David McRaney's Blog, page 17
January 29, 2020
YANSS 172 – Douglas Rushkoff implores us to curate a digital, psychedelic substrate that embraces the messiness of human beings
In this episode of the You Are Not So Smart Podcast we sit down with one of the original cyberpunks, the famed journalist, documentarian, media theorist, all-around technology superstar and weirdo, Douglas Rushkoff.
MIT considers Rushkoff one of the “world’s ten most influential thinkers,” and in the episode we talk about his latest (and 20th) book, Team Human.
The book is a bit of a manifesto in which he imagines a new counterculture that would revolt against the algorithms that are slowly altering our collective behavior for the benefit of shareholders.
He implores us, instead, to curate a digital, psychedelic substrate that embraces the messiness of human beings: our unpredictability, our pursuit of novelty and innovation, and our primate/animal/social connectedness.
[image error]The book is presented in a series of aphorisms that add up to a rallying cry for building communities outside of what the machines that tend our walled gardens might suggest we build. As the title suggests, he would prefer that we turned our technological attention to encouraging and facilitating teamwork.
In the book, he says that any technology whose initial purpose is to connect people will eventually become colonized and repurposed to repress and isolate them. But, the good news is that we’ve seen this pattern so often that we can now stop it in its tracks and choose to build something else. In the interview, you’ll hear what his thoughts are on all this — and much more.
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[image error]Douglas Rushkoff is a professor of Media Theory and Digital Economics at the City University of New York and a titan of technology journalism who coined the terms viral media, digital native, and social currency. His bestsellers include Coercion, Present Shock, Throwing Rocks and the Google Bus, Program or Be Programmed, Life Inc, and Media Virus, and his famed PBS Frontline documentaries include Generation Like, The Persuaders, and Merchants of Cool. His latest project is the Team Human podcast.
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Douglas Rushkoff’s Official Website
The World’s Most Influential Thinkers
YANSS 171 – How partisan identities affect our ability to reason, rationalize, and recall
Jay Van Bavel studies “from neurons to social networks…how collective concerns — group identities, moral values, and political beliefs — shape the mind and brain,” and in this episode we travel to his office at NYU to sit down and ask him a zillion questions about how the brain uses motivated reasoning to create the separate realities we argue over on a daily basis.
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View this post on InstagramA post shared by David McRaney (@davidmcraney) on Jan 21, 2020 at 8:06pm PST
Jay Van Bavel is an Associate Professor of Psychology & Neural Science at New York University and director of the Social Perception and Evaluation Lab.
From his paper The Partisan Brain: An Identity-Based Model of Political Belief: “Democracies assume accurate knowledge by the populace, but the human attraction to fake and untrustworthy news poses a serious problem for healthy democratic functioning. …Identification with political parties – known as partisanship – can bias information processing in the human brain. There is extensive evidence that people engage in motivated political reasoning, but recent research suggests that partisanship can alter memory, implicit evaluation, and even perceptual judgments.”
In the episode, you will learn all about his work studying the affects of social identity and morality on politics and human cognition, and how modern media companies capitalize on and influence group identity and morality.
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Social Identity and Morality Lab
The Partisan Brain: An Identity-Based Model of Political Belief
YANSS 170 – Exploring the reasoning of Flat Earthers, a conversation with Mark Sargent
In September of 2019, I sat down with Mark Sargent at the Gather Festival in Stockholm, Sweden to have a conversation. I wanted to try and understand the reasoning behind his beliefs, and non-beliefs — the reasoning that lead him to believe the Earth is flat.
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To be clear, I believe the scientific consensus that the Earth is, well, not flat. But fighting Mark’s beliefs with the facts I believe are true from the sources that I trust was not the point of this conversation. This was not a debate, but an exploration of what lead Mark to believe those facts were false and that those sources were not trustworthy.
