Smart Cookies

Thomas Lockley is Associate Professor at Nihon University College of Law in Tokyo, where he teaches courses about the international and multicultural history of Japan and East Asia. We talk about the REAL HISTORY behind the "Shogun" TV show, but also about feudal Japan, the Samurai, the arrival of Europeans... as well as Prof. Lockley's latest book "A Gentleman from Japan."

Peter Heather is Chair of Medieval History at King's College London. Some of his most famous books include The Fall of the Roman Empire, Rome Resurgent, Christendom, and most recently Why Empires Fall: Rome, America and the Future of the West. We talk about the last days of the western Roman empire, the role of barbarians, the rise of the Persian empire, decadence, popular cliches, the worst Roman Emperor of all time and many parallels of falling Rome with the West today.

Alison Rowlands is a Professor of European history at the University of Essex researching witchcraft of the early modern period in central Europe. We talk about medieval beliefs in the supernatural, witch trials, the Inquisition, torture, the role of gender in accusations of witchcraft, as well as witchcraft in popular culture.

The Illegals was a network of sleeper agents created by KGB, who were sent into western countries, pretending to be ordinary citizens. Jack Barsky was a young German man when he signed up and became one of the few Illegals who sent straight into the belly of the beast - into the US. We discuss his early life in East Germany, the KGB training he went through in Moscow, his mission in the US, the eventual arrest by the FBI, as well as famous films portraying spying.

Jacob Mikanowski is a Polish-American journalist, writer and academic who's recently published an amazing book on the history of EASTERN EUROPE called "Goodbye Eastern Europe: An Intimate History of a Divided Land." Jacob and I talk about the origins of Slavs, the surprising role of slavery in early kingdoms, the colourful medieval Slavdom, as well as modern stereotypes and our unique sense of humour.

Uwe Boll is an infamous German film director, a Hollywood outcast consistently panned by critics, who produced and directed more than 30 films, working with some of the biggest names in show business. We talk about his everlasting passion for film, humble beginnings, first feature, developing a hard skin, hanging out with Mike Tyson and boxing his critics in the ring.

Most of us believe our lives are ordered by reason, or at least some kind of a sensible narrative... However, much as we hate to admit it, chance, randomness and chaos all play a crucial role in our lives (as well as our societies) - and that's exactly what Brian Klaas, associate professor in Global politics at University College London, wrote a phenomenal book about (called Fluke: Chance, Chaos and Why Everything We Do Matters). We also discuss the pervasive ideology of individualism, "hustle culture", the myth of a secret genius, conspiracy theories and the best way to lead our lives in our dopamine dependent societies.

I talk to Norman Ohler, the author of the best-selling book Blitzed: Drugs in Nazi Germany. We discuss the hidden history of widespread drug use in the Third Reich, the mass consumption of methamphetamines by the German army, as well as Adolf Hitler's spiralling dependence on "injections" administered to him by his doctor, Theo Morell.

Brent Lee is an ex-conspiracy theorist who's managed to escape the rabbit hole after dwelling in its depths for 15 years. These days he's known as the host of the "Some Dare Call It Conspiracy" podcast, through which he's trying to help people who are still caught up in these beliefs. We talk about his descent into the bizarre world of conspiracies, the impact they had on his personal life, his beliefs at the time, the con men "influencers" he encountered, as well as his mission of trying to reach people who still inhabit this paranoid world.

Dr. Michael Rowe is a Reader in modern European History at King's College London. Over the last two decades he has published extensively on the period of the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars. In this episode of Smart Cookies we talk about Napoleon's rise, his personality, conquests and defeats, as well as his relationship with Josephine and finally, bout Ridley Scott's divisive Napoleon biopic.

Dr. Michael Rowe is a Reader in modern European History at King's College London. Over the last two decades he has published extensively on the period of the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars. In this episode of Smart Cookies we talk about Napoleon's rise, his personality, conquests and defeats, as well as his relationship with Josephine and finally, bout Ridley Scott's divisive Napoleon biopic.

Dr. Tobias Jones is a researcher, historian and lecturer of Mongol history at Leiden University. Back by popular demand, he returns to Smart Cookies to talk about some of the most powerful women of the Mongol Empire. We also talk discuss upbringing and the role of Mongolian women, the ancient custom of bride kidnapping, levirate marriage, whispers of warrior women, and Marco Polo doing kung-fu in China.

