The Unfolding Thought Podcast

Jonathan Rauch is a lifelong atheist who once expected declining religious influence to make America more tolerant, rational, and peaceful.

Instead, he watched politics become a substitute religion, supplying identity, belonging, moral certainty, and a perpetual struggle between good and evil. His unexpected conclusion: liberal democracy needs Christianity.

In this conversation, Rauch explains the argument behind Cross Purposes: Christianity’s Broken Bargain with Democracy. He says Donald Trump offered white evangelicals power in exchange for loyalty, a bargain Rauch compares with the temptation Jesus rejected in Matthew 4. Accepting that bargain, he argues, weakened both Christian witness and American democracy.

What does democracy need from Christianity? Rauch connects three teachings of Jesus with three requirements of Madisonian government:

• Do not be ruled by fear. Citizens must be able to lose elections without believing the country has ended.
• Recognize every person’s equal dignity. Political opponents remain civic equals with the same rights.
• Forgive rather than destroy your enemies. Winning cannot become permission to eliminate the opposition.

Eric and Jonathan also discuss signs of Christian renewal, civic theology, Latter-day Saint peacemaking, the rise of post-liberalism, and what its critics of liberal democracy would put in its place.

The conversation eventually turns to artificial intelligence, parenting, education, books, and human meaning. If AI can summarize our books and write our essays, why undertake the difficult work of thinking? What should we teach children when nobody can confidently predict which jobs will survive?

Questions explored

• Why does a lifelong atheist believe democracy needs Christianity?
• When does politics begin functioning like religion?
• What bargain did Donald Trump offer white evangelicals?
• How do the teachings of Jesus align with James Madison’s democracy?
• Can Christianity separate itself from MAGA politics?
• What is post-liberalism, and what would replace liberal democracy?
• Why might philosophy and religious traditions matter more as AI improves?
• Why are intellectual and moral humility so difficult and so necessary?

About Jonathan Rauch

Jonathan Rauch is a senior fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution, a contributing writer at The Atlantic, and the author of nine books, including Cross Purposes, The Constitution of Knowledge, The Happiness Curve, and Kindly Inquisitors.

Episode Links

• Cross Purposes: Christianity’s Broken Bargain with Democracy: https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300273540/cross-purposes/
• Explore Jonathan Rauch’s books: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B001HOP3SC
• Jonathan Rauch at the Brookings Institution: https://www.brookings.edu/people/jonathan-rauch/
• Read Jonathan’s work at The Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/author/jonathan-rauch/

For more episodes: https://unfoldingthought.com

Questions or guest ideas: [email protected]

What does moral courage cost when power would rather you stay silent?

Investigative journalist and military biographer Robert Coram joins to examine four extraordinary and complicated figures in American military history: fighter pilot and strategist John Boyd; Medal of Honor recipient and Vietnam POW Colonel George “Bud” Day; Marine Lieutenant General Victor “Brute” Krulak; and World War II fighter pilot, double ace, and God Is My Co-Pilot author Robert Lee Scott Jr.

Coram explains the pattern that drew him to Boyd, Day, and Krulak: each reached a moral fork where principle threatened promotion, safety, status, or career. Scott became the revealing exception—a study in genuine achievement, heroic legend, and the difficulty of separating memory from fact.

The conversation explores Boyd’s influence on air combat, fighter design, military strategy, and the OODA loop; Day’s five years, seven months, and thirteen days as a POW in North Vietnam, the prolonged torture he endured, the resistance he resumed after his body reached its limit, and the burden carried by his wife, Dorie; and Krulak’s warning to President Lyndon B. Johnson about the Vietnam War—an act Coram believes helped cost Krulak a fourth star and the chance to become Commandant of the Marine Corps.

Eric and Robert also examine what happens when one of a celebrated pilot’s most dramatic stories cannot be verified.

Robert recounts the undercover South Caicos reporting trip that put him inside a drug-smuggling network, the “Book Angel” who helped send him toward Boyd, and the private costs carried by military families. He explains how writing American Patriot changed his understanding of military virtue, patriotism, and his father. Finally, Coram turns his investigative method on himself and asks whether his memoir Gully Dirt was too honest.