This meeting came about because Earlier in the year YANSS presented an episode about Behind the Curve, a documentary about Flat Earthers, and in that episode I sat down with the producers to talk about belief, tribalism, scientific literacy, science denialism, and many other ideas which came to the surface during their investigation into the Flat Earther subculture.
Soon after, the organizers of Gather saw the documentary, listened to that episode of the show, and thought it would be interesting if I demonstrated, on stage, the ideas presented within about how to have respectful conversations with people who believe or feel differently than you do — to maintain empathy and avoid arguing or debating until you truly understand where the person is coming from, until you understand their reasoning and motivations.
Since Mark was the main character in Behind the Curve, they thought it would a great way to start their festival of ideas would be to showcase how ideas like Mark’s are formed and maintained.
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December 18, 2019
YANSS 169 – How scientists use children’s drawings, round rooms, and cave paintings to better understand how minds struggle to share their inner worlds
Moira Dillon studies how “the physical world in which we live shapes the abstract world in which we think,” and in this episode we travel to her Lab for the Developing Mind at NYU to sit down and ask her a zillion questions about how the brain creates the reality we interact with, and how we attempt to communicate that reality to others through language, art, geometry, and mathematics.
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[image error]Moira Dillon studies how the brain uses spatial reasoning to locate objects in her “round room” at NYU
In the show, we ask: How does an organism communicate what it is experiencing in a symbolic medium so that can transfer that information from one mind to another?
You will learn all about Dillon’s work studying children’s (and adults’) drawings, spatial reasoning inside her special “round room” at NYU, and “infants’ sensitivity to shape changes in 2D visual forms,” all of which illuminate like never before how we turn objective reality into our personal, and sometimes agreed-upon, abstract hallucinations.
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YANSS 168 – The 12 patterns politicians fall into when they mistake, misrepresent, and mangle science
In this episode, science journalist Dave Levitan talks about his new book: Not a Scientist: How Politicians Mistake, Misrepresent, and Utterly Mangle Science.
In the book, Levitan takes us through 12 repeating patterns that politicians fall into when they talk about scientific research. Some are nefarious and intentional, some are based on ignorance, and some are just part of the normal business of politicians managing their public image or trying to appeal to their base. Not only do they often get the science wrong, they sometimes fail to communicate the nature of scientific inquiry and the goals of the scientific process itself.
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This episode is sponsored by The Great Courses Plus. Get unlimited access to a huge library of The Great Courses lecture series on many fascinating subjects. Start FOR FREE with The Psychology of Human Behavior taught by David W. Martin. Learn about how your mind makes sense of the world and what motivates us to think, feel, and behave differently from one another. Click here for a FREE TRIAL.
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There is no better way to create a website than with Squarespace. Creating your website with Squarespace is a simple, intuitive process. You can add and arrange your content and features with the click of a mouse. Squarespace makes adding a domain to your site simple; if you sign up for a year you’ll receive a custom domain for free for a year. Start your free trial today, at Squarespace.com and enter offer code SOSMART to get 10% off your first purchase.
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Support the show directly by becoming a patron! Get episodes one-day-early and ad-free. Head over to the YANSS Patreon Page for more details.
Links and Sources
Download – iTunes – Stitcher – RSS – Patreon – Soundcloud
November 20, 2019
YANSS 167 – How to talk to people about things
In this episode, we sit down with negotiation expert Misha Glouberman who explains how to talk to people about things — that is, how to avoid the pitfalls associated with debate when two or more people attempt to come to an agreement that will be mutually beneficial.
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Misha Glouberman teaches negotiation, both in the classroom and within organizations, and he also works as a professional facilitator, which means he helps people design and run conferences and meetings. He also lectures, hosts Trampoline Hall (which has a podcast) — where he interviews the speakers afterfield and fields questions from the audience — and he is the co-author of the book The Chairs Are Where the People Go, a collection of his dictated musings about life recorded and edited by author Sheila Heti.
