reeducated

In this episode, I sit down with Shaun M. Dougherty, Professor of Education and Policy at Boston College, to talk about how we measure learning and what our systems of assessment often miss. Shaun’s research focuses on education policy, equity, and the impact of accountability systems, and he brings both an analytical and deeply human perspective to the question of what counts as a good education.

We explore the evolution of standardized testing, the limits of quantitative measures, and the philosophy behind how societies define success. Shaun shares how his time as a teacher and administrator shaped his approach to research and why purpose and meaning must be at the center of any educational framework. We talk about literacy, curiosity, and the tension between learning for life and learning for advancement, asking how education can balance rigor with relevance.

This conversation moves between data science, ethics, and lived experience, connecting policy to purpose and measurement to meaning. It invites us to imagine an education system that values curiosity as much as compliance and measures growth not only by numbers, but by how deeply we connect to what we learn.

Chapter:

00:00 – Introduction: Who is Shaun M. Dougherty
02:00 – From Camp Counselor to Economist to Educator
05:00 – The Moment That Sparked His Interest in Education Research
08:00 – What Should We Measure in Education and Why
11:00 – Why Purpose and Meaning Matter More Than Metrics
15:00 – Can Curiosity and Connection Be Measured?
19:00 – The Problem of Test Preparation and the Loss of Authentic Learning
23:00 – Campbell’s Law: When Over-Measuring Changes What We Measure
27:00 – How Policy Shapes Schools and Student Motivation
31:00 – Grades, Purpose, and the Philosophy of Educational Signals
35:00 – Human Capital vs. Meaning: The Debate Behind Learning’s Purpose
39:00 – Inequality and the Uneven Impact of Standardized Testing
43:00 – The Role of Career and Technical Education as a Counterbalance
46:00 – What the Future of Educational Metrics Could Look Like
49:00 – Closing Reflections: Curiosity, Connection, and the Evolving Mind

In this episode, I sit down with Paul Thagard, philosopher, cognitive scientist, and Professor Emeritus at the University of Waterloo, whose career has bridged philosophy, psychology, neuroscience, and computer modeling. Paul has spent decades exploring how humans think, feel, and make sense of the world. From scientific reasoning and creativity to consciousness and the meaning of life, his work has helped reshape how we understand the mind itself.

We talk about how he first fell in love with philosophy as a teenager shelving books in a public library, and how that early curiosity evolved into a lifelong pursuit of understanding how reasoning and inference work. Paul explains his theory of coherence, showing how both thought and emotion can be understood through neural networks that seek balance and connection. We also discuss motivated reasoning, how emotions shape our beliefs, and why science and philosophy must work together to reveal truth and value.

The conversation turns deeply human as we explore his scientific theory of meaning. Drawing from his book The Brain and the Meaning of Life, Paul argues that love, work, and play are not just sources of happiness but the biological and psychological foundations of a meaningful life. We end by reflecting on empathy, curiosity, and how wonder can lead not to mysticism, but to understanding. It’s a conversation about truth, beauty, and what it really means to be human.

⏱️Chapter

00:00 – Introduction: Meeting Paul Thagard, philosopher and cognitive scientist
02:00 – Discovering philosophy at age 15 in a public library
06:00 – From curiosity to cognition: how reasoning became his lifelong pursuit
10:00 – Reason vs inference: how we think, feel, and communicate
14:00 – Social reasoning and why communication is central to thought
18:00 – Creativity and the psychology of discovery
22:00 – Defining science and its difference from belief or politics
27:00 – Misinformation, evidence, and the culture of truth
31:00 – The balance between science, ethics, and values
36:00 – Wonder, awe, and the human drive to understand
41:00 – Can science explain beauty, art, and emotion?
46:00 – The theory of coherence: how the brain fits reality together
51:00 – Neural networks, reasoning, and the structure of consciousness
56:00 – Motivated reasoning and how emotions distort evidence
1:00:00 – Ethics in science: curiosity, danger, and responsibility
1:03:00 – The meaning of life: love, work, and play as biological truths
1:06:00 – Closing reflections on empathy, rationality, and the future of understanding

In this episode, I speak with Brandon Smith, an FRQSC postdoctoral fellow at the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s Institute for Research in the Humanities, who earned his PhD in Philosophy from McGill University in 2024. His research examines the history and applicability of philosophical accounts of happiness, and his first book, The Search for Mind-Body Flourishing in Spinoza’s Eudaimonism, is forthcoming in Brill’s New Research in the History of Western Philosophy series.

