Lulu Miller

Design Matters with Debbie Millman

Design Matters Media

Arts, Design

4.6 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 21 July 2025

⏱️ 85 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Lulu Miller is a Peabody Award–winning journalist, co-host of Radiolab, founder of the podcast Terrestrials, and author of the acclaimed book Why Fish Don’t Exist. She joins to discuss her career at the intersection of science, philosophy, and storytelling, inviting us to question how we understand the world and our place within it.

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Transcript

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0:00.7	She finally looked at me and was just like, what are you doing here?
0:04.5	Your questions aren't going to bring him back.
0:07.2	I didn't have an answer.
0:08.3	And I remember driving back like 14 hours to New York through this thunderstorm just thinking like, I don't have an answer.
0:15.3	I don't have the like backbone.
0:17.0	I don't have the like ethical compass to be doing this work.
0:20.4	This microphone is too powerful and I have not grown up enough to hold it.
0:25.2	And at that time I was just like, I want out.
0:27.0	I should never do this.
0:27.8	I'm messing with people's lives.
0:28.8	I'm making people feel worse.
0:30.1	I don't belong here.
0:34.6	From the TED Audio Collective, this is Design Matters with Debbie Milman.
0:41.5	On Design Matters, Debbie talks with some of the most creative people in the world about what they do, how they got to be who they are, and what they're thinking about, and working on.
0:50.4	On this episode, writer and radio host Lulu Miller talks about the conflicts in her career and about going deep into reporting.
0:58.8	Literally smelling the pocket notebooks in his archives that I eventually visit that had been like collecting the sweat near his heart.
1:06.9	Like, I got intimate with this guy.
1:14.5	Hi. Like I got intimate with this guy. Hi, I'm Peter, colleague at Asda Bideford.
1:17.6	I'm always asked by customers why our prices are so weirdly specific.
1:21.7	That's a good question, Peter.
1:23.2	Like this 130 grand pack of Asda shredded iceberg lettuce.
1:26.7	See, 48p!
	...

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