The Ezra Klein Show: Michael Pollan’s Journey to the Borderlands of Consciousness
5/22/20261 hr 29 min
Today we are delighted to share an episode from our colleagues on “The Ezra Klein Show,” originally published on March 31. Ezra interviewed author Michael Pollan, whose best-selling books include “The Omnivore’s Dilemma,” “In Defense of Food,” and “How to Change Your Mind.” Pollan’s latest book, “A World Appears: A Journey Into Consciousness,” came out earlier this year. It’s an exploration of what consciousness is, and the book is — as our review put it — “highly pleasurable to read.”
Mentioned in the episode:
“The Descriptive Experience Sampling method” by Russell T. Hurlburt and Sarah A. Akhter
“What Is It Like to Be a Bat?” by Thomas Nagel
The Hidden Spring by Mark Solms
Descartes’ Error by Antonio Damasio
“The Oxford Handbook of Spontaneous Thought” by Kalina Christoff and Kieran C. R. Fox
Book Recommendations:
The Blind Spot by Adam Frank, Marcelo Gleiser and Evan Thompson
Ducks, Newburyport by Lucy Ellmann
Being You by Anil Seth
You can find transcripts and more episodes of “The Ezra Klein Show” at nytimes.com/ezra-klein-podcast, and you can find Ezra on Twitter @ezraklein. Book recommendations from all our guests are listed at https://www.nytimes.com/article/ezra-klein-show-book-recs.
This episode of “The Ezra Klein Show” was produced by Kristin Lin. Fact-checking by Kim Freda. Our senior engineer is Jeff Geld, with additional mixing by Aman Sahota and Isaac Jones. Our executive producer is Claire Gordon. The show’s production team also includes Marie Cascione, Annie Galvin, Michelle Harris, Rollin Hu, Emma Kehlbeck, Jack McCordick, Marina King and Jan Kobal. Original music by Pat McCusker. Audience strategy by Kristina Samulewski and Shannon Busta. The director of New York Times Opinion Audio is Annie-Rose Strasser.
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Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsSpeaker 10:00
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Gilbert Cruz· Host0:25
[instrumental music] I'm Gilbert Cruz, and this is The Book Review from The New York Times. Today, we are delighted to share an episode from our colleagues over on The Ezra Klein Show. It's an interview with Michael Pollan. You probably have heard of Michael Pollan. He has written several best-selling books, including The Omnivore's Dilemma, In Defense of Food, and How to Change Your Mind. His latest book came out earlier this year, and it's called A World Appears: A Journey into Consciousness. It's an exploration of what consciousness is, and the book is, as our review says, "highly pleasurable to read." The conversation Pollan has with Ezra is also highly pleasurable. I hope you enjoy.
Unknown speaker1:08
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