Episodes

  • Underground: Will Hunt

    Underground: Will Hunt
    Mar 31 2025
    This time we’ve read Underground: a Human History of the Worlds Beneath our feet, in which adventure bro Will Hunt explores the caves of South Dakota, the underground city of Paris, and ancient holy sites of South America in this captivating adventure reportage.
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    1 hr and 16 mins
  • The Communist Manifesto

    The Communist Manifesto
    Feb 25 2025
    In this People’s Episode of the BroCast, we review the book that launched a thousand conservative backlashes: the surprisingly sedate and measured Communist Manifesto, written by Marx and Engles. Written in a time of rapid and seemingly gathering reform, the Manifesto became the soundtrack to the revolutions of 1948-49, and had far reaching consequences, from the American Civil War to the Russian Revolution. Yet for all that, it’s a terribly misunderstood piece of political writing that most people never bother to read. If they did, as we discover in this episode, they might find that many of its arguments remain as vital today as the day they were written.
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    1 hr and 51 mins
  • Roger Penrose: The Bro Emperor’s New Mind

    Roger Penrose: The Bro Emperor’s New Mind
    Jan 4 2025
    Today the bros talk about a monumental, if flawed, effort to present a coherent argument against the idea that “Strong Ai” or the idea that consciousness arises solely from algorithmic processes (and that therefore the human brain is in essence a computer and the mind is a program). Does he succeed? Maybe. Probably not. But the process is very interesting. Bibliography: - Benjamin: The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction Re: physicalism, qualia, individuated sentience, Einstein-brains - J.R. Lucas: Minds Machines and Godel - Searle: Minds Brains and Programs Re: Chinese Room -A Historical Overview of Ai Winters Re: Framing effect, “Ai Effect” -Newman and Nagel: "Gödel's Proof" Re: mathematical incompleteness -Wallace: Consider The Lobster, "Authority and American Usage" Re: Constructing realities, being and consciousness -Hegel: Example Of The Hegelian Dialectic" Duality of being and nothing, dialectic processes, sublation -Christian: Big History Re: Watchmaker fallacy, God of Gaps, philosophy of knowledge -Assefa: Tiling the Plane Recent discovery of infinite non-periodic tiling shapes
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    2 hrs and 7 mins
  • Bill Bryson - The Body: a Bro’s Guide for Occupants

    Bill Bryson - The Body: a Bro’s Guide for Occupants
    Dec 10 2024
    In this episode, the boys talk about Bill Bryson’s latest (and reportedly final) book: The Body, a Guide for Occupants. Bryson takes the reader on a tour of the delightfully weird human form, covering everything from the world of microbial life, to DNA, disease, evolution, and the history of medicine. More on the book: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43582376-the-body
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    1 hr and 34 mins
  • Peter Zeihan: The End of the World Is Just the Beginning Bro

    Peter Zeihan: The End of the World Is Just the Beginning Bro
    Nov 11 2024
    This time the guys talk about a provocative book on geopolitics, demography, globalization, technology, and trade, by analyst Peter Zeihan. In it, Zeihan argues that the world is entering a period of disorderly de-globalization and de-industrialization in which the living standards of billions of people will precipitously drop. Read more about the book: https://zeihan.com/end-of-the-world/
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    1 hr and 37 mins
  • Character Limit: How Bro Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter - Kate Conger and Ryan Mac

    Character Limit: How Bro Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter - Kate Conger and Ryan Mac
    Oct 21 2024
    On this episode we dive into the wild life and times of everyone’s favorite billionaire: Elon “I’m Actually a Socialist” Musk. It tells the tale of how Musk bought Twitter in 2020, possibly during an Ambien binge, in what would become the largest take-private deal in the history of the Tech industry. Things… did not go well. Hear our take on the book, and on the Enigma that is Musk.
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    1 hr and 47 mins
  • Konstantin Stanislavski: An Actor Prepares, Bro

    Konstantin Stanislavski: An Actor Prepares, Bro
    Sep 24 2024
    Legendary stage director and founder of the Moscow Art Theater (MAT), Konstantin Sergeyevich Stanislavski, published one of the seminal texts of modern acting method, An Actor Prepares, in 1938. Regarded popularly as the founder of “Method” acting, Stanislavski preached the total commitment of the body and mind to the art of becoming an actor’s subject. He is credited with the popular showbiz saying: “the show must go on,” which, legend has it, he muttered in the midst of a heart attack during a performance. He spent the rest of his life as a director and teacher. A who’s who of legendary actors have counted themselves as followers of his method, including Marlon Brando, Anthony Hopkins, Robert De Niro, Daniel Day-Lewis, and Meryl Streep. Often misunderstood in the media and criticized (or idolized) in popular culture, Stanislavski’s teachings are not merely the total embodiment of character, but the meticulous preparation of a performance, down to the tiniest seemingly insignificant details. In this episode, we discuss the book that propelled Stanislavski to immortal fame, and we let you know why (or why not), you may want to give it a read.
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    1 hr and 30 mins
  • The Invisible Doctrine: The Secret History of Neoliberalism

    The Invisible Doctrine: The Secret History of Neoliberalism
    Aug 28 2024

    On this episode, the guys delve into George Manbiot and Peter Hutchison’s short history of Neoliberalism: the doctrine that’s seldom mentioned, but visible in every aspect of modern political life.

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    1 hr and 22 mins