Questions Answered

• Why did Robert Coram choose John Boyd, Bud Day, and Brute Krulak—and why was Robert Lee Scott Jr. the exception?
• How did John Boyd influence air combat, fighter design, military strategy, and the OODA loop?
• What did Bud Day endure during more than five and a half years as a POW in North Vietnam?
• What did resistance look like after torture overcame Day’s body?
• What role did Dorie Day play during his captivity and after he returned home?
• Why does Coram believe Brute Krulak’s warning to LBJ cost him the Marine Corps Commandancy?
• Was Robert Lee Scott Jr. an original AVG Flying Tiger?
• How can a biographer separate documented achievement from heroic legend?
• How did an undercover reporting trip to South Caicos put Coram inside a smuggling network?
• How did writing American Patriot change Coram’s understanding of military service and his father?
• Why did Coram wonder whether Gully Dirt was too honest?

Books Discussed

• Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War
• American Patriot: The Life and Wars of Colonel Bud Day
• Brute: The Life of Victor Krulak, U.S. Marine
• Double Ace: The Life of Robert Lee Scott Jr., Pilot, Hero, and Teller of Tall Tales
• Gully Dirt
• Ink

Episode Links

Robert Coram’s website: https://robertcoram.com
Robert Coram’s books: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B000AQ322M

For more episodes: https://unfoldingthought.com

Questions or guest ideas: [email protected]

In this episode, Eric talks with leadership strategist, military veteran, and author Kari Zeller about one of the biggest misconceptions surrounding artificial intelligence: that AI is primarily a technology problem.

Kari argues that the real challenge isn’t learning new AI tools. It’s learning how to lead when the assumptions that have defined work, expertise, and human value are rapidly changing.

Drawing from her new book Re-Placed, she introduces the distinction between being replaced by AI and becoming re-placed: intentionally creating a new role for yourself, your team, and your organization inside a changing world.

The conversation explores why leadership is becoming less about providing answers and more about creating context, why organizations routinely suppress the intelligence already inside them, how AI changes the role of managers, and why unlocking human judgment may become more valuable than maximizing productivity.

Eric and Kari also discuss mobilization, organizational transformation, distributed intelligence, Kodak and Fujifilm, AI strategy, workplace identity, military leadership, intentionality, and why the future belongs to leaders who create new possibilities rather than simply adapt to change.

Rather than asking whether AI will replace people, Kari asks a different question:

What uniquely human work remains when information, expertise, and analysis become abundant?

At its core, this is a conversation about leadership, identity, and how organizations can use AI to amplify human capability rather than diminish it.

Questions Answered

• Will AI replace managers and leaders?
• What does it mean to be “re-placed” instead of replaced?
• Why is leadership becoming more important because of AI?
• What is human mobilization?
• Why do organizations suppress human intelligence?
• What is distributed intelligence inside an organization?
• How should leaders think differently about AI adoption?
• What can humans do that AI cannot?
• Why did Kodak fail while Fujifilm adapted?
• How do leaders create organizational transformation instead of simple adaptation?
• Why is intentionality becoming a competitive advantage?
• How should executives balance artificial intelligence with human judgment?

Episode Links

• Kari’s website: https://karizeller.com/
• Kari’s company TGN Consulting: https://tgn-consulting.com/
• Re-Placed: Answering the Call of Leadership in the Age of AI: https://www.amazon.com/Re-Placed-Answering-Call-Leadership-Age/dp/1639081941
• Kari’s previous appearance on The Unfolding Thought Podcast: https://unfoldingthought.com/lindsay-mcgregor-blame-the-system-not-the-person/

For more episodes: https://unfoldingthought.com

Questions or guest ideas: [email protected]

In this episode, Eric talks with MIT researcher, innovation expert, and author Michael Schrage about why artificial intelligence is forcing leaders to rethink much more than technology.

Michael argues that AI is exposing fundamental questions about purpose, value creation, critical thinking, collaboration, and what organizations are actually trying to optimize. As AI becomes increasingly capable, technical skill alone becomes less differentiating. The real advantage shifts toward asking better questions, making better judgments, and understanding the tradeoffs behind every decision.

The conversation explores why experimentation is replacing traditional R&D, why collaboration creates better outcomes than isolated AI use, how promptathons develop stronger thinking, and why organizations obsessed with efficiency may be missing AI’s greatest opportunity.

