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All Seasons

Season 1

  • S01E01 Isolation

    • January 18, 2017
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    What happens when your brain is deprived of stimulation? What effect does being cut off from interaction with the outside world have on a person? What effect does it have on me, when I am locked in a windowless, soundproof isolation chamber for three days? In this episode of Mind Field, I take both an objective and a very intimate look at Isolation.

  • S01E02 Conformity

    • January 18, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    We are all unique individuals. We follow the beat of our own drum. We wouldn’t throw our own beliefs out the window just to fit in...or would we? In this episode of Mind Field, I demonstrate the strong, human urge to conform, and just how far people will go to fall in with the crowd.

  • S01E03 Destruction

    • January 25, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    We humans love to build, create, and organize. So why do we also love to destroy things? Can violently breaking stuff really help to calm us down, or does it just make us more angry? In this episode of Mind Field, I take a hard look at our urge to destroy.

  • S01E04 Artificial Intelligence

    • February 1, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    So you say you love your computer or smartphone...but can it love you back? As we become more dependent on technology, and our technology becomes more lifelike, where does the line between human and computer lie? And what happens when our relationships become romantic? In this episode of Mind Field, I look into Artificial Intelligence.

  • S01E05 Freedom of Choice

    • February 8, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    We may value having Freedom of Choice, but are we actually happier when we have limited choices...or even no choice at all? Do we truly have control over our decisions, or are they really predetermined by other forces? My fellow YouTubers and I have our minds read by a “box” that reveals who - or what - is really calling the shots.

  • S01E06 Touch

    • February 15, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    How much of the sensations we feel is determined by our physical bodies? Maybe our minds play a bigger role than we know. I’ll see if people can be tricked into feeling intense physical pain, even though it’s all in their heads. I’ll also look at a machine that makes it possible for you to tickle yourself, and I’ll show you a weird physical illusion you can do at home.

  • S01E07 In Your Face

    • February 22, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    How much do we communicate through facial expressions? Are our expressions affected by our moods, or is it the other way around? And what happens to your ability to relate to others when your facial muscles are frozen by Botox? In this episode of Mind Field, I take a look at what’s In Your Face.

  • S01E08 Do You Know Yourself?

    • March 1, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    What makes you, you? If even the most basic parts of you, like your memories or your past, can be forgotten or manipulated, how can you know ever really know who “you” are? In this episode of Mind Field I look at how well Do You Know Yourself?

Season 2

  • S02E01 The Greater Good

    • December 6, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Would you reroute a train to run over one person to prevent it from running over five others? In the classic “Trolley Problem” survey, most people say they would. But I wanted to test what people would actually do in a real-life situation. In the world’s first realistic simulation of this controversial moral dilemma, unsuspecting subjects will be forced to make what they believe is a life-or-death decision.

  • SPECIAL 0x1 Grayson Brulte Interview

    • December 6, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    I get candid with Grayson Brulte, autonomous vehicle expert, as we discuss the potential ethical issues associated with driverless cars.

  • S02E02 The Psychedelic Experience

    • December 6, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Do psychedelic drugs really bring about self-healing and personal enlightenment? New research says they may. In this episode, I travel to the Amazonian jungle of Peru to experience the mind-expanding effects of the psychedelic brew Ayahuasca. I’m joined by Imperial College London’s Head of Psychedelic Research, Dr. Robin Carhart-Harris, who measures the impact of Ayahuasca on my brain.

  • SPECIAL 0x2 Uncut Shaman Song

    • December 6, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Watch as a Peruvian Shaman performs his icaro—or healing chant—in its entirety, from my Ayahuasca ceremony.

  • SPECIAL 0x3 A Few Personal Questions

    • December 6, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    With just seven days until my Ayahuasca ceremony, I fill out a recommended personality survey—which becomes a little revealing.

  • SPECIAL 0x4 Gail Thomas Interview

    • December 6, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    I explore how psychedelics can improve mental health in my interview with cancer survivor Gail Thomas, as we discuss her experience in a study involving psilocybin--or mushrooms.

