David McRaney (he/him)

David McRaney is a journalist and lecturer fascinated with brains, minds, and culture. He created the ongoing podcast You Are Not So Smart based on his 2009 internationally bestselling book of the same name and its followup, You Are Now Less Dumb. Before that, he cut his teeth as a newspaper reporter covering Hurricane Katrina on the Gulf Coast and in the Pine Belt region of the Deep South. Later, he covered things like who tests rockets for NASA, what it is like to run a halfway home for homeless people who are HIV-positive, and how a family sent their kids to college by making and selling knives. Since then, he has been an editor, photographer, voiceover artist, television host, journalism teacher, lecturer, and tornado survivor. Most recently, after finishing his latest book, How Minds Change, all about the science behind how and why people do and do not change their minds and the intricacies and nuances of persuasion. After finishing How Minds Change, he wrote, produced, and recorded a six-hour audio documentary exploring the history of the idea and the word – genius – which is the subject of his next book.