Mixed Mental Arts

Paul A. Offit, MD is the Chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases and the Director of the Vaccine Education Center at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. In addition, Dr. Offit is the Maurice R. Hilleman Professor of Vaccinology and a Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. He is a recipient of many awards including the J. Edmund Bradley Prize for Excellence in Pediatrics from the University of Maryland Medical School, the Young Investigator Award in Vaccine Development from the Infectious Disease Society of America, and a Research Career Development Award from the National Institutes of Health. Be sure to rate and comment in iTunes.

While a Professor at Harvard University, Bert Vaux noticed that within a week students were suppressing their accents in order to blend in on campus. What intrigued Bert was that even though students were trying to cover up their accents, very often the words they used would give away where they were from. People from New Jersey would casually refer to the night before Hallowe'en as mischief night. Bostonians thought everybody called a water fountain a bubbler. And what people from Seattle called a potato bug was obviously called a roly poly to Kansans. So, in 2002, Bert created a survey to discern these patterns. After collecting data for over a decade, they went viral last year. If you saw a bunch of dialect maps floating around on The New York Times, The Today Show, Business Insider, Huff Po, or Facebook or had a conversation about what you call something or other in your part of the country, you have already experienced the work of Bert Vaux. (More on all the places the survey showed up here) Since millions of people have now taken the survey, there's a good chance you've even taken it. In this episode, Bryan, Hunter and Bert discuss why language and dialect are so continuously fascinating to people: they represent identity. We use language and dialect to mark our identity. Although our word choices, grammatical choices and how we choose to pronounce words are often unconscious, they are of vital significance for how we see ourselves and how we are seen by others. To find out what your accent says about you, visit by clicking here and take Bert's dialect quiz. An abbreviated version was featured by The New York Times, click here. Bert Vaux is currently a professor at Cambridge University. He's very excited to have just become a dad!

Within its first week of publication, Confessions of An Economic Hitman hit #1 on Amazon. Then it hit The New York Times bestseller list. Within five weeks of its release, Confessions of An Economic Hitman was already in its fifth printing. In it, Perkins tells how as a consultant for one of the world's most prominent firms he knowingly engaged in a subtle but deliberate strategy designed to extract the wealth of people far less fortunate than him. Perkins' tale of unrestricted corporate greed working in collusion with a Machiavellian US government has resonated strongly with a broad audience especially in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis. However, it has met with strong criticism from prestige media outlets like The New York Times and government agencies. Notably, Sebastian Mallaby, writing in The Washington Post, insisted that Mr. Perkins' "basic contentions are flat wrong." In a 2006 rebuttal, the State Department claimed that the book "appears to be a total fabrication." Then again, given the criticism that Mr. Perkins sends the State Department's way, you could hardly expect them to be asking for signed copies. Be sure to rate and comment in iTunes.

Lindsey Davis describes herself modestly as "an English Lady Pensioner." She is certainly an English Lady, but as an author she is far too prolific to fit any definition of the word retired. The author of 27 books, Davis' most famous creation is Marcus Didius Falco, a series of detective novels set in Ancient Rome. Although she wins high marks from classicists—she was named honorary President of the Classical society and has been invited to speak at places like the Getty Villa—she balks at the idea that even the merest suggestion that the Falco novels filled rich details about every aspect of Roman life might be described as "educational." Instead, she insists they're entertainment. That they are. In this interview, we talk to Ms Davis about the reasons for the enduring popularity of the detective genre and why she resonated with the Roman Empire as a backdrop for her novels. (The answers will surprise you.) Currently, Ms Davis is writing books in a spin-off series about Falco's daughter who is also a detective. You can find Ms Davis on the web at www.lindseydavis.co.uk. All 27 of her books are available on Amazon. If you're looking for a place to explore her work there's no better place than with The Silver Pigs, the award-winning first novel in the Falco series. Be sure to rate and comment in iTunes.

Bryan sits down with good friend and famed photographer, Randall Slavin. He has taken photos of some of the finest actors and entertainers in the game today. Check out his website, visit randallslavin.com. Be sure to rate and comment in iTunes.

