Paul Bloom

[0] Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert, Experts on Expert.

[1] I'm Dak Shepard.

[2] I'm joined by Madeline Paddalen.

[3] Hello.

[4] Madeline Patelan.

[5] That's my new name.

[6] Yeah, it's a new name, a new moniker.

[7] A new monica.

[8] I'm trying to think with form I was filling out.

[9] Maybe it was one of these school forms, like, what are your nicknames for your kids?

[10] And it's like, where would I begin?

[11] For everyone I know, I have got like 35 nicknames.

[12] Yeah.

[13] For everyone.

[14] I love a nickname.

[15] I was thinking about that on one of my walks.

[16] Like, if I had a kid, what would I name it?

[17] And then I would definitely want it to have the ability for nickname.

[18] Right, right.

[19] Yeah, you know what's really funny is, I think, as you know, I wanted for 30 years to have a child named Lincoln.

[20] I thought it was going to be a boy.

[21] Yeah.

[22] And so I would float that by Bree all the time.

[23] And she'd go, I don't want a Lincoln because everyone would call him link.

[24] Yeah, we do that.

[25] And what's funny is I was like, they're not going to call him Lincoln.

[26] Yeah, that's gross.

[27] And then I'd call Link, Link, Link.

[28] All the time.

[29] All the time.

[30] And I like it.

[31] It's so funny.

[32] But before I had a person to place it with, it felt like a bad nickname.

[33] Okay, okay.

[34] Since we started this shindig, this public barbecue, that is the podcast, Paul Bloom was always kind of.

[35] Top of mind.

[36] Top of mind.

[37] In the Danny Conneman list, people we had heard many times on other podcasts and just prayed we could speak with at some point.

[38] And we've done it.

[39] Paul Bloom is an award -winning psychologist who's still.

[40] studies how children and adults make sense of the world.

[41] He has many fantastic books against empathy, the case for rational compassion, just babies, the origin of good and evil, how pleasure works.

[42] Descartes' baby, how children learn the meaning of words.

[43] Most importantly, he has a new book that we talk about in -depth today, right now, called The Sweet Spot, The Pleasure of Suffering and the Search for Meaning.

[44] So cool.

[45] Yeah, his whole thing that I love about him is he takes something we commonly hold as negative or positive in challenges it be that empathy or now suffering.

[46] Yeah.

[47] And it's a wonderfully stimulating conversation.

[48] It's a good time.

[49] It's a good time.

[50] So please enjoy one of our heroes, Paul Bloom.

[51] Wondry Plus subscribers can listen to Armchair Expert early and add free right now.

[52] Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts.

[53] Or you can listen for free wherever you get your podcasts.

[54] He's an armchair.

[55] I was listening to your Stephen Pinker talk yesterday, and all of a sudden you mentioned my name.

[56] Of course!

[57] Oh, yeah.

[58] I got a shout -down.

[59] You'll hate this.

[60] But, you know, you're on the pantheon of psychologists.

[61] You're just, you're incredible.

[62] You heard your name on the Pinker episode, but your name has been said, Monica.

[63] By the way, this is Monica.

[64] Hi, Monica.

[65] Hey, nice to meet you.

[66] So nice to meet you.

[67] How many times do you think we brought up Paul in 350 episodes?

[68] You probably came up in our first episode as, like, like someone we want to talk to.

[69] Maybe 75, 80 times.

[70] The reason, of course, we're obsessive with you is of the many, many Sam episodes we had listened to, really you and Jonathan Haidt were our favorites of all time.

[71] If I wanted to recommend someone that show, like I would say, listen to Paul Bloom on that show.

[72] I love your point of view on everything virtually you talk about.

[73] So we're just gigantic fans.

[74] Oh, thank you so much.

[75] That's wonderful.

[76] And one of the things that interests me when I talk to people like you or Adam Graham, or all these different people is, I'm most curious why anyone goes into what they go into, okay?

[77] So I think the reason I love your work is, I could be wrong about it, but you seem to have a proclivity to want to disprove really commonly held definitive statements we have, like empathy is great, prejudice is bad.

[78] And I have the same proclivity, and I know what mine comes from, and I'm curious if you know why that's an interest of yours.

[79] It is in part a desire to sort of debunk simple ideas that sort of, I think, are too simple.

[80] I think it's not so much that I think these ideas are wrong or I'm pushing, and I want to sort of be the opposite, whatever else says.

[81] But I just think some things, you've got to look deeper.

[82] And if you look deeper and you think really hard, like you think about kindness.

[83] And you realize kindness isn't just one thing.

[84] Or, you know, you think about suffering.

[85] And some suffering is terrible.

[86] It's just bad for you.

[87] Nothing good to be said about it.

[88] Another suffering might be beneficial.

[89] or fun.

[90] And so I like looking deeper into these things.

[91] I find I kind of have a dream job in that I could look at the questions that really excite me and dive into them and then write about them and do research on them.

[92] Yeah.

[93] Could you say at what point in your career that transition happened where you had the autonomy to kind of just explore what you loved and not either make a name for yourself or find gainful employment or any of those things?

[94] Can you remember when you felt the freedom of that?

[95] I actually can.

[96] I studied language in graduate school.

[97] I was very interested in that.

[98] And I worked with Susan Kerry and also Stephen Pinker, who was just on your show.

[99] Yeah.

[100] And I did work on that.

[101] I'm still very interested in that.

[102] But I was an assistant professor and a psychologist, Paul Rosen came and gave a talk.

[103] It was about disgust and morality.

[104] What we feel is gross.

[105] What we feel is immoral.

[106] And I'm listening, and this is the coolest thing ever.

[107] And I said, I wish I could study that.

[108] And it was like, a year later, I said, well, what's starting?

[109] helping me. And so I just reconfigured my lab, and I started to look at questions about disgust and morality.

[110] I've always done research with children, and I think what children think.

[111] And then I realized that I could just do whatever the hell I want, as long as it's of some value and of interest to people and, you know, hopefully good science.

[112] And then I felt I had the freedom.

[113] Yeah, and prior to that, like, what was the story you were telling yourself that this wasn't the type of thing that got funding or didn't get eyes?

[114] Or can you remember the argument in your head for why you weren't previously pursuing those?

[115] You know, it's more of a sense of you don't want to embarrass yourself.

[116] Uh -huh.

[117] And if you study technical things, which I did originally in my career, having to do with syntax and word learning and everything like that, I don't want to diss that line of work.

[118] I remain very excited about it.

[119] But nobody rolls their eyes when you're telling that.

[120] I mean, maybe some people think it's boring.

[121] But if you study, why we get so upset about somebody who has sex with chickens?

[122] Yeah, I love that kind of question.

[123] Well, then.

[124] And people are saying, is that a scientific question?

[125] Why do people like original artwork more than forgeries?

[126] Why do people like BDSM?

[127] And all of a sudden, you know, you're in an area where there's a high potential for looking silly.

[128] Yeah.

[129] And I don't know.

[130] Maybe I do look silly sometimes, but I find these irresistible questions.

[131] Us too.

[132] It's pretty much this whole podcast.

[133] Yeah.

[134] Definitely the fact check.

[135] There's nothing we like more.

[136] This was the recent one we came up with Monica and I. I was like, okay, you're dating someone.

[137] Let's just say, for instance, my wife.

[138] She's 41.

[139] We've been together for, I don't know, 15 years.

[140] What if she had nude photographs of herself at 17 years old?

[141] Is it okay for him to enjoy those?

[142] To look at them, A, and then B, enjoy them because you've got to wonder if there's a victim in this scenario.

[143] I have no position, but it's just a, that's the kind of question I love asking, which is like, what is the morality of that?

[144] On the one hand, it's a question about the morality of how young is too young.

[145] and it's culture.

[146] I mean, 17 is quite young in this culture.

[147] Lissa and other cultures, other times.

[148] And then there's a cool question, which is you're looking at pictures of somebody who's now fully an adult.

[149] Yeah, yeah.

[150] You know, I would say to some extent, her consent, what she thought of it might matter.

[151] Right, but I'm a guy, so I'm innately perverted.

[152] So I was like, if I had pictures of myself at 17 naked and my wife wanted to see them, I would be thrilled with that notion, just that she'd have any kind of interest whatsoever.

[153] me physically is always going to be a plus for me. I think the difficult question is what if you yourself got aroused at pictures of yourself when you were 17?

[154] Well, Paul, I most certainly would.

[155] I have a long history of being autoerotic.

[156] As much as I don't like my face, I have had moments of autoeroticism.

[157] Okay, let's not get bogged down in that.

[158] I guess the reason I'm asking because I think my proclivity is I think I grew up, well, I grew up with a mom who had two suicide attempts.

[159] And so I think for me, emotions are scary when I was a kid.

[160] They were scary.

[161] I don't know how to tweak them.

[162] And I think for me, I got kind of obsessed with finding out what the logical fallacy that underlied this really huge reaction.

[163] And I think I've pursued that in life.

[164] And I think as a partner, I'm annoying.

[165] We were watching the show scenes from a marriage.

[166] I really recommend it.

[167] It's such a deep dive into the psychology of relationships.

[168] But I found myself really identifying with the main character because he was trying to really work his wife through this issue and trying to get down to the bottom of what maybe was really going on.

[169] And I was like, oh, my God, that's what it's like being married to me. I'm hoping to clutch onto some logical component we can fix so that I don't have to ever experience the very scary emotions.

[170] And I was just curious if that's your background at all without having to say anything too revealing about yourself.

[171] I'm two episodes into that show.

[172] And, you know, she reveals her infidelity to her husband, says, I'm off to go.

[173] this guy for six months.

[174] And his reaction, this is in part to answer to your question, is totally alien to me. Which he says, well, I don't think this is right for you.

[175] Maybe you should stay for a few more weeks with me. Well, I think his reaction is actually hugely unnatural.

[176] It would be rage, devastation, shock, but he was so analytic.

[177] And I aspire towards being that analytic in my life.

[178] But no. The short answer is absolutely no. Yeah, I watched that episode last.

[179] night.

[180] Oh, you did?

[181] Yeah, I just put it on to like go to sleep and then of course I watched the whole thing and I couldn't stop.

[182] And it is something Dax would do.

[183] I mean, you're, you also have high emotions as well, but like trying to figure it out just using logic alone and removing the emotional portion, which is is removing a portion of reality.

[184] So I don't know that it's all that helpful, but it was crazy watching that.

[185] A full life requires both.

[186] I have made a lot of arguments when it comes to moral decisions and certain things.

[187] We should be more rational.

[188] We should be less emotional or hot -headed.

[189] And I think that's true for policy, but for everyday life, when you're with somebody you love, when you're with your kids, when you're, you know, your partner, or with somebody you hate.

[190] I think emotions are important.

[191] They motivate us.

[192] They drive us.

[193] And there is a kind of wisdom to it.

[194] Yeah.

[195] I agree.

[196] And so having said all that, I find myself often trying to point out to generally my side of the political spectrum.

[197] which is like you're blasting people with facts and you're ignoring that they're experiencing a very emotional feeling of fear and facts don't really combat fear.

[198] Yeah.

[199] And so much of what goes on in political battles, you actually online isn't really about the facts.

[200] It's about, I want my group to like me. I'd rather have friends than be right.

[201] Yeah.

[202] So when you see people do, say, outrageous political things, just totally unmoorfered facts, so much of it is saying, I want to be a good Republican.

[203] I don't want to lose.

[204] all my friends.

[205] I want to be a good liberal, you know.

[206] Yeah, I was listening to you and Sam talk recently.

[207] And, oh, you guys were discussing whether or not the handshake would disappear post -COVID.

[208] And you said you could imagine a scenario where a liberal tries to shake someone's hand and get shamed.

[209] And then a Republican tries to bow to another one, it gets beat up over it.

[210] And I was like, you know, those are funny examples and also very much within the realm of possibility.

[211] Yeah.

[212] There was New York Times had some polling data about what Democrats and Republicans thought about COVID.

[213] And the point is that their beliefs were extremely inaccurate, exactly in line with their political prejudices.

[214] So the Democrats radically overstated how dangerous COVID is for kids, despite a factor of 100.

[215] Well, the Republicans radically understated the dangers of COVID in certain situations.

[216] Oh, it's just like the flu.

[217] And they were both wrong in exactly the way their political party said to be wrong.

[218] So one thing I want to talk largely about the sweet spot.

[219] But of course, I would regret not just getting two cents on empathy because I just love your descriptions of it.

[220] I love you pointing out what that really means and how one would really truly behave in a situation if they were truly empathetic.