Eric and Michael also discuss innovation economics, creative destruction, recommendation engines, philosophy, critical thinking, human capital, experimentation, management, education, prompt engineering, organizational strategy, and the future of work.

One of Michael’s central arguments is simple:

Software ate the world. AI is eating software. Philosophy will increasingly shape AI.

At its core, this episode is about becoming a better thinker in a world where intelligence is becoming abundant but judgment remains scarce.

Questions Answered

• Why does Michael Schrage say philosophy “eats” AI?
• Why are so many companies approaching AI incorrectly?
• How should leaders think about AI beyond automation?
• What is the difference between efficiency and value creation?
• Why is experimentation replacing traditional R&D?
• What are promptathons, and why do they work?
• How does AI change collaboration?
• What makes organizations innovative?
• Why will critical thinking become more valuable in the AI era?
• How should businesses balance optimization versus exploration?
• What should young people study as AI advances?
• How can AI help people become more valuable rather than simply more productive?

Episode Links

• Michael’s MIT Sloan Management Review article, Philosophy Eats AI: https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/philosophy-eats-ai/
• Michael Schrage’s books: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Michael-Schrage/author/B001KIV9TW

For more episodes: https://unfoldingthought.com

Questions or guest ideas: [email protected]

In this episode, Eric talks with organizational researcher, entrepreneur, and Primed to Perform co-author Neel Doshi about a question most discussions about artificial intelligence never ask:

What if AI doesn’t replace meaningful work, but makes it possible to redesign work for the better?

Neel argues that organizations are approaching AI from the wrong direction. Rather than treating it primarily as a tool for automation, he believes its greatest potential lies in helping people solve problems, collaborate more effectively, continuously improve their work, and contribute in ways that were previously impossible.

The conversation explores why so many AI initiatives fail, why transformational change almost always gets worse before it gets better, why organizations remain trapped in command-and-control management, and why motivation is becoming a greater competitive advantage than technology itself.

Eric and Neel also discuss organizational culture, burnout, AI augmentation versus automation, leadership, Six Sigma, continuous improvement, collaboration, intrinsic motivation, knowledge work, experimentation, and the future of management.

Rather than asking whether AI will eliminate jobs, Neel asks a different question:

Can AI help create the most empowering workplaces we’ve ever seen?

At its core, this conversation is about designing organizations where technology strengthens human capability instead of replacing it.

Questions Answered

• Why are so many AI initiatives failing?
• Why do transformational changes usually get worse before they get better?
• What is the difference between AI automation and AI augmentation?
• Why are employees feeling less empowered at work?
• How should leaders introduce AI without damaging culture?
• Why do command-and-control organizations struggle with AI?
• What motivates people to do their best work?
• How can AI improve collaboration instead of replacing it?
• What can leaders learn from Six Sigma about AI adoption?
• Why do most organizations misunderstand productivity?
• What is “AI native, people first” leadership?
• Could AI create a new golden age of work?

Episode Links

• Factor AI: https://www.factor.ai
• Primed to Perform: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0062373986
• Lindsay McGregor’s previous appearance: https://unfoldingthought.com/lindsay-mcgregor-blame-the-system-not-the-person/

For more episodes: https://unfoldingthought.com

Questions or guest ideas: [email protected]

In this episode, Eric talks with former fighter pilot, entrepreneur, and Afterburner CEO Boo Boucousis about one practice that separates fighter pilots from nearly every other profession: the debrief.

Every mission, whether successful or unsuccessful, ends with an honest examination of what happened, why it happened, and what should change next time. Boo argues that this simple habit explains why fighter pilots improve so quickly and why so many organizations fail to do the same.

The conversation explores how bias shapes decision making, why perception often matters more than data, how John Boyd’s ideas influenced modern leadership, and why structured reflection may be one of the most overlooked competitive advantages in business.

Eric and Boo also discuss curiosity, intentionality, red teaming, AI, strategy, meetings, organizational culture, and why technology is making disciplined thinking more important rather than less.

At its core, this episode is about replacing assumptions with reality and learning how to improve faster by making reflection part of the work itself.

Questions Answered

• What is a fighter pilot debrief?
• Why do fighter pilots debrief every mission?
• How does debriefing improve leadership?
• What is the ORCA method?
• Why do organizations keep repeating the same mistakes?
• How do biases affect decision making?
• What is red teaming?
• How can teams make better decisions?
• How should leaders use AI?
• Why are meetings often ineffective?
• What is the difference between goals and destinations?
• Why is curiosity more valuable than certainty?

