Can brain science save addiction policy? | Keith Humphreys

From Our Neurons to Yours

From Our Neurons to Yours
Can brain science save addiction policy? | Keith Humphreys
Jul 10, 2025 Season 7 Episode 10
Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute at Stanford University, Nicholas Weiler, Keith Humphreys

If addiction is a disease of the brain, what does that mean for how we treat people—and how we write policy? In this wide-ranging conversation, Stanford addiction expert and policy advisor Keith Humphreys returns to the show to walk us through what neuroscience has taught us about substance use disorders and how that science intersects with law, public health, and politics.

From the biology of craving to the limits of autonomy, we explore the tension between compassion and accountability, and what truly effective treatment and prevention might look like.

Episode Highlights

  • Why addiction isn’t just a moral failure—and how brain science explains drug-seeking behavior
  • The biological pathways affected by opioids, alcohol, and stimulants—and why some drugs are harder to treat
  • What makes some people more vulnerable to addiction than others
  • Why effective addiction policy must account for impaired decision-making
  • How policy can—and can’t—respond to the science
  • The promise and limitations of brain stimulation, psychedelics, and medications like naloxone
  • Why prevention—especially for teens—is key to long-term change
  • What a more human, effective, and science-based future could look like

Resources & Links

We want to hear from your neurons! Email us at at neuronspodcast@stanford.edu

Send us a text!

Thanks for listening! If you're enjoying our show, please take a moment to give us a review on your podcast app of choice and share this episode with your friends. That's how we grow as a show and bring the stories of the frontiers of neuroscience to a wider audience.

Learn more about the Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute at Stanford and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Episode Artwork Can brain science save addiction policy? | Keith Humphreys 45:51 Episode Artwork How basic science transformed stroke care | Marion Buckwalter 34:51 Episode Artwork Surgery as a window into brain resilience | Martin Angst 37:32 Episode Artwork Best of: How neural prosthetics could free minds trapped by brain injury | Jaimie Henderson 22:20 Episode Artwork The secrets of resilient aging | Beth Mormino & Anthony Wagner 36:30 Episode Artwork Building AI simulations of the human brain | Dan Yamins 32:56 Episode Artwork What ChatGPT understands: Large language models and the neuroscience of meaning | Laura Gwilliams 42:31 Episode Artwork What the other half of the brain does | Brad Zuchero 35:00 Episode Artwork Stimulating the brain with sound | Kim Butts Pauly and Raag Airan 30:43 Episode Artwork Does good sleep insulate the brain against Alzheimer's? | Erin Gibson 39:25 Episode Artwork How to live in a world without free will | Robert Sapolsky 40:46 Episode Artwork The power of psychedelics meets the power of placebo: ketamine, opioids, and hope in depression treatment | Boris Heifets & Theresa Lii 35:10 Episode Artwork Seeing sounds, tasting colors: the science of synaesthesia with David Eagleman (re-release) 21:52 Episode Artwork The BRAIN Initiative: the national vision for the future of neuroscience is now in doubt | Bill Newsome 39:23 Episode Artwork The cannabinoids within: how marijuana hijacks an ancient signaling system in the brain | Ivan Soltesz 37:33 Episode Artwork Memory Palaces: the science of mental time travel and the brain's GPS system | Lisa Giocomo (Re-release) 25:50 Episode Artwork Why new Alzheimer's drugs don't work | Mike Greicius, Stanford University School of Medicine 25:48 Episode Artwork Depression's distinctive fingerprints in the brain | Leanne Williams, Stanford University 28:11 Episode Artwork How the brain helps cancers grow | Michelle Monje 21:27 Episode Artwork Unraveling Timothy Syndrome: the new science of human brain development | Sergiu Pasca 30:31 Episode Artwork How VR could help treat depression with "radical behaviorist" Dr. Kim Bullock 21:36 Episode Artwork Electronic skin and the future of wearable technology | Zhenan Bao 23:35 Episode Artwork How a new kind of brain plasticity could help make sense of addiction | Michelle Monje and Rob Malenka 22:54 Episode Artwork Our plastic brains: learning, memory and aging with the one and only Carla Shatz (Rerelease) 21:56 Episode Artwork Programming Announcement 0:25