[221] So if you went in mind, why did you study empathy?

[222] What got you curious about it?

[223] I was really interested in a role of emotions in moral decisions and when they could lead us astray.

[224] Because a lot of people, for instance, who are very negative, do you think gay sex is immoral?

[225] Say, well, it's disgusting.

[226] And that's what drives their arguments in part.

[227] And so I argued, and had the research on this, suggesting I disgust as a really unreliable moral guide.

[228] Maybe you're disgusted by this or disgusted by that.

[229] You shouldn't let it sway you when it comes to right and wrong.

[230] And I found that everybody agreed with me to denigrate disgust as a moral guide.

[231] But then I wondered, well, what else could this argument be extended to?

[232] And then I went to empathy.

[233] And the moral I looked at it, the more I've thought that there's so many better ways to make moral decisions that are more fair, less biased, less cruel, than empathy.

[234] So putting yourself in other person's shoes and feeling what they feel is really great as a source of pleasure, as a source for intimate relationships.

[235] But I argue it's a train wreck when it comes to moral decisions.

[236] We're much more likely feel empathy for people who look like us, for people who share our views, who speak our language, who are close to us, it's very hard to feel empathy for distant strangers.

[237] And more than that, empathy is often weaponized.

[238] If I want you both to hate some group, the standard thing is I'll tell you about the victims and the terrible things they did and get you all energized.

[239] And there's evidence from both the lab in real life that the more empathy you feel towards the suffering group, the more you want to hurt the people who cause the suffering.

[240] So empathy is often used as a tool to get people riled up.

[241] I think we're just better off with compassion, with love, with cost -benefit analysis.

[242] So that's the sort of argument I was making.

[243] Well, you give this great example that if you saw somebody drowning and you were on the shore or vice versa, you're drowning and there's a person on the shore that discovers you.

[244] You, of course, want them to rescue you.

[245] You don't want them to put themselves in your shoes and start panicking because now both of you are likely to die soon.

[246] Yes.

[247] Take therapy.

[248] Is this classic example, which I like because it's a time.

[249] distinguishes what called cognitive empathy, which is understanding what's going on.

[250] And that's important.

[251] We're not going to have a good relationship if I can't understand what's going on in your head.

[252] You understand what's going on my head.

[253] But we don't want the sharing of feelings.

[254] And so therapy is a good example.

[255] If I go to my shrink and I'm deeply anxious and freaking out, I don't want her to start freaking out and get anxious.

[256] I don't want to burst into tears.

[257] I've heard burst into tears.

[258] And we're saying, oh, I want somebody who wants to help me to understand me. and to care about me. But sometimes, if you're anxious, you want to be met with calm.

[259] And if you're miserable, you want to be met with somebody who's kind of a bit more positive.

[260] And so I said empathy is good for intimate relationships, but not always.

[261] Even in that case, you see that if you're with somebody you love and they're in trouble, you kind of don't want to give back the same thing they're sending out.

[262] You almost become codependent.

[263] Right.

[264] Like you're matching their emotional state, and now both of you are fucked.

[265] That's right.

[266] Well, I think the other thing that probably took people aback was the notion that in general, sociopaths probably track a deviation higher on the empathy scale or quite often do.

[267] Is it psychopaths or sociopaths?

[268] The sociopath was just a politically correct term for psychopath.

[269] Oh, okay.

[270] For a while.

[271] Psychopath just sounded too bad.

[272] And honestly, of all the groups, you have to worry about offending.

[273] Don't worry about psychopaths.

[274] That's true.

[275] This gets us back to understanding other people's minds.

[276] So I said it's really good.

[277] if you want to, like, for friends to get along, to make the world a better place.

[278] But it's a form of intelligence.

[279] And like any other sort of intelligence, it could be used in all different ways.

[280] So you're exactly right.

[281] Some people who are psychopathic in their behavior, the worst people in the world, are extremely good at understanding what other people think and feel.

[282] Seducer, con, con, man, torture.

[283] Even a schoolyard bully is often really sense, really figures out what he could say or do to make the other kid cry.

[284] Oh, yeah.

[285] He's not stupid about other people.

[286] He's smart about other people.

[287] He's just an asshole.

[288] Yeah, he's not calling everyone dumb dumb.

[289] He's like, this guy's a short, this guy is a freak, this guy, you know.

[290] I know exactly what you don't want to hear about yourself.

[291] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[292] You also said one time, which I thought was really interesting.

[293] If everyone wanted to take care of everyone else's kid, like if everyone had the same feeling about all the children in the world, it wouldn't be productive because you almost need to, care about your kids more than you care about other people's kids so you can take care of them and the other people can take care of their kids.

[294] I think there's a really cool debate here.

[295] Suppose you think like I do that you really want your morality to help to most people.

[296] And I think empathy gets in a way of that.

[297] But it isn't inconsistent of partiality.

[298] And so that example is exactly right.

[299] If I would say I want to help the most people, so I'm going to divide my attention equally among a million babies, well, that's impossible.

[300] Why don't I take care of the baby in my house?

[301] You take care of the baby in my house.

[302] take care of a baby in your house, you and then things will work out.

[303] And the same thing in some way is an argument for the value of partitioning ourselves into families, into nations, into communities where you're best equipped to help the people close to you.

[304] So I'm not entirely against partiality.

[305] Well, it's interesting, right, because even though I have a political point of view, I'm a big proponent of there being two sides, right?

[306] And quite often there's so much merit in both sides.

[307] And what you just described is kind of more of a Republican point of view, which is like take care of your town.

[308] Like statistically, they're more likely to help an individual than donate to a group that's going to help a bunch of people, right?

[309] They just happen to have an approach that they believe in, do the individual, do your town, maybe, you know, the whole thing scales upward.

[310] And there's great merit to that, I think.

[311] You're pushing me on a hard problem, which I've just struggled with, which is probably compared to most people, I skew very.

[312] liberal on this.

[313] I'm comfortable with federal government.

[314] I'm comfortable even with some degree of world government.

[315] But I think there is a case to be made for the value of smaller groups and smaller communities.

[316] And for me, family is my go -to example.

[317] So there's people like Peter Singer, who's a consequentialist, I have tremendous respect for him.

[318] But he thinks that to spend more time with your kid, to care more about your kid than a stranger is a moral mistake.

[319] A perfectly understandable moral mistake, but a mistake nonetheless.

[320] And that's too far for me. I just can't believe that that's wrong.

[321] I've argued with Sam Harris as well as he's from his more Buddhist perspective.

[322] He just says, you run into building on fire and you get saved two people or save your child, save two.

[323] I can't go that far.

[324] That was a fascinating debate.

[325] Yeah.

[326] And I think it stemmed from one of his meditation practices, right, where you're kind of like praying for everyone or thinking of everyone on the planet.

[327] But it ignores the reality of limited resources, I think.

[328] Well, you know, what's funny is I get to live with it real hands.

[329] So I'm in AA, right?

[330] And it's a very hands -on experience.

[331] I have one guy call me. Maybe I sponsor five guys.

[332] Maybe 10 people have my number.

[333] And I'd like to think that of this over 16, 17 years, that I've helped save a handful of lives.

[334] My wife is tackling like Uganda.

[335] And it's amazing.

[336] It truly is.

[337] But our scopes are so vastly different.

[338] And then as I watch her allocate resources versus how I allocate resources, it can be a point of debate.

[339] Yeah.

[340] I think that's the hardest moral question that we have to struggle with day to day, which is of our limited resources, how much go to ourselves?

[341] I mean, I spend a lot of my energies trying to improve my own life.

[342] So does every functioning person.

[343] How much to those close to you?

[344] And then how much to total strangers?

[345] And it sounds like between you and your wife, the math, works out somewhat different.

[346] And different people might work better with some balance or another.

[347] But it is such a difficult problem.

[348] I think, and here I would agree with somebody like Peter Singer and Steve Pinker as well, that the human mistake has always been too much for me, my family, my group, and not enough for other people.

[349] I think real sign of moral progress is recognizing, at least in an abstract level, that people in a faraway country matter just as much as the people you love.

[350] I totally agree, but I would just counter, and again, this is anecdotal, this is my own personal experience.

[351] I needed to get myself on firm footing and have my needs met so that I could then extend out and I feel like I really have like I think I have people now in my life that think I'm very generous and I'll just point out I was not generous in my 20s when I lived in a one bedroom apartment like I couldn't have been generous all this stuff affords me to be more generous and more thoughtful again it the debate over food it's like I'll get someone on here telling you how to eat well if you've got three jobs and three kids and you're a single parent guess what's not on your fucking radar whether the shit's organic or not so I'm I'm very sympathetic to that situation and I think that can really be grafted or mapped on to a lot of things it's like how much bandwidth do you have left so I think it might be more productive in the end you might be better off by first tending to your thing so that then you can kind of spread everywhere else your point about resources is right it's not that people have a lot of resources are better people than people less and that's not what you're saying right but if you are starving to death if you are struggling to stay alive to keep those you love alive, you're just not going to have much left.

[352] Well, if you have a lot of resources, and I think the three of us certainly do relative to 99 % of people on Earth, there becomes an obligation even to use the excess and not just for our families and friends.

[353] Yeah.

[354] And I just want to make my point crystal clear.

[355] I'm actually arguing I'm the exact same scumbag.

[356] I just have more now.

[357] Like I didn't evolve as a, I'm not a better person.

[358] I just now in a position where it's not painful for me to be generous.

[359] But you're framing that in a funny way, because what that means is you were always a good person.

[360] You just didn't have the resources early on to use that goodness.

[361] That's a great glass half full take on it.

[362] I like that.

[363] I was always waiting to blossom into a nice person.

[364] Well, real scumbags don't have people who think you're a great guy and who you help.

[365] So you were a saint in hiding.

[366] Oh, my God.

[367] I love this analysis.

[368] That's too much.

[369] That's too much.

[370] Yeah, that's a little extreme.

[371] We've gone a little bit more.

[372] What were you just about the same one?

[373] I think if you really look at the big picture of, yeah, I'll take care of my kids, you take care of your kids.

[374] And that way everyone will be taken care of.

[375] The reality is that's not true.

[376] Some people aren't taking care of their kids.

[377] I wish that could be the case, but it's just not.

[378] So I think you have to look outward to take care of those who aren't being taken care of.

[379] That's right.

[380] I've heard people say, well, everybody just takes care of her own.

[381] But I think that's ultimately a selfie.

[382] kind of savage view, because some people, like you're saying, don't have anybody to take care of them.

[383] I agree, and this is why I'm a proponent of both parties.

[384] This is kind of a centrist's claim, but I think that forget about Democrats and Republicans, both sort of a liberal worldview and a conservative worldview, have their strengths.

[385] And I think one of the good things about living in a society of a spider -sorts democracy is they could fight it out and compromise.

[386] And ideally, we keep best of both features.

[387] So there's even some psychological work suggesting that Democrats or liberals tend to have a little of a large, or moral circle.

[388] They encompass more things, like they care maybe about, what animals, say, or an environment of people far away, while conservatives, on average, might have a tighter moral circle zooming more in on family and community.

[389] But they're both of value in different ways.

[390] This is off topic, but I just wanted to say it because I was watching your TED talk, and I'm someone who thinks they're aware of all these different ways prejudice reveal themselves.

[391] It's a great TED talk.

[392] I really urge everyone to watch it.

[393] It's really great, and it's on prejudice.

[394] But, man, you showed a slide that kind of, it didn't shock me, but also I was just like, oh, fuck, right.

[395] Which was, Monica, they sold as an experiment.

[396] They sold a set of baseball cards on eBay.

[397] And in the photo, a white hand's holding each card.

[398] And then they have the exact same cards for sale, and a black hand is holding the cards.

[399] And they, as you would guess, fetched far lower bids.

[400] That jumped out at me, that one.

[401] It was a very clever study.

[402] It was done by a friend of mine, Masri and Benaji and colleagues.

[403] And it was clever because a lot of psychology experiments on bias have serious problems and they're very unrealistic.

[404] And I think we should be very skeptical about some of the claims that would implicit bias.

[405] You know, we could talk about that.

[406] But this was a clever study because people didn't, you know, they didn't know they didn't know they were in a study.

[407] And I don't think they were a bunch of KKK white supremacists.

[408] Right.

[409] They just saw a darker hand and said, well, you know, I can't trust this person as much and so on.

[410] And this is interesting because it's an example of the duality present within us, which is, on the one hand, we're like that.

[411] We have all sorts of biases.

[412] Some of them are okay.

[413] Like I said before, I'm happy to be biased, love my sons more than strangers.