Episode Links

• Boo’s website: https://callmeboo.com/
• Boo’s business Afterburner: https://www.afterburner.com/
• The Just Think study: https://as.virginia.edu/news/doing-something-better-doing-nothing-most-people-study-shows-0

For more episodes: https://unfoldingthought.com

Questions or guest ideas: [email protected]

In this episode, Eric talks with advertising author and former agency CEO Bob Hoffman about the incentives quietly shaping the modern digital world.

The conversation begins with social media and children but quickly expands into a broader discussion of advertising, platform economics, AI, media buying, creativity, and the concentration of power inside a handful of technology companies.

Bob argues that many of the problems people associate with social media are not accidental. They are predictable outcomes of business models designed to maximize attention and advertising revenue. He explains why outrage consistently outperforms nuance, why advertisers continue funding platforms they publicly criticize, and why legislation has struggled to keep pace with technological change.

Eric and Bob also explore the future of advertising agencies, the difference between brand building and performance marketing, the limitations of digital metrics, and why creative thinking is becoming increasingly undervalued inside organizations.

The discussion closes with AI, cyber warfare, and a broader question about modern society: What happens when more power becomes concentrated in fewer hands?

Rather than treating advertising as a narrow business topic, this conversation explores how incentives shape culture, technology, institutions, and the decisions we make every day.

Questions Answered

• Why is social media so harmful for children?
• Why do outrage and conspiracy theories spread so effectively online?
• How do advertising incentives shape social media platforms?
• Why hasn’t legislation kept pace with digital platforms?
• What is Section 230 and why does it matter?
• Why are advertising agencies losing influence?
• Is performance marketing replacing brand building?
• Why are digital advertising metrics often misleading?
• Why is creativity becoming less valued in advertising?
• How are Meta, Google, and other platforms changing the advertising industry?
• What risks does AI pose beyond marketing?
• Why is concentrated technological power a societal concern?

Episode Links

• Bob Hoffman’s books on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Bob-Hoffman/author/B007W8R8H6
• Bob Hoffman’s website: https://www.bobhoffmanswebsite.com

For more episodes: https://unfoldingthought.com

Questions or guest ideas: [email protected]

In this episode, Eric talks with Coach Rory O’Neill about a question that extends far beyond youth soccer: What happens when a system rewards customer satisfaction more than genuine development?

Drawing on experience coaching from recreational leagues to MLS NEXT, Rory argues that many of the problems parents blame on coaches or individual clubs are actually consequences of a deeper structural issue. In the United States, youth soccer exists inside a closed ecosystem where incentives often prioritize retaining paying families over producing elite players.

The conversation explores why American youth sports have become increasingly expensive, why parents and players constantly feel pressure to change clubs, why burnout may be misunderstood, and why many of the world’s best soccer nations approach development in fundamentally different ways.

Eric and Rory also discuss promotion and relegation, college soccer, pay-to-play models, training compensation, player movement, Japanese soccer culture, and the surprising ways incentives shape everything from coaching decisions to parental expectations.

Rather than asking why the United States hasn’t won a men’s World Cup, Rory asks a different question: What if the system is producing exactly the results it was designed to produce?

At its core, this is a conversation about incentives. About development versus marketing. And about how the structures we build quietly shape the people they produce.

Questions Answered

• Why is youth soccer so expensive in the United States?
• What does “pay to play” actually mean?
• Why doesn’t the United States use promotion and relegation?
• How does MLS influence youth player development?
• Why do so many families switch clubs every year?
• Why do youth coaches become so protective of players?
• Is burnout really caused by early specialization?
• Why do some children seem unable to get enough soccer?
• How do Japan and Argentina develop elite players differently?
• Is college soccer a realistic path to professional soccer?
• Why are American clubs dependent on parent tuition?
• What incentives actually produce world class players?

