logo
episode-header-image
Sep 2024
1h 4m

140. How to Breathe Better

Freakonomics Radio + Stitcher
About this episode
Bestselling author James Nestor believes that we can improve our lives by changing the way we breathe. He’s persuasive enough to get Steve taping his mouth shut at night. He explains how humans dive to depths of 300 feet without supplemental oxygen, and describes what it’s like to be accepted into a pod of whales. 
Up next
Nov 22
171. Measuring Pollution on Parallel Earths
<p>Michael Greenstone knows it’s corny, but he wants to make the world a better place — by tracking the impact of air quality, developing pollution markets in India, and … starting a podcast, which Steve says proves he’s over the hill.</p><p> </p><ul><li><strong>SOURCES:</strong> ... Show More
56m 1s
Nov 15
Suleika Jaouad’s Survival Mechanisms (Replay)
<p>Suleika Jaouad was diagnosed with cancer at 22. She made her illness the subject of a <i>New York Times</i> column and a memoir, <i>Between Two Kingdoms.</i> She and Steve talk about what it means to live with a potentially fatal illness, how to talk to people who've gone thro ... Show More
58m 46s
Nov 8
170. Finding the God Particle
<p>Physicist and former pop star Brian Cox tells Steve about discovering the Higgs boson, having a number-one hit, and why particle physics research will almost certainly not create a black hole that destroys all life on earth.</p><p> </p><ul><li><strong>SOURCES:</strong><ul><li> ... Show More
59m 10s
Recommended Episodes
May 2024
About Freedivers: How to hold your breath under water for over six minutes
Our guest this week is Daan, who is a free diver and a man with possibly the most calming voice in the world. He can also hold his breath underwater for over 6 minutes, which is unbelievable. Daan is here to tell us about his life as a freediver. He tells us all about the beauty ... Show More
56m 58s
Dec 2022
William Trubridge: Freediving, Dolphins, and Creating a Mental Immune System
Send us a textWilliam Trubridge is the world’s deepest man, with an unassisted freediving record to 102m or 334 feet. He holds eighteen freediving records and six world champion titles, and is able to hold his breath for over seven minutes. He has spent an extraordinary amount ti ... Show More
47m 15s
Dec 2024
119: Surviving Against All Odds: Endurance by Alfred Lansing
"In that instant they felt an overwhelming sense of pride and accomplishment. Though they had failed dismally even to come close to the expedition's original objective, they knew now that somehow they had done much, much more than ever they set out to do." Welcome back to another ... Show More
1h 36m
Sep 30
#829: James Nestor — Breathing Protocols to Reboot Your Health, Fix Your Sleep, and Boost Performance
<p><strong>James Nestor</strong> is a science journalist and the author of the international bestseller <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Breath-New-Science-Lost-Art/dp/0735213615/?tag=offsitoftimfe-20" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong><em>Breath: The New Science o ... Show More
1h 50m
Mar 2024
How to Keep Going When Things Get Hard: A Special Blue Sky Presentation of the "Ten Percent Happier" Podcast with Dan Harris, Featuring Bryan Stevenson
<p>This episode is a master class on sticking with it, no matter what. From our friend Dan Harris on the <a href= "https://link.chtbl.com/irheI89V" target="_blank" rel= "noreferrer noopener">Ten Percent Happier</a> podcast, we're joined by Bryan Stevenson, who is a public interes ... Show More
1h 8m
Jan 2025
The Darkest Dark
<p>We fall down the looking glass with Sönke Johnsen, a biologist who finds himself staring at one of the darkest things on the planet. So dark, it’s almost like he’s holding a blackhole in his hands. On his quest to understand how something could possibly be that black, we enter ... Show More
26m 28s
Oct 31
Jane G. Goldberg, "Wired for Why: How We Think, Feel, and Make Meaning" (2025)
WIRED FOR WHY: How We Think, Feel and Make Meaning. (Self-Published 2025) spans eighteen chapters exploring everything from how we manage to stay alive against all odds, to why language separates us from other species, to whether death might be a metaphor. It's a journey through ... Show More
1h 3m
Jun 2025
The Cage
<p>This is episode two of Swimming with Shadows: A Radiolab Week of Sharks.</p><p><i>Jaws</i> spawned a thousand imitators: sharks in tornados, sharks in avalanches, sharks that battle giant octopuses. Hollywood has officially turned sharks into monsters of every shape and size. ... Show More
18m 22s
Jun 2025
Making a Monster
<p>Episode one of <i>Swimming with Shadows: A Radiolab Week of Sharks</i>.<br /><br />Rodney Fox went into the ocean one summer day in 1963. He came out barely alive, his body torn apart by a great white shark. At the time, it was one of the worst shark attacks ever survived.</p> ... Show More
26m 38s
Mar 2025
Carl Zimmer on the Hidden Life in the Air We Breathe
<p>Carl Zimmer is one of the finest science communicators of our time, having spent decades writing about biology, evolution, and heredity. His latest (and 16<sup>th</sup>) book, <em><span style= "mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-theme-font: major-fareast;" ... Show More
51m 43s