Episode Transcript
Transcripts are displayed as originally observed. Some content, including advertisements may have changed.
Use Ctrl + F to search
0:19
what's up ladies and gentlemen boys and girls around
0:21
the world i would like to welcome you back to
0:23
the real talk with zoo the podcast
0:26
now today's episode i feel is long
0:28
overdue i'm surprised we have not already
0:30
had this conversation by on today's
0:33
episode i have the one and only jeffrey
0:35
miller who is a well known evolutionary
0:38
psychologist and a very interesting
0:40
sinker out there in the world today so walk
0:42
into the show geoffrey howe
0:44
thanks for to be hers
0:46
awesome so i've done a brief ensure their jeffrey
0:48
but for people who are not familiar with
0:50
you and some of your work the tell them a little
0:52
bit about
0:54
that involved in this field of evolutionary
0:56
psychology for about thirty years
0:59
you know ever since grad school at stanford and
1:01
but we try to do is understand human nature the
1:04
origins of human references
1:07
and desires emotions motivations
1:09
all the kind of architecture that makes
1:11
us human and we try to understand where
1:13
does that come from how does it work how
1:16
does it play out and modern life so
1:18
, on a huge range of stuff like human
1:21
intelligence creativity language
1:23
art music a lot on
1:25
mating and mate choice and why we're attracted
1:28
certain things
1:29
other people both males and females
1:32
particularly like our ,
1:34
traits that are attractive not just physical traits
1:37
i'm a more recently i've gotten
1:39
involved i've gotten like effective altruism movement
1:42
which is about how to do the most good you can
1:44
based on reason and evidence i'm
1:46
quite interested and evidence catastrophic
1:48
risks that come from
1:50
there was a shared humanity and i'm
1:52
pretty active on twitter as on primal
1:54
polly
1:56
awesome while there's so much that we can
1:58
do we can get into on that that before
2:00
we dive right into a jeffrey tell me a little bit more
2:02
about your life story
2:05
tell me more about everything that led
2:07
up to the stage because i'm sure there's
2:09
an interesting story behind this
2:11
just grew up in a nice bourgeois
2:13
family in ohio went to columbia
2:16
university as an undergrad arm
2:19
columbia least back in the eighties
2:21
was awesome because it was kind of like a great books
2:23
western civilization ah
2:26
, liberal education but you could also
2:28
take a lotta courses and and diverse
2:30
topics on i was always fascinated
2:32
by by both western
2:34
and eastern civilization tried
2:36
to study japanese took a lot of
2:38
courses on you know history is on
2:40
china japan india japan
2:43
i'm want to grad school at stanford studied
2:46
cognitive psychology evolutionary psychology
2:49
spent nine years and england actually and
2:51
postdoc or to university of
2:53
sussex university college london london
2:55
university of economics arm and
2:57
since about two thousand and one i've been at university of
3:00
i've mexico and albuquerque com
3:02
and you know visited different other universities
3:05
like n y u stern business school and
3:08
sabbaticals here and air arm
3:10
britain
3:11
five books
3:13
probably the ones you know i'd strongly
3:15
recommend most would be like
3:17
the mating mind my first book spent
3:20
ah from two thousand and eight about consumer
3:22
behavior the know i'd vote did
3:24
a little book called virtue signaling
3:27
when in nineteen that some a
3:29
little more political
3:30
mostly focused on kind of free speech
3:33
and arm why
3:35
it's important
3:36
awesome what is it they got you
3:39
interested in these
3:41
areas to begin with to the point that you
3:43
wanted to dedicate your
3:45
life and career to going into
3:47
them in such dept
3:50
well i'm can ask be you know i've got a little
3:52
touch of the as burgers and like i don't naturally
3:55
understand people's out well and
3:57
so there are two kinds
3:59
of
3:59
people roughly who go into psychology
4:02
this people who are like highly empathic and
4:04
get people kind of naturally and wanna help
4:06
them attorneys people like me who
4:08
are like
4:09
what the hell's going on get people
4:11
are particularly don't understand women i
4:14
, to be very systematic about understanding
4:16
them so i shall study psychology and
4:20
that's what kind of got me into it on
4:22
as an undergraduate and then i thought wow
4:25
the whole process of doing research and
4:27
, to systematically get
4:29
a grip of on human nature is
4:32
just fascinating and rewarding
4:34
and i can't imagine anything more
4:37
fun and always and doing evolutionary psychology
4:40
because anything you can imagine anything that
4:42
anything is of interest this
4:44
kind of a psychology angle
4:46
who it mouth so it's an extremely
4:49
broad
4:50
the field it's very interdisciplinary
4:52
it's very exciting we made a lot of progress
4:55
