to know someone (it’s kind of gross). But biographers often have the luck of getting to know the peopl...
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55:08
Jacob Levy on Smith, Hayek, and Social Justice
The title of this episode might confuse you: what on earth do Adam Smith and F. A. Hayek have to say about social just...
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1:04:47
Don Boudreaux on The Essential Hayek
The month of October 2024 marks the 50th anniversary of F. A. Hayek winning the Nobel ...
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52:42
Nicholas Snow on Prohibition
Do you ever take a moment to think about the fact that Americans, the people of the land of the free, spent 13 years under Prohibition? Did you kno...
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56:58
Robert Doar on Think Tanks and Scholarship
What does it actually mean to run a think tank, to create harmony within an office building full of idea-confident folk? Some have called the think tank a monastery, some have called it an academic social club, and some have even called it a po...
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52:09