We trace a historical arc of ideas about pleasure and the good life, moving from Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle through the Stoics and Epicureans, and into early modern debates with Descartes, Hobbes, and Spinoza. Brandon explains how the Stoics treat pleasure as neither good nor bad in itself, why Epicurus distinguishes the calm pleasure of healthy functioning from the thrill of satisfying a want, and how Spinoza reframes pleasure as the feeling of increased self-expressive power that supports flourishing across a whole life. We also look at the worry that pleasure can mislead, and how a hierarchy of pleasures helps separate short-lived impulses from sustainable well-being.

I ask how these frameworks shape everyday choices and public ideals, from addiction and shame to policy and education. Brandon argues that flourishing is both objective and subjective, grounded in facts about human functioning while also requiring lived awareness. We end by connecting this to classrooms and culture, asking how a richer account of pleasure and meaning can help people learn, collaborate, and live well.

Chapters:

00:00 – Introduction: Who is Brandon Smith and what drew him to the philosophy of happiness
03:00 – What it means to study happiness historically and philosophically
07:00 – The ancient roots of eudaimonia: from Socrates to Aristotle
12:00 – Aristotle’s idea of flourishing and the life of rational activity
17:00 – Stoicism: virtue, detachment, and the neutrality of pleasure
22:00 – Epicurus and the distinction between active pleasure and calm tranquility
27:00 – Misunderstanding Epicureanism: pleasure as simplicity, not indulgence
32:00 – The tension between desire, control, and the moral suspicion of pleasure
37:00 – How Christianity and modern moral theory reframed pleasure as suspect
42:00 – Spinoza’s revolution: joy as an increase in the power to act
47:00 – Pleasure, reason, and the harmony of mind and body
52:00 – Why Spinoza rejects dualism and reframes happiness as understanding
57:00 – The difference between momentary joy and lifelong flourishing
1:02:00 – Modern echoes: how psychology and ethics return to ancient ideas
1:07:00 – Can happiness be taught? What education can learn from eudaimonism
1:11:00 – Flourishing beyond utility: meaning, community, and freedom
1:16:00 – Closing reflections: the art of living well in a restless age
1:20:00 – Final takeaway: happiness as the joyful exercise of understanding

In this episode, I speak with Terry E. Robinson, one of the world’s leading neuroscientists on addiction and reward. A Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Neuroscience at the University of Michigan, Robinson’s work has transformed how we understand compulsion, motivation, and brain plasticity. His pioneering research on the Incentive Sensitization Theory of Addiction—developed with Kent Berridge—helped redefine addiction not as a failure of willpower, but as a deeply ingrained form of learning that alters how the brain “wants” rather than “likes.”

We begin with the history of neuroscience and how the field has evolved since Robinson entered it in the late 1970s. He explains how, while the central questions of neuroscience have remained the same, our tools have changed dramatically, allowing us to peer into the brain with unprecedented precision. We discuss the concept of brain plasticity and how experiences, drugs, stress, and even education reshape neural circuits. Robinson describes how addiction arises when this same plasticity becomes maladaptive, transforming desire into pathological wanting that can persist for years after drug use stops.

Our conversation moves beyond addiction to the broader implications of adaptability itself—how our brains constantly change in response to life’s experiences, for better or worse. Robinson shares how curiosity has fueled his 47-year career, how science progresses through serendipity, and why real discovery means being open to the unexpected. It is a conversation about the power and peril of a brain that never stops changing, and what that means for learning, freedom, and the human capacity to evolve.

Chapters

00:00 – Introduction: Welcoming Terry E. Robinson, pioneer in addiction neuroscience

01:00 – Life between Michigan and Italy: Reflections on remote work and retirement

03:00 – Entering neuroscience in the 1970s: How the field has changed over 47 years

06:00 – The evolution of neuroscience methods and what questions remain the same

09:00 – Can we ever fully understand the brain? The limits of human comprehension

12:00 – How public understanding of neuroscience has grown over time

15:00 – What brain plasticity really means and why change defines our minds

18:00 – How experience, stress, and environment shape the brain’s adaptability

22:00 – Can IQ and plasticity be connected? Learning, flexibility, and intelligence

