Futurology

Futurology

The future never arrives all at once. It ripples through society long before we know what to call it. At the Berggruen Institute, we know that we need more than prediction to name what’s next; we need invention. Each week, Institute President Dawn Nakagawa introduces us to scientists and philosophers recalibrating our cosmologies, technologists coming to terms with alien intelligence, and policymakers scrambling to design systems for a world in flux. Join thinkers and doers from the Berggruen-verse as we imagine a future that we can accomplish together, instead of one that we’re all working to prevent.

Episodes

The Cyborg Watershed of the American West (with Lauren Bon and Grant Slater)

August 12, 2025 • 80 mins
The ever-branching network of lakes, rivers, and streams that flow west from the Rockies enable human life to flourish in one of the hottest places on Earth. This is a “cyborg watershed” – part natural, part machine, and wholly entangled with the myths and machinery of the region. In this episode, LA-based artist Lauren Bon joins Futurology producer Grant Slater to trace the path of her large-scale artworks that intervene in th...
Mark as Played

The Death Knell of the Nation-State (with Rana Dasgupta and Jonathan Blake)

August 5, 2025 • 83 mins
The modern nation-state wasn’t just a conglomeration of laws and armies. It was a belief in borders, in belonging, in the promise that citizenship could ground identity in a chaotic world. That belief is faltering. In this episode, writer and thinker Rana Dasgupta joins Jonathan Blake to explore the spiritual and political collapse of state power.They unearth sovereignty's theological roots, assess its crumbling currency regimes...
Mark as Played

How We Discovered Our Own Extinction (with Thomas Moynihan and Benjamin Bratton)

July 29, 2025 • 57 mins
For most of human history, the end of the world was a divine promise, inevitable and liberating for the holy alone. But the invention of extinction changed that. This was no prophecy. It was discovery – a realization that the universe could go on without us – and probably would. In this episode, philosopher Thomas Moynihan joins Benjamin Bratton to trace the history of a shift in thinking: that the future isn’t guaranteed. They ...
Mark as Played

The Rise of the Cyberocracy (with John Markoff and Grant Slater)

July 22, 2025 • 95 mins
In the 21st century, Silicon Valley has coded into existence a vast memetic machinery — a self-replicating ecosystem of feedback loops, default settings, and algorithms now steering society at scale. Increasingly, it appears this emergent cyberocracy no longer wants to disrupt the world, but to govern it. In this episode, veteran journalist John Markoff teases out novel strands of thought that are increasingly embedded in the DN...
Mark as Played

Did the Sun Ever Set on the Age of Empire? (with Niall Ferguson and Nathan Gardels)

July 15, 2025 • 56 mins
On America’s 250th birthday, historian Niall Ferguson suggests that the US has reached an age when most republics fizzle out. Donald Trump’s rise is merely a symptom of this late-stage unspooling of an empire that America could never quite escape. In this episode, Ferguson tells the story of a republic that burns hot, forgets fast, and could smolder on the ash heap of history sooner than we expect in the face of a second Cold Wa...
Mark as Played

What if Buddhists Ran the World? (with Stephen Batchelor and Bing Song)

July 8, 2025 • 77 mins
Stephen Batchelor has spent decades stripping Buddhism of its dogma to find what wisdom it can offer the modern world. Could cities and countries run on karma instead of capital? In this episode, he sketches a vision of society grounded in awareness, compassion, and radical interdependence — a politics of presence rather than power. Stripped of its cosmologies, he argues, a secular Buddhism could light the way toward an ethical ...
Mark as Played

Letting Robots Know Where They Stand (with Fei-Fei Li and Dawn Nakagawa)

July 1, 2025 • 58 mins
Before robots can act, they need to know where they are. That’s the deceptively simple premise behind the latest effort from machine vision pioneer Fei-Fei Li. She's building a Large World Model that will enable artificial intelligences to situate themselves in our reality and create entirely new worlds of their own, for human minds to inhabit. In this episode, we trace the evolution of artificial perception — from the early da...
Mark as Played

Inhabiting Artificial Minds... On Mars and Beyond (with Vandi Verma and Claire Webb)

June 24, 2025 • 70 mins
If we ever land on another planet, we won’t be the first to arrive. It will be our machines — the ones we’ve trained, calibrated, and loaded onto rockets – who will roam alien landscapes. In this episode, NASA roboticist Vandi Verma takes us inside the mind of a Mars rover — and into the process of building, steering, and co-evolving with machines that learn as they go. As we aim for unwelcoming planets and stranger moons, our r...
Mark as Played

After the End of History, an Age of Disorder (with Francis Fukuyama and Nathan Gardels)

June 24, 2025 • 55 mins
More than three decades ago, Francis Fukuyama saw the future: a world order that looked inevitable, stable, liberal. What emerged instead is something bumpier, louder, and far more dangerous. In this episode, Fukuyama takes us on a ride through the strange resurrection of 19th-century power politics, the rise of political strongmen, and the collapse of trust that can dooms institutions to failure. We discuss what’s left to salva...
Mark as Played

Welcome to Futurology | Podcast Trailer

June 19, 2025 • 1 min
Futurology is a new a weekly podcast from the Berggruen Institute where we work to name what’s next. Join us as we imagine a future we can accomplish together, instead of one we must all work to prevent.
Mark as Played

Popular Podcasts

    New Heights with Jason & Travis Kelce

    New Heights with Jason & Travis Kelce

    Football’s funniest family duo — Jason Kelce of the Philadelphia Eagles and Travis Kelce of the Kansas City Chiefs — team up to provide next-level access to life in the league as it unfolds. The two brothers and Super Bowl champions drop weekly insights about the weekly slate of games and share their INSIDE perspectives on trending NFL news and sports headlines. They also endlessly rag on each other as brothers do, chat the latest in pop culture and welcome some very popular and well-known friends to chat with them. Check out new episodes every Wednesday. Follow New Heights on the Wondery App, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to new episodes early and ad-free, and get exclusive content on Wondery+. Join Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And join our new membership for a unique fan experience by going to the New Heights YouTube channel now!

    Dateline NBC

    Dateline NBC

    Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com

    24/7 News: The Latest

    24/7 News: The Latest

    The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.

    Stuff You Should Know

    Stuff You Should Know

    If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.

    The Bobby Bones Show

    The Bobby Bones Show

    Listen to 'The Bobby Bones Show' by downloading the daily full replay.

Advertise With Us
Music, radio and podcasts, all free. Listen online or download the iHeart App.

Connect

Explore

iHeart

Live Radio

Podcasts

Artist Radio

Exclusives

News

Features

Events

Contests

Photos

Information

About

Advertise

Blog

Brand Guidelines

Contest Guidelines

Subscription Offers

Jobs

Get the App

Automotive

Home

Mobile

Wearables

© 2025 iHeartMedia, Inc.