i think i'm last thirty years who i
4:57
think a lot of people mix up evolutionary psychology
5:00
and evolutionary biology
5:02
so can you please explain
5:05
the difference between them i know i've had
5:07
on guard sat on my podcast
5:09
chest before who's an evolutionary biologist
5:14
well i eat my is like i'm getting psychologists
5:16
way and we didn't six you're you're both evolutionary
5:18
psychologists
5:19
right rather yeah so i all
5:22
honestly all we're trying to do is apply
5:24
all the amazing the syrian
5:26
tools and insights from evolutionary
5:28
biology okay to human
5:31
psychology
5:33
though
5:35
i didn't graduate school i read a huge amount about
5:37
primate behavior animal behavior genetics
5:40
anthropology me know the origins
5:42
of people studies of hunter gatherers
5:44
and tribal people and what you do
5:46
as you try to we've that together and non
5:48
into understanding modern human behavior
5:51
so innocence were were more
5:53
a branch of evolutionary
5:56
biology than we are of kind of sandwich social
5:58
sciences like
5:59
you know gender studies
6:02
or sociology or cultural anthropology
6:05
so we take a very kind of hard sciences
6:08
approach to psychology
6:11
are but it's really informed by thinking
6:13
humans are just another animal were very
6:16
you know unusual special exciting kind of
6:18
animal but a lot of our behavior we
6:20
share with other primates other mammals
6:23
etc
6:24
and what was the first field
6:26
with in that area that really the
6:29
really grabbed you what was the was
6:31
the first thing you went deeper
6:33
i went deep really on sexual selection
6:35
theory august back in grad school circa
6:38
nineteen eighty nine right okay
6:41
i was absolutely fascinated by darwin's
6:43
key insight that oh
6:45
my god we're not just shaped to survive
6:48
or shape to
6:49
like please the preferences of the other
6:51
sacks and and many species
6:54
that's basically males trying to to
6:56
be the kind of males than females want
6:59
but , humans it's neutral mate choice
7:01
both sexes are choosy both
7:03
sexes do courtship both sexes
7:06
try to attract the other sex so
7:08
and assets and little more on balance
7:11
then of course the sexes like somewhat different things
7:13
they attach different weights to
7:16
, traits but the
7:18
basic insight that basic insight what we are
7:21
there to attract the other sacks
7:23
i found extremely powerful
7:25
and i thought this can explain a lot about
7:28
us on our human
7:30
intelligence or language abilities
7:32
why we want to make art and music
7:34
why we wanted wrap etc
7:40
i've gotten a lot of mileage out of that nuts what
7:42
my first book the mating mindless was
7:44
really focused on
7:45
yeah what was the first star or
7:47
what we're somebody insights back
7:50
then that shocked
7:52
or surprised you because you
7:54
said you came into this from a you could use your
7:56
term at term at sort of as be perspective
7:59
ah who are you know a guy who's they're trying
8:01
to understand the opposite sex
8:03
and you know perhaps try to be more attractive to women
8:06
and so on so what were some of the
8:09
or some of the core insights that made
8:11
you go wow that's a that's
8:14
something interesting that perhaps most people
8:16
don't consciously think about or aren't
8:18
even aware of
8:20
what were my favorite topics a sense of
8:22
humor why why a sense
8:24
of humor so attractive
8:27
, important and valuable valuable
8:29
have always been fascinated by stand up comedy
8:31
ever since eighties i've never done it
8:34
but i have like huge respect for comedians
8:36
who are good at it and
8:39
that's one style comedy
8:41
you were often there's like
8:44
sort of us and you know
8:46
extroverted also performing for
8:49
a bunch of people
8:50
the inhuman courtship and sort of intimate
8:52
situations often the best
8:55
humor is like
8:56
very it's very ad hoc
8:58
it's kind of on the fly it's not a pre
9:00
planned story it's just like responding
9:03
to the environment or ongoing social
9:06
situations and saying something witty and
9:08
funny about it why is
9:10
that attractive it seems like a total
9:14
luxury ability that doesn't really
9:16
help you survive like it humor
9:18
doesn't help you find food or
9:20
avoid predators or do
9:23
a lot of other basic survival
9:26
, so what information
9:28
is information conveying
9:31
with my colleagues and grad students we we
9:34
dove into this and basically
9:38
intelligence
9:39
is conveyed pretty well for sense
9:41
of humor and that's one reason i think
9:43
sense of humor as attractive it's kind of like an eye
9:45
to indicator it's , a
9:47
mental health indicator because
9:51
almost every
9:52
the mental disorder you can think of
9:54
whether it's depression anxiety
9:56
ah schizophrenia undermines
9:59
sense of humor it makes people less
10:02
funny it might make them weirder but none
10:05
able to do engaged humor
10:07
as well the humor
10:10
also kind of a testimony to mental health