26:00 – The importance of connecting knowledge across disciplines in education

30:00 – Genes, environment, and the false dichotomy between nature and nurture

33:00 – When adaptation turns harmful: PTSD and maladaptive brain change

37:00 – The birth of the Incentive Sensitization Theory of Addiction

40:00 – How drugs rewire the brain: tolerance, sensitization, and lasting change

44:00 – Dopamine, wanting, and liking: redefining reward and motivation

48:00 – Beyond drugs: behavioral addictions like gambling, food, and pornography

52:00 – Why treatment remains difficult and how context influences relapse

55:00 – Curiosity, serendipity, and the real nature of scientific discovery

58:00 – Closing reflections: Change, curiosity, and the future of neuroscience

In this episode, I sit down with David Sulzer, known in the music world as Dave Soldier, a neuroscientist and composer whose work lives at the intersection of art and science. As a Columbia University professor with over 200 research papers and a prolific musical career, Sulzer has spent decades exploring how the brain learns, remembers, and creates. Our conversation flows through his current reading list, from Thomas Paine and Aldous Huxley to Johannes Kepler, revealing how the questions of the past continue to shape our search for truth and meaning today.

We talk about the way Kepler and Galileo once believed the stars were embedded in a celestial sphere and how understanding their errors opens a window into the evolution of human thought. Sulzer explains how curiosity, rather than certainty, drives real discovery and how science and art are bound by the same impulse: the desire to understand the world through pattern, rhythm, and form. We explore his book Music, Math, and Mind, which demystifies how sound becomes emotion, how learning happens in the brain, and why curiosity might be the most beautiful human instinct of all.

As the conversation unfolds, we move from neuroscience to philosophy, from Indian classical music to Renaissance art, from learning behaviors to the politics of scientific funding. What emerges is a reflection on what it means to be truly educated: to follow your curiosity wherever it leads, to see connections others miss, and to find harmony between intellect and imagination. This episode is for anyone who has ever wondered how a melody can change your mind or how the mind itself might just be music in motion.

⏱️ Chapters

00:00 – Introduction: Meeting David Sulzer, neuroscientist and composer
01:30 – How he chooses what to read and what books teach him about our time
05:00 – Kepler, Galileo, and how early scientists imagined the universe
09:30 – The harmony between music, mathematics, and planetary motion
14:00 – What we forget about how people once understood the cosmos
18:00 – Curiosity, play, and the beauty of not knowing
22:00 – How Music, Math, and Mind explores sound, emotion, and learning
27:00 – Why education should connect art and science
32:00 – Tradition versus innovation in music and human creativity
37:00 – Balancing two callings: being both a scientist and a musician
42:00 – The neuroscience of learning and what changes in the brain
47:00 – Depression, schizophrenia, and the complexity of mental illness
52:00 – Why funding for science and research truly matters
56:00 – Closing reflections on curiosity, meaning, and the purpose of knowledge

In this episode, I sit down with historian Barbara H. Rosenwein to talk about how emotions, far from being timeless or universal, are shaped by the cultures and communities we live in. Drawing from her influential concept of emotional communities, Barbara helps me understand how emotions like anger, shame, pride, and love have been expressed, suppressed, and moralized across history. We explore how medieval monks, warriors, or aristocratic women didn’t just feel differently than we do today. They inhabited different emotional worlds, with distinct rules about what could be shown, hidden, or valued.

We also discuss the modern myth that emotions are raw, instinctive things we should either control or let loose. Barbara challenges this binary, showing instead how emotional expressions are learned, practiced, and patterned, passed down like language or custom. We talk about the emotional life of institutions (like schools), the policing of public vulnerability, and how historical shifts in religious or political structures can create entirely new emotional landscapes. There’s a particularly powerful moment where we reflect on the role of shame in both medieval and modern settings, how it can be used as a tool of control, but also resisted through new emotional solidarities.

This episode is not just about what people felt in the past. It’s about what we’ve been taught to feel today, and how knowing history might free us to feel differently. If you’ve ever wondered where your emotions come from, or why some are welcome in public while others are hidden, this conversation offers an eye-opening and deeply human perspective.