Jerry Coyne is a professor of biology at the University of Chicago and the author of the brilliantly articulate Why Evolution is True. Piece by piece, Coyne lays out the overwhelming support for evolution. In this interview Professor Coyne explains to us not only why evolution is true but why religion or a desire for mystery causes so many people to reject well-established science. Far from decreasing our sense of wonder, evolution increases our ability to marvel at the natural world. Professor Coyne said it so brilliantly in his book, we'll share a little excerpt here: But there is even more cause for wonder. For the process of evolution—natural selection, the mechanism that drove the first named replicating molecule into the diversity of millions of fossil and living forms—is mechanism of staggering simplicity and beauty. And only those who understand it can experience the awe that comes with realizing how such a straightforward process could yield features as divers as the flower of the orchid, the wing of the bat, and the tail of the peacock. Again in The Origin, Darwin—imbued with Victorian paternalism—described this feeling: "When we no longer look at an organic being as a savage looks at a ship, as at something wholly beyond his comprehension; when we regard every production of nature as one which has had a history; when we contemplate every complex structure and instinct as the summing up of many contrivances, each useful to the possessor, nearly in the same way as when we look at any great mechanical invention as the summing up of the labour, the experience, the reason, and even the blunders of numerous workmen; when we thus view each organic being, how far more interesting, I speak from experience, will the study of natural history become!" Pretty amazing, huh? For more on Professor Coyne's work, you can visit him on the web at whyevolutionistrue.com or follow him on twitter at @evolutionistrue. Why Evolution is True is available everywhere, but if you buy it by clicking on the Amazon link here you'll be supporting the show.

Bryan sits down with comedian and Podcaster, Greg Fitzsimmons. Greg was born in New York City, New York, to New York City radio personality Bob Fitzsimmons, and Patricia (née McCarthy) Fitzsimmons. He grew up in Tarrytown, New York. He began his stand up comedy career while attending Boston University. Fitzsimmons has since appeared on such programs as The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Late Show with David Letterman, Late Night with Conan O'Brien, Chelsea Lately and Comedy Central Presents. In 1996, Greg hosted the MTV game show Idiot Savants. He is also a regular commentator on Vh1's Best Week Ever and I Love The series.

"Wanna know about wine and why it's good for your health? Jim Duane, wine maker for Seavey Vineyards sits me down and talks about how you get a world class Cabernet and what it takes to make something this perfect (and expensive) He will surprise you. At least he did me. Be sure to rate and comment in iTunes.

In January 2008, Christian Lander created a blog that gave a voice to people who already have way more than their fair share of a say in how the world is run. Stuff White People Like took a close look at just what makes white people happy. Why do white people love coffee and Ray Ban's and picking their own fruit? What is it about hating people who wear Ed Hardy that makes palefaces so happy? Christian Lander has those answers and more. In this interview, Christian helps Bryan figure out just how white he is with the help of his NY-Times bestselling book Stuff White People Like: The Definitive Guide to the Unique Taste of Millions and its sequel Whiter Shades of Pale: The Stuff White People Like, Coast to Coast from Seattle's Sweaters to Maine's Microbrews. Both books are available everywhere!!!

Although William Bernstein has an MD and a PhD in Chemistry, he began his career in neuroscience before deciding to become a financial investor and an author of historical books. Safe to say, he's exactly the sort of guest we love to have on The Bryan Callen Show. Although he's written several books, today's podcast focuses primarily on The Birth of Plenty: How the Prosperity of the Modern World was Created. In the last few hundred years, the average wealth of a resident of planet earth has increased astronomically. Bernstein lays out for us the four factors that he argues drove that innovation. In today's episode, Dr. Bernstein (aka Bill), Hunter and Bryan discuss how the world achieved its modern prosperity and how we can use these four factors to drive further prosperity generation around the world. Dr. Bernstein (aka Bill) is the author of three of the best history books you'll ever read: The Birth of Plenty: How the Prosperity of the Modern World was Created, A Splendid Exchange: How Trade Shaped the World from Prehistory to Today, Masters of the Word: How Media Shaped History. He's also the author of an investing book called The Four Pillars of Investing: Lessons for Building a Winning Portfolio that Big Mike "Bryan's Dad" Callen "best investment book ever produced for the lay person." Pretty impressed right now. Dr. Bernstein (aka Bill) is on the web at http://www.efficientfrontier.com/.

Bryan sits down with good friend and comedian/actor, Bobby Lee. Bobby Lee is an American actor and comedian best known as a cast member on MADtv from 2001 to 2009 and for his roles in the films Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle, Pineapple Express and The Dictator. Be sure to rate and comment in iTunes.

While working on a history textbook for US students, Tamim Ansary found that he and his team of American advisors had a very different sense of the world. The Americans saw history as a long march towards democracy and free-market capitalism in which Islam had no particularly major role to play. On the other hand, Mr. Ansary having been born in Kabul and spent his earliest years learning a Muslim view of history felt a little differently about things. How could a religion with 1.6 billion followers be regarded as a mere footnote? This was just before 9/11. The day after that event Mr. Ansary sent an e-mail to a few friends trying to interpret the Islamic world for people steeped in a Western sense of history and a Western world and that's what he's been doing ever since. Although Mr. Ansary is a fan of democratic society—he lives in the US after all—in his books he sets his personal opinions aside to allow us to really understand the world as Muslims do. Today we talk about two of his books. In the first, Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes, Mr. Ansary lays out an entire vision of history as seen and felt by Muslims around the world. In the second, Games Without Rules: The Often-Interrupted History of Afghanistan, he lays out for us a history of Afghanistan that helps us make sense of why countless great empires have failed to conquer much less understand his home country. You can visit Mr. Ansary on the web at http://mirtamimansary.com and follow him on twitter @mirtamimansary. Mr. Ansary is the author of many books. Today, we focused on just two of them Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes and Games Without Rules: The Often-Interrupted History of Afghanistan. Both available from here to Kabul.

