Freakonomics Radio + Stitcher
342 episodes listed below
Everyday questions, carefully complicated.
No Stupid Questions treats small questions as serious evidence about how people think, argue, desire, remember, and belong. The tone is relaxed and funny, but the conversations keep returning to research, uncertainty, and the messy work of changing a mind.
PRESS PLAY
No Stupid Questions makes curiosity feel like a usable habit rather than a personality trait. Its questions are often disarmingly simple. Why not pig milk? Does the first or last interview slot matter? How can someone be convinced they are wrong? From there, the show opens into psychology, ethics, memory, status, group identity, happiness, and the strange pressure to have a clean answer before life has supplied one. The conversations in the excerpts are measured but lively. A discussion of milk becomes a way to ask why cultures reject some possibilities and normalize others. A job-interview question becomes a tour through primacy, recall, and the awkward hope of being remembered. A conversation about persuasion admits that good theory can run into hard limits when people feel judged, cornered, or publicly committed. The show is especially good at preserving uncertainty without making it feel vague. Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner appear repeatedly as named conversational partners, with a dynamic that mixes research, teasing, personal admission, and moral discomfort. The pleasure is not just in the answer. It is in watching a question get tested, narrowed, complicated, and occasionally left open. Listener emails add range, bringing in doctoral interviews, academia, parenting, minority communities, envy, media habits, and the social cost of not fitting neatly into a group. Laurie Santos appears in a replay crossover that leans into mimicry, happiness, and the contagious nature of behavior. The show can be playful, but it is not frivolous. It can be earnest, but it avoids turning every topic into advice. Its best moments come when a familiar feeling, such as wanting what is unavailable or bristling at being corrected, gets treated as both ordinary and worth examining carefully.
Made for: For listeners who like psychology, social behavior, and practical philosophy delivered through conversation rather than lecture. It especially suits people who enjoy research, listener questions, and answers that leave room for doubt.
What sets it apart: The show’s strength is its scale: tiny curiosities become serious investigations without losing their oddness. It pairs cognitive science with banter, personal memory, and a steady resistance to easy certainty.
Research psychologist Angela Duckworth (author of "Grit") and tech and sports executive Mike Maughan really like to ask people questions, and they believe there’s no such thing as a stupid one. So they have a podcast where they can ask each other as many “stupid questions” as they want. New episodes each week. "No Stupid Questions" is a production of the Freakonomics Radio Network. To get every show in the Freakonomics Radio Network without ads and a monthly bonus episode of Freakonomics Radio, start a free trial for SiriusXM Podcasts+ on Apple Podcasts or by visiting siriusxm.com/podcastsplus.
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
It makes behavioral psychology usable by testing research and big ideas against personal stories, listener questions, humor, and candid disagreement.
No Stupid Questions turns ordinary perplexities into conversations about why people notice, desire, persuade, and sort themselves into groups. Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner test ideas against personal stories, research, listener questions, and each other's objections.
This is the show that turns pig milk into a referendum on your unexamined assumptions.
Press play if you want
Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
Pig milk opens a smart path into the assumptions behind food, disgust, and lifesaving care.
What starts as a dairy oddity turns into a neat test of how food habits pick up moral force. Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner use the absence of pig milk from ordinary diets to open a wider conversation about pigs, disgust, and the foods people learn to treat as normal.
A grounded look at persuasion, incentives, and why being right is not always enough.
The episode treats persuasion as a matter of lowering defenses before making a point. It leans on Pascal's advice to acknowledge what is right in another person's view before showing where it falls short, and it folds in Dale Carnegie as part of the same larger question: how to…
A grounded look at envy, tribalism, and the uneasy pull of wanting what is out of reach.
No Stupid Questions turns a simple itch into a clear look at envy, tribalism, and the uneasy self-judgment that can come with wanting what feels out of reach.
A noticing game opens into attention, court awareness, and the stubborn mess of sleep.
Angela Duckworth opens with a small noticing game, asking Stephen Dubner to name three things in the room he had missed. That simple prompt sets up the episode's best stretch: attention, court awareness, and the habit of looking past a narrow keyhole view of the world.
A near-death conversation that values uncertainty, humor, and restraint over tidy wisdom.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner frame death less as a revelation than as an awkward, darkly funny problem of meaning. They trade near-death stories, compare high-impact risk with high-probability risk, and return to a flood story that never settles into a neat moral.
A reflective look at talent, luck, and the teams behind visible success.
Eric Schmidt's search for the Einstein of the 21st century opens into a broader argument about what success really rests on. The piece makes a strong case that individual talent and structural change do not have to be treated as competing ideas, and it keeps returning to the…
APA's Kim Mills interviews psychology researchers on tipping, crying, and extremism.
Why not pig milk?
This episode explores whether taking the first or last interview slot affects memorability, discussing psychological research on primacy and recency effects in the context of job interviews.
Nobody wants to feel stupid.
Why do we want what we can't have?
This episode explores how to overcome binary thinking in modern society, particularly in politics, by embracing nuance and moderation.
Stephen Dubner shares a childhood story about receiving meaningful advice while fishing with a family friend after his father's death.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss the importance of being nice and whether reading books is morally superior to other media.
Laurie Santos and Angela Duckworth open a crossover between The Happiness Lab and No Stupid Questions by joking about TV mashups like The Simpsons and 24, then bring in listener Sabika Shaban from Qatar with a question about mimicry in multicultural conversations.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss the drama triangle and its impact on relationships, and whether awards improve performance.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss whether it's better to invest in strengths or improve weaknesses, based on a listener question.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss the value of complaining and irrational pet peeves.
Angela Duckworth and Mike Maughan discuss whether dreams are meaningful and the connection between music and memory.
Angela Duckworth starts with a challenge.
Stephen Dubner opens with a near-death traffic accident on the drive home after getting his second COVID vaccine shot.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss misandry, the Dunning-Kruger effect, and a Freudian slip about regression to the man.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss self-perception vs.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss whether first or last impressions matter more, using the peak-end theory from a famous colonoscopy study.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss a study comparing the effectiveness of cash transfers versus psychotherapy on well-being in rural Kenya.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss whether humans are becoming smarter or stupider and how to increase curiosity.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss listener questions about the benefits of pessimism and whether public speaking can be learned.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss whether talent or effort is more important for success, based on Duckworth's research.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss whether the saying 'you are the average of your five closest friends' predicts success and explore the correlation between friendships and life outcomes.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss a listener's question about seeking comfort in familiar media when feeling tired, exploring the psychology behind this behavior.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner debate the balance between grit and knowing when to quit, exploring the sunk cost fallacy and the upside of quitting.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss whether Stephen is a hoarder and explore time perspectives.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss the concept of a gratitude letter and explore whether a forgiveness letter could be similarly beneficial.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss whether checklists hinder critical thinking, referencing Atul Gawande's Checklist Manifesto.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss a study comparing hedonism and self-control in relation to happiness.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss why people forget beloved books and whether we overestimate our significance in others' lives.
Angela Duckworth and Stephen Dubner discuss the psychological effects of praise versus constructive feedback, using Duckworth's experience with student ratings to explore whether craving praise is problematic.
This episode explores why people buy things like exercise equipment and health food that they never actually use, examining the psychology behind aspirational purchases.
Hidden talent sounds simple.