
Unpaywalled: The science of Johann Hari
From Science Fictions by Tom Chivers and Stuart Ritchie
May 12, 2026 · 1h 11m
About this episode
Tom and Stuart discuss Johann Hari's career and his popular science books.
We are sorry we’ve been missing so many episodes recently! Stuart’s been busy and Tom’s been… also busy. We’re busy. Hopefully back to normal service next week. In the meantime, here’s an old paid episode, unpaywalled. Apologies. … Johann Hari is a journalist with an interesting past who has now written four very popular books on scientific topics (addiction, depression, attention, and obesity). Are those books any good? In this paid-subscriber-only episode of The Studies Show , Tom and Stuart—who have both written reviews of Hari’s books—discuss Hari’s career, his sudden emergence as a science writer, and exactly how many miles you need to travel around the world to ensure your book becomes a New York Times bestseller. Show Notes * The funniest bad book review ever , of The Meaning of Disgust by Colin McGinn (review by Nina Strohminger) * Hari’s corrections page for his new book where he discusses the Jay Rayner debacle * Article about Hari’s quotations of Antonio Negri * Brian Whelan’s criticism of Hari from 2011 * And another article by the same author on the same topic * Guy Walters on Hari in the New Statesman * David Allen Green on Hari and the allegations of sockpuppeting…
People in this episode
Hosts: Tom Chivers, Stuart Ritchie
Topics covered
- journalism
- science writing
- book reviews
- addiction
- depression
- attention
- obesity
Keywords
- Johann Hari
- science writing
- book reviews
- addiction
- depression
- obesity
- attention
- New York Times bestseller
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: New York Times, The Studies Show, Telegraph, New Statesman
Books & works: The Meaning of Disgust
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