  • SPECIAL 0x5 Digital Drugs

    • December 6, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Is there a way to experience the effects of psychedelic drugs without having to ingest anything? Watch as I test out a few of these unconventional audio and visual files to see if their claims are true.

  • S02E03 Interrogation

    • December 6, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Psychology. Neuroscience. Drugs. All can be tools of interrogation. In this episode, an expert shows me how to coerce unsuspecting subjects into signing false confessions; a police psychologist questions me about my personal life after I am injected with a truth serum; and I match wits against a new brainwave-reading lie-detection method developed at Northwestern University.

  • SPECIAL 0x6 Uncut False Confession

    • December 6, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Expert Melissa Russano elicits a false confession from one of our test subjects in this fascinating, uncut session.

  • SPECIAL 0x7 False Confession Victim

    • December 6, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    I sit down with Jeffrey Deskovic, a real-life victim of a false confession conviction.

  • S02E04 Your Brain on Tech

    • December 6, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Technology isn’t just changing our lives. It’s literally changing our brains -- and maybe for the better. In this episode, I’m a human lab rat in a groundbreaking study at UC Irvine, where scientists test how playing 3D video games affects my spatial memory. Will 10 days of gaming improve my ability to physically navigate a giant, 60-foot maze? And will an fMRI machine detect any physical changes to my brain?

  • SPECIAL 0x8 The Human Lab Rat

    • December 6, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Check out this extended cut of my challenging experience as a human lab rat in a giant, 60-foot real-world maze.

  • S02E05 How to Make a Hero

    • December 13, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    What makes a hero? Dr. Philip Zimbardo, the psychologist behind the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment, now runs seminars to teach everyday people how to be heroes. But can heroism be learned? I put his unsuspecting students into a fake crisis situation to see if they would act heroically. Also, I asked employees to help me run a seemingly dangerous experiment, to see if they would blow the whistle to stop me.

  • SPECIAL 0x9 Hero in the Sky

    • December 13, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    I interview Shirley Dygert, a first time skydiver, and her tandem skydiving instructor, Dave Hartsock, about a treacherous skydive they both miraculously survived.

  • SPECIAL 0x10 Mr. Xtreme

    • December 13, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    In San Diego, real-life superheroes walk the streets as part of the Xtreme Justice League. I chat with Mr. Xtreme, one of the league’s most visible members, to discuss what it means to be a hero in today’s society.

  • S02E06 The Power of Suggestion

    • December 20, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Exactly how do placebos work? Researchers believe that, through the power of suggestion, placebos may unleash the power of our own subconscious minds to cure ourselves. I was honored to participate in McGill University’s groundbreaking study of an accessory-assisted placebo. Could a fake, non-functioning “Sham Brain Scanner” enable children with ADHD and other neurological conditions to alleviate their own symptoms?

  • SPECIAL 0x11 Thought Implant

    • December 20, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Check out the final stage of our power of suggestion test, where we try to convince our subjects that a brain scanner can implant a number in their minds.

  • SPECIAL 0x12 Sham Acupuncture

    • December 20, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    I go deeper into accessory-assisted placebos by discussing sham acupuncture—and getting stuck with a few needles in the process.

  • SPECIAL 0x13 Unleashed

    • December 20, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    I attempt to discuss placebos, but my furry co-star keeps stealing the scene.

  • S02E07 Divergent Minds

    • December 27, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Scientists can’t dissect living people’s brains to study their function. But by examining the behavior of people whose brains are atypical (due to stroke, injury, or being born that way), we can learn a lot about all our brains. In this episode, I travel to London to meet a blind, autistic savant with astonishing musical abilities, and I volunteer to have my own brain’s function temporarily disrupted at UCLA’s Neuromodulation Lab.

  • SPECIAL 0x14 Hearing Test

    • December 27, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Let’s do a little test. I’ll play two tones and you see if you’re one of the few people who can notice a difference between them.