Bryan sits down with comedian, Kira Soltanovich. For the past 8 years, she could be seen as a television corespondent in her own reoccurring segment for the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, called Photo Booth. She's also a successful Podcaster at The Network Studios of her very own show about comedians, who are also parents, called "The Kira Soltanovich Show. You can find her online by going to thekirashow.com as well as kiracomedy.com. Be sure to rate and comment in iTunes.

As the head writer and creative director of video at Cracked.com, Dan O'Brien writes important potentially Pulitzer-prize winning pieces on topics such as Why Spiderman is a Dick and 3 Insane Spider-Man Movies You Won't Believe Almost Got Made. But Dan O'Brien doesn't just write about Spiderman. Over the last few years, he has systematically tackled the most important historical question humanity has ever faced: which US President would be toughest in a fight? In his latest book How to Fight Presidents: Defending Yourself Against the Badasses Who Ran This Country, Dan O'Brien summarizes in just a few pages everything you would need to know to beat not just lesser Presidents like Millard Fillmore and Franklin Pierce but truly epic Presidents like Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt. In this episode, Dan, Bryan and Hunter get into a heated debate about which President would win in a fight. Through Dan's definitive book on the question and occasional use of unreliable internet sources, Dan, Bryan and Hunter draw on historiography, biometric data and their own very limited fighting experience to try and settle this question once and for all. Nature vs Nurture, Which President would win in a fight…all the most important topics are debated on The Bryan Callen Show.Actually, we'd love to hear what you think. Tweet @bryancallen, @huntermaats and @DOB_INC to tell us which President you think would win in a fight.Dan O'Brien is the co-editor of You Might be a Zombie and Other Bad News, the head writer of The De-Textbook and the author of How to Fight Presidents. They're all available in lots of place, but you should buy them by clicking on the Amazon links below if you want to support the show. If you want the show to fail, then you should still buy them…just don't do it through the links below.

Dr. Ben Goldacre is the author of two excellent books, Bad Pharma and Bad Science, but he didn't show up for this episode so there's not much point telling you more about him. So, Bryan and Hunter just had a conversation the same way they would if a famous author/doctor wasn't around…because he wasn't. This episode features Bryan and Hunter talking a lot about Bad Pharma—because it really is an excellent book—and then more generally about the scientific method, how much regulation of the pharmaceutical industry is optimal and what exactly is going on inside Bryan's pants. We'd actually really recommend both Bad Pharma and Bad Science. We'd also love to interview Dr. Ben, so send him a tweet and ask him to come on The Bryan Callen Show. @bengoldacre. Paging, Dr. Ben. Paging, Dr. Ben. Your presence is requested on The Bryan Callen Show.

For 150 years, we've been taught that we had to choose sides when understanding where top-level performance comes from. Is it nature? Or, is it nurture? In this episode, two of our favorite guests of all time Dan Coyle—author of The Talent Code—and Dave Epstein—author of The Sports Gene—join us on the show to discuss what the latest science really shows about where talent comes from. Is it nature vs nurture or is it more accurate to say nature plus nurture? One of the mankind's most enduring questions. We think we can pretty much wrap it up in an hour. Well, maybe not wrap it up but with Dan Coyle and Dave Epstein onboard we can get about as close as humanly possible. You can follow them on Twitter at @DavidEpstein and @DanielCoyle. Their blogs are http://thesportsgene.com/blog/ and http://www.thetalentcode.com. The Sports Gene, The Talent Code and The Little Book of Talent are available from all good booksellers. You can also get them by clicking below. To listen to Bryan and Hunter interviewing them one-on-one, check out the following episodes: http://bryancallen.com/2013/12/23/ep87-daniel-coyle/ http://bryancallen.com/2013/11/18/ep77-david-epstein/

When Steven Spielberg was looking for a dinosaur expert for Jurassic park, he chose John Gurche. Steven Spielberg kind of gets to pick whoever he wants, so that's a pretty good sign that John Gurche is the best in the world at what he does. As a paleoartist, Gurche works closely with the world's foremost paleontologists to figure out from fossils that are often millions of years old what the creatures that left them behind would have looked like. In Shaping Humanity: How Science, Art, and Imagination Help Us Understand Our Origins, Gurche explains the work he did for the Smithsonian Institution's Hall of Human Origins. Commissioned to make fifteen sculptures covering six million years of human evolution, Gurche explains how a hole in the base of the skull tells us which ancestors walked upright and why we currently think our ancestors' eyes might have turned white. In this interview, we explore how through accidental finds and scientific missteps we have teased out our present understanding of human evolution and in the end through Mr. Gurche's work and words we develop a shared connection with a past before recorded history.For more of Mr. Gurche's work, visit http://www.gurche.com/. His work is amazing.Shaping Humanity: How Science, Art, and Imagination Help Us Understand Our Origins is available on Amazon. It's one of the most beautiful, fascinating books you'll ever own.