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This episode is sponsored by The Great Courses Plus. Get unlimited access to a huge library of The Great Courses lecture series on many fascinating subjects. Start FOR FREE with The Psychology of Human Behavior taught by David W. Martin. Learn about how your mind makes sense of the world and what motivates us to think, feel, and behave differently from one another. Click here for a FREE TRIAL.
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There is no better way to create a website than with Squarespace. Creating your website with Squarespace is a simple, intuitive process. You can add and arrange your content and features with the click of a mouse. Squarespace makes adding a domain to your site simple; if you sign up for a year you’ll receive a custom domain for free for a year. Start your free trial today, at Squarespace.com and enter offer code SOSMART to get 10% off your first purchase.
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Support the show directly by becoming a patron! Get episodes one-day-early and ad-free. Head over to the YANSS Patreon Page for more details.
Links and Sources
Download – iTunes – Stitcher – RSS – Patreon – Soundcloud
YANSS 166 – The psychological phenomena that mask our progress when we attempt to change the world for the better
In this episode we explore prevalence induced concept change with psychologist David Levari.
In a nutshell, when we set out to change the world by reducing examples of something we have deemed problematic, and we succeed, a host of psychological phenomena can mask our progress and make those problems seem intractable — as if we are only treading water when, in fact, we’ve created the change we set out to make.
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This episode is sponsored by The Great Courses Plus. Get unlimited access to a huge library of The Great Courses lecture series on many fascinating subjects. Start FOR FREE with The Psychology of Human Behavior taught by David W. Martin. Learn about how your mind makes sense of the world and what motivates us to think, feel, and behave differently from one another. Click here for a FREE TRIAL.
[image error]
There is no better way to create a website than with Squarespace. Creating your website with Squarespace is a simple, intuitive process. You can add and arrange your content and features with the click of a mouse. Squarespace makes adding a domain to your site simple; if you sign up for a year you’ll receive a custom domain for free for a year. Start your free trial today, at Squarespace.com and enter offer code SOSMART to get 10% off your first purchase.
[image error]
Support the show directly by becoming a patron! Get episodes one-day-early and ad-free. Head over to the YANSS Patreon Page for more details.
Links and Sources
Download – iTunes – Stitcher – RSS – Patreon – Soundcloud
Why The World Is Getting Better And Why Hardly Anyone Knows It
John Gray: Steven Pinker is wrong about violence and war
Poll about the world getting better
The problem with solving problems
YANSS 165 – How to avoid the health costs of living a life disconnected
On this episode, journalist Kate Leaver talks about her new book, The Friendship Cure: Reconnecting in the Modern World, in which she explores the crippling, damaging, life-threatening impact of loneliness and the severe mental health costs of living a life disconnected from a support network of close contacts. But…as she explains in the episode, there is a cure…learning how to connect with others and curate better friendships.
In the interview we talk about loneliness, how to make friends, the difference between male and female friendship, platonic friendships, friends with benefits and lots, lots, more, including the Sardinian secret to a long life surrounded by friends, family, and lovable assholes.
Download – iTunes – Stitcher – RSS – Patreon – Soundcloud
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This episode is sponsored by The Great Courses Plus. Get unlimited access to a huge library of The Great Courses lecture series on many fascinating subjects. Start FOR FREE with The Psychology of Human Behavior taught by David W. Martin. Learn about how your mind makes sense of the world and what motivates us to think, feel, and behave differently from one another. Click here for a FREE TRIAL.
[image error]
There is no better way to create a website than with Squarespace. Creating your website with Squarespace is a simple, intuitive process. You can add and arrange your content and features with the click of a mouse. Squarespace makes adding a domain to your site simple; if you sign up for a year you’ll receive a custom domain for free for a year. Start your free trial today, at Squarespace.com and enter offer code SOSMART to get 10% off your first purchase.
[image error]
Support the show directly by becoming a patron! Get episodes one-day-early and ad-free. Head over to the YANSS Patreon Page for more details.
