AI Summary
5 min read🎙️ The Voices & The Context
- The Format: This is a polished, narrative-driven interview. Host Shankar Vedantam frames philosophical questions with vivid stories, guiding psychologist Emma Levine through her research on the ethics of lying.
- The Key Players:
- Host: Shankar Vedantam, the calm, inquisitive narrator of Hidden Brain.
- Guest: Emma Levine, a psychologist at the University of Chicago. She studies the surprising psychology behind when we think lying is actually the right thing to do.
- The Vibe: Educational & Thought-Provoking. It feels like a fascinating philosophy class where the professor keeps pulling out surprising experiments. It’s serious but never dry, filled with "aha!" moments.
🗝️ Key Themes & Topics
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What you'll learn
- 1 (00:00) **🎙️ Introduction: Emma Levine**
- 2 (03:45) **The Wedding Guest List Dilemma**
- 3 (08:39) **"Must-Lie" Situations and "Bad Truths"**
- 4 (10:23) **Lies in High-Stakes Politics: The Cuban Missile Crisis**
- 5 (14:08) **The Paradox of Honesty**
- 6 (16:13) **When Vulnerability Makes Lying Acceptable**
- 7 (18:55) **Lying to the Cognitively Impaired**
+ Full timestamped outline available in the app
Show Notes
Should you tell a harsh truth if it will only cause pain? Or is it sometimes kinder to keep someone in the dark? Psychologist Emma Levine explores the unwritten rules that guide when people feel it’s acceptable to lie — and what those choices reveal about trust, harm, and our deepest moral values.
In our companion Hidden Brain+ episode, we explore ways to bridge the gap between the many lies we condone in practice, and the lying we claim to hate. If you're a subscriber, that episode is called “Telling The Truth About Lies.” If you're not yet a Hidden Brain+ subscriber, please visit support.hiddenbrain.org or apple.co/hidden brain for a free seven-day trial.
We're excited to share that Hidden Brain is coming to YouTube! Check out our trailer and subscribe so you don't miss our first three episodes, coming April 10.
Illustration by Masantocreative for Unsplash+
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