  • SPECIAL 0x15 The Musical Savant

    • December 27, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Derek Paravicini, a blind, autistic pianist and musical savant, sits down with me at the keyboard and shows off his incredible range of musical styles.

  • SPECIAL 0x16 Dynamic Duet

    • December 27, 2017
    • YouTube Premium

    Jazz pianist Dave O’Brien and his student Derek Paravicini play an impressive piano duet for me.

  • S02E08 The Electric Brain

    • January 3, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Our nervous system is fundamentally electric. We move our arm by sending a signal to the muscles that control it. That means we can bypass our brains and use electricity to control our bodies, or use our minds to control other bodies. In this episode, I explore how we can use electricity and our brains to control cockroaches, move other people’s limbs, restore motion to people who are paralyzed, and even read people’s minds.

Season 3

  • S03E01 The Cognitive Tradeoff Hypothesis

    • December 5, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Humans are the only Earthlings with complex language. But at what cost was that ability acquired? In this episode, I visit Tetsuro Matsuzawa to learn about his influential cognitive tradeoff hypothesis.

  • SPECIAL 0x19 The Origins of Disgust

    • December 5, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    With the help of Cecile Sarabian, Dr. Andrew MacIntosh and some fake poop, Michael observes levels of disgust among Japanese Macaques.

  • SPECIAL 0x20 Rock, Paper, Scissors

    • December 5, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Kyoto University Ph.D. candidate Jie Gao shares her research involving Chimpanzees and the schoolyard game “Rock, Paper, Scissors.”

  • SPECIAL 0x21 Brains and Language

    • December 5, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael and Dr. Terrence Deacon discuss the connection between language and the physical brain.

  • S03E02 Moral Licensing

    • December 5, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    How are our moral decisions influenced by factors we’re not aware of? A phenomenon known as Moral Licensing claims that when we do something good, we often subconsciously allow ourselves to then do something bad. In this episode, I take a look at whether those who donate money to charity become more likely to let a kid take the blame for a crime they know they committed.

  • SPECIAL 0x22 The Park PSA

    • December 5, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    We edited the fake Los Angeles parks PSA from our Moral Licensing demonstration!

  • SPECIAL 0x23 Virtual Dilemmas

    • December 5, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael wrestles with two moral dilemmas in VR, designed by researchers Dr. Erick Ramirez and Dr. Scott LaBarge.

  • S03E03 The Stilwell Brain

    • December 12, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    There are 100 billion individual neurons in the human brain. Working together, they allow us to make sense of, and move through, the world around us. Scientists have built replicas of the human brain with computers, but no one has ever successfully made a brain out of humans. On this episode, I’ll travel back to my hometown of Stilwell, Kansas, and turn it into a working brain!

  • S03E04 The Stanford Prison Experiment

    • December 19, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Normal people can become monsters, given the right situation. That’s the standard narrative of the Stanford Prison Experiment, one of the most famous psychological experiments of all time. But what if the cause of its participants’ cruel behavior wasn’t what we’ve always been told?

  • S03E05 Should I Die?

    • December 26, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    If I could live forever, should I? How does being reminded of our own mortality affect us psychologically? In this episode I speak with mortician and death positivity activist Caitlin Doughty and visit a cryonics facility trying to extend human life indefinitely. Will I take them up on their offer, or will I choose to die?

  • S03E06 How to Talk to Aliens

    • January 2, 2019
    • YouTube Premium

    If we send messages to outer space, what should they say? And how should they be written? Should we even attempt to make contact with whatever (or whoever) might be out there at all?

  • S03E07 Behavior and Belief

    • January 9, 2019
    • YouTube Premium

    How can a lie become true? In this episode, Dr. Aaron Blaisdell and I create a game show that is actually a giant “human Skinner Box” to observe the formation of superstitious beliefs. And Dr. Samuel Veissière helps me design and perform a placebo reverse exorcism, harnessing the power of belief in both science and religion to convince normal people that a spirit has possessed their bodies.

