Dr. Dilnavaz Bhiladvala is a neurosurgeon with over 30 years of experience working in various hospitals across India and the UAE. She is the Head of Department of Neurosurgery at Al Dhaid Hospital, Sharjah, UAE before which she was the Head of Department and Professor Neurosurgery at Kamineni Institute of Medical Sciences, India. She takes us through how the field of neurosurgery has changed across…
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#41. ‘Ngaruroro’: Understanding Māori Wellbeing – Finley Johnson
https://youtu.be/xVI5irqlaQc Finley Ngarangi Johnson and Colleagues introduce 'Ngaruroro' which is a new model for Māori wellbeing. Fin, who is a PhD student at Victoria University of Wellington and a Researcher at the Ministry of Social Development, talks about the effort put into designing the new measure. the themes it covers and some of the issues faced when designing a wellbeing measure for the complexities of…
#40. Voice of Aroha – Kodrean Eashae & Luis Perez
https://youtu.be/_E7V9yI9eg8 World Refugee Day is on the 20th of June each year and is dedicated to refugees all around the world. We spoke to Kodrean Eashae and Luis Perez from Voice of Aroha. Voice of Aroha does incredible work highlighting the stories of refugees and minority communities in New Zealand with the aims of assisting in grassroots change. Host of Me, Racism and I, Thoraya…
#39. Reimagining the Role of the Catholic Church – Geo Robrigado
https://youtu.be/ZeI935be5-w The Catholic church is the only religious entity to hold a seat in the United Nations through the Vatican city’s status as a state. Geo Robrigado, Law graduate and former President of the Victoria University of Wellington Student Union, speaks about his research in law, international relations and politics focusing on how the Catholic Church maintains its political relevance. We go through the influence…
#38. Planetary Melancholia – Prateek Shankar and Valerie Navarrete
https://youtu.be/rgpSb-AZWi8 Prateek Shankar and Valerie Navarrete are founders of the Jungle Publics, a group trying to foster interdisciplinary discussions and reimagine how we relate to our planet and each other. They come on to talk about their first major publication titled “Planetary Melancholia“. The article is written with Center for Complexity and the Global Arts & Cultures department at the Rhode Island School of Design….
#37. Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics – Dr. Liza Bolton
https://youtu.be/KS2pOAnq1bQ The use of stats and throwing around numbers in conversation is incredibly common, yet statistics itself is poorly understood. Dr. Liza Bolton from @universityofauckland discusses the dark art that is statistics. Using examples, she takes us through some misconceptions and dispels the notion that numbers don’t lie. We cover how to identify the best ice cream store, how to not be fooled when stats…
#36. Drugs 101: Cannabis – Professor. Tim Karl
https://youtu.be/VcopxLLrZgk Professor Tim Karl of Western Sydney University. He joined to give us a basic overview into the world of cannabinoids. He spoke about what happens in our brain when we use/abuse cannabis and all the different components the plant has. This podcast covers where research is in terms of the benefits of medical marijuana, some of the concerns which people need to be aware…
EA #4. Atheism After Near Death Experiences – Dr. Alex Fry
Near-death experiences (NDEs) are common amongst those coming close to death and profoundly impact how they make sense of the world. Dr. Alex Fry of the University of Bournemouth draws on interviews with atheists who have had a NDE to explore whether death anxiety motivates attempts to make sense of the world and the extent to which the dominant belief systems in the UK shape…
#35. International Law and Armed Conflict – Prof. Alberto Costi
https://youtu.be/Na7-6V1OR_Q As the term “international law” is brought up frequently in discourse these days we sat down with Professor Alberto Costi to get an introduction into international law and laws of armed conflict. We cover how international law works and how it is implemented? Who can be held accountable for breaches in international humanitarian law? Where do non-state actors fit in? The nuances within the…
#34. How Virtual Reality is Reshaping Neuroscience – Dr. Chris Maymon
https://youtu.be/AtsAGMNewHA?si=B_9XrDyk4WGK0HGu On this episode, Dr. Christopher Maymon, Head of the Virtual Reality lab at Victoria University of Wellington delves into the captivating realm of VR and emotion research. Explore with us as we dissect groundbreaking studies and innovative experiments, uncovering the intricate interplay between VR experiences and human emotions. From negative emotions like fear and disgust to the the more obscure positive emotions like awe….
