The Glenn Show

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Longtime friend of the show Robert Wright joins Glenn to talk about The God Test: Artificial Intelligence and Our Coming Cosmic Reckoning, which argues AI deserves serious attention — including from its doomers. Wright contends that responsible global coordination, however improbable it seems amid current geopolitical turmoil, is essential to steering AI toward humanity...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Harvey Mansfield, the eminent political philosopher who spent over seven decades at Harvard, joins Glenn to discuss his new book, Where Harvard Went Wrong: Fifty Years of Commentary that Fell on Deaf Ears. Mansfield argues that Harvard has traded its commitment to truth for an overbearing political emphasis on equality — fueling grade inflation, racially discriminatory ...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Glenn sits down with Michael Poliakoff, president of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, to discuss the crisis facing American higher education. Despite the university system's extraordinary contributions to innovation and democracy, Poliakoff argues it is failing at a core mission: civic education. Students graduate without foundational knowledge of American history...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Last month, John McWhorter and Glenn explored the latest tranche of questions from full subscribers. They start off talking with TGS writer and editor Mark Sussman about Christopher Nolan’s casting of Lupita Nyong’o as Helen of Troy in his new adaptation of The Odyssey. Aa...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

John McWhorter returns for another wide-ranging conversation, starting with his latest book-in-progress on American English dialects and his remarkable productivity as a writer. From there, Glenn and John tackle the social media controversy over Lupita Nyong'o's casting as Helen of Troy in Christopher Nolan's upcoming Odyssey adaptation, weighing in on race, casting norms, an...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Glenn sits down with Israeli-American historian Omer Bartov to discuss his new book, Israel: What Went Wrong—a rigorous and deeply personal account of the contradictions at Israel's founding and how they've shaped the country's present. Bartov traces the legal, political, and religious tensions that have fueled belligerence in the occupied territories and eroded democra...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Glenn welcomes back actor and writer Clifton Duncan to discuss the challenges facing artists in an era of intense political polarization. Clifton is currently developing a one-man show about the life and work of Thomas Sowell, and also writes about art, politics, and identity on his Substack, The State of the Arts. The conversation explores a delicate tension: while politics ...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Taking a break from headlines, Glenn turns inward — reflecting on family as a source of stability amid political and personal upheaval. He's joined by his son, Glenn Loury II, for one of their occasional recorded conversations. Together they explore how family relationships evolve over time, keeping the memory of Glenn's late wife Linda Datcher Loury alive through a rea...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Glenn hosted a cross-spectrum foreign policy debate featuring Washington Post columnist Shadi Hamid, American Conservative writer Andrew Day, and University of Washington historian Daniel Bessner. The central question: what role should American power play in the 21st century? Hamid, author of The Case for American Power, defended robust U.S. military engagement abroad, while ...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Scott Dolan asks what our best path forward is after Trump. Aaron Cara presents a theory about Glenn and John's disagreement over Trump’s presidency. Michael Maloney asks what Glenn and John think of a recent study of deceptiveness and claims of consciousness by AI. Jason proposes an intriguing parallel between AI and the cotton gin. Yan Shen asks what, if anything, the...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Glenn and John McWhorter reunite for their monthly conversation, starting with a familiar disagreement: Trump. John reduces Trump's governing philosophy to one word—"a*****e"—arguing his personality explains his chaotic, norm-breaking style. Glenn isn't so sure. He sees Trump as a more conventional figure responding to structural forces larger than any one leader,...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

In this episode, Glenn hosts a virtual roundtable on incarceration, crime, deterrence, and community, drawing on two key texts. In the first hour, he spoke with Jeffrey Seaman, co-author of a Fordham Urban Law Review article arguing that true racial injustice lies not in the treatment of Black offenders but in the chronic under-provision of justice resources to Black victims....

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Glenn and Ben Peterson discuss his forthcoming book on how informal institutions — families, churches, neighborhoods — maintain social order where law and markets cannot. Peterson argues that reputation enforces norms more effectively than regulation: your neighbor's judgment carries more weight than a police citation. They explore criminal justice reform, where P...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Last week's livestream featured Robert Cherry, emeritus professor of economics at Brooklyn College and author of a new book, Arab Citizens of Israel: How Far Have They Come? Bob is a labor economist who spent forty years studying discrimination in the U.S. labor market. His involvement with NGOs working in the Arab sector eventually led him to apply that same analytical lens ...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

In this edition of Glenn and John's monthly Q&A sessions, they tackle subscriber questions about funding for the Iran War, Trump Derangement Syndrome, meritocracy, Israel, and other topics.

The Glenn Show is almost entirely audience-supported, so to those of us who are already full...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Glenn and John McWhorter agree the war in Iran is a bad idea—so why can't they agree on anything else? On last week's livestream, the two clashed over what's driving the conflict, how it's being conducted, and whether Trump is capable of strategic thinking. John isn't troubled by targeted strikes on Iranian leaders like Ayatollah Khamenei; Glenn calls those strikes what...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Glenn Loury welcomes Steven Pinker to discuss his new book, When Everyone Knows That Everyone Knows. Pinker—author of The Language Instinct, The Blank Slate, The Better Angels of Our Nature, and Rationality—explains how “common knowledge” works in everyday life. Drawing on vivid examples—from a Soviet-era joke about dissent to the rise and fall o...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Last week’s livestream presented a panel of guests whose political orientations and positions on the Iran War demonstrate the scrambling effect this conflict is already having on domestic political alliances. On the anti-war side, we have historian, foreign policy expert, and man of the left Danny Bessner of the University of Washington and the American Prestige podcast...

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

In this segment from last week's livestream, Glenn and Boston University economist Larry Kotlikoff talk about the national debt, social security, personal finance, fiscal policy, and China’s seemingly inevitable path to becoming the dominant world economic power. Are Trump's tariff policies as wrong-headed as they seem? And should we be putting boots on the ground in Uk...