[414] Some of them are not okay.

[415] I wouldn't be happy to find out that I trusted white people more than other people.

[416] And when it's not okay, we are rational enough to say, hey, let's try to fix this.

[417] And this is what distinguishes us from every other creature, the ability to say, This is the way it feels to me, but I think it's wrong, and I want to take steps to stop it.

[418] Okay, so impartiality.

[419] I think that was kind of where we got to in that TED talk.

[420] You lay out that pinky scenario, which is wonderful.

[421] Can you walk us through that a little bit?

[422] And then I just want to give a personal debate I get ensnared in.

[423] This is the Little Finger thing.

[424] Yeah, I'm sorry, David, yeah, Adam Smith is pointing out that I'm pushing something I'd call rational compassion as a way to be a good person.

[425] And you can say, well, why not just rationality?

[426] Why not just intelligence?

[427] Adam points out that from that point of rationality, there's no reason to favor him losing his little pinky finger as opposed to killing thousands of people.

[428] I mean, imagine you had a psychopath in front of you.

[429] Psychopath said, I like hurting people.

[430] I like causing misery.

[431] And you said, well, man, you know, I'm going to argue you out of it.

[432] You can't.

[433] If he doesn't accept that people have value, there's no ways to argue him out of it.

[434] And the conclusion here is, I think rationality is absolutely totally critical for being a good person, being a good life, but you also need to care.

[435] And that's the sort of separate thing.

[436] Yeah, he says like the first layer is the man learns that 100 ,000 people died in this accident in a faraway country.

[437] He goes to bed.

[438] Then he learns that in his country, something happened.

[439] He kind of goes to bed.

[440] Then he learns he's going to get his pinky cut off in the next morning.

[441] He can't sleep.

[442] So it's like innately, he cares more about that than everything.

[443] But then yet you can think your way through it and you can confront that natural.

[444] Right.

[445] So emotionally, if I read that a thousand people are going to die in some country, honestly, okay, some faraway country, I see that stuff all the time.

[446] If I got upset by it, I'd never get out of bed.

[447] But if you told me that tomorrow that somebody's going to snip off my pinky finger, I'd spend a whole night thinking, oh, my God, this is so.

[448] So it's far more emotional to me. But then if you put to me the question, which is worse?

[449] It's worse, a thousand people die.

[450] Yeah.

[451] And it's that other step.

[452] Smith goes on and says, conscience, reason.

[453] It's a soft voice of rationality that I think when we're at our best is what we listen to.

[454] Yeah, the time that I'm in that conversation is I happen to be against the death penalty.

[455] Who cares?

[456] People often respond, like, really, what if your daughter was killed?

[457] And I go, I would shoot him myself.

[458] But I don't think someone who's lost a daughter should be writing policy.

[459] Like, I would be the absolute wrong person in that moment to be making policy.

[460] That's exactly right.

[461] And that's sort of what if your sort of argument is how I think rotten people push rotten policies.

[462] Like I'd say, I have no problem of immigration.

[463] And then I say, let me tell you a story of an illegal immigrant who snuck in and raped somebody.

[464] Now what do you think?

[465] Right.

[466] Well, the better me says, well, let's see what the numbers are.

[467] are immigrants more likely to commit crimes?

[468] They are not, and so on.

[469] And let's look at it from a sort of cold -blooded but kind cost -benefit analysis.

[470] But you know you're in the presence of somebody trying to make you to do a crummy decision when he says, well, what if your daughter was murdered?

[471] Because we don't think straight.

[472] He's trying to get you in a position where you don't think straight.

[473] Yeah, there was a terrible law being proposed in Northern California.

[474] An illegal immigrant had hit somebody with their truck, and a young person had been killed.

[475] And then they named the bill after the young person that had been killed, an immigrant was drunk.

[476] And it was this whole thing about immigration.

[477] I'm like, guys, this is a drunk driving issue.

[478] Like, you can't possibly conflate the two.

[479] Bill's named after dead children.

[480] They're terrible.

[481] Generally, probably not objective as they should be.

[482] You don't see people at their reason best.

[483] You have these situations where people get punitive.

[484] And they get punitive, even if it makes the world worse.

[485] I know.

[486] Yeah.

[487] It's very frustrating.

[488] It is.

[489] There's a study where they ask people, they thought people bought a pharmaceutical company, there's something awful.

[490] And they say, if you put a pharmaceutical company out of business, many people will die.

[491] And still people say, put them out of business.

[492] Punish them.

[493] And there's so much interest in like, let's punish the bad person, even if it makes the world worse.

[494] It's a very human appetite.

[495] But again, I feel it.

[496] I think we all feel it.

[497] But we shouldn't.

[498] We should try to sort of step back and say, well, what will call it?

[499] the most flourishing, the best life.

[500] Now, I don't want you to panic when I bring up this example because it'll be coming out of my mouth, so you won't get quoted, you won't get canceled.

[501] But I find myself using that argument with the Michael Jackson debate.

[502] It's like, the man was a monster, absolutely.

[503] Should his music go away, which is on any given day, probably 600 ,000 human beings listen to beat it, and it makes their day wonderful?

[504] Like, is that what we want to do is deny all those people who are enjoying the product to punish him who's dead?

[505] No, if he were, alive and we're talking about punishing him or discouraging this behavior.

[506] He's not smiling down from heaven thinking, I beat the system.

[507] They're still listening.

[508] But with that said, I think it's also okay for people personally to be like, I can't listen to this.

[509] This reminds me of this.

[510] Yuck, I don't like it.

[511] Totally great.

[512] It's just a personal choice.

[513] Yeah, for some people, they can no longer enjoy the music, for sure.

[514] And I don't think those people should be forced to listen to it.

[515] But if they're on an 80s pop hit station, they might want to pick another station because he's likely to come up.

[516] In general, I agree.

[517] I tend to lean very much in the direction of sort of freedom of expression, really freedom of expression in the arts, including for people who are terrible people.

[518] But Monica, you're exactly right, the freedom of expression and freedom in general includes saying, I don't want to ever see a Polanski film.

[519] I don't want to listen to this music.

[520] I don't want to look at this artwork.

[521] That includes that too.

[522] And even trying to persuade other people is terrible.

[523] Stay tuned for more armchair expert, if you dare.

[524] What's up, guys?

[525] It's your girl Kiki, and my podcast is back with a new season.

[526] And let me tell you, it's too good.

[527] And I'm diving into the brains of entertainment's best and brightest.

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[542] So I lay out those two previous explorations of yours because, well, the tastiest thing for me is a Malcolm Gladwell book, because almost every single thing starts out with you, I bet you'd think it works this way.

[543] And guess what it works this way?

[544] I get elated with that.

[545] So I kind of think that's a similar theme that you're on.

[546] It's perfect.

[547] Well, let's take a look.

[548] Prejudice is horrendous.

[549] Well, let's take a look.

[550] Well, so I would argue you've done it again with the sweet spot, which is the pleasures of suffering and the search for meaning.

[551] So why did you want to do this?

[552] Is this a response to what is commonly being called now toxic positivity?

[553] Like, what prompted you to explore this?

[554] So, simple curiosity.

[555] I come from an evolutionary background.

[556] I think there's some behaviors that people do that are not so hard to explain.

[557] Like, why do we eat food when we're hungry?

[558] hungry.

[559] Why do we pursue sex and pursue love and love our children?

[560] The details of working this out are really incredibly difficult, but they're not really mysteries.

[561] They're kind of Evolution 101.

[562] But then, for a long time, I've been wondering, why do people like to eat really spicy foods that make them sweat?

[563] Why do I like that hot bass and saunas?

[564] They go to dojoes and gyms and get punched in the face.

[565] They train for marathons.

[566] They watch horror movies, and which is just fascinating, scaring the pants off.

[567] And fear, we're supposed to be bad.

[568] They engage in BDSM.

[569] And if they don't do it in person, they read books like 50 Shades of Gray, which is crazy, crazy bestseller.

[570] And so I just was interested in that appetite for it.

[571] And that got me going out.

[572] That's the pleasure of suffering.

[573] And then as I started to think about that, I got into the idea, which is actually a very old idea in established in many religions about the connection to me and suffering and a life full of me. So in that way, I'm actually a fairly traditional book.

[574] I'm just like ancient wisdom, as somebody would say.

[575] Yeah, I just got to tell you one.

[576] I'm talking too much because I want to impress you because you're one of my heroes.

[577] But I had a moment the other day where I was like, I can't believe I'm reading this.

[578] I happen to be reading notes from the underground, Otsevsky.

[579] Oh, yeah, yeah.

[580] And there's a goddamn chapter in there about that mathematics have come so far that basically humans will become entirely predictable.

[581] And so what I was hearing was the exact argument that, say, Sam would, make about this determinism that technology is bringing on to us.

[582] And I was like, oh, this is a fucking human thought.

[583] We keep thinking this new technology is really the foundation of the fear.

[584] But no, it's just the fear is in us.

[585] Yeah, I mean, I think determinism is correct in that we're physical things.

[586] We're subject to physical law.

[587] But humans are and will be for as long as we could ever, probably for as long as our species gone, unpredictable and erratic.

[588] we're just too complicated and too messy.

[589] It's not a metaphysical truth.

[590] I mean, if there's a God, God could predict what we're doing.

[591] But if there isn't, we're perfectly unpredictable.

[592] Well, as we already talked about, emotion is an enormous component that I don't see that being broken down into ones and zeros at any point.

[593] Like, it makes very irrational things happen and whatever.

[594] I don't know.

[595] I was reading the other day, they found a particle that doesn't behave the way any particles are supposed to behave.

[596] And I was like, well, there you go.

[597] I mean, it's endless what's not going to fit our scheme.

[598] But back to the important issue.

[599] So these things that we do, we choose to watch these movies or we read 50 shades of gray, we're not doing it consciously, would you argue?

[600] We're not like, oh, you know what, I'm going to experience some suffering so that I can then enjoy the peak of joy.

[601] Like, do you think there is an evolutionary component of this?

[602] Like, why do we crave that?

[603] Why do we search that out?

[604] So we're talking about pleasure now and how suffering could lead to pleasure.

[605] And I think for some of it is just an accident of how our brains are wired up.

[606] I think sometimes it's just contrast.

[607] We appreciate contrast.

[608] And then one of the quirks of that is that you could have an unpleasant experience that sets a stage for pleasure.

[609] And you might really spicy food and drink cold beer and it feels so good.

[610] The bath cools down and feels just right.

[611] Some of it is the sort of oppressive feeling of consciousness like one argument for BDSM is it takes you out of yourself.

[612] Same with rigorous exercise.

[613] and martial arts.

[614] If you're sparring with somebody, you're not thinking about yourself.

[615] The voice in your head has gone quiet.

[616] But I do think some of these things are evolved appetites.

[617] And I think horror movies and tragedies and so on reflect an evolved appetite to think of the worst, to focus on worst -case scenarios.

[618] I think it's an adaptive appetite.

[619] I could fantasize about all sorts of good things happening to me. But I don't need to prepare for them.

[620] Oh, a big prize?

[621] Well, thank you.

[622] but bad things you want to prepare for and I think a lot of what goes on when we enjoy these unpleasant fictions is an appetite to explore bad things what am I going to do when everything goes to hell and there's no law enforcement and everything I'm on my own well we really have that in a lot of movies what are going to do if my family dies what am I going to do if I lose my job and become destitute and we'd like to scratch that itch yeah do you think there's any arguments to be made that for the first 150 ,000 years we were here, we had a bunch of very real tangible threats around us at all times.

[623] We had real food scarcity.

[624] We had real marauders, all these things.

[625] And that as our life has become so predictable and comfortable that we have all this wiring that needs some kind of attention.

[626] I've struggled with that.

[627] And the question comes up is, our appetite for masochistic pleasures, is it part of being sort of the fat, lazy, entitled West where we have no concerns?

[628] And so we just seek out pain because we don't get any of the sort we're supposed to normally get.

[629] It may be true, but a lot of the phenomena I discussed in my book seem to be pretty universal.

[630] And in fact, even in places that are very poor, often there are sort of gruesome rituals people participate in and violent spectacles.

[631] So I think the idea that you're saying is tempting and I used to believe it's true, but I'm no longer so sure.

[632] Yeah.

[633] Maybe as far back as we were humans, we liked the pain in the right dose.

[634] Do you think part of that could be, I mean, I guess this is sort of akin to pleasure.

[635] We talked about this a little bit with Danny Kahneman, but don't you think we kind of seek relief, like the feeling of relief?

[636] So if you watch a movie or squid game or whatever, it's like, oh, my God, this is crazy.