10:12
happiness , emotional stability
10:15
etc so we're
10:17
always trying to unpack what's the underlying
10:19
logic behind why certain
10:22
things are are attractive
10:24
yeah that's actually interesting i've never i never
10:26
thought of that point you just made of it being
10:29
a potential mental health indicator
10:31
cause you're you're absolutely right that this
10:33
the sense of humor aspect
10:36
is something that those go
10:38
when when people have that as well
10:40
as the i'm
10:42
, know i think we're living in an interesting time actually
10:45
in our society and culture
10:47
where i mean mean
10:49
we're literally talking as not
10:52
one but two comedians not so
10:54
long ago have been attacked on stage
10:56
for telling a joke and
10:59
i've noticed over the past many years
11:01
that a lot of
11:03
people seem to losing their sense of humor
11:06
and its cylinders
11:08
look through this this political lens but
11:10
it's like what what's going on here wire people
11:13
not able to take to take why's everyone
11:16
why people taking more a sense
11:18
of are very sort of minor minor
11:21
things that we're not are
11:23
not really that gratuitous or
11:25
a horribly offensive or anything like that
11:30
so a it's it's an interesting thing to
11:32
note that seems to play on some way
11:35
on both an individual level but also like
11:37
also societal level societal feel i feel like the
11:40
siamese become a bit more
11:43
i'm stuck up
11:45
and grabbed stuck up and fragile in away yeah
11:48
kind of puritanical furious don't like
11:50
humor yes and so
11:52
it's almost like there's a trade off between being
11:54
super earnest and serious about everything
11:56
in life versus being very
11:59
wait for
11:59
i'm not taking anything seriously
12:02
and i think if you you wanna be
12:06
and good relationships that are that are
12:08
productive like with you know a spouse
12:10
or in a serious relationship or even
12:12
a friendship that you value you
12:15
have to be able to kind of go back and forth
12:17
along that spectrum from earnest to
12:19
to humorous so ,
12:22
my lifestyle and i make fun of each
12:24
other a lot fights
12:26
in we try to be sensitive
12:29
to light the context of one we're doing
12:31
it and we also try to make fun
12:33
of ourselves
12:35
as much as of the other person is
12:37
one thing that you see about woken us is
12:40
, almost total inability to
12:42
do healthy something very
12:44
nice make owners themselves so
12:48
i respect some people
12:50
who are kind of you know progressive
12:52
liberals if they have a sense
12:54
of humor about it and they kind of aba and
12:57
, is how this
12:59
can become quite ridiculous
13:01
and guess is our and
13:05
they don't take it too seriously
13:08
the nice i think we are cleaner com
13:11
in danger of losing dot in in
13:13
public discourse particularly social media
13:15
as you and i both know the right a
13:17
lot of people won't take a joke
13:20
and then give it the most
13:22
the return a call judgmental interpretation
13:25
they can and and you know come after you for
13:28
yeah it it's almost like the the principle
13:30
of on charity the are taking
13:32
everything in the worst away possible
13:35
rather than giving people the benefit of the
13:37
doubt and saying okay maybe
13:40
okay i may be that cross the line a little but
13:42
they probably meant it this way it's
13:45
like someone can to say something very
13:47
benign and someone will go out of their
13:49
way to twist and convoluted into
13:52
them being or you
13:54
know potentially meaning something that
13:56
they absolutely didn't and maybe
13:59
i'm just we're pretty to it now with
14:01
the rise of social media and my own profile
14:04
but it i don't feel like people used
14:06
to do that
14:07
so much adding people used to give each other
14:09
the benefit the benefit of the doubt
14:11
more arm and gonna be more willing
14:13
to laugh things off and
14:16
you know forget people when they did maybe
14:18
cross a line by , as
14:20
you said has become very puritanical
14:22
end end that with
14:25
that also comes the sort of a group aggression
14:27
right the the aggression note the mobs the
14:30
you know these these attacks whether online about
14:32
sometimes trickling into the
14:34
real world as well
14:36
green a one one
14:39
, to fight us might be to kind of encourage more
14:41
people to actually do do
14:44
take an improv comedy class do a little
14:46
stand up at an open mike locally
14:49
and figure out just
14:51
how difficult it is to make people
14:53
laugh without being alone transgressive
14:55
yeah my serious a lot of the woke
14:58
folks don't actually
15:00
true enough
15:02
in person social interaction
15:05
that's funny that
15:07
they actually have the experience of understanding
15:09
from the inside what it takes
15:11
actually be funny and and deliver joy
15:14
and laughter to other people's because
15:17
it's basically spending all the time