  • S03E08 Mind Reading

    • January 16, 2019
    • YouTube Premium

    Does mind reading freak you out? I knew you’d say that. On this episode, I’ll explore the science behind real-life mind reading. I’ll visit a researcher who will attempt to reconstruct images from my memory, and travel to Japan to meet with a scientist who is - for the first time ever – predicting the content of peoples’ dreams.

  • SPECIAL 0x38 What Is The Scariest Thing?

    • October 24, 2019

    Everyone is scared of something ... but what's the SCARIEST thing? Is it even possible to answer such a question? In this special Michael explores the dark recesses of the mind to learn how fears are born and whether there exists a grand, unifying terror.

Additional Specials

  • SPECIAL 0x17 Marcie Bockbrader Interview

    • January 3, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Research Physiatrist Marcie Bockbrader talks to me about a brain-computer interface project that is helping a paralyzed man move his arm.

  • SPECIAL 0x18 Sending a Signal

    • January 3, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    I interview principal research statistician David Friedenberg about his role in analyzing all the data collected in a project aimed at helping a paralyzed man move again.

  • SPECIAL 0x24 Coin Toss

    • December 12, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael uses a series of coin flips and a large group of people to demonstrate the “wisdom of the crowd.”

  • SPECIAL 0x25 Q & A

    • December 12, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael recruits local Vsauce fans for his Brain experiment, and fields questions in a Q&A setting.

  • SPECIAL 0x26 Memory Lane

    • December 12, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael shares memories with his mom, who has saved everything from his childhood - from report cards to his space camp jacket.

  • SPECIAL 0x27 Fast Times at Blue Valley High

    • December 12, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael takes Dr. Chris Eliasmith on a tour through his high school, including his forensics team’s wall of fame.

  • SPECIAL 0x28 Jelly Bean Experiment

    • December 12, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael conducts his own version of the famous “jelly bean jar” experiment and reveals the statistical significance of the results.

  • SPECIAL 0x29 A Great Performance

    • December 19, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael learns the true story behind Stanford Prison Experiment guard Dave Eshleman’s “John Wayne” moniker.

  • SPECIAL 0x30 Personal Responsibility

    • December 19, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael learns more about Ben Blum’s cousin Alex and his personal transformation after participating in an armed bank robbery

  • SPECIAL 0x31 A Death Positive World

    • December 26, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael meets with Caitlin Doughty and learns about a death-positive culture in Indonesia, where relatives keep their dead loved ones in their homes.

  • SPECIAL 0x32 World Views

    • December 26, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael meets with psychologists Dr. Jeff Greenberg and Dr. Sheldon Solomon to discuss how death affects our world views.

  • SPECIAL 0x33 A Frozen Pioneer

    • December 26, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael visits Alcor life extension and learns about the first person to ever be frozen using cryonics.

  • SPECIAL 0x34 A Family Affair

    • December 26, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael visits Alcor life extension and learns about the family behind – and preserved by – cryonics.

  • SPECIAL 0x35 Philosophizing About Death

    • December 26, 2018
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael discusses the philosophy of death, and its changing definition, with Dr. Max More, CEO of Alcor life extension.

  • SPECIAL 0x36 Barnard's Star

    • January 2, 2019
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael and Dr. Douglas Vakoch discuss Barnard’s Star, the closest star to our solar system, within the context of sending messages into space.

  • SPECIAL 0x37 The Golden Record

    • January 2, 2019
    • YouTube Premium

    Michael and Dr. Steven Vance discuss the famous “Golden Record”, which was sent aboard NASA’s Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft.

  • SPECIAL 0x39 I Watch 3 Episodes of Mind Field With Our Experts & Researchers

    • October 14, 2019
    • YouTube Premium

    I asked a group of colleagues who worked with me on the series to sit down at Vsauce HQ and watch through three entire episodes. We go behind the scenes, elaborate on topics in the episodes, and dig in to what impact working on Mind Field has had on their current research.