Perhaps nothing demonstrates the power of the internet and thereby the power of a democratic approach to problem solving like Wikipedia. In The Wikipedia Revolution: How a Bunch of Nobodies Created The World's Greatest Encyclopedia, Andrew Lih lays bare for us the tremendous power of ordinary people to do something truly incredible when they come together. While traditional encyclopedias like Encylopedia Britannica have relied on Nobel Laureates and other highly-respected professionals to write their articles, Wikipedia has placed its faith in ordinary people and the wisdom of the crowds. In just over a decade, the results have been astounding. With over 30 million articles in 287 languages, Wikipedia dwarfs all other encyclopedias and a 2005 investigation by the highly-respected journal Nature found that Wikipedia's accuracy was almost exactly the same as Encyclopedia Britannica. In this interview, Andrew Lih shares with us how he became fascinated by the site, how the site has developed and what the success of Wikipedia means for everything from government spying to democracy to digital protectionism in China. More than a lens into the world's future, this interview will restore your faith in humanity.The Wikipedia Revolution: How a Bunch of Nobodies Created The World's Greatest Encyclopedia is available on Amazon.Andrew Lih's website is http://www.andrewlih.com and you can follow him on twitter @fuzheado.

Bryan sits down with the founder of The Bullet Proof Executive, Dave Asprey. Long time friend, Jimmy Burke. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Bryan has a very exclusive conversation with one of America's finest military veterans and a former member of Seal Team 6. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Bryan sits down with author, producer and actor, Chad Kultgen. He is a controversial author notable for publishing several novels on the sexual relationships of Americans. He has published opinion pieces on the Huffington Post, and was a staff writer for Hits and The World Weekly News. His works have been reviewed by Maxim, Penthouse, and the New York Times amongst others. He has several writing and production credits, including for The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, a 2013 film starring Steve Carell. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Steven Strogatz has a really impressive resumé. Besides being a professor at Cornell, he also has the sixth most highly cited paper in all of physics and his 1998 paper "Collective dynamics of small-world networks" was the most highly cited paper in its field for a decade. Cool as all of that is that's not what excites us most about Steven Strogatz, because as you look at his resumé you realize that Strogatz is perhaps the greatest living popularizer of something that underpins all of our lives but most people have (at best) mixed feelings about: math. As the author of a series of NY Times columns that the Harvard Business Review "must reads for entrepreneurs and executives who grasp that mathematics is now the lingua franca of serious business analysis." Those columns have now been collected in an awesome book called The Joy of X: A Guided Tour of Math From One to Infinity. From basic arithmetic to calculus and beyond, Strogatz shows readers not just what math is but puts it in a context that allows us to experience the beauty of math regardless of how much math we actually know. In this interview, Professor Strogatz discusses his book and gives Bryan and Hunter an inside look at the life of a top-level mathematician. They discuss math prodigies, cultural beliefs at math and the importance of constantly striving for excellence every day even if you're not sure it'll pay necessarily pay off. This conversation will not only teach you the Joy of X; it will teach you the Joy of Talking to Professor Strogatz. Steven Strogatz is the author of three books: The Calculus of Friendship, Sync and The Joy of X. They're all available at Amazon and everywhere else. Also, check out his awesome TED talk about how flocks of birds and other animals sync up: http://www.ted.com/talks/steven_strogatz_on_sync.html Steven Strogatz is on twitter @stevenstrogatz. Be sure to check out his website stevenstrogatz.com.

Jared Mason Diamond is an American scientist and author best known for his popular science books The Third Chimpanzee (1991), Guns, Germs, and Steel (1997, awarded a Pulitzer Prize), Collapse (2005) and The World Until Yesterday (2012). Originally trained in physiology, Diamond's work is known for drawing from a variety of fields, including anthropology, ecology, geography, and evolutionary biology. As of 2013, he is Professor of Geography at the University of California, Los Angeles. He has been described as "America's best-known geographer". Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Lawrence Krauss is the only physicist to have received awards from all three major American physics societies. In addition to his work as a theoretical physicist and cosmologist where he has authored or co-authored more than three hundred academic articles, Krauss has devoted much of his career to getting the public of their fear of science. As Krauss explains to Bryan and Hunter, you don't have to be a professional musician to enjoy music and you're wrong if you think you have to be a professional physicist to enjoy the beauty of physics. With books such as The Physics of Star Trek and Fear of Physics, Krauss meets the public where they are and helps move them towards being able to enjoy science without feeling like they need a PhD. In this interview, Krauss also tackles head on why we don't need God to explain the existence of the Universe and why he thinks we're better off without religion.Lawrence Krauss has authored nine books for the general public. They're available from all good booksellers and they're as entertaining as he is.