[637] And you're feeling all the emotions.

[638] At the end of it, there's a sense of relief that you're not in it.

[639] I think relief plays a big rule.

[640] And one bit of relief might be what you're talking about, which is social comparison.

[641] which is, thank God, that's not me. I think another bit of relief is from the very arc of stories.

[642] This data scientist took, like, I think hundreds of thousands of plot lines, put them into a computer and chugged away what the common plot is.

[643] And the way he described is things just get worse and worse and worse and worse, then they get better.

[644] And that's the relief you're talking about.

[645] I think a lot of stories afford us that sort of thing.

[646] I mean, my favorite example is revenge films like John Wick.

[647] Do you read the synopsis is they kill his dog and they all.

[648] Oh, man, that's sad.

[649] And then an explosion, he kills everybody.

[650] Oh, that sounds like fun.

[651] Yeah, yeah.

[652] Well, that's kind of wish fulfillment, that something would happen to you and it would give you licensed act any way you wanted and it would be justified.

[653] Wish fulfillment is another thing that goes on.

[654] The attraction of evil characters, the Hannibal Lecters, Satan in Paradise Lost, they none of the three of us would want to be a murderous cannibal killer.

[655] But it's kind of fun to imagine that degree of power and that, do we have freedom from society.

[656] So we indulge or take a milder form.

[657] Who doesn't like Walter White from Breaking Bad or Tony Soprano?

[658] Yeah.

[659] I struggle with it, even with real -life characters.

[660] We've talked about this a bunch as I'm drawn to a figure like Pablo Escobar, who, without one advantage in life, wills his way into being the eighth richest man in the world.

[661] I mean, too, dastardly deeds, but I'm still, I can't help but be fascinated by it.

[662] Well, we're tremendously status -conscious creatures.

[663] We constantly compare ourselves to others.

[664] And this isn't necessarily a bad thing.

[665] It could lead us to excel in the arts and sciences or just be a good person that people respect and so on.

[666] But there is a sort of shortcut to high status, and that's having everybody terrified of you.

[667] And so we look at Escobar and our fictional character, real character, and we say, wow, this guy's in some way is at the top of a status hierarchy.

[668] He's not a named professor.

[669] He doesn't have an Academy Award, but he kills people.

[670] But then even more fascinating, half the people fear him and then half the people in Medellan love him because he's also provided public housing.

[671] So it's like, oh, is this guy getting the best of both worlds?

[672] He's loved and feared?

[673] It's not a bad combination.

[674] But ultimately, we shouldn't want to become murderous drug wars, even if we do help our community.

[675] Well, if we care about our kids, it's not a great place for them to hang out in after we've created that.

[676] We should have a parental advisory for this discussion saying Do not try to Pablo Escobar thing at home.

[677] Oh, this is going to be full of trigger warnings.

[678] It's going to be like Michael Jackson.

[679] It's going to be a spoiler alert for scenes from America.

[680] We might not ever get to your interview.

[681] We haven't started yet.

[682] This is just so relieving.

[683] Tell me how it adds significance and meaning to your life.

[684] Yeah, that's a good question.

[685] I don't think it's a suffering in and of itself that we want.

[686] I think what we want is meaning and purpose.

[687] I defend in the book something you could call motivational pluralism, which is we want more than one thing.

[688] We definitely want pleasure.

[689] Everybody wants pleasure.

[690] Everybody wants a cool drink on a hot day.

[691] But we also want other things.

[692] We want to be good.

[693] You're talking about the support you give to people.

[694] And that's something you want.

[695] You want to feel like a good person.

[696] And we want meaning.

[697] We want meaningful projects.

[698] The three of us are talking here because we're all engaged in a meaningful and difficult project.

[699] And it won't be meaningful.

[700] It doesn't count unless it involves suffering and straining.

[701] Yeah.

[702] But why?

[703] Well, so as I was reading all this stuff, it made me think, again, of Connemon and the concept of the narrative self, or I don't know if that's his exact words, but I'm so fascinated with the narrative self.

[704] And I started thinking about it individually, or just from my own point of view, and it's like, yeah, all my self -esteem that the acts I would deemable are generally things that I don't want to do or.

[705] they're uncomfortable.

[706] Those are the things I'm proud of myself of.

[707] When I'm writing the story of my life and I'm in bed at night, I'm like, oh, I did nine things I didn't want to do.

[708] That gives me a really wonderful feeling, whether it's legitimate or not.

[709] I think it is legitimate.

[710] I mean, Kahneman has thought very deeply about this.

[711] And he makes this distinction, which is, you know, you can walk around with a beeper that goes off randomly.

[712] And then when it goes off, you say how happy you are.

[713] And then we can determine how good your life is by just averaging.

[714] You're happy a lot of time.

[715] You're sad a lot of time.

[716] But economists says it's not really how people work.

[717] People like to think back at their past and construct a narrative, construct a sort of overall view.

[718] And to some extent, it's like we're making up a resume, a CV.

[719] And so I'll go through something really difficult and hard so I can look back on it later and say, that's what I did.

[720] That's the kind of person I am.

[721] Yeah, and I was even thinking after reading that from you that I don't ever tell a story.

[722] I've seen seals in the real life, in my real life, I don't know, 20, 30 times, I got bit by a seal one time.

[723] So if I'm ever going to talk about a, yes, I tried to pet one.

[724] You see that.

[725] That interested me. Yeah.

[726] So I was on ecstasy with friends back when I was a drug addict.

[727] And we came across a seal on a beach here in California.

[728] And there were some people watching and looking, oh, he's up on the shore.

[729] And then I got it in my head that they're dogs.

[730] And if it smells you and likes your scent, then you're free to start the cuddling.

[731] I promise you this is true.

[732] I have a huge scar on my thumb from it.

[733] And so I was getting closer and closer and I felt like the bond was happening and I was getting all the cues.

[734] So I held out my hand so the seal could smell it and he took one whiff and they went, and it was really polarizing on the beach.

[735] Some people were yelling, that's what you get, don't get close to what?

[736] And then another one, people were going, that's how they say hi.

[737] Like some people are defending the seal.

[738] And that's the story I'm going to tell you about my seal experiences because it has a story there.

[739] Like, there isn't a story unless something like that happens.

[740] It was agony, but even then for a split second, you probably thought, man, this is going to make a great story years later.

[741] Oh, we talk about this all the time.

[742] I'll be mid -miserable experience.

[743] And as a writer and a comedian, I switch immediately to, like, remember every detail.

[744] You're going to be telling this one.

[745] And it almost takes me out of the suffering.

[746] We're narrative creatures.

[747] And not everything we'll do.

[748] We want our stories to have meaning to affect people, to have, to have, to affect people, to have, purpose to have a sort of narrative structure.

[749] There's a big difference between climbing Mount Everest and standing in my study and walking around in circles a million times.

[750] They're both extremely difficult and time -consuming and so on.

[751] But the second one is ridiculous.

[752] If I tell you say, you're such a loser.

[753] And so some pursuits, and it's very hard to sort of pull this word, but some pursuits intuitively are meaningful.

[754] But those do require suffering.

[755] I ran a marathon a long time ago.

[756] And I remember how hard it was.

[757] But I think back fondly because it was hard.

[758] If I was in such good shape, I just ran a marathon, whatever.

[759] I wouldn't be telling you about it now.

[760] I wouldn't remember it.

[761] Yeah.

[762] So is there something prescriptive about the book?

[763] Because again, in my real life, which is I work a lot.

[764] I have a lot of jobs.

[765] And I fantasize about these little pockets I'm going to get.

[766] And they pop up every now and then.

[767] Either I'm out of town filming.

[768] There's three days off in a hotel.

[769] And I start thinking a week ahead of time, like, oh, I'm going to watch that series.

[770] I'm going to order that.

[771] food I'm going to do blank blank blank and always inevitably a day and a half into my indulgence I'm like saturated with pleasure and I don't give a shit about any of it and it's so but and then I get frustrated I'm like what is this concept I'm striving for that I don't actually enjoy when I get it so there's something a bit prescriptive about the book and your story is a good one on that line which is I think the pursuit of meaningful pursuits and suffering suffering could be a good source of pleasure, but also just, I think, I think more generally, when you're having some difficulty and anxiety and stress, to some extent, it means you're doing the right thing.

[772] There are at least three problems of hedonism.

[773] One problem of hedonism is it's often selfish, and it's just wrong to be selfish.

[774] It should be even more for others.

[775] A second problem is it's often boring.

[776] And psychologists like to talk of the hedonic treadmill, which is you're really enjoying the great meals in the hotel, and then they're the same great meals and you stop enjoying them, so you have to get better meals.

[777] there's probably some studies that are the pornography trajectory of people when they enter porn.

[778] And if you overindulge, you could end up in some very strange places.

[779] Yeah.

[780] And so you get bored.

[781] I think it's better to try to do something difficult.

[782] And then the third factor, and this is from a lot of psychological studies, is pursuing pleasure, somewhat paradoxically, often makes you miserable.

[783] There are these studies where you ask somebody, how important is it for you to be happy?

[784] How much you work to be happy?

[785] And people who say very important and a lot, when they're asked, how happy are you?

[786] They say, not much.

[787] I'm depressed.

[788] I'm anxious.

[789] Happiness and pleasure often are the sort of things that are better when you don't strive towards them.

[790] Would you agree with this concept of toxic positivity, this kind of seeming movement in self -help and some modern psychology?

[791] Yeah.

[792] I think sometimes we are both sort of as regular people but also people in my field are, are just too concerned with happiness and pleasure.

[793] I'm nothing against happiness and pleasure.

[794] I'm a pluralist.

[795] If somebody said, I want to give those up, I'd say, oh, man, don't give those up.

[796] They're great.

[797] But too many people think that's it.

[798] That's the end of the story.

[799] And I think a life well lived.

[800] And not just me. Like when you ask people, when you do the studies, a life well live, most people believe involves struggle and difficulty, positive emotions, but negative emotions too.

[801] And that's the life you look back on.

[802] you say, that was a good life.

[803] Yeah.

[804] What is the relationship between life satisfaction and money?

[805] Psychologists used to have a really unintuitive story, which this day, see, money doesn't matter for happiness.

[806] And people say, wow, that's amazing.

[807] And it turns as to be total nonsense.

[808] It's exactly as you'd expect, the more money you make, the happier you are, no matter how you measure it.

[809] When you measure pleasure, satisfaction, and so on.

[810] And this is true, not just for individuals, but for countries.

[811] It's not just comparison.

[812] It's that rich people in rich countries are happy than people in poorer countries.

[813] Now, one question which people do debate is when does it stop?

[814] Yeah, this is what we've heard, that it plateaus and then in fact goes down at some point.

[815] It definitely has diminishing returns, which makes sense.

[816] If you're making 20 ,000 and then you make 40 ,000, that's amazing.

[817] That's double.

[818] If you're making 500 ,000, you make 520 ,000, you don't notice it.

[819] And so it does plateau, though there's some evidence that people with over $10 million are actually happier than people with over $1 million.

[820] There's some evidence that it's less of a growth.

[821] And it's not such a surprise why money would make you happy.

[822] Money buys things that make you happy, like travel, freedom from oppressive work, freedom from oppressive relationships, you know, good food.

[823] Delicious meals.

[824] Healthcare, which is just a good one.

[825] good protection for your kids.

[826] And then it also, in this world, gets you status.

[827] And people like status.

[828] Yeah, we are social primates.

[829] We're social primates.

[830] And I'm not sure whether somebody with 2 million can buy more happy stuff than somebody with 1 million, but maybe they feel a bit better about themselves.

[831] And security, right?

[832] Security.

[833] Knowing that it's not going to go.

[834] The more you have means the less likely it is that it's going to go away, that your status is going to go away, that your stuff is going to go away.

[835] That's right.

[836] And it varies from country to country.

[837] Money always matters.

[838] But how much it matters varies from country to country.

[839] And if you're in a place where if you run out, you're really screwed, then it's very important.

[840] It'd be strange if that weren't a case.

[841] Although, could I apply your own argument to this and say that it could make your life so comfortable and easy that it does lack a sufficient amount of struggle and suffering to actually allow you to be happy?

[842] to observe that in my circle.

[843] I think that that's right.

[844] I think that there are some people, and this is why maybe some studies show, as you mentioned, that too much money, you could actually have a drop off in happiness.

[845] I think, wow, I'm now really wealthy.

[846] I don't have to work.

[847] I don't have to do anything difficult.

[848] I'm just going to party and do drugs and hang out with people.

[849] And that's not a very good life.

