"Our democracy is what’s at stake," says Karen Hao, an engineer who used to work in Silicon Valley. Now she’s an outspoken critic of its AI giants. The investigative journalist argues AI companies run their businesses like empires and it has to stop. In her 2025 bestseller, Empire of AI, Hao digs into the global impact of Big AI and explores how we need to rethink AI to build a better future. This podcast includes a lecture by Karen Hao and a discussion with host Nahlah Ayed.

Fact and fiction may seem poles apart but writers Esi Edugyan and Tiya Miles find the two intertwine perfectly in their award-winning storytelling. Both authors try to imagine past lives in their work, in part so that we may reimagine our own. They may operate in different realms but what they share is the telling of profoundly important stories that would otherwise go untold. It's been a longtime goal for IDEAS to bring these two accomplished authors together for a discussion — and it was worth the wait.

This podcast was recorded in front of an audience in January 2026 at a Toronto Public Library event.

Poetry can find you when you need it most. It can be life-altering. It was for six IDEAS producers who join Nahlah Ayed in studio to share their favourite poems and why they go back to it year after year. This special episode is to mark UNESCO's World Poetry Day, March 21st.

Eleanor Roosevelt once said that universal human rights begin in “small places, close to home — so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any map of the world.” In his fourth Massey Lecture, Alex Neve reflects on moments when people power won the day.

*Read this article to learn about the "most powerful" moment in Alex Neve's 40-year-career.

A case before the Supreme Court of Canada is challenging Quebec’s law on secularism. Benjamin Berger is a prominent voice in the study of constitutional and criminal law in Canada. In this podcast, he examines the dangers of what secularism hides — and how secularism obscures the impact of religion on our legal and political systems.

Benjamin Berger is professor at Osgoode Hall Law School of York University. He delivered Memorial University’s 2026 Henrietta Harvey Distinguished Lecture.

If journalist Vince Beiser had his way the term 'clean energy' wouldn't exist — it's a misnomer. He argues green energy comes with cost. Sure, solar power or wind power are both better than power from fossil fuels but Beiser points out they are still harmful to the planet and people. "There's no magic solution." Beiser tells IDEAS we need to shift to renewable energy but we also need to recognize it's not a "magic solution" — there is a downside with consequences.

Vince Beiser's book is called Power Metal: The Race for the Resources that Will Shape the Future.

Port cities are where worlds collide. They are a place of cultural, economic, political and religious contact. They've existed for millennia and facilitated the birth of empires and the rise of a globalized economy. Without port cities, our world would look very different. In the first episode of our series on how port cities shaped the world as we know it, UBC journalism professor Kamal Al-Solaylee visits Singapore — a constantly-evolving port city whose maritime roots go back to the 13th century.

“One of your tribe is enough.” That’s what Margaret Rossiter was told when she said she wanted to study female scientists. Nevertheless, Rossiter persisted. She found and documented hundreds of women whose contributions to science had been overlooked, under-credited and misappropriated. Then she made history herself by coining the term “The Matilda Effect” to describe why those women failed to get the credit they deserved.

Who is Matilda? Matilda Joslyn Gage was a suffragist erased from history. She was known as being too radical for Susan B. Anthony. This podcast shares her story.