Links and Sources
Download – iTunes – Stitcher – RSS – Patreon – Soundcloud
October 8, 2019
YANSS 164 – Why science says meetings are inevitable and essential but their awfulness is neither
You probably hate meetings — most people do — and much of their awfulness feels inevitable which makes meetings seem unnecessary, but in this episode psychologist and organizational scientist Steven Rogelberg says that neither of these conclusions are true.
Meetings are only bad if we make them bad, and since they are crucial to the cohesion of any institution, he wrote a book called The Surprising Science of Meetings about how to use his research and the research of others to improve the meetings that must take place within any organization.
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This episode is sponsored by The Great Courses Plus. Get unlimited access to a huge library of The Great Courses lecture series on many fascinating subjects. Start FOR FREE with The Psychology of Human Behavior taught by David W. Martin. Learn about how your mind makes sense of the world and what motivates us to think, feel, and behave differently from one another. Click here for a FREE TRIAL.
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Innovative materials. Advanced construction. Timeless aesthetic. Born at MIT, Ministry of Supply created a new category of clothing. They call it “performance professional.” They re-invented sharp, classic styles in materials that synchronize with the human body. Use the offer code YANSS to get $10 off your first purchase of scientifically defined, sustainable, amazing dress clothing delivered straight to your door.
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Support the show directly by becoming a patron! Get episodes one-day-early and ad-free. Head over to the YANSS Patreon Page for more details.
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We often think of science as lab coats and petri dishes, telescopes and test tubes, but scientists study every aspect of the natural world. When you learn that there are scientists who study meetings, those times that we get together in board rooms or over video chat or on conference calls or even just between coffees, it reminds you that everything we do is part of the natural world. The interaction of atoms and molecules and phsycical forces that scale up to things like power point presentations and weekly department head check-ins and so on.
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YANSS 163 – Why pursuing the things we think will make us happy can make us sad and avoiding the things we think will make us sad can make us miserable
In this episode we welcome Yale psychologist Laurie Santos who discusses her new podcast — The Happiness Lab — which explores how wrong and misguided we can be when we pursue those things that we think will make us happy (or avoid those things that we think will make us sad).
Based on the psychology course she teaches at Yale — “Psychology and the Good Life,” the most popular class in the university’s 300-year history — The Happiness Lab is a scientific tour of the latest research into what does and does not make us happy, and sad, and miserable, and content, and depressed, and joyous, and fulfilled.
Download – iTunes – Stitcher – RSS – Patreon – Soundcloud
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This episode is sponsored by The Great Courses Plus. Get unlimited access to a huge library of The Great Courses lecture series on many fascinating subjects. Start FOR FREE with The Psychology of Human Behavior taught by David W. Martin. Learn about how your mind makes sense of the world and what motivates us to think, feel, and behave differently from one another. Click here for a FREE TRIAL.
[image error]
There is no better way to create a website than with Squarespace. Creating your website with Squarespace is a simple, intuitive process. You can add and arrange your content and features with the click of a mouse. Squarespace makes adding a domain to your site simple; if you sign up for a year you’ll receive a custom domain for free for a year. Start your free trial today, at Squarespace.com and enter offer code SOSMART to get 10% off your first purchase.
[image error]
Support the show directly by becoming a patron! Get episodes one-day-early and ad-free. Head over to the YANSS Patreon Page for more details.
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You will learn that the pursuit of happiness, like a lot of what we talk about You Are Not So Smart, is scrambled up by same misplaced confidence that gets us into trouble in other domains: We don’t know what would make us happy, but we also don’t know that we don’t know that, which would be a manageable problem except for the fact that we also believe that we do know what would make us happy. So, when we poll people and get their opinions on how to create a policy or how to design…anything, people will say what they think they want, and when we make those things, it makes everyone sad.
In the episode, we discuss why ATMs make us lonely, why you should talk to strangers on the subway, and how winning the lottery would be the worst thing that could ever happen to you, and so much more.
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