[850] And then it starts to show.

[851] But I think for a lot of people, what money buys is the opportunity to do meaningful work.

[852] there are studies of meaningful jobs and they're not all high paying like being a member of the clergy is a very meaningful job for people but someone who wants on the bottom like the job that has the least meaning in life is a parking lot of tenant and nobody has a lot of money is a parking lot of tenant and a lot of people are trapped with low -paying jobs and although the Buddhists are right you could get meaning out of anything it's harder to do it if you have sort of a menial unsatisfying jobs and easier to do it if you have enough wealth and resources to find something exciting and worthwhile.

[853] So I believe you, and I agree with you, and I'm someone who had no money and that now has a lot of money.

[854] The one thing, though, I guess I focus on probably to my detriment is that it did answer the question for me that, no, the human brain just is what it is.

[855] It is looking for more.

[856] It is looking for the next thing.

[857] And there is no getting off that treadmill, or at least in my experience.

[858] Like, you just shift the weird things you think about.

[859] I used to think about, God, I wish I had a window in this apartment, so it was bright enough for me to be awake.

[860] And now I think, like, God damn, and I paid X amount for these doors and the locks suck.

[861] Like, that is my nature, and I can't buy my way out of it.

[862] Yeah, my country house is grafting, you know, what to do, what you do.

[863] This yacht is, is very unstable.

[864] The treadmill screws us all.

[865] If you're seeking happiness, the treadmill screws it off.

[866] You are not saying, I mean, there are some problems which are, if your kid is done, because of an untreated infection, that's just categorically worse than your yacht is smaller than your friend's yacht.

[867] But still, even people who have great wealth, they're mammals.

[868] They're going to get bored.

[869] They're going to get frustrated.

[870] Ultimately, our bodies fail us.

[871] Sometimes our minds fail us.

[872] And these resources will give you more opportunity to live a good life.

[873] But in the end, yeah, there's a ceiling on this.

[874] I think one answer is, don't put so much emphasis on happy.

[875] Yeah.

[876] Now, here's what I'm fascinated with because I grew up in the Midwest, in Michigan, in a very blue -collar area, and there was a concept of retirement that I ingested, and I can't shake it, right?

[877] So I have this fantasy that I will get safe, then I can quit, and I'm smart enough to know that that's not going to yield the thing, but it's very hard for me to shake.

[878] I constantly am thinking, like, when am I going to retire?

[879] I'll give you a great example.

[880] I happen to know the showrunner, Chuck Laurie, who created two and a half men and Big Bang theory he has more money than god and i stupidly said like when are you going to retire whatever and he said i didn't move to california to get rich and retire i moved here to write tv like what are you talking about and i was like what a fucking great answer and why am i caught in this paradigm do you have any thoughts on retirement and the whole structure of that fantasy to some extent it depends where you're placed some people have menial unpleasant humiliating jobs and for them retirement is a bliss some people might enjoy their work but have other pursuits, hobbies, or relationship with loved ones, that are just much better.

[881] But I feel the same.

[882] I mean, I don't want to inquire into your finances, but I wouldn't be surprised if you could, if you wanted to retire this afternoon.

[883] I could.

[884] You're right.

[885] But you're not going to.

[886] I mean, if you did retire, you'd probably start up a podcast about retirement.

[887] Maybe you're already retired.

[888] Yeah.

[889] I think a lot of laborers would agree I'm already retired.

[890] Yes, that's right.

[891] So I think that's kind of the way out of your paradox, which is retirement is a really important and valuable goal for people who have difficult jobs and difficult and often physically, often literally backbreaking jobs.

[892] But for people like us, I think I plan never to retire.

[893] Yeah, yeah.

[894] I'm starting to wonder if that's more what I should be thinking about as opposed to this very interesting thing that doesn't actually map onto my life the way it would have if I stayed in where I grew up.

[895] Yeah.

[896] I want to just get into, there's one thing that you say that interests me is that people sometimes pursue physical suffering as a way to exit their emotional suffering.

[897] Yeah.

[898] I bring this up in a couple of contexts.

[899] I'm bringing this out regarding VDSM and rigorous exercise.

[900] And also, this doesn't really count of suffering, but also intense concentration, the sort that a chick sent me how he calls flow.

[901] And I think there's different things going on in these cases.

[902] But one thing is, a lot of us find consciousness pretty oppressive, our own voice in our heads, constantly saying, how do I look, how am I sounding?

[903] I can't help thinking about what I did last month, which was really embarrassing.

[904] And I got this thing's going to happen.

[905] And so you want to escape from all that.

[906] Some things like martial arts, for instance, or rigorous exercise or total focus, get you out of your, out of your own head.

[907] And that's so satisfying.

[908] Oh, yeah.

[909] People ask why I race motorcycles on the track and people, it perplexes people.

[910] And I say, it's the only thing I've ever found in my entire life that requires 100 % of my concentration.

[911] If I let my mind wander for five seconds, I'm going down.

[912] And I had to go to that point to shut this fucking racket off in my head.

[913] Yes.

[914] I once got violently mugged on the streets of New Haven.

[915] And it occurred to me afterwards that during the mugging, though it was not an experience I'd recommend to you.

[916] I wasn't thinking about my book.

[917] So there's a kind of, that's like a seal story.

[918] Oh, that's great.

[919] That's interesting.

[920] It's almost like the more privileged you are, the more in your head.

[921] head you are.

[922] Like you have the luxury of being in your head.

[923] Yes.

[924] A lot of people don't have the luxury of being in their head, often because they're in jobs that require like 100 % of their attention or they're maybe afraid, very afraid of different situations.

[925] And in some way, I think it's interesting question how much children are in their own heads in the same way.

[926] But at least for people like us, we are just in our own heads.

[927] And a lot of times, that's not so pleasant.

[928] And so So getting on a motorcycle, during that period, you are just you.

[929] And you're not thinking about how you're looking and what's going to happen to you.

[930] I would.

[931] I just can't.

[932] Yeah, I'd love to.

[933] You just can't.

[934] There's some line from a dominatrix, I quote it in my book, something to the fact that when the whip is being shown, you can't look away from it and you can't think of anything else.

[935] Oh, wow.

[936] And that's not my thing.

[937] But I have some understanding for how it could have a certain appeal.

[938] Dare we get into the topic of cutting because I learned about cutting in a way I hadn't previously understood it.

[939] And it was that you can give yourself this physical pain that will distract you from the emotional pain.

[940] But also biologically, I learned that your body also then will release its version of opiate.

[941] It'll also give you some kind of a biochemical response that could be helpful.

[942] So is that something you looked into at all?

[943] I talk a bit about cutting in adolescence in my book, and most of my book is making the case for suffering, for chosen suffering.

[944] Unchosen suffering is totally different thing, but chosen suffering.

[945] But cutting is a difficult thing because that's not, I think, that is connected with all sorts of bad outcomes and kids in trouble.

[946] And so the question is, why do they do it?

[947] And one answer is what you're saying, which is a sort of a jolt, again, away from themselves, what sometimes people do when they're trying to stop.

[948] And this is a therapy that's recommended, but people sometimes figure out themselves.

[949] It's like they have a rubber band on their wrists and they snap it.

[950] Yeah.

[951] There's different theories of what goes on.

[952] And one thing is the distraction theory.

[953] And another theory is it's a cry for help.

[954] Right.

[955] Let me show you what my insides feel like.

[956] If people love you, then you just tell them I'm in trouble and they'll help.

[957] If people don't care about you at all, there's nothing you do and make a difference.

[958] But sometimes there's in -between cases where I'm going to hold my body hostage.

[959] This is how serious my concern is.

[960] And then there's also a theory, which I'm not.

[961] I think has a bit of evidence for it, which is sometimes cutting is self -punishment.

[962] Sometimes people will do damage to your body.

[963] Because remember we were talking before, a punitive impulse.

[964] We want to hurt people who do bad things.

[965] Well, this could be turned inwards.

[966] And all of a sudden, I think I'm a terrible person.

[967] I'm going to punish myself.

[968] And sometimes self -harm is that sort of thing.

[969] Did you see Once Upon a Time in Hollywood?

[970] Of course.

[971] Oh, my God.

[972] When Leonardo was giving himself the speech in this trailer, he's so mad he drank too much the night before and he's looking in the mirror he says if you drink like that again i'm gonna fucking kill you yeah and i as a recovering alcoholic i'm like i've had that speech with myself in the mirror numerous times and what a concept if you do that again i'll kill you self -hatred is a real thing and you want to hurt those you hate yeah stay tuned for more armchair expert if you dare okay i want to ask you two more fun questions before we let you go again just so overjoyed to be talking to you.

[973] How are the sexual fantasies of men and women different?

[974] It used to be very hard to answer that question because all you could do is you ask people and people why, of course.

[975] Sure, sure.

[976] So you're kind of stuck.

[977] And then people started doing big data analyses on porn hub and other pornographic websites.

[978] And then you learn a lot about what people want.

[979] and also you could use Google analytics somehow to figure out who on the site.

[980] Typically, you can take a good guess as to their gender and their age, which I didn't know.

[981] So one of the odd findings is there's a fairly high appetite often for violent and unpleasant degrading porn, which surprisingly seems to be more common in women than in men.

[982] Which is very surprising.

[983] That's a twist.

[984] There's a guy on blank on his name, but he wrote a book called Everybody Lies, and includes a lot of analyses of these data, and it's very interesting.

[985] And this is a really puzzle because men are far more violent than women, on average, and far more sexually violent in women on average.

[986] And so it's kind of a puzzle why women are drawn to these things.

[987] And like we were talking about before, often you don't know, we do things and we don't know why.

[988] And so one answer, I'm not sure this is just a right answer.

[989] And actually, I end this section of books saying, I just don't know.

[990] I talk about all the data and say, I just don't know.

[991] But one answer is because women are far more.

[992] likely than men to be the target of sexual violence, at least outside of a prison, to be the target of sexual violence.

[993] They tend to think about it more, and they tend to obsess about it, and that sometimes it may show up, just like I might go to a horror movie to see the most scariest thing to me that might manifest itself to some extent in sexual fantasy.

[994] Yeah.

[995] I think that's exactly right.

[996] Yeah, I bet it's a multi -prong thing, or I could at least imagine it being a multi -prong thing.

[997] Well, that's a great explanation, and people do like to see their...

[998] fears played out that's pretty common i'd also imagine far more women are suffering from that trauma and i'm a sexual abuse survivor so i have all these weird proclivities we have this great doctor on dr catahawkes and i said like is it right or wrong i mean you're you're now stuck with these things like you didn't choose this experience yet it now has put on to you certain desires and proclivities and can we say it's wrong for people to be pursuing those and she's her answer was really clean and i loved it which was it's not wrong at all unless you have to be secretive about it or you have shame about it.

[999] And so I do think because so many women are also survivors, like it's, who knows what the outcome of that is?

[1000] That could also be in the stew.

[1001] Yeah.

[1002] In general, sexual desire, maybe because it's been sort of ghettoized in my field.

[1003] We have an enormous number of people studying visual perception and language development, but sexual desires is fairly understudied.

[1004] There's a lot of mysteries.

[1005] So the porn letter finds that people are drawn towards cartoon porn.

[1006] Who are drawn to cartoon porn porn porn.

[1007] Men and women, on average, it's anime and other cartoon pornographic images and movies have a very high draw.

[1008] And so does incest.

[1009] And it's a real puzzle because evolutionary psych 101 says, you know, incest is bad, avoid incest.

[1010] My sense for some of this is that it doesn't reflect sort of normal sexual appetites.

[1011] It reflects two things.

[1012] One thing is it reflects simply boredom.

[1013] born, which is, I don't know, a 14 -year -old guy might type into a web browser, naked person, and like, wow, but you get habituated, you get bored, a treadmill happens here too, and it pushes you to weird places.

[1014] And then the second thing is, there's a love of the perverse of doing something simply because it's wrong.

[1015] Yeah.

[1016] And I think some of the appetite for things like revenge porn and pornography involving people who are not willing participants is driven by the sense, this is wrong, and that's kind of why I'm going to do it.

[1017] Do we have a conclusion about that?

[1018] We just have an observation.

[1019] We just have an observation.

[1020] Well, I think maybe part of it is it's doing something wrong that you can get away with.

[1021] Whereas in life, if you're doing something wrong, there's a risk of a consequence.

[1022] And so this is a way to kind of do that and not have one.

[1023] Yes, the Michael Douglas movie falling down.

[1024] It's like everyone desires to just go silver back because they've had enough.

[1025] Yeah.