15:19
you know on their phones and front of their computer
15:21
is not interacting socially just texting
15:23
people
15:25
do not really developing
15:27
they're kind of comedic skills
15:29
are there they're
15:31
not getting like well calibrated about
15:34
how do you actually do human social life
15:37
in a way that is light and playful and
15:39
and funny
15:42
i think if they leveled up so skills you
15:45
know they'd have a lot more tolerance for like
15:48
the
15:49
joe rogan or i'm other
15:51
stand up comedians you know violating
15:54
social norms i wouldn't take those violations
15:56
that seriously they go oh yeah
15:59
i
15:59
do that always i'm in my own
16:01
relationships not a big deal when
16:04
i think something else this this also interesting
16:07
is i've observed that
16:10
maybe i can that maybe that maybe this isn't a new
16:13
the i don't think this is really a new thing i think we're just
16:15
experiencing it in it's latest form
16:18
and this this inability of people
16:20
to separate themselves
16:22
from their ideas or their beliefs in
16:24
any way shape or form so
16:27
if someone's them a belief
16:29
or is is is questioned
16:31
or is challenge or whatever there's
16:34
this this either years
16:36
why we are we all have things that are you very
16:38
very close to us and things that we have that we hold
16:41
deeply why
16:43
if that is even just
16:45
the approach
16:46
or prodded in a in a way that that
16:49
people don't like then there's
16:51
this huge spinola
16:53
backlash and aggression and aggression think actually it's
16:55
important and it it's think it's an ongoing activity
16:58
to be able to separate
17:00
yourself somewhat from
17:03
your beliefs so that if someone questions
17:05
or challenges that yes that might
17:07
be a deeply held belief of yours but it's not
17:09
a non attack on the individual
17:12
the is not going to you're not you're not going after
17:14
the person right so i
17:17
don't like i'm i'm a christian i am
17:19
i i believe i believe in god i know many
17:21
people who don't there's all sorts of different religions
17:23
out there but if someone says
17:25
something about you know made a fair
17:28
comment or criticism or meal asked
17:30
a question about christianity i
17:32
won't blow my lid on them as if like
17:34
they directly are
17:37
trying to attack me or send me or
17:39
whatever it's like a but but i think it takes
17:41
a are you can have to practice that to go
17:43
okay way as interesting why why
17:46
do you think that or cool like let's like
17:48
let's let's this let's have this discussion
17:50
okay i see your perspective this is my perspective
17:52
and share that and
17:55
then i think it gets even harder online because of course
17:59
you can't and
17:59
yeah you're you're get
18:02
say anything without potentially
18:04
iran the bigger the bigger it does a problem the
18:06
i've been experiencing over times by
18:08
the bigger the audience the
18:11
, the less likely
18:13
i don't think i've ever had a viral to eat which haven't
18:15
like which ended somebody's were
18:17
unsuccessful headsets i do like
18:19
that do like my goal undersea i like thinking
18:21
out loud putting my thoughts out there agree
18:24
disagree you know you're
18:26
at you know i think look ,
18:28
anybody who's active on social media
18:30
has a substantial following like whatever
18:33
ten thousand twenty thousand followers whatever
18:35
you have way more followers and i do but you
18:38
know i have my little audience anybody
18:40
who's in that position knows your
18:42
persona in
18:45
social media is not
18:46
your your real life persona
18:49
like i know zoo be on twitter is
18:51
is not the same as in a zoo
18:53
be in and your private life might
18:56
i deliberately chose like if i'm pretty similar
18:58
system for three years it's more
19:00
and more and more than of there's more ability
19:02
for nuance in in a world
19:05
that more ability for know that's
19:08
not to say it's an authentic it's just a different
19:10
facet of of ourselves that we project
19:13
on social media just like when i give a talk at
19:15
a scientific conference that's a particular persona
19:18
that i dot the flight more
19:20
formal more measured more
19:23
more as be whatever
19:26
and
19:28
it's really important for people to be able to separate
19:30
the social media persona us
19:33
from
19:34
you know the real life people and remember
19:36
there's a real life person behind
19:38
i'm just for get back in the seventies
19:41
everybody understood like david bowie
19:43
is gonna adopt a different stage
19:45
persona like for every concert tour
19:48
and not like the real david bowie
19:52
there was an understanding that like this is
19:54
partly
19:56
formative
19:58
and yet
19:59
the
19:59
the be in a way more authentic on
20:03
social media when you're
20:05
saying what you really think then perhaps
20:07
you might say in your private life to to friends
20:09
and family