Bryan and Hunter sit down with comedian, Sarah Tiana. They talk about their lives in comedy as well as comedians in relationships and much more. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Charles Duhigg is a writer for the business section of The New York Times. He's clearly pretty good at it, because he won a Pulitzer Prize in 2013 for a series of ten articles on Apple called iEconomy. He's also clearly pretty good at writing books, because The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do In Life and Business was on The New York Times bestseller list for 62 weeks. Basically, Charles Duhigg is pretty damn awesome. Oh, wait. He won a Pulitzer Prize and wrote a New York Times bestseller. He's incredibly awesome. In this week's episode, Charles tells Bryan and Hunter about how the book came about (it began with civil unrest, food vendors and being with the US Armed Forces in Iraq), the science behind the book and how—by breaking down the true and often surprising sources of our own habits—we can shape our habits to fit our lives rather than the other way around. The Power of Habit is available from all good booksellers and you can follow Charles on twitter at @cduhigg.

Bryan sits down with comedian, Skylar Stone. Stone has been seen on telelvision and in comedy clubs throughout the country. He has a monthly show at the Improv in Hollywood. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Along with his colleagues Professor Russell Foster broke the conventional wisdom and discovered a light-sensitive cell inside the eye that had nothing to do with vision. Although much of the scientific community was originally skeptical, these photosensitive Retinal Ganglion Cells (pRGCs) have not only become an accepted part of our biology they have major consequences for people young and old living in every part of the world. That's because pRGCs regulate sleep. In spite of playing no role in vision, these crucial components of the eye use the light exposure in our daily lives to manage an activity so important we spend a third of our lives doing it. In this episode of the show, Professor Foster offers insight into what sleep is, why it matters so very much and what his research means for individuals, businesses and societies as a whole.Russell Foster is the author of three particularly excellent books for a general audience Sleep: A Very Short Introduction, Rhythms of Life: The Biological Clocks that Control the Daily Lives of Every Living Thing and Seasons of Life: The Biological Rhythms that Enable Living Things to Thrive and Survive.

Back by popular demand, Bryan sits down with his dad, Michael Callen. They talk about a variety of different things, from professional schooling and the changes they are encountering, as well as the differences regarding traditional schooling verses online. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

"Hello. We are looking for highly intelligent individuals. To find them, we have devised a test. There is a message hidden in this image. Find it, and it will lead you on the road to finding us. We look forward to meeting the few that will make it all the way through. Good luck. 3301." Hidden in that image were a series of elaborate clues that would draw the world's best cryptographers, steganographers and internet security experts racing to unlock the mysteries of this puzzle. It's still going on…or is it? On November 25th, 2013, Chris Bell wrote an article for The Daily Telegraph about what has come to be known as Cicada 3301 and made the wider world aware of what only the internet's superusers had known before. The intent of Cicada 3301's creators remains unknown as does what will happen next. On this episode, Chris tells Bryan and Hunter all about the known knowns and the known unknowns of Cicada 3301. (Hunter's note: For the best listening experience, read Chris' article first: The Internet mystery that has the world baffled) You can follow Chris on Twitter @chrisbellwriter.