[1026] And this is a difference between fantasies and reality, which is a difference.

[1027] which is you were talking about sexual fantasies and how they're not necessarily wrong.

[1028] And the thing about them is they'll take you to places which you would never go in real life because there aren't real people involved.

[1029] And the same true for revenge fantasies and often self -harm or suicidal fantasies.

[1030] As long as they stay fantasies, they could just be, you know, your mind working out things.

[1031] Yeah.

[1032] Does having children improve our lives?

[1033] So you had Danny Conneman on, and that Connoven, who creates, figure in the field and present to some early evidence that actually people, when they're with their kids, are pretty miserable.

[1034] So you have these beepers go off.

[1035] And then when a beeper goes off, and now we use iPhones, you say, you have to answer two questions.

[1036] What are you doing and how happy you are?

[1037] And it turns out when people are with friends or watching revenge porn, watching revenge porn, they're pretty happy.

[1038] But when people are with their young children, often, they're not so happy.

[1039] It's kind of boring and stressful and so on.

[1040] But the paradoxes, that if you ask people, and our testament in different ways, people say kids are the great joy of her life.

[1041] They give her life's meaning to give her life's purpose.

[1042] And so since common, there have been other studies, and things always get more complicated.

[1043] So in some countries, parents are happier than non -parents.

[1044] And these tend to be countries which have a lot of resources for child care, a lot of time off, a lot of inexpensive daycare.

[1045] Fathers tend to be happier being parents than mothers, maybe because a lot of the labor goes to mothers.

[1046] And I think most interesting to me, there's this difference, which is it's kind of a toss -up about whether kids give you pleasure or not.

[1047] It's complicated.

[1048] But kids pretty clearly give you a sense of purpose and meaning.

[1049] And so when psychologists say, oh, parents aren't as happy as people choose not to have kids, and these are both different life choices which go in different directions, but parents don't necessarily say, oh, you're full of it.

[1050] What they say is, my kids don't make me, give me pleasure in the way that a hot foot Sunday does, the satisfaction to give us much deeper.

[1051] And this is the sort of case you think about when you try to say, look, people are after more than one thing.

[1052] Yeah.

[1053] I want to know, because I'm so in awe of you, what subjects or fields do you suck at?

[1054] Like, what baffles you?

[1055] We got to ask Bill Gates this, and he said, because this motherfucker will sit down and learn every single thing about waste treatment, like better than the expert who wrote the book.

[1056] He can do anything.

[1057] I hope you've seen the mind of Bill.

[1058] Have you watched that, Doc?

[1059] I haven't seen that yet.

[1060] Oh, my God, it's incredible.

[1061] The guy carries around a book bag, the size of a refrigerator, and he reads all those books every week.

[1062] It's insane.

[1063] But his was economics.

[1064] He's like, that's the thing I just, you know, luckily I can talk to the best in the world, but even being able to talk to them, I really struggle with that.

[1065] And I'm curious, what are your big gaps?

[1066] How much time do you have?

[1067] I'll just give you a few of my gaps.

[1068] I was raised.

[1069] I was raised.

[1070] I was.

[1071] in Montreal, and I took French all the time for hours, and I am horrible at it.

[1072] And I am horrible at every language.

[1073] I barely speak English.

[1074] I'm just like, languages.

[1075] I'm terrible at languages.

[1076] Money terrifies me. I have an email from somebody about grants, and I haven't answered it for two weeks.

[1077] I'm terrified to open it up.

[1078] And honestly, although I'm interested in neuroscience and brain, I'm not a spatial thinker.

[1079] I'm very much of more words than space.

[1080] What does spatial thinker mean?

[1081] Could you tell me what they mean?

[1082] Spatial thinker is somebody who could take a map of the brain and says, well, that parts to amygdala, that parts to the hippocampus, that part's the central giant, there's a visual cortex, and get everything lined up in a three -dimensional space to know where everything is.

[1083] And I can barely find my way very bad at spatial skills.

[1084] So I'm bad at language, money, and space.

[1085] And again, I have found one profession in my life, you know, university.

[1086] professor that for which I'd survive.

[1087] If there was an apocalypse, I would be killed by the zombies first.

[1088] Well, Paul Bloom, so delighted to talk to you.

[1089] It's been literally, you were in our wish list with Connemon right when we started, and it's been such a pleasure to talk to you.

[1090] And you're prolific, so I hope you'll have another book and you'll come talk to us.

[1091] Yeah, come back.

[1092] Yeah.

[1093] This has been an extraordinary amount of fun.

[1094] This has been, I'm very grateful that you had me on.

[1095] Thank you so much.

[1096] I'm going to go downstairs and work out to get a little suffering to kind of write the ship.

[1097] Good for you.

[1098] Good for you.

[1099] Good for you.

[1100] try to get some anxiety in there while you're at it i'll do it i'll do it such a pleasure i can't wait to talk to you again and great look with the book everyone should read the sweet spot the pleasures of suffering in the search for meaning which is out november 2nd so get it oh well there'll be an audible version that's kind of my lane yes it will be and do you read your own books or do you have someone with a lumbering voice too i get people of better voices than me to read the books so someone else with a much better voice is going to read my book okay Okay, wonderful.

[1101] So everyone looked for the sweet spot.

[1102] Such a blast.

[1103] And we'll talk to you again soon.

[1104] And thank you guys.

[1105] This was a lot of fun.

[1106] So good.

[1107] Thank you.

[1108] And now my favorite part of the show, the fact check with my soulmate Monica Padman.

[1109] What's going on?

[1110] What is APL?

[1111] Athletic Propulsion Lab.

[1112] Oh.

[1113] It's a brand.

[1114] It's a trusted brand.

[1115] It's not always play Lucy Goosey.

[1116] That's a PLG.

[1117] Oh, you're getting that kiss to use.

[1118] I always do.

[1119] What's the Golden Goose brand?

[1120] That's fancy.

[1121] Yeah, Goosey Gander.

[1122] I had a pair of Goosey Gander's.

[1123] You did?

[1124] A while ago.

[1125] Oh, my God.

[1126] You were an early adopter.

[1127] I was.

[1128] I'm trying to think who had them.

[1129] I, of course, copied somebody.

[1130] That's how the world works.

[1131] You see a pair of shoes on someone, blows your mind, and then you begin the hunt.

[1132] Speaking of that, a lot of people commented on my sweater.

[1133] Oh, for sure, of course they do.

[1134] It's an incredible sweater.

[1135] Hit them with it.

[1136] In the picture that I was on your shoulders.

[1137] And it's McLaren colors, right?

[1138] This is the one?

[1139] Yeah, it has some.

[1140] It has lots of colors.

[1141] Okay.

[1142] I don't remember the brand.

[1143] Oh, no. That's a terrible update.

[1144] That's an anti -up date.

[1145] Yeah.

[1146] I got it at Selfridges in London.

[1147] Oh, well, that's, you can start there.

[1148] Nope.

[1149] I got it at Liberty in London.

[1150] Okay, Liberty Mutual of Omaha London.

[1151] But I appreciate that everyone liked that sweater.

[1152] I like it a lot, too.

[1153] Yeah, it's great.

[1154] I really do think it has the blue in it.

[1155] I think you're right.

[1156] You commented on that day, the day of the photograph.

[1157] Speaking of London, okay, this is dangerous.

[1158] Uh -oh.

[1159] The whole one second walk over to the attic that was debating whether to bring this up.

[1160] So I just read the New York Times this article.

[1161] And the headline's kind of like, you know, why is England doing bad again with COVID?

[1162] it so i'm like oh you know let's let's read this and then it it printed this graph and the graph upon first glance you're like oh man they're fucking they're out to see and the graph shows the u .s and some other european countries uh -huh and we're we're at uh we're at 30 cases per 100 000 people a day.

[1163] And the Brits are at 60 cases for 100 ,000.

[1164] So that's 6 per 10 ,000.

[1165] Yeah.

[1166] That's 0 .6 per 1 ,000.

[1167] This isn't even a stat.

[1168] But I'm sure what they're saying is they were really low and now it seems to be climbing.

[1169] Not that it's a ton.

[1170] But it's kind of like if there's if, how about this?

[1171] If someone has, out of a billion people, someone has a penny and then someone has two pennies you go oh my god someone has 200 % as many pennies but it's nothing neither people has pennies i see what you're saying i really do like 60 out of a hundred thousand that's not even a like there more people fell out of their bathtub today out of a hundred thousand i know i just think it's a different way of looking at it like you're you're reading that as that they're saying they're doing bad right right and i'm hearing that as as they're saying okay we have to monitor this because everything was low, really low for a while.

[1172] And now maybe there's a gradual increase.

[1173] Let's see, has anything changed?

[1174] Are they not getting boosters?

[1175] Are they this?

[1176] Like, just keeping an eye on what's the change.

[1177] Yeah, that's a great defense of it.

[1178] And then in the same article, there's a paragraph that, of course, I highlighted and copied, and I don't know what end I thought I was going to.

[1179] But it said in there that Scotland and England have the same vaccine rate and Scotland has mask mandate and England doesn't and there's no difference in their current rate.

[1180] So it's like, well, that's a curious bit of data.

[1181] And then I read a second, I read a follow -up one that was basically just a plea to humility, which is like, no one fucking knows still what's going on.

[1182] Yeah.

[1183] Go ahead, push back.

[1184] This is what you're good at.

[1185] I'm not, I'm not pushing back on what you're talking about, I guess my question is, when you're looking at this and you're copying and you're pasting.

[1186] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1187] Do you stop and think, like, what is happening?

[1188] Why am I, why do I care?

[1189] I'll tell you I care because I don't like disinformation.

[1190] That's the chip on my shoulder.

[1191] I don't like being lied to.

[1192] I don't like people with agendas.

[1193] I don't like mass hysteria.

[1194] I don't like emotionally led policies.

[1195] So when I look at that whole thing, what I recognize is this doesn't really have anything to do with COVID.

[1196] I don't believe it does.

[1197] The fact that this would be a front page story on the biggest newspaper in America to report that 60 out of 100 ,000 people are getting something, that's not, objectively, that's not a front page worthy story.

[1198] So my conclusion is we are projecting onto this topic.

[1199] relationship issues.

[1200] Like, as humans and as countrymen, and even as participants in a world order, this is the loading or unloading the dishwasher in a relationship.

[1201] And then all of this other emotional baggage is getting projected onto it.

[1202] Like, is this pathogen bearing the weight of a much bigger debate that's on our minds or a much bigger grievance?

[1203] And it's less and less fitting.

[1204] To me, like when I look at 60 cases in 100 ,000, I go, well, this is less and less fitting an appropriate amount of news coverage, an appropriate amount of thought, an appropriate amount of a lot of stuff.

[1205] So it must represent something else.

[1206] I don't know if it's like individual freedom versus group, group freedom, or I don't know.

[1207] I mean, that's my hunch is it's going to line up the same way all these things line up, like you're either someone who believes in individual rights or you believe in, you know.

[1208] well yeah that's the whole mass thing in general yeah so when i think everyone's like kind of chasing their tail and maybe i feel like i'm caught up in the tail chasing yeah i feel this absurd uh calling to to say stop this has become so opaque and i don't think we're even worried about what we claim to be worried about i yeah i don't know what to say a ton of people have died of this thing it's a big it's a big deal it's a it was It is an enormous deal.

[1209] And there's, we can't say it's over.

[1210] It's not over.

[1211] If we are not monitoring it, there will be more variants.

[1212] There will be more, like, it's not something we can just decide is done.

[1213] And then that's that.

[1214] I mean, we can move forward.

[1215] We are, I think.

[1216] I mean, I'm at restaurants.

[1217] I'm at, we went to F1.

[1218] But it's still something to be aware of.

[1219] It doesn't bother me that it's something to be aware of.

[1220] Let's put it this way.

[1221] And I wish I could look up some things, but I promise to.

[1222] I'll look up some things that have a rate of 60 per 100 ,000.

[1223] And I promise if those things were on the front page of the newspaper, you'd be like, what is happening?

[1224] Like 60 out of 100 ,000 people are dying of falling on brooms in London, but only 30 are falling on brooms and dying in the U .S. And you would just go like, that's crazy that that's a front page story on the New York Times.

[1225] This gets so complicated because I think everyone, should independently have thoughts, right?

[1226] Yeah, yeah.

[1227] Not be swayed by your community or whatever.

[1228] But I do think it's worth noting, like what we say about Sam and Brett, which is, like, they have what they believe are independent thoughts.

[1229] But when you map those thoughts onto groups, who are the groups that agree?

[1230] And are you aligned with the group?