#33. So Emotional – Assoc. Prof. Gina Grimshaw
https://youtu.be/oS2ZlUjXFQ0?si=Wjzf5rK3LJSTdHRf Associate Professor Gina Grimshaw leads the Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience Lab at Victoria University of Wellington. She joins to talk about emotions and her research on how emotional states affect cognitive processes like attention, language, and executive control. Gina also gives us an intro into multiple aspects of emotions such as the association of emotions with colors and why artificial intelligence is poor at…
#32. Elite Dominance and Inequality in Academia – Assoc. Prof. Mehmet Orhan
https://youtu.be/yCMDMRCAHLM Dr. Mehmet Orhan, Associate Professor of Management and Organizational Behavior at EM Normandie Business School joined us to talk about authorship inequality, elite dominance, and the ethical and problematic issues of doing science and academic careers. It covers issues such as unequal opportunities and bias in journal publications and how this inequality of research output can influence societies. Dr. Orhan also talks about how…
EA #3. Unholy Catholic Ireland – Dr. Hugh Turpin
https://youtu.be/RqUhHIJPFcg Dr. Hugh Turpin of Oxford University joins Feryl and Sahir on the podcast to share his work on the decline of Catholicism in Ireland and the factors which have led to it. We also cover his current research with the Explaining Atheism project about understanding how Ireland, Northern Ireland and Poland, 3 regions with strong religious identities have seen steep declines in religious beliefs…
EJOP #1. Muslim Women’s Experiences of Identity and Belonging in Switzerland – Rachael Loxston
https://youtu.be/4mYn9tUelK4 For the very first episode of our collaboration with Europe's Journal of Psychology, Rachael Loxton joins to discuss her research paper titled “Liberty Can Be for You One Thing, and for Me Something Different”: Muslim Women's Experiences of Identity and Belonging in Switzerland. This paper investigates how these concepts are experienced by Muslim women in Switzerland, a minority group targeted in the political campaign…
EA #2. The Rise and Fall of Rituals – Dr. Martin Lang
https://youtu.be/A72VvZ3H0YM Dr. Martin Lang is assistant professor at Masaryk University, Czech Republic. And is the Director of the Laboratory for the Experimental Research of Religion (LEVYNA). He joins us to talk us through how rituals form and the roles they have played in fostering cooperation. We discuss the benefits of rituals in reducing anxiety and his current work on why we are seeing a decline…
#31. AI and Māori/Indigenous Data Sovereignty – Dr. Karaitiana Taiuru
https://youtu.be/dYO5McgvKWg Dr. Karaitiana Taiuru is a Māori technology ethicist specializing in Māori rights with Artificial intelligence, Māori Data Sovereignty and Governance with emerging digital technologies and biological sciences. He brings his extensive expertise in advocacy for digital Māori rights and data sovereignty and experience in roles including Office of the Prime Minister’s Chief Science Advisor – Expert Advisory Committee on Artificial Intelligence. We discuss the…
#30. Unravelling the Role of Dopamine – Dr. Kate Witt
https://youtu.be/mqxHSmz1nV8 Dr. Kate Witt, lecturer at Victoria University of Wellington, joins to discuss her research on Dopamine. Dopamine is an integral neurotransmitter, mainly associated with pleasure and motivation. Dr. Witt's work uses a genetically modified animal model to understand changes in behaviour focusing particularly on anhedonia (the inability to experience joy or pleasure), asociality (lack of social interactions) and avolition (lack of motivation). Support us…
EA #1. Explaining Māori Deconversion from Christianity in Aotearoa (New Zealand) – Dr. Sara Rahmani
https://youtu.be/dd2ZI-fxIRs For the first episode of our Explaining Atheism series, Dr. Sara Rahmani from the School of Social and Cultural Studies at Victoria University of Wellington joins us to talk about her project exploring Māori atheism. It explores the individual, sociocultural and historical processes contributing to Māori deconversion. https://www.explainingatheism.org/research-projects/explaining-mori-atheism-in-aotearoa-new-zealand Support us and reach out!Instagram: @thesmoothbrainsocietyTikTok: @thesmoothbrainsocietyTwitter/X: @SmoothBrainSocFacebook: @thesmoothbrainsocietyMerch and all other links: Linktreeemail: thesmoothbrainsociety@gmail.com
EA #0. Introduction to the Explaining Atheism Project
https://youtu.be/ct_dmuvuKjQ Smooth Brain Society is collaborating with the Explaining Atheism Project to bring you a brand new series focusing on non-religion. Over the course of the series we will have multiple guests from across the world explaining the factors which lead to atheism or non-belief and how religion has changed over time. This introductory episode talks about the program, what its aims are and why…
#29. Place Cells: How we know where we are – Prof. Kate Jeffery
https://youtu.be/W-Br7q_9ZAw Professor Kate Jeffery, Head of School of Psychology and Neuroscience at the University of Glasgow. Discusses her work on our idea of place, space and navigation. We get an introduction to place cells which are the neurons in the brain which help us identify our location in space. We speak about how these were discovered how they work and where research on our understanding…