🎙️ Episode Chapters

00:00 – Introduction
02:15 – Emotional Communities Defined
06:42 – Are Emotions Universal?
12:01 – How Historians Read Emotion
17:25 – Religious Emotional Norms in the Middle Ages
24:40 – Emotion as Power and Social Order
30:15 – From Individual Emotion to Emotional Style
34:50 – Grief and Love Across Time
40:08 – The Modern Myth of Emotional Freedom
45:23 – Rethinking Emotional Intelligence
50:50 – What History Can Teach Us About Feeling
55:10 – Final Reflections and Takeaways

In this episode, I speak with Kent C. Berridge, the James Olds Distinguished University Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at the University of Michigan, whose pioneering work has reshaped how we understand pleasure, motivation, and addiction. Kent explains the crucial distinction between “liking” and “wanting,” showing how dopamine drives craving and desire rather than pleasure itself. We trace the history of neuroscience discoveries, from early experiments with rats pressing levers to stimulate brain reward centers, to the identification of hedonic hotspots in the brain that genuinely generate pleasure.

We explore how this distinction helps explain phenomena like irrational cravings in addiction, where people may intensely want a drug even if they no longer enjoy it. Kent connects this to broader issues, including depression, Parkinson’s disease, and schizophrenia, where wanting and liking can become uncoupled. We also discuss how these insights apply beyond clinical settings, from understanding why students may not always want to learn despite liking the subject, to how everyday cues like social media notifications hijack our dopamine systems.

Our conversation also considers the future of this research: from possible biomedical treatments for compulsive cravings to the role of meditation and cultural practices in shaping pleasure. Kent emphasizes that understanding how liking and wanting operate separately not only deepens our knowledge of the brain but also helps us cultivate empathy for people struggling with addiction and mental health challenges. This episode invites listeners to reflect on their own habits, pleasures, and desires—and what it really means to like something versus simply wanting it.

00:00 – Introduction: Welcoming Kent C. Berridge and the study of pleasure
01:00 – The story of James Olds and the discovery of brain reward systems
03:00 – How early experiments with rats changed our understanding of motivation
06:00 – Separating liking from wanting: where neuroscience challenged assumptions
09:00 – Dopamine’s true role: desire, not pleasure
12:00 – The implications of wanting without liking in addiction
15:00 – Sensitization theory and how addiction rewires desire
18:00 – Understanding irrational craving and the challenge of relapse
21:00 – Depression, anhedonia, and the neuroscience of motivation loss
24:00 – What this tells us about learning, teaching, and motivation
26:00 – Hedonic hotspots: the brain’s pleasure-generating centers
30:00 – How the brain decides what to like (and how that can change)
33:00 – Meditation, bliss, and the science of pure pleasure
36:00 – Addiction, empathy, and the limits of willpower
38:00 – Education, dopamine, and how to make learning desirable
40:00 – Closing reflections: pleasure, purpose, and the future of neuroscience

In this episode, I talk with Gautam Kaul about how we learn, make decisions, and deal with risk. Gautam, a finance professor at the University of Michigan, has spent much of his career studying markets, uncertainty, and how people respond to them. But what makes his approach unique is the way he frames finance not only as numbers and equations, but as stories about human behavior and responsibility.

We explore why humans often misjudge risk and how education can help people become more thoughtful decision-makers. Gautam explains how teaching finance is less about technical formulas and more about building the ability to understand uncertainty, weigh options, and take responsibility for choices. We also talk about the emotional side of learning and decision-making, and how stories can be just as important as logic in shaping our understanding of the world.

This conversation left me thinking about how education, whether in finance or any fiel,d prepares us for the uncertainties of life itself. Instead of only focusing on outcomes, Gautam argues that we should be paying attention to how we make decisions, what values drive those choices, and how we learn from both successes and failures.

00:00 – Introduction: Meeting Gautam Kaul and his background in finance and education
02:00 – Early life in India and lessons from cultural diversity
05:00 – Adapting between two worlds: India and the United States
08:00 – Academia as a space for intellectual freedom and discovery
11:00 – Differences between Indian and American academic systems
14:00 – How finance became a framework for understanding human behavior
18:00 – The philosophical roots of economics and finance
22:00 – Time, risk, and the power of decision-making under uncertainty
26:00 – How finance can address complex social and environmental problems
30:00 – Profit, purpose, and the moral costs of innovation
34:00 – Markets, inequality, and the moral consequences of freedom
38:00 – What education gets wrong: training versus true learning
43:00 – Why higher education should focus on “why” instead of “how”
47:00 – Money as a technology that shapes human relationships
51:00 – The danger of turning everything into a transaction
56:00 – The illusion of infinite growth and the moral limits of capitalism
1:01:00 – Inequality, sustainability, and the collective good
1:06:00 – What can and cannot be bought: love, happiness, and meaning
1:10:00 – Empathy, community, and what it means to live well
1:14:00 – Final reflections: thinking deeply before acting

In this episode, I sit down with Michael Treadway, a clinical psychologist and neuroscientist whose work focuses on how the brain makes decisions about effort and reward. We explore why motivation sometimes feels elusive and how conditions like depression and anxiety can shift the way people weigh costs and benefits. Michael explains how his lab uses tasks and brain imaging to study the decisions we all make about whether something is "worth the effort," and what this tells us about both healthy behavior and mental health challenges.