[1231] Yeah.

[1232] Uh -huh.

[1233] Totally agree.

[1234] You're more inclined to look around at your bedfellows and kind of make a verdict based on that, which I would agree with most times.

[1235] What I would suggest is I don't even have bedfellows.

[1236] Like, I'm critical of the left and the right on this whole topic.

[1237] A really interesting part of the subsequent article I read was talking about how we can't get out of the villain hero paradigm.

[1238] It's how our brains work, right?

[1239] So all of our stories kind of consist of a hero and a villain.

[1240] And the article was saying that psychologists looked at the way people talk about sports athletes, right?

[1241] Basically, virtue is supposed to win out in all stories.

[1242] That's the bottom line.

[1243] It's like the villain through he or she's moral failings will eventually unravel themselves and the person with virtue will rise.

[1244] And they apply this bizarre blueprint to athletes.

[1245] And it's funny because they point out all the times they ignore when it doesn't fit the story.

[1246] Like where the person with no virtue who got a DUI who had a batting slump and wasn't clutch.

[1247] And so these people get labeled chokers, people who choke or clutch people.

[1248] And how it ignores that the people that were chokers often go on to be very clutch players and win championships.

[1249] but it doesn't it no longer fits the story of their moral failings causing this right and so it was saying that this COVID thing is very much the same thing which is there's got to be a hero and a villain and if you're on the left the villain is someone who won't wear a mask and if you're on the right the villain is somebody who's wearing their mask in their car by themselves or whatever the thing is they think is absurd and it's just inadequate It's not a real take on any of it.

[1250] So it's like the shaming and the villains and the heroes and I'm a hero because I'm double vacs and I wear a mask inside my car.

[1251] Or I'm a hero because I'm fighting the Gestapo that's forcing me to wear a mask and I'm a patriot.

[1252] All these things, they're rubbish on both sides is what I'm saying.

[1253] And I just think we're being victimized by this paradigm we love to live in, which is like hero and villain.

[1254] I get that.

[1255] But I also, like, I think there's a middle.

[1256] I don't walk around and I'm like, yeah, I'm double -vaxed and I'm special.

[1257] Yeah.

[1258] Or I'm doing the right thing.

[1259] I'm like, yeah, I did the thing I was supposed to do.

[1260] I wear the mask and that's fine.

[1261] You cannot take a pride in either thing.

[1262] You can just like do the thing.

[1263] Yeah, for sure.

[1264] And some significant percentage is likely doing that.

[1265] Yeah, I hope.

[1266] But the bottom line is when we went to England, this whole thing that we have, literally doesn't exist there.

[1267] They don't have a political division on the topic.

[1268] And it was so interesting to be in that world because without the political division, people literally just don't talk about it because it's not a story.

[1269] It's like they all got faxed.

[1270] They did what they were going to do.

[1271] They're 80 % fax and they don't wear masks.

[1272] And that's the whole thing.

[1273] Yeah.

[1274] And no one's talking about it.

[1275] No one's like some gargoyle who's doing this or some virtue signaler who's doing that and it's just to step out of it and to recognize how a story driven it is here definitely is what ignites my fervor about the topic it is very particular to here but it is interesting seeing all these different places because yeah here it's so it's so left and right man it's so political in england there's nothing right and then when we were in paris because we were in london for so long and we were not wearing masks and we were just going along with the thing, I would walk into places in Paris, and immediately it was like, do you have a mask?

[1276] Do you have a mask?

[1277] Yeah.

[1278] But they weren't political either.

[1279] True.

[1280] Yeah.

[1281] They were just following a rule.

[1282] Yeah, they just have a commonly held belief in a certain policy.

[1283] Exactly.

[1284] But no one's like pushing back on it.

[1285] They're just, that's just what they're doing.

[1286] And I just got to say, I find it embarrassing.

[1287] I love this country more than anything, but it is one of the few things I find really embarrassing about this country is that we're all so fucking anchored in our political identity that nothing no topic can slide through without getting sucked into the gravitational pull of the left or the right i just find it very frustrating and mad yeah i mean i i i do too it's a bummer but it's there's a flip side of the coin we have opinions on everything it's not just politics we are a very opinionated group of people we have thoughts on things we want to expound upon things.

[1288] We want to push things forward.

[1289] Like that there's good stuff to it as well, but yeah.

[1290] And I love that aspect.

[1291] That's the Israeli thing, the challenger, the person that feels like their opinion is as valid.

[1292] My issue is I'm not seeing that many individual opinions.

[1293] I see a left opinion and a right opinion.

[1294] I not like seen any variety within that spectrum.

[1295] Yeah.

[1296] I think our thought in this country is a little less independent than we think it is.

[1297] I think it's pretty much lockstep with whatever political party we think we're in or socioeconomic bracket we might think we're in you know like there's these pockets that really do hijack any real independent analysis well i mean paul says that in this episode we maybe more than anything want to be liked within our group yes it's the most important thing so yeah but you know we need a we need a check valve for that in my opinion i just think like knowing that about ourselves we need a little more checks and a little more humility, myself included, which is just like, things aren't even remotely approaching certainties that are being spouted as certainties around every corner.

[1298] It's also individual.

[1299] I am not someone who is opposed to rules at all.

[1300] I follow them my whole life.

[1301] I'm totally fine following them.

[1302] I like them in a lot of ways.

[1303] And so to me, I'm not going to feel like an idiot.

[1304] in 10 years, if they're like, actually, those masks, they didn't work.

[1305] Right.

[1306] I won't care.

[1307] I'm like, okay, but they didn't hurt me. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1308] And they could have helped.

[1309] So I'd much rather do that, follow a rule, not really think too hard about it.

[1310] Yep.

[1311] And for other people, I think yourself included, you're way more wary of rules.

[1312] Yes, and I will just say, because people are regularly manipulating things.

[1313] to push an agenda.

[1314] Let's just take, you know, the Trump getting peed on in a hotel by a hooker in the dossier.

[1315] I was always like, that's just such horseship.

[1316] It's such horrid.

[1317] There's no way he was getting peed on by a hooker, right?

[1318] But I'm getting that information from a Scotland yard operative vetted by the CIA.

[1319] So I think it's healthy to go, that sounds a little preposterous.

[1320] You know, I think there's a great deal.

[1321] of agenda -driven information dumped on our laps.

[1322] And I do think you have to ask yourself if that seems plausible, kind of regularly in life.

[1323] Right, but also what's the cost?

[1324] So, like, the cost of the Trump thing, there is a cost.

[1325] There's a huge one, yeah.

[1326] Yes, and so the cost of wearing a mask, to me, is zero.

[1327] So I totally agree with you, except for when you and I had to actually be in a mask 12 hours.

[1328] Like, we had to fly.

[1329] Yeah.

[1330] And we were in that mask for 12 hours.

[1331] And so when I'm in the mask for 12 hours, my skin gets all red and peely around the whole area the mask is on my face.

[1332] And I have great lungs.

[1333] I don't know what it's like to have any kind of diminished breathing on top of the reduction of the oxygen.

[1334] But I don't have a job where I have a mask on for 12 hours a day.

[1335] If I did, I bet I would feel much differently than I do about it.

[1336] I feel the same way you do, which is like, yeah, who knows it might prove to be ineffective.

[1337] But with the chance that it could have been effective, Why not do it?

[1338] Because it's not a huge deal.

[1339] But again, when I wear one for 12 hours, I have to be honest with myself and I go, no, I couldn't wear one 48 hours a week.

[1340] I couldn't.

[1341] Yeah.

[1342] I'd have to quit whatever job required me to do that.

[1343] Right.

[1344] Yeah, I mean, I'm not telling people what to do.

[1345] You have to just do a cost -benefit analysis and also understand, like, what are you personally bringing to the table?

[1346] Is it your dad was controlling?

[1347] And so this, you know, is it just indignation?

[1348] Yeah.

[1349] Yeah, like what is happening, really?

[1350] And maybe even if you recognize it doesn't matter, you just love those opinions.

[1351] Or you can work through all.

[1352] I think I've done a great job working through all of it because I have complied with everything.

[1353] And then on the other side of having worked through most of it, also going, oh, yeah, I couldn't wear this thing 12 hours a day.

[1354] I have a new kind of sympathy for people who are asked at a restaurant that's already fucking hot and shitty.

[1355] and their skin's already on fire from just working over a stove.

[1356] Yeah.

[1357] Then you had that mass like, you know, I don't know what that experience is like.

[1358] And it's possible I would be like, I don't fucking, you know.

[1359] Yeah, I don't know.

[1360] I'm not in that position.

[1361] So I can't really, I can only speak for me. Yeah, podcaster extraordinaire.

[1362] Madeline Paddalen.

[1363] Oh, yeah, Madeline Paddalen.

[1364] Danny called me Madeline as a joke.

[1365] Sure.

[1366] He knew my name.

[1367] Yes, very well.

[1368] And then it turned into Madeline Paddleyn.

[1369] Which is a great name.

[1370] So you got your tattoos.

[1371] I got my tattoos.

[1372] They're finally starting to fade a bit, which it makes me happy.

[1373] They're really cool.

[1374] Thank you so much.

[1375] Yeah, the shading starting to die back a bit, which I like.

[1376] Because at first, it just looked like at a dirt smear all over my wrist because of the shading.

[1377] Yeah.

[1378] That's to be expected.

[1379] But yeah, just actually this morning, I realized like some pieces had flaked off of the shading.

[1380] I was like, okay, now we're settling into something that.

[1381] I think, yeah, I like it.

[1382] You were in there for so long.

[1383] Yes, for you, it was a whole revelation.

[1384] You didn't realize how long they took.

[1385] Yeah, my man, Freddie at Shamrock, took his fucking time, and I appreciate it.

[1386] Yeah.

[1387] Yeah, I think I was in there for what I didn't have been.

[1388] Six hours or something.

[1389] Yeah, five hours, maybe.

[1390] Some of it, you know, was tinkering with the sizes and putting on the, they put a transfer on you first, right?

[1391] Uh -huh.

[1392] I've talked about this experience when I said I was buying the engagement ring, and I had this very visceral feeling as I was handing the person the card.

[1393] I was like, what is this feeling?

[1394] Like, it was so specific.

[1395] And I mold on it for like five minutes.

[1396] I'm like, oh, my God, I know what it is.

[1397] It's when they put the transfer on and you have basically a purple outline of it and you stand in front of the mirror and you look at it and you go, yeah.

[1398] You're making a permanent decision.

[1399] Yeah, I think it's so rare in your life you actually make a permanent decision.

[1400] Wow, yeah.

[1401] That it gives you this crazy specific shock of something I don't know what chemicals That's interesting Yeah But you know I got it less this time Good Which is weird Well I'm sure because they're Lincoln and Delta And probably because I've already done it A bunch of times at this point I do have to You're not gonna like this Okay But because you You said once you get them You don't notice them You don't think about it again So you won't regret it Whatever Callie's getting a tattoo removed currently And it's not a tattoo too that that's like on her back or yeah it's not offensive um no she just doesn't like it she doesn't like it she doesn't like it oh okay so she's getting it removed where's it at her ankle it's a compass it's a cute tattoo she got in college and uh yeah she she she she she don't like it um what else was i say oh Halloween wrap up you did your hay ride oh man yeah the hay ride um It evolved a little bit this year.

[1402] It got a little better, I would argue.

[1403] It was so fun.

[1404] I spent more time on the trailer.

[1405] First of all, I also learned last year I got too many hay bales.

[1406] Okay, yeah, sure.

[1407] Everyone was sitting on top of hay bales, and then it was, the trailer was both top -heavy, and now just people are in danger of toppling out of it.

[1408] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1409] So we went with less hay bales, so everything got lower.

[1410] And then I had, because I didn't have full hay bales when I broke up all the hay, I had to put basically walls on the inside of the trailer so the hay wouldn't dump out everywhere.

[1411] So once I put these little walls up, which I repurposed some old shingles that had come off, some old mock slate shingles, got them on the trailer.

[1412] Then I painted the outside of those orange.

[1413] So there's a little pumpkin flare.

[1414] It was really cute, really fun.

[1415] I'll brag for you.

[1416] Okay.

[1417] Your driving skills were fantastic.

[1418] Oh, my gosh.

[1419] Thank you.

[1420] Everyone was commenting.

[1421] Thank you so much.

[1422] We even had a big cheer at one point because you...

[1423] It made me happy every time.

[1424] Turned.

[1425] I don't know how you did it.

[1426] The 180 or the turn into the alley?

[1427] Because as the driver...

[1428] The alley's the trickiest.