Bruce Greyson is a Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry and Neuro-behavioral Sciences at the University of Virginia, who has studied near-death experiences for more than 45 years and is one of the world’s leading experts on their science and significance. He is the author of After: A Doctor Explores What Near-Death Experiences Reveal about Life and Beyond, co-author of Irreducible Mind and co-editor of The Handbook of Near-Death Experiences. We talk about his research on near-death experiences, science defying survivor testimonies, the prospect of the afterlife and scepticism.

Tariq Ali is a writer, filmmaker and a leading figure of the international left since the 60s. He is a long-standing editor of the New Left Review and a political commentator published on every continent. His books include The Clash of Fundamentalisms, The Obama Syndrome and the latest, Winston Churchill: His Times, His Crimes, which we discuss in this episode. We also talk about Churchill's racist views, support of British Imperialism, World War 2, Class Warfare and his role in The Bengal Famine.

During one of the most dramatic summers in recent memory, filled with record breaking temperatures, devastating wildfires and destructive floods, a bombshell report released by the IISD exposed the fact that our governments are pumping RECORD amounts of money into big oil... I talk to one of the reports' authors, Tara Laan, to figure out WHY. We also discuss climate anxiety, the relationship between pollution and health, climate summits, COP28 and climate activism.

Professor Avi Loeb is a former Chair of the astronomy department at Harvard University, founding director of Harvard's Black Hole Initiative and director of the Institute for Theory and Computation at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. He is also the head of the Galileo Project - the Systematic Scientific Search for Evidence of Extraterrestrial Technological Artifacts. We talk about the US government's "secret retrieval program" testimony by David Grusch, UFO and UAP sightings, the search for Alien Civilisations, space trash from possible neighbours.... and Professor Loeb's hunt for interstellar objects in the Pacific Ocean.

Stanley Stepanic is an Assistant Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures at the University of Virginia. To date he has published three textbooks that have been released in recent editions - these are "Dracula or the Timeless Path of the Vampire," "Russian and East European Film", and "Russian Folklore". In addition to such publications, Professor Stepanic has been very active in the public sphere, giving a variety of presentations, primarily concerning the VAMPIRE. We talk about vampire origins, Count Dracula, the Blood Countess, Nosferatu, symbolism, vampire incarnations in pop culture and... Morbius.

Stuart Vyse is a behavioral scientist and writer with a PhD in psychology and BA and MA degrees in English Literature. He's a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science and the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, as well as a contributing editor for the Skeptical Inquirer magazine. His first book, Believing in Magic: The Psychology of Superstition won the William James Book Award of the American Psychological Association. In 2020 he wrote a book called Superstition, published by Oxford press - who also released his latest book, The Uses of Delusion: Why It’s Not Always Rational to be Rational. We talk about black cats, Friday the 13th, Zodiac, delusions, the futility of Twitter debates and my addiction to fortune telling.

Professor Patrick McNamara has over 15 years of experience working directly on the problem of the nature and function of dreaming. He has been the recipient of grant awards from the National Institutes of Health, to further study sleep and was awarded the Ph.D. in Behavioral Neuroscience from Boston University. He did a Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Aphasia Research Center, Boston VA Medical Center. He has published over 50 scientific papers as well as several books on the neuroscience of dreams. We talk about the neuroscience and evolution of dreaming, but also about REM sleep, the function of nightmares, demonic possession dreams, sleep paralysis, lucid dreaming and dreams within dreams.

Mike Rothschild is a journalist and author, focused on the intersections between internet culture and politics as seen through the dark glass of conspiracy theories. Since 2018, he has specialized in examining the QAnon conspiracy cult and is one of the first journalists to reveal its connections to past conspiracy theories. He is the author of the seminal work on QAnon, "The Storm Is Upon Us: How QAnon Became a Movement, Cult, and Conspiracy Theory of Everything.""We talk about QAnon's humble beginnings, it's meteoric rise and it's status after the 2020 presidential election... We also discuss conspiracy theories in general, as well as Bill Gates, the Reptoids, JFK, the attempted coup in Germany, the pervasive underlying thread of anti-Semitism, and of course, the infamous "Mattress Conspiracy."