SZEPS WORLD TOUR - SAM HARRIS on Making Sense of Life
Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps
Josh Szeps
4.5 • 905 Ratings
🗓️ 5 August 2025
⏱️ 68 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
How much responsibility do podcasters have not to "platform" crazy voices? Is there a countervailing duty to explore unusual ideas, spurned by elites? Why did Sam Harris fearlessly take on Islam, Black Lives Matter and Gaza, but not transgender ideology? Are psychedelics a portal to another realm, will A.I. become conscious, and is Sam a hypocrite for eating meat?
Sam Harris is one of the world's most influential podcasters and commentators. He burst onto the scene as a prominent atheist but has since become an elder statesman of reason and logic, advocating mindfulness and rationality through his meditation app, Waking Up, and his podcast, Making Sense.
Sam has always been a generous supporter of Josh's work and was kind enough to invite us to his private studio during the Szeps Live Around-the-World Podcast Marathon for a two-and-a-half-hour livestream. Enjoy this sparkling meeting of minds.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | I got a Waymo today. |
| 0:06.0 | I've never done that. |
| 0:07.0 | You haven't done it? |
| 0:08.0 | Would you do it? |
| 0:09.0 | Oh yeah. |
| 0:10.0 | Yeah. But I just haven't. |
| 0:12.0 | There are areas that they still don't reach in this town, so I haven't scrutinized them. |
| 0:18.0 | Are you curious? |
| 0:19.0 | Yeah. Well, I just assume it's fine. |
| 0:21.5 | Was it fine? |
| 0:22.6 | Was it fine? |
| 0:23.6 | If anything, it's overly cautious. |
| 0:17.9 | Right. It's like, you know, you can go. Bro. What are you waiting for? A written invitation? Like, there's nothing there. No, I've been on, I've driven around them, so I see that they're not. Mm. You're not crashing into things. |
| 0:20.2 | And I say to people, like, I trust Google, |
| 0:21.7 | and they raise their eyebrow at me and like, why would you trust Google? |
| 0:23.0 | I'm like, I mean, I don to people like, I trust Google, and they raise their eyebrow at me and like, why would you trust Google? |
| 0:39.5 | I'm like, I mean, I don't trust them to give a shit about me or my data. If you compare it to what Elon is doing, then you... Well, yeah, I also, I also, yes, exactly. I trust that they're not going to crash me into a wall. Right. you know that would be bad press but i think that's interesting um how are you feeling about the pace of |
| 0:39.4 | a ian crash me into a wall. Right. You know, that would be bad press. But I think that's interesting. |
| 0:56.3 | How are you feeling about the pace of AI at the moment? |
| 1:00.6 | Well, it's, my views actually have not changed in a decade. |
| 1:07.6 | I started worrying about it exactly 10 years ago. |
| 1:12.2 | I guess the only update is that some of the things that I thought we didn't have to worry about, |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Josh Szeps, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Josh Szeps and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.