All Episodes
Plain English with Derek Thompson — 411 episodes · page 1 of 5
AI Is Smarter Than Ever. So Where’s the Revolution?
How Abundance Has Failed and Succeeded
America’s Crisis of Social Connection, With Adam Grant
Russia’s Plague Mystery and the Coming Age of Bioweapons
The Bitter Rivalries Behind the Race to Build Superintelligence
Why the Midterms Suddenly Look So Bad for Republicans
Why Things Become Popular, with Chuck Klosterman
EThe Single Smartest Case Against AI Doom
The Truth About Mississippi's Education "Miracle"
Why Experts Keep Getting the Economy So Wrong
What’s the Point of College?
The New Book That Scares Big Tech
AI Slop Is Breaking the Internet. Can We Save It?
Why Everything Is Going to Keep Getting More Expensive
Higher Education’s Age of ‘Insufferable Hypocrisy’
It May Be Time to Freak Out About AI
Why Americans Hate Data Centers
Why America Is Switching From Booze to Weed
"The End of Reading Is Here"
What Translator Emily Wilson Thinks of Christopher Nolan’s ‘The Odyssey'
Why 'The Odyssey' Is the West’s Greatest Story
A Philosopher’s One-Word Theory for Why the World Feels So Weird
How Israel Is Transforming American Politics
MEGAPOD: The Most Overrated American Who Ever Lived
A Surprising Theory About the Future of War
SpaceX, AI Bubble Fears, and The Age of the Trillion-Dollar, Zero-Profit Company
The Iran War Is Ending. Everybody Lost.
The Donald Trump Corruption Scandal Draft
EThe Most Exciting Month of Medical Breakthroughs in Years
Old-igarchy: How the Elderly Conquered American Power
How Modern Fatherhood Is Changing Men’s Brains
EWhat 400,000 Essays Reveal About AI and Creativity
The Surprising Truth About America's Friendship Crisis
Why the NBA Feels Broken—and Why the League Can’t Fix It
The Men Who Think Toxic Feminism Destroyed America
EDoes Anybody Know How to Solve an American Debt Crisis?
The Global Fertility Crisis Is Worse Than You Think
The Case Against the AI Job Apocalypse
Why American Happiness Just Fell Off a Cliff
One of the Deadliest Cancers in America May Have Met Its Match
Why Too Much Freedom Is the Enemy of Success
Why the Iran War Is Tearing MAGA Apart
The Triple Crisis That’s Breaking Hollywood—and Changing the Future of Movies
The Most Powerful and Dangerous AI Model Yet
The Whole World Is Fighting About Energy
‘The Job Market for Young People Is Brutal’
America's Religious Revival Is a Mirage
Is China the Winner of the Iran War?
Why We're Addicted to ‘Sh*tty Flow’
EAnthropic Thinks AI Might Destroy the Economy. It's Building It Anyway.
America's Tax System Is Broken
The Casino-ification of America
"Yes, AI Is a Bubble. There Is No Question."
The Pill That Works Even When You Know It's Fake
The Economic Crisis of the Iran War Goes Far Beyond Oil
"American Democracy as We Know It Might Not Survive This Technology"
Trump Is Doubling Down on Iran. How Should Democrats Respond?
The Four Ways That the Iran War Could End
How Metrics Make Us Miserable
The Future of GLP-1 Drugs and AI Medicine, With Eli Lilly CEO David Ricks
The Supreme Court Strikes Down Trump’s Tariffs. Now What?
The Media Theory That Explains “99% of Everything”
"America Isn’t Ready for What AI Will Do to Jobs"
The Meltdown at The Washington Post—and the Crisis in News
Plain English BEST OF: What’s the Matter With America’s Food?
Plain English BEST OF: This Is How the AI Bubble Could Burst
Plain English BEST OF: The Healthiest "Super-Agers" Have One Thing in Common, According to a 25-Year Study
Plain English BEST OF: The Modern World Is Changing America’s Personality for the Worse
Plain English BEST OF: If GLP-1 Drugs Are Good for Everything, Should We All Be on Them?
Plain English BEST OF: What Experts Really Think About Smartphones and Mental Health
Plain English BEST OF: How Gen Z Sees the World
Plain English BEST OF: A Grand, Unified Theory of Why Americans Are So Unhealthy
Plain English BEST OF: The Antisocial Century
Plain English BEST OF: How to Be Happy and the Science of Cognitive Time Travel
A Grand Unified Theory of Cultural Stagnation
The American Math Crisis
How Superintelligent AI Could Upend Work and Politics
Everything Is Television
Are Young People Screwed?
The Democrats Have a New Winning Formula
How the American Revolution Changed the World, With Ken Burns
The Problem With Sports Gambling
EMichael Lewis on How the Global Financial Crisis Explains Trump, Crypto, and Everything Else
What Happens When AI Learns to Do Our Jobs
Can "Touch-Grass Populism" Save America?
Everybody Thinks AI Is a Bubble. What If They’re Wrong?
The Future of Entertainment, Part 2: What’s the Matter With Broadway?
The Future of Entertainment, Part 1: Is Hollywood's Business Model Broken?
Why Money Doesn't Buy Happiness in America
Is AI Really About to Solve Human Disease?
How America Became a Nation of "Free Speech Hypocrites"
What’s the Matter With America’s Food?
This Is How the AI Bubble Could Burst
The Jimmy Kimmel Saga and America's Free-Speech Crisis
If GLP-1 Drugs Are Good for Everything, Should We All Be on Them?
Charlie Kirk's Killing and America's Age of "Salad-Bar Extremism"
America in the Age of Diagnosis
Trumponomics Explained, Part 2: The Enshittification of American Power
EWhat Is Trumponomics? Part 1: How Donald Trump Is Breaking American Capitalism
The Healthiest "Super-Agers" Have One Thing in Common, According to a 25-Year Study