Our conversation moves between the lab and everyday life—why following through on goals often feels harder than setting them, how motivation is tied to brain circuits that evolved to help us survive, and why mental health struggles can make effort feel overwhelming. Michael also reflects on how understanding the neuroscience of motivation can shape new treatments for depression and anxiety, as well as practical strategies for daily living.

By the end of the discussion, we not only examine the science behind effort and persistence but also look at what it means for education, work, and personal growth. It’s a chance to see how the brain’s decision-making processes influence everything from simple daily choices to long-term goals.

00:00 – Introduction: Welcoming Michael Treadway and his research on motivation and affect
02:00 – From music to neuroscience: the personal journey behind his work
05:00 – What is pleasure? Defining the term through psychology and neuroscience
08:00 – Subjective experience and the philosophy of mind
11:00 – Can we measure pleasure? The challenge of quantifying qualia
14:00 – The hedonic treadmill and the stability of well-being
18:00 – How circumstance and expectation shape the feeling of pleasure
21:00 – The effort paradox: why we avoid and seek effort at the same time
25:00 – Education, technology, and the loss of meaningful struggle
30:00 – Effort as intrinsic reward: how meaning arises through doing
34:00 – Capitalism, reward, and the value of work
38:00 – The neuroscience of effort: why thinking feels tiring
42:00 – Why effort might be biologically rewarding
45:00 – The role of perspective and prediction error in shaping joy
49:00 – Eastern philosophy, mindfulness, and changing the perceiver
53:00 – Passion as a learned skill and the connection to pleasure
57:00 – Depression, dopamine, and the disconnect between wanting and liking
1:00:00 – Behavioral activation and non-drug approaches to well-being
1:04:00 – Closing reflections: redefining pleasure, effort, and meaning

In this episode, I talk with Keith Sawyer about how creativity really works, especially when it happens in groups. We begin by challenging the common image of creativity as the result of a lone genius working in isolation. Keith explains how innovation often grows out of collaboration, improvisation, and the back-and-forth exchange of ideas. Drawing examples from jazz ensembles and brainstorming sessions, we discuss how structure and spontaneity combine to create moments of breakthrough.

We also explore what research tells us about the conditions that help teams become more innovative. Keith shares why diversity of thought matters, how psychological safety fuels risk-taking, and why most brainstorming sessions fail to deliver. He explains that creativity isn’t just about sudden inspiration but about patterns of interaction that can be studied and encouraged.

For anyone interested in education, work, or the arts, this conversation offers practical ways of thinking about collaboration and creativity. It highlights how we can create environments whether in classrooms, offices, or communities that don’t just value ideas but actively nurture the connections that make them possible.

00:00 – Introduction: Meeting Keith Sawyer and his research on creativity and collaboration
02:00 – From jazz piano to psychology: discovering improvisation as a science
06:00 – How group improvisation shaped his philosophy of creativity
10:00 – What creativity really means: newness, intention, and human adaptability
14:00 – Improvisation as a model for life: responding to uncertainty
18:00 – Collaboration, jazz, and how group dynamics create “group genius”
22:00 – The myth of the lone genius and the truth behind collective creativity
27:00 – How culture and education reinforce individualism over collaboration
31:00 – Why creativity must be taught across all subjects, not just the arts
35:00 – Deep knowledge versus superficial knowledge: what schools miss
39:00 – How to teach creativity through project-based and interdisciplinary learning
43:00 – Creativity and early education: why younger classrooms have an advantage
47:00 – Integrating creativity in organizations and interdisciplinary research
50:00 – Generative AI, animals, and what makes human creativity unique
53:00 – Mindsets and practices: how to nurture creativity in any field
55:00 – Closing reflections: improvisation, creativity, and what makes us human