20:11
i think a big problem with social media
20:13
as well beyond just the the
20:15
, and the amount of information
20:18
and the speed of it is that and
20:20
i think this happens on twitter especially and especially think i've made
20:22
this point on previous start with start
20:25
hot topic or the latest political
20:28
controversy or throwing out
20:30
your throwing out religious convictions or thoughts
20:32
on this or that right you start always with common ground
20:35
that you start with an introduction you build
20:37
some common ground you build some or poor
20:39
you establish that you're both decent human beings
20:41
and then maybe if you talk for a long time you
20:43
might get into some more interesting
20:46
topics but on twitter this happens
20:48
in reverse though the first time someone
20:50
comes across jeffrey miller the first time someone
20:52
comes comes across you bitch it's quite
20:54
probable that that
20:56
is it it's something that we said which was
20:59
you know was bit a bit edgy or controversial
21:02
are going against the narrative or something
21:04
and something people then very
21:06
quickly formless caricature the
21:08
who they think you are everything about you
21:11
your story always he believed this you
21:13
must also believe all of these other things and
21:15
and whatever and sometimes sometimes
21:18
they might be accurate but most
21:20
of the time they're they're really far off
21:22
so people have this image of
21:24
who you are also there's no
21:27
there's no facial expressions there's no tone
21:29
there's no anything and so with
21:32
it this embodiment and the conversation
21:35
starting already had some kind of
21:37
tension i think is very
21:39
easy for people to just end up screaming
21:42
at each other and like that there's
21:44
met so many people on twitter or on social
21:46
media in general media think who i think i met this
21:48
person in person in in real world we'd
21:51
probably get on right
21:54
lie that we didn't we to leave be civil that at a
21:56
minimum but just
21:58
because of the way this has happened the way
22:00
we kind of discovered each other you're
22:02
almost at this at this impasse and then
22:04
of course you have an audience looking
22:06
on and so no one wants to
22:10
people don't like changing their mind publicly or
22:12
someone doesn't want to concede anything or
22:14
whatever and it just ends up in this in
22:16
this type of fight and i don't think it's very conducive
22:19
to much
22:20
yeah we're my wife and i had the interesting
22:22
experience back in january of going to this
22:24
conference calls for about a con and
22:27
erotic on was at st a hotel in miami
22:29
and basically it was it a a hundred
22:32
people from kind of like
22:34
intellectual dark web and alternative
22:36
centrists and different kinds
22:38
i like heterodox thinkers most
22:41
of us knew each other
22:42
through twitter
22:43
i had met in person before
22:46
and so you're hanging out and you know finn hotel
22:49
bar meet know these people by you by
22:51
you them and you've actually like
22:53
the amd were some you've read tweeted damn
22:55
you've interacted answers media a
22:57
lot they've never met him in person and
23:00
there was kind of awkwardness were like
23:03
you kind of know a lot about
23:05
lot about limited
23:07
part of their persona
23:10
then you know almost nothing about
23:12
their tone of voice how they actually interact
23:15
everything else are interested in and
23:18
you can have to build a relationship
23:20
the
23:21
from scratch surrogates as a
23:23
good insight that are yeah we
23:25
we kind of start
23:27
backwards on twitter from the to
23:30
suffer normally it would take you several
23:32
hours of any amount to get to
23:36
and i
23:38
don't know maybe in the future there will be some kind of
23:41
a form of social media the
23:43
metaverse god forbid or whatever that
23:47
maybe allows maybe more naturals file of
23:49
som
23:50
interaction yeah yeah
23:53
it's something that's possible it's just that it's
23:56
it's difficult it's difficult because
23:59
we all have our by if he's we all have our prejudices
24:02
in all sorts of directions even even
24:04
those of us who
24:05
right
24:06
the something that humans out because you'll you'll
24:08
see at you'll see the kind of what you do next you go you
24:10
look at the bio have a quick look at the bios like okay
24:13
i see this an ass so boom you put
24:15
them in this box and down
24:17
mean hey i do this i mean there's a law called
24:19
out you know jeebies razor which i've said you know someone
24:22
has their pronouns in the bio and
24:24
on research or
24:26
gender i generally try i i'm i'm
24:28
often i'm think i've had like three people who have
24:30
disprove this
24:31
on over probably
24:34
a three year period the
24:36
the i don't want to job
24:38
to such conclusions but it's like you end up creating
24:40
heuristics armed but then someone
24:42