It's the Bryan Callen Christmas Special. Bryan sits down with actor, comedian and good friend, Dov Davidoff. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Daniel Coyle kept hearing about places all over world where talent flourished. They weren't necessarily well-funded. They weren't necessarily in big cities. In fact, quite often, these talent hot spots looked run down and neglected, but inside what was happening was something very close to magic: ordinary people were being turned into top-level performers. From a Russian tennis camp to soccer coaching in the slums of Brazil to an unlikely music camp, Coyle found that "Greatness isn't born. It's Grown." In The Talent Code—which, by the way, is one of the best books you'll ever read—Daniel Coyle lays out those secrets and let's the world that it's not just about doing 10,000 hours of practice…it's about doing the right kind of practice. In this episode, Bryan, Hunter and Dan talk about the book, their own experiences and the one thing required to fix education today. Dan has an excellent blog, which you can read at thetalentcode.com. You can follow him on Twitter at @DanielCoyle. The Talent Code and his follow up book The Little Book of Talent are available from all good booksellers. Only a truly evil bookstore wouldn't carry The Talent Code. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Bryan sit down with MTV's Girl Code, Jessimae Peluso. She is "a bottle rocket with a pulse," headed in only the expected, upward trajectory of a firecracker, and ready to explode. The self-proclaimed "insecure narcissist" has founded a solid comic reputation in New York City and beyond, slaying audiences with her unequivocal, straightforward, ravishingly raw humor. Slamming listeners with her stances on everything from her roots in Syracuse New York, her fear of children to her infatuation with John Stamos, Jessimae will lay her hook in you from the moment she hits the stage. The dynamic Jessimae Peluso is an artist in the truest sense of the word, persistently out to challenge herself and her audience. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Growing up in the age of the great transatlantic liner, William Francis Gibbs had only one dream: to build the world's greatest ship. In that age, nations competed to build the largest, most luxurious and the fastest ship. In particular, they competed to win the Blue Riband, the prize awarded to the fastest ship to cross the Atlantic. Although Gibbs was the product of tremendous wealth and privilege, he was clear that it was not his family's fortune that made him a success rather it was his father losing it all. Forced to drop out of Harvard and lacking basic mathematical skills, Gibbs became America's greatest naval architect through boundless determination. Although he would build many ships, it was that first ship that he dreamed of that would mark the high-water mark of his career. The SS United States would be the largest, most luxurious and the fastest ship would know. It was also the last ship to hold the Blue Riband. In a book The Wall Street Journal called one of the ten best non-fiction books of 2012, Steve Ujifusa recounts the tale of the Steve Jobs of shipping, William Francis Gibbs. A Man and His Ship is available everywhere and in all formats. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Don's has an unique brand of comedy unlike most other comics and that makes him the clubs perfect closing act every night. Don was the co-creater/star of the cult classic film, "Windy City Heat", which was developed in the Comedy Store's Belly Room. The show is now called The Ding-Dong Show and it continues every Monday night as it has since 1992 making it the longest running show in the clubs history. Don can also be seen nightly as the audience warm-up for ABC's, "Jimmy Kimmel Live". Don's eyes are blue and his relationship status is complicated.

For decades your teachers, authority figures and textbooks have been lying to you. You do not have five senses. Your tongue doesn't have neatly segregated taste-bud zones. You don't know what the pyramids really looked like. You're even pooping wrong - Jesus, you're a wreck! Fortunately, the team from Cracked.com is here to clue you in on the truth. Jack O'Brien, the editor-in-chief of Cracked.com, joins Bryan on the show to share with us the latest book from the popular site. Bringing together six years worth of research, The De-Textbook was built from the ground up to systematically seek out, dismantle and destroy the many untruths that years of misguided education have left festering inside of you, and leave you a smarter person...whether you like it or not. The De-Textbook is a merciless, brutal learning machine. It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are informed. It's also incredibly entertaining as is this episode of The Bryan Callen Show.The De-Textbook is available from all good booksellers. You can find out more about The De-Textbook at http://www.cracked.com/the-de-textbook/. (Note to attentive readers: You will notice that this write-up is taken almost verbatim from this site. That's because while Hunter normally does careful episode write-ups, he was so impressed by the lively writing found on the Cracked.com website that he decided he should mostly just copy and paste. As a side note, if you scroll down there's a fun sneak peak at what the book actually looks like.) By the way, you can also follow Jack O'Brien on twitter @jack_obrien. We just did.

Bryan sits down with comedian, Jay Larson. They discuss a variety of topics. With appearances on TOSH.0, The Late Late show, The Smoking Gun Presents, Conan and his own half hour special on Comedy Central Jay has come a long way since he moved to Los Angeles in 2000. After flunking out of college, then finally getting accepted back after many attempts, Jay threw away his diploma to pursue a career in Stand Up comedy. After living in a condemned house for 14 months, I mean who hasn't, Jay started opening for comedy greats such as Nick Swardson, Daniel Tosh and Pablo Fransisco. He soon became known as a comedian with a whacky, original voice who tends to get a little weird. Since those early days Jay has continued climbing the ranks with multiple TV appearances, many internet short films and his first album, "Self-Diagnosed", available on itunes direct lender payday loans. His voice continues to grow as he has delved into the world of interacting with strangers and creating conflict with people he doesn't know. Jay is a fantastic storyteller, showcased weekly on his podcast, "The Crabfeast" on Jay Mohr's Fake Mustache Studios. With TV projects in development, be sure to catch Jay now before he ignores everyone...forever…seriously...he will.