[1429] Yeah.

[1430] The 180, though, you came like a half a centimeter from a car at one of those.

[1431] And I did 12 times that night.

[1432] And Danny Ricardo was next to me and was like, you'll make it.

[1433] And then you did.

[1434] Oh, thank you.

[1435] That's a big compliment.

[1436] Thank you, thank you, thank you.

[1437] I really appreciate you telling me that.

[1438] You've been really gracious and showering me with praise for my driving of the...

[1439] I was impressed.

[1440] I have to give it up.

[1441] This year I decided.

[1442] Last year, I basically drove the pot around a lot, then got out, then went trick -or -to -door with the kids on foot, and then at the end gave a couple rides to neighbors.

[1443] This year I was trying to get the neighbors in right away.

[1444] So I basically did a loop with you guys.

[1445] You guys got out.

[1446] And then I started forcing neighbors in.

[1447] You did.

[1448] I just did the neighbors most of the night.

[1449] It was a service to the neighborhood.

[1450] It was really sweet.

[1451] Every time we would see it, I was like, oh, my gosh, so many people are in back.

[1452] They love it.

[1453] They're so happy.

[1454] Thank you.

[1455] And so you and a couple other people were nice enough to congratulate my driving, which everyone knows is a huge thing for me. I have to say out loud, the most stressful part of the whole experience is not at all driving the trailer through the tight neighborhood with alleys.

[1456] It's keeping the playlist going while I'm driving because you go on Spotify and they've got a great 2021 Halloween party mix.

[1457] And it's fucking great.

[1458] Yeah.

[1459] But even a great one has some stinkers in it for me. So I'm like, I got to skip songs.

[1460] I got to make sure we don't hear that.

[1461] Yes.

[1462] My main stress that whole night is just keeping that playlist rocking and not repeating thriller too many times.

[1463] I think we played it three times.

[1464] You know, you're going to repeat it.

[1465] Well, obviously, but you don't want to take critical math.

[1466] You don't want to go to the well too much on it.

[1467] You know, every time the thing's passing, you don't want to hear a thriller.

[1468] That's right.

[1469] So that was the part where, you know, quite often turning in the alley.

[1470] I am just nose right in the phone trying to find the next song.

[1471] I'm sure you how to make a playlist next year.

[1472] Okay.

[1473] You know, it's funny because people are asking like, what can we bring over?

[1474] What can we bring over?

[1475] And I was saying, you know, nothing.

[1476] And then it occurred to me, I probably should tell Ryan, like, Ryan make a playlist.

[1477] He would have loved that.

[1478] his lane he really knows how to keep everyone party pumped that might be my request for next year is that he make a okay i like that we're saying it on here yeah yeah yeah yeah ryan but yeah man it was a fucking awesome Halloween holy smokes i uh i couldn't believe how much fun it was um okay couple facts okay okay so he said sociopath is a more polite term for psychopath oh like because you said what's a difference he said it's really just a polite term but according to the internet yeah Psychopaths tend to be more manipulative Can be seen by others as more charming Lead a semblance of a normal life And minimize risk in criminal activities Sociopaths tend to be more erratic, rage prone And unable to lead as much of a normal life They do sound the same So to me it sounds like a psychopath is a sociopath with skills Like empathy skills and...

[1479] True, it's like a step up Yeah, it's just like they're charming sociopaths, it sounds like Yeah, I would agree Neither give a fuck about the ethical disasters that result from their behaviors.

[1480] No, they don't.

[1481] We talk about conneming a little bit, and you say narrative self, and you said he doesn't call it that.

[1482] He calls it remembering self versus experiencing self.

[1483] Oh, I looked at most meaningful jobs.

[1484] Oh, good.

[1485] This would be a great roadmap for any collegiate listeners.

[1486] Okay, one is clergy.

[1487] He said that, and that checks out.

[1488] I don't.

[1489] I mean?

[1490] I don't like that one.

[1491] Well, why?

[1492] Well, is it clergy like in the Roman Catholic sense where they're celibate?

[1493] I don't know.

[1494] Because that, that to me is one of the weirdest, most gruesome perversions of any group think we've ever had.

[1495] That somehow some group of people should be celibate because that's going to make them closer to the Lord who designed us to sexually procreate.

[1496] It doesn't make a lick a sense to me. It just seems like a weird punishment.

[1497] Like we're making them prove their purity.

[1498] Yeah, I think it's also that they don't get swayed by human temptation.

[1499] But then we look at the outcome of it and it's like a disproportionately inordinately high rate of pedophilia and stuff.

[1500] Yeah, so like the outcome is pathological.

[1501] Yeah.

[1502] Okay, sorry.

[1503] All right.

[1504] Okay.

[1505] Two English language and literature teachers, post -secondary.

[1506] Post -secondary.

[1507] So that would be like professors?

[1508] Yeah.

[1509] English professors, huh?

[1510] That's cool.

[1511] If you love literature enough to make it through a PhD and get yourself a college teaching job, you're likely to feel pretty good about your work.

[1512] Oh, I'm doing not going to like this.

[1513] Uh -oh.

[1514] Directors, religious activities, and education.

[1515] Another religious job rests at the top of pay scales list of most meaningful jobs.

[1516] Directors of religious activities and education aren't ordained clergy, but they oversee programs for congregation members.

[1517] These workers only are a typical salary of $37 ,000, so it's definitely not done for love of money.

[1518] But since 96 % of these workers say their job makes the world a better place, they definitely seem to get something out of it.

[1519] You know, if I was a cynical listener, I'd be like, hey, Shepard, how much data do you fucking need?

[1520] I know.

[1521] It's true.

[1522] That's true.

[1523] I'm inclined to explain that by going anytime you make a choice over money for good.

[1524] yeah as long as you believe what you're doing is good it's going to lead to meaning and purpose yeah that's what this is whether that's a you know fool's errand but we're not saying anything's objective meaningfulness has is not objective you're absolutely right thank you surgeons arrogant psychopassian yeah exactly sociopath psychopaths psychopath.

[1525] Surgeon.

[1526] Education administrators, elementary and secondary school.

[1527] Radiation therapist.

[1528] That makes sense.

[1529] You know, I deal with a ton of x -ray givers, radiologists.

[1530] Oh, my.

[1531] And they are, I will say as a lot.

[1532] They're a chipper group.

[1533] I always like interacting with them.

[1534] And again, I'm with them a lot.

[1535] I get a couple dozen x -rays a year.

[1536] Your best friends.

[1537] You know, I'm always trying to trick them into giving me the prognosis.

[1538] Because they, they know.

[1539] They know.

[1540] Yeah, like they can read an x -ray better than any doctor probably.

[1541] And I'm always like, well, is it broke?

[1542] And they're like, well, the doctor's going to come in there.

[1543] They have like a lot of ethics.

[1544] Oh, wow.

[1545] They won't tell me. And they know it must be so tempting to know the answer and to bite your tongue.

[1546] Good for them.

[1547] They're like the opposite of air again.

[1548] Of me. Yeah.

[1549] I can't imagine knowing the answer for something and not forcing the person to listen.

[1550] Yeah, the patient's like, I'll wait for the doctor.

[1551] No, I know.

[1552] No, I'm your doctor.

[1553] I'd be the worst radiologist in the history.

[1554] of radiology.

[1555] Yeah, you could go see him waste some time if you want or I can tell you right now.

[1556] You don't need shit.

[1557] There's nothing here.

[1558] Not even a airline fracture.

[1559] Oh, my God.

[1560] Go back to skateboarding, young man. Are you sure?

[1561] It really hurts.

[1562] Yeah.

[1563] Really, really hurt.

[1564] That's just soft tissue damage.

[1565] I also kind of, as a hobby, I'm into soft tissue stuff.

[1566] Oh, wow.

[1567] Okay.

[1568] Endo and exoskeleton, really.

[1569] Okay.

[1570] Chiropractors, psychiatrists, anesthesiologists, rehabilitation counselors, occupational therapists, kindergarten teachers, epidemiologists.

[1571] When was a study?

[1572] To be fair, a lot of these say tie next to that.

[1573] Oh, okay.

[1574] I didn't make that clear.

[1575] Okay.

[1576] Well, these are tied.

[1577] When was a study?

[1578] Let's see.

[1579] Can't be found.

[1580] I just wonder if that epidemiologist thing has changed during our last pandemic.

[1581] You know what?

[1582] Or maybe it's more.

[1583] Maybe more, yeah.

[1584] Okay.

[1585] So hard to know.

[1586] We'll never know because I don't know how to look up dates.

[1587] Yeah.

[1588] It's too hard.

[1589] Does cutting, this was an interesting article, does cutting release a biochemical reaction?

[1590] According to this American Psychological Association, APA.

[1591] Uh -huh.

[1592] This is who Pellon Hub.

[1593] This was his arch nemesis was the APA.

[1594] He tried to get Dianetics signed off on by them.

[1595] And they were like, there's not a single experiment in here.

[1596] And so he sent a team.

[1597] He found out that they were not registered as a trademark.

[1598] So he somehow had this ploy to send people to Switzerland to register the APA in Switzerland.

[1599] And it was like this covert operation.

[1600] There was a boat they had to get on.

[1601] It was a whole caper.

[1602] Wow.

[1603] Yeah, he did not like the APA.

[1604] Fact checks should just be called additional facts.

[1605] Additional unsubstantiated facts.

[1606] Okay, I'm going to read some of this.

[1607] A phenomenon called pain offset relief.

[1608] According to this concept, virtually everyone experiences an unpleasant physical reaction to a painful stimulus.

[1609] Removing the stimulus does not return the individual to their pre -stimulus state.

[1610] However, rather it leads them into a short but intense state of euphoria.

[1611] Using a technique called pain offset relief conditioning, those scientists also found that if you paired the pain with the stimulus over time, people would react more favorably to the pain because they had learned to associate it with pain relief.

[1612] For example, when researchers shocked rats and then presented them with a pleasant odor over time the rats began seeking out the smell.

[1613] Ah, I wish I could remember why I read that thing.

[1614] Yeah.

[1615] Yeah, this isn't one of my armchair theories.

[1616] This is something I read.

[1617] You read it.

[1618] Did you read it in the cover in New York Times?

[1619] probably it's the only thing i read even though it angers me half the time it's pretty fine but half the time you love it that's true that's true i love it it's a great newspaper but yeah it's just it's a group of human they're they're an in -group out group like they're a group of humans that sit in the same building and they they hash stuff out to see which side of the right and wrong they're on yeah i personally think they do a pretty good job of being impartial but But everything, they're always slipped through the cracks.

[1620] Well, they had on the cover of their own newspaper this year in, I want to say March, it was a meta study done by a scientist that looked at metadata from all of the COVID information, right?

[1621] So there's like positive and there's negative.

[1622] There's, you know, progress is made here.

[1623] There's a spike there.

[1624] And they found that in general in the scientific journals, is which thing we're supposed to trust the most.

[1625] It was 50 -50, positive and negative.

[1626] and they found that the Times reporting was 80 % negative.

[1627] And then they spent a whole cover section admitting that they were definitely to the fearmongering side of this scale.

[1628] But the fact that they printed that to me means.

[1629] It's encouraging.

[1630] It's what makes me stick with the thing.

[1631] But it also lets me know sometimes I'm reading that paper and they're off base.

[1632] They're inflating something by almost a factor of two.

[1633] Yeah.

[1634] Okay.

[1635] He talks about a book called Everybody Lies, but he didn't know the, or he forgot the author.

[1636] And the author is Seth Stevens Dividowitz.

[1637] Oh, wow.

[1638] Davidowitz.

[1639] Everybody lies.

[1640] Italian and Polish.

[1641] Oh, my God.

[1642] Ding, ding, ding, ding, everybody lies.

[1643] I'm just talking.

[1644] Oh, my God.

[1645] Ding, ding, dang.

[1646] The New York Times lies.

[1647] Everybody that we are not saying that.

[1648] Everybody lies.

[1649] Big data, new data, and what the Internet can tell us about who we really are.

[1650] That is all That's everything Correct I love you And I love Paul Bloom man We don't really talk about him But that's kind of what we do Sorry I think I probably said it on the podcast He's one of the people that make me nervous Yeah but you did great Like I'm scared to talk to him a little bit He was so easy to talk to though He was.

[1651] And I'll get back to everyone on the sweater brand.

[1652] Yeah.

[1653] That's TBD.

[1654] And I had something, too.

[1655] I was, oh, I was going to look up stuff that's at a rate of 60 per 100 ,000 just for some comparisons.

[1656] Love you.

[1657] Bye.

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