else might see i you know like an american flag
24:44
and hashtag mega in someone elses pro ana like
24:46
oh gosh okay this is this is this person
24:48
in this is that person but again
24:51
if they met in real life it would be like hey nice to me
24:53
what's your name okay cool i'm from here you're from there
24:55
so on and so forth and you
24:57
know that pronouns in the bio person and
24:59
that mega american flag person that
25:02
actually you don't get on and just have a decent
25:04
conversation and they wouldn't they
25:07
are they wouldn't be screaming at each other and thinking thinking
25:09
one another are are evil or
25:11
racist or whatever other
25:14
thing whatever is i'm in phobia
25:16
they want to put out there
25:18
i think we can a lost art of
25:20
of feeling like there's
25:23
a kind of civic obligation to be able to get
25:25
along with people of them and political views
25:28
the like my parents were very active in local
25:30
politics and cincinnati ohio and
25:32
they were involved in all kinds of groups you
25:34
know local planning board of school
25:37
boards or like leave leader women
25:39
voters were there was there was diversity
25:41
of political views among the people
25:44
actively engaged and were you're
25:47
you're a neighborhoods where people actually
25:49
talk to their neighbors and the kids
25:51
play together and as genuine community
25:55
and so everybody salt lake
25:58
we have a kind of moral obligation
25:59
the be able to get along with people
26:02
vote differently from us and think
26:04
different things and you
26:06
, maybe we're all going to same church
26:08
every sunday and we know we
26:10
don't agree about things but we
26:12
have to get along i think that
26:14
kind of civic virtue of
26:18
there were like everybody has individual
26:21
responsibility to at
26:23
least
26:24
the able to see the other side's
26:26
when of you were trying to losing
26:28
that and that's
26:31
the project because it means you don't really and
26:33
up with any real civil
26:35
society you don't have a a
26:38
community once you lose
26:40
as an evolutionary psychologist
26:42
what are your thoughts on
26:44
this sort of this you could
26:46
call this this new challenge
26:48
in scaling
26:50
and quantity i mean
26:53
the notion that we
26:55
are able to connect with
26:58
and reach on a daily basis hundreds
27:00
of thousands or millions of
27:02
people as far as
27:04
human history goes i
27:07
mean that never existed
27:09
before unless you are unless you are
27:11
king or queen and
27:13
even then it was it was localized in your geographic
27:15
area but having this ability to
27:17
from your smartphone or for the a laptop
27:20
through social media through you tube you
27:22
podcast and so on to reach and connect
27:24
with vast amounts
27:26
of people all over the world as
27:29
much as i love that and it's amazing and
27:31
i built my career off it it also
27:33
freaks me out because i'm just like this is so
27:36
the natural and there is no there's
27:39
no blueprint for how
27:41
this is supposed to work this is just a complete
27:43
experiment i'm not meant to be connected
27:45
to over a million people like that's
27:47
not
27:48
normal it's cool it's
27:51
cool but it is if not normal on
27:54
the completely surreal it yeah
27:56
it's
27:58
basically impossible for a kind
27:59
the ordinary social primate brain
28:02
like ours right are we've
28:04
evolved
28:05
the most spend most of our time and little
28:08
clans have like twenty or thirty people
28:10
that are kind of like extended family and our
28:12
mates and and kind and laws
28:14
and punch kids and
28:16
, that exists within the context
28:18
of a bigger tribe which is
28:20
a time bunch of clans maybe up two
28:23
thousand and two thousand people might
28:25
kind of speaking the same dialect and once
28:27
in awhile getting together for ortiz
28:30
or rituals or whatever but the scale
28:32
a modern society is is
28:34
you know orders of magnitude bigger than that
28:36
that it's fast and scale and yet and
28:39
yeah we're trying to deal with it
28:41
this very tribal
28:43
brain
28:45
editor's real as you do public
28:47
performances that her you know
28:49
streaming to
28:51
hundreds of thousands millions of people
28:56
you have to develop these little tricks routed how
28:58
to deal with it like when i'm writing a book
29:02
basically have like
29:03
the one ideal reader
29:05
in mind i can't think about
29:07
thousands of readers there's like the one
29:09
ideal reader who
29:11
i hope will read it and i'm writing for that one
29:13
person
29:15
likewise you know i ,
29:17
one reason these kind of podcast on
29:20
talks work is
29:22
that i sort of have illusion
29:24
i'm just talking to zoo be and you're just talking
29:26
to me then the
29:28
fact that there's maybe thousands of of
29:30
people who will later eavesdrop on it
29:33
the
29:35
isn't really that syria
29:36
right and it lets us be relatively natural
29:40
but man if i was like up on stage like billie