By 2004, Tim Ferriss was running an online brain and body supplements company that was grossing $40,000 a month. He was his own boss. He was making a lot of money. Things seemed good until one day his girlfriend handed him a plaque that read "Business Hours End at 5p.m.!" Suddenly, it dawned on Tim that things were actually very, very bad. What did success matter if you didn't have the time to enjoy your life? So, he booked himself a ticket to Europe and promptly had a nervous breakdown. He didn't know what to do with himself. His entire identity was wrapped up in his work. It didn't matter that he was his own boss, because he still had no freedom. And so, Tim embarked on a quest to figure out how to get maximum results in the minimum amount of time. The result has been the incredibly successful 4-hour series of books. The 4-Hour Workweek, The 4-Hour Body, The 4-Hour Chef have all become bestsellers and been translated into dozens of languages. Ferriss' website has a million visitors a month. Now, with The Tim Ferriss Experiment, Ferriss gives himself one week to master skills using the techniques he lays out in the 4-Hour series. He has one week to learn a language. He has one week to build a business. He has one week to learn parkour. The disciplines are wildly different for a reason. They offer Ferriss the chance to show that all learning works in the same way and that the set of strategies Ferriss has developed to learn the maximum amount in the minimum amount of time can be applied to any and every skill. In this episode, Tim, Bryan and Hunter discuss Ferriss' meta-learning strategies, what makes an effective teacher and how we can all get the most out of our most valuable resource: time.Tim Ferris blogs at http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/. You can follow him on twitter at @tferriss. His books are all available on Amazon. And although you can watch The Tim Ferriss Experiment pretty much anywhere, he especially appreciates views and reviews on iTunes, where, by the way, the first episode—where he has one week to get good enough at drums to play in concert with the rock band Foreigner—is free.

Bryan sits down with comedian, UFC Commentator, and Podcaster of the "Joe Rogan Experience," good friend, Joe Rogan. They discuss their personal hunting experiences and as a added bonus, Master Hunter Steven Rinella.

"Grann himself inspires a devotion in readers that can border on the obsessive," writes a Slate journalist describing the work of New Yorker reporter David Grann. We can understand why. Grann's work is obsessively researched and crafted until he produces journalism so exquisitely wrought that you found yourself obsessively talking about it with anyone who will listen. Fittingly enough, Grann's favorite topic to write about is obsession—the obsession of explorers, detectives, murderers, con artists or anyone. In his first book, The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon, Grann tells the story of Percy Fawcett a once world famous explorer's search for El Dorado, a legendary city Fawcett believed to be in the Amazon. Through penis-parasitizing fish, terrifying parasites and much more, Fawcett's expedition endured a harrowing journey through one of the most potentially deadly places on the planet. In his second book, The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession Grann brings together his finest articles for The New Yorker in one place. You might as well buy them both, because once you read one you'll want to obsessively read the other. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Bryan sits down with comedian, Bill Burr. As with other comics associated with The Opie & Anthony Show, in 2008, Burr's voice was featured in the game Grand Theft Auto IV. In the game, Bill plays Jason Michaels of the biker gang The Lost MC in the mission "No Love Lost". In 2009, he reprised his role in the game's expansion pack The Lost and Damned. Burr's special Let it Go was recorded at The Fillmore in San Francisco and premiered on Comedy Central on September 18, 2010. A later special, You People Are All The Same, premiered in 2012 as a Netflix exclusive. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

As a senior writer for Sports Illustrated, Dave Epstein helped break the story that Alex Rodriguez tested positive for steroids in 2003. He's written for the Swimsuit Edition--which he describes as the cushiest assignment ever--and he covered the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Like anyone who has spent a lot of time in and around sports, one question has always nagged at him: how much of a difference do genetics make in athletic performance. Wading into issues like race and gender, Epstein's book lays out the scientific realities of what we today know about the role of genetics in top-level athletic performance. In today's episode, Dave tells us about hyper-muscular babies, the African tribe that dominates distance running and what trait is over represented among top female athletes and fashion models.The Sports Gene: Inside the Science of Extraordinary Athletic Performance is available in all good bookstores. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Bryan sits down with fitness expert, Tony Blauer. Blauer Tactical Systems (BTS) is one of the world's leading consulting companies specializing in the research and development of close quarter tactics & scenario-based training for law enforcement, military and professional self-defense instructors. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

In Merchants of Doubt, Naomi Oreskes and Erik M Conway reveal that the same handful of individuals who have made a career out of selling doubt. Fred Singer, Fred Seitz and Bill Nierenberg began their career as physicists and Cold Warriors. Committed to doing anything they could to oppose a growth in governmental power, they created pseudoscience that denied the dangers of smoking, nuclear winter, the depletion of the ozone layer, acid rain and, most recently, global warming. From their positions well-respected physicists, they have used their credibility to sow doubt in the mind of the public on issues of health and the environment and thereby ensure that nothing is done to change the situation. In this week's episode, Naomi and Erik tell the story of how "small numbers of people can have large, negative impacts, especially if they are organised, determined and have access to power." They tell Bryan and Hunter the realities of global warming. They make it clear, as they say in the book that "there are many reasons why the United States has failed to act on global warming, but at least one is the confusion raised by Bill Nierenberg, Fred Seitz, and Fred Singer." Before we can solve the problem of global warming, we have to agree that there is a problem. Merchants of Doubt can help us do just that.Merchants of Doubt is available from all good booksellers.

