Awe Psychology (WONDER) with Dacher Keltner

Ologies with Alie Ward

Alie Ward

Society & Culture, Science, Comedy

4.9 • 25.7K Ratings

🗓️ 3 June 2026

⏱️ 39 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Awe?! You can study this? You can, and it turns out it’s really important for our mental health. Dr. Dacher Keltner, the legendary UC Berkeley psychology professor, author, and founding director of the Greater Good Science Center, lent us some time to chat about his research into what makes us feel awe, and how that sense of vastness can make our lives and relationships richer. From spending some time under starry skies, to walking past ancient ruins, to listening to a favorite song, these big and little moments can help us feel smaller in the best way. Also: hop into a mosh pit.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Oh, look at this. This is a special episode of Ologies I'm very excited about. And it's brought to you by
0:05.9	the lovely vacation rental service, Verbo. And today, this is all about awe, as you have probably
0:11.4	noticed from the title. And we're going to talk about exactly what awe is. But you have probably
0:16.7	felt it if you've ever stopped in your tracks to go, whoa, and felt connected to something bigger. Especially if you've ever stopped into tracks to go whoa and felt connected to something bigger especially
0:23.6	if you've ever seen something you've never seen before or you've traveled travel is one of the
0:28.8	easiest ways to really stock up on those awe-filled moments and share it with other people so we're
0:34.7	going to talk about how that works in the brain, actually.
0:38.2	And Verbo, thank you for sponsoring this. They make it easy to bring your people together in one place.
0:44.2	So you can actually share those experiences. And they work hard to get everything right before you arrive.
0:49.3	And if something does go wrong, Verbo care and 24-7 customer support are there to help make it right. The people
0:55.5	on your trip are full of surprises, not your verbo. So book your next day on the Verbo app. I just did,
1:02.7	literally. Oh hey, it's the sidewalk chicken bone. Your dog yearns for Alley Ward. This episode is nearly a decade in the making. I don't even
1:14.5	want to waste time on an intro, but I'm going to roll through this ologist's cred as fast as I can.
1:20.0	Ph.D., Stanford University, cool as hell dude, distinguished professor of psychology at UC Berkeley's
1:26.7	social interaction laboratory,
1:29.2	chill, founder and co-director of the Greater Good Science Center, author of several textbooks
1:36.0	and books just for regular people, most recently a book called Aw, The New Science of Everyday
1:43.0	Wonder and How It Can transform your life. Also,
1:46.6	very nice. Host of the dazzling podcast, The Science of Happiness, worked to stop solitary confinement
1:54.5	at San Quentin Prison, researcher whose papers have been cited over 100,000 times.
2:03.5	So, a dream.
2:06.9	After years, years of hoping to have a monologies,
	...

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