29:42
i wish doing a live performance one hundred thousand
29:44
people and coliseum huge
29:47
respect for the people who can do that
29:49
i would find out
29:52
just absolutely trippy and
29:54
yeah bizarre do you know
29:56
it's interesting actually
29:59
as a
29:59
at a performer i'm is
30:03
performing the smaller crowds
30:05
the is the
30:08
a triggers more the that
30:11
kind of nervous energy then
30:14
if you're doing or like a larger performs outperformed
30:16
it if you festivals and stuff like that know never two hundred
30:18
thousand people but certainly to thousands
30:20
of people and it's harder to do
30:22
a performance to like twenty
30:25
or thirty people in her room then
30:27
to even two two or
30:29
three thousand in my experience
30:32
because there's a number where
30:34
you don't really see individuals
30:36
anymore right like
30:38
if you prefer that of many people you can see
30:41
each person's face
30:43
and how they're responding to each song
30:45
and you know you can you can talk to
30:47
you can make eye contact with each individual
30:49
and it feels a lot sort sort
30:52
of closer but actually want to get
30:54
past a certain level it the
30:57
oh but you're pretty feels more one to one in
30:59
a way kind of ever have a reverts back to that one
31:02
to one feeling whereas i all doesn't
31:04
matter how many people out there as just a crowd
31:06
so i'm going to do this i can look
31:08
and everyone's eyes i can really see everyone's reaction
31:11
who's paying attention who's getting worse as twenty people
31:13
i can tell if one person's not enjoying the show
31:15
like i can see how that person is getting bored or he's
31:17
starting to talk to he's talking about person
31:19
over there and it actually distracts you as a performer
31:21
keziah like you , just
31:24
icing feel like doing all that but actually
31:26
it if it's tons you it's tons notice any
31:30
yeah i heard every academic has this
31:32
like we actually signed it way easier
31:35
to do on a large class like
31:37
lecturing two hundred two hundred students
31:39
than to do a small seminar where it's like ten
31:41
to twenty students and , you can
31:44
see is all the reactions
31:46
and you much more acutely self
31:48
conscious if you've got got know a
31:50
ten students seminar than
31:53
i'm a much bigger performances
31:56
i'm
31:58
so i'm i'm gonna introverted and not
32:00
naturally like
32:02
there's a confident outgoing
32:04
that's true of a lot of professors like
32:06
worthy introverted nerds percent in graduate
32:08
school you have to learn how to teach to
32:11
, big classes most of us
32:13
can learn to do it pretty well but
32:16
we stole you're like small
32:18
seminars or little bit socially
32:21
, because you've got that kind of one
32:24
to one eye contact and you can read people's expressions
32:26
and you can see when they're bored if
32:29
you're in luck trying to a
32:32
large class are you doing like stand
32:34
up comedy for thousands of people then
32:37
you can just kind of blur everybody out
32:39
take like the average energy of
32:41
the room
32:43
and kind of feed on that without having
32:47
the kind of monitor individual
32:49
reactions what you're doing
32:50
the here that switching topics
32:53
a little be jeffrey i saw some of the questions
32:55
that people had put you on twitter so
32:58
instead of that going through each of them one
33:00
by one i saw i saw of questions just
33:02
about the challenges
33:05
and some of the questions and concerns around
33:08
men and women in society
33:10
today especially young men and young women
33:13
it seems like there's a lot of
33:16
confusion lot of loneliness
33:18
there's various mental health
33:21
issues that are popping up and i also think
33:23
that just , terms of people
33:25
knowing their place and knowing their
33:27
roles perhaps we're at
33:29
an all time low of that not really
33:32
being clear for
33:34
a lot of young people so can use share
33:36
some of your thoughts on that what do you think some of the
33:39
big challenges that men
33:41
and women and people together
33:44
our
33:45
facing in this regard
33:49
this is this has been a big
33:52
the issue for years and years i mean that the
33:54
challenge of men and women fighting each other
33:56
and having good relationships as what you know
33:58
inspired tucker max and
33:59
to write to mate book and twenty fifteen
34:03
and i was intended as for have taken
34:06
, dating advice young single straight guys
34:09
guys how to level up how to
34:11
improve their attractiveness the women
34:13
and not just physical attractiveness but
34:15
also like how do you cultivate your social skills
34:18
and you sense of humor and your sense of style
34:20
and style career and
34:22
you're on you're dating skills
34:26
and we were kind of playing against
34:29
the previous pick up artist approach
34:32
which is basically less developed like sociopathic
34:35
manipulative tactics that kind of hit