Over the course of three decades working in Hollywood, John Truby has fixed over a thousand film scripts. In his book Anatomy of Story: 22 Steps to Becoming a Master Storyteller, John refutes the advice so often given to writers to "just write." By providing specific tools, he takes the process of screenwriting from a mysterious act of inspiration to a series of tools that can be applied to break down any script. But John's advice is not just for storytellers. As John, Bryan and Hunter discuss, a writer cannot take his characters through the process of moral growth without going through that process himself. More than the cornerstone of a great film, writing is a powerful tool for figuring out who you really are and what you really stand for.

Alexis Ohanian co-founded Reddit out of his dorm room at the University of Virginia. As a leader of the grass-roots movement that overturned Congress's Stop Online Piracy Act and Senate IP Protection Act, he earned a spot in The Daily Dot's top ten most influential Internet Rights activists of 2012 and was dubbed the "Mayor of the Internet" by Forbes. Still, as you'll discover in this episode, Alexis is an incredibly down-to-earth guy with a great sense of humor. On today's show, Alexis, Bryan and Hunter talk about Alexis' book Without Their Permission: How the 21st Century Will Be Made, Not Managed. As more and more individuals use the internet to innovate and create better and better business opportunities, there's plenty of reasons to be optimistic. However, there are things we need to do to ensure those freedoms. Without Their Permission: How the 21st Century Will Be Made, Not Managed is available from all major booksellers. Alexis can be followed on twitter @alexisohanian.

Bryan Callen sits down with actor and comedian, Harland Williams from such movies as "Dumb and Dumber," "Freddy Got Fingered," "There's Something About Mary," "Half Baked," "RocketMan," "Sorority Boys," "Down Periscope" and "Employee of The Month." He is an author and illustrator of his own series of children's books involving a little brontosaurus named Jimbo. Williams' love of art drove him to create the series, in which the curious, young dinosaur embarks on a series of amazing adventures and learns important life lessons in the process. The artistically inclined Williams had refined his passion for drawing and painting at Canada's Sheridan College in Oakville, Ontario. Finding a creative outlet in poetry and painting while working as a forest ranger for five years after dropping out of Sheridan College, Williams set his goals to leave the forest as a stand-up comic and actor, soon moving to Los Angeles to pursue his newfound calling. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Bryan and Hunter take this episode to reflect on and synthesize everything they've learned over the course of the last dozen or so episodes recording the show together. From the philosophy of Professor Dan Robinson to understanding human memory with Josh Foer, it's been a wild ride. This was a much needed opportunity to digest all they'd learned and pull out the big overarching lessons they've learned in talking to so many awesome guests.

Bryan and Hunter sit down with the star of "Sullivan and Son," on TBS, stand-up comedian, Steve Byrne. They discuss Steve's sitcom as well as other career moments, including trips overseas doing USO tours, getting married, and having kids. Be sure to Rate and Comment on iTunes.

Charles C. Mann didn't plan to write about the world before and after Columbus, but, at a certain point, he realized he couldn't wait for anyone else to do it. In his book 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus, Mr. Mann relentlessly dispels the myths of Native American life in the Americas before Columbus made landfall in 1492. Although native Americans are often depicted living in an untouched wilderness, the reality of native American life was very different. They transformed their environment, built empires, made war and invented two technologies that would prove vital to Europe's rise: the potato and the corn plant. In his book 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created, Mr. Mann describes how Columbus' arrival in the new world set off the exchange of species between the Americas and the rest of the world. After centuries of relentless plant breeding, the peoples of the new world had transformed the minimally useful ancestors of corn and potatoes into the most productive food-producing technologies in the world. Europe--for centuries in the grip of famine--was finally able to free itself from the struggle for survival, grow its population and usher in the modern world. In China, the sweet potato allowed previously sparsely-inhabited regions to become major population centers. In the Americas, diseases like smallpox created a Native American apocalypse while diseases like malaria would incentivize the development of a slavery based on the forced importation of West African peoples. The roots of our modern world can be traced to the exchange of a few key species. Drawing together the latest scientific research from biology, history, archaeology and anthropology, in this episode Mr. Mann paints a vision of the world that might allow us to finally transcend the narrative of race and allow us to finally see all the peoples of the past as they truly were: just like us.1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus and 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created are both available on Amazon and through all good booksellers.