Episode Links

• Coach Rory Soccer on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@CoachRorySoccer
• Rory’s previous appearance: https://unfoldingthought.com/rory-oneill-inside-the-matrix-of-american-youth-soccer/
• The discussion with Dr Ming Ming Chiu: https://unfoldingthought.com/dr-ming-ming-chiu-why-fake-news-works-so-well/

For more episodes: https://unfoldingthought.com

Questions or guest ideas: [email protected]

In this episode, Eric talks with energy strategist Peter Kelly-Detwiler about a question that is quickly moving from the engineering world into everyday life:

Will artificial intelligence fundamentally change how we think about electricity?

Peter argues that the AI race is not primarily a software race. It is increasingly a race for electrons. As companies invest trillions of dollars into AI infrastructure, electricity is becoming a strategic resource that shapes economics, geopolitics, national security, and technological innovation.

The conversation explores why AI data centers are unlike previous industrial loads, why a single delayed data center can represent billions of dollars in lost value, and why some companies are willing to pay electricity prices more than one hundred times higher than normal market rates. Peter explains concepts like “compute heat rate,” co-located power generation, battery storage, transmission constraints, and why data centers are beginning to reshape energy markets around the world.

Eric and Peter also discuss the surprising fragility of the modern power grid, how AI changes long-term planning for utilities, why batteries may become the Swiss Army knife of the electrical system, and why cybersecurity has become one of the industry’s greatest concerns. They examine the tension between innovation and regulation, the politics of transmission lines, and the possibility that electricity may become as strategically important in the twenty-first century as oil was in the twentieth.

Perhaps the biggest idea is one that most people rarely consider. We tend to think of AI as software running in the cloud. Peter suggests a different mental model: AI is the conversion of electricity, chips, and data into digital labor. If that is true, then the future economy may be constrained not by algorithms, but by our ability to generate, move, store, and protect electrons.

Episode Links

• Peter’s article on Compute Heat Rate: https://www.rtoinsider.com/129994-metric-related-data-centers-electricity-that-may-matter/
• Peter’s book The Energy Switch: https://www.amazon.com/Energy-Switch-Companies-Transforming-Electrical/dp/1633886662
• The Grid by Gretchen Bakke: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1632865688/
• Peter’s website: https://www.peterkellydetwiler.com/
• Connect with Peter on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/peterkellydetwiler/
• Peter’s first appearance on The Unfolding Thought Podcast: https://unfoldingthought.com/42-peter-kelly-detwiler-the-future-of-energy-and-sustainability/

For more episodes: https://unfoldingthought.com

Questions or guest ideas: [email protected]

In this episode, Eric talks with futurist and philosopher Eliot Frick about a question that quietly sits beneath many of today’s biggest debates: what if the anxiety, polarization, institutional distrust, and constant sense of crisis are not isolated problems, but signs that an entire way of thinking has reached its limits?

Drawing from Thomas Kuhn, Nietzsche, complexity theory, developmental psychology, mythology, and futures studies, Eliot argues that paradigms behave like living systems. They emerge, expand into new possibilities, become increasingly rigid, and eventually struggle to solve the very problems they once addressed.

The conversation explores why collapse narratives have become so compelling, why institutions increasingly feel performative rather than generative, why social media rewards outrage over imagination, and why cultures often become obsessed with finding new enemies as they run out of new frontiers.

Rather than asking whether society is getting better or worse, Eliot invites a different question: What if we are living through the end of one worldview and the uncertain birth of another?

At its core, this is a conversation about perception. About the invisible assumptions that shape how we understand progress, identity, institutions, and the future itself.

Questions Answered

• What is a paradigm shift?
• What is modernity?
• Why does everything feel like it’s falling apart?
• Why are collapse narratives so persuasive?
• Why do institutions become increasingly performative?
• What is an egregore and how does it influence society?
• What is adjacent possibility?
• Why do cultures stop feeling optimistic?
• Why do societies become more polarized over time?
• Is progress itself a kind of hidden religion?
• How do civilizations transform without completely collapsing?
• What comes after a dominant cultural paradigm?

Episode Links

• Eliot’s latest article that we discuss: https://www.subjunctivism.org/p/it-was-always-already-there
• Eliot Frick on Substack: https://www.subjunctivism.org/
• Eliot’s previous appearance: https://unfoldingthought.com/16-eliot-frick-pioneering-the-unknown/
• Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Structure_of_Scientific_Revolutions
• Jim Dator, Four Images of the Future: https://foresightguide.com/dator-four-futures/

For more episodes: https://unfoldingthought.com

Questions or guest ideas: [email protected]