34:37
women's hot buttons and
34:39
try to get them into bad as soon as possible
34:43
when we ran the made in grounds podcast
34:45
was associated with shot that book
34:48
project
34:49
we had hundreds of young men calling in
34:52
was questions very very
34:54
few of them wanted to just
34:56
like maximize notches on the belt
34:58
maximize number of women aged fatwas
35:01
the typical young guy just
35:03
wants a girlfriend
35:05
just like any com friend anybody
35:07
who's pretty good who they can hang out
35:09
with and play video
35:11
games with and have sex with and have some
35:15
some validation with that's
35:17
, they want and they have no idea how to get
35:19
it it seems
35:21
like their parents failed to
35:24
educate them in sort of how
35:26
male and female psychology works public
35:29
schools had failed them right we
35:31
have sex education but we don't have like relationship
35:33
education or courtroom education
35:38
you know
35:39
mass media had sort of failed
35:41
them because you don't actually learn
35:44
how to have a successful date just by watching
35:47
romantic comedies them
35:50
or by watching typical long form
35:52
dramatic tv series why because
35:56
the screenwriters are lazy
35:58
they create all
35:59
kind of artificial conflict
36:02
then couples
36:04
that's a terrible role model
36:07
the young people right if you think
36:09
you should behave in a relationship the way that
36:11
most people in marriages
36:13
in movies behave you
36:16
have an awful lot of pointless stupid arguments
36:18
about and
36:21
so we think it's kind of a failure
36:23
of education
36:26
what happened now is with
36:28
hendra dating apps a lot of
36:30
people see
36:32
i think they're seeing other people having way
36:34
more a sexual success than they are
36:38
they see other people having what
36:40
i think are great relationships it
36:43
to the
36:43
being glamorized on instagram
36:47
they're not actually getting very many reality
36:49
checks about how these things actually unfolds
36:51
and and , you can do in
36:54
and realized kind of be
36:56
more attractive have better relationships understand
36:59
the other sex better
37:01
in my year that i think
37:03
also i think a big problem the way we actually
37:05
happened society is just one of it's
37:09
weird because it seems like simultaneously
37:11
we have problems of a both both scarcity
37:14
and abundance and perhaps they're
37:17
those things are not as
37:19
the opposite
37:20
as it might seem i
37:22
ate i feel this way everything
37:24
from them ,
37:26
relationships to food
37:29
on the a
37:31
just the a lot of sorts social behavior it's
37:33
almost like things
37:35
have been so materially
37:38
good for a while i mean if
37:40
if your the young person
37:42
do that i'll probably for forty
37:44
and under we we
37:46
haven't really knows be very very peaceful
37:49
on there haven't been a massive
37:51
sort of global struggles that humans
37:53
have the past would have constantly been dealing with
37:56
we have an ad major world wars
37:58
or anything like that there are tons of
38:00
young men have been shipped off to fight in battle
38:03
or we've you know facing some type
38:05
of salmon or them yes we
38:07
we had this out your pandemic for two years but
38:09
if we're being honest was very very
38:11
mild compared to are many
38:13
of the things that humans have dealt with in
38:16
the past and it seems
38:18
like with that the order
38:20
of material success and lack
38:22
of threats coupled
38:25
with this rise of the
38:27
technology and smartphones and social
38:30
media and interconnectedness and all of
38:32
these apps and everything it's
38:34
like we have so much but
38:36
i think it's made people feel like day
38:39
they have little or they don't know what to do that
38:41
they admitted there there's too much out there there's
38:43
so much that they don't know they don't want to choose they
38:45
don't know what to do they don't know their role they don't know where
38:47
they fit in and and it looks
38:49
like as you said it looks can
38:51
see everybody else is life for the highlight reel
38:53
of their life and it looks like oh well this person has
38:55
added this girl looks like that and that guy has
38:58
that and you know makes people feel i
39:00
think especially this this hits teens
39:02
and perhaps people in their early twenties
39:06
it's interesting because i mean i'm i'm thirty five
39:09
though it's funny to think that i'm really
39:11
part of that last generation that's
39:14
had grown up with both without
39:16
the internet and a whole to social media and
39:19
also with it with someone who's even just ten
39:21
years younger than me twenty five i'm
39:23
like man you you
39:25
that's always been there like or you when
39:28
facebook started you are
39:30
just a child and then you
39:32
know you you haven't known the world without all of this
39:34
stuff so i think that's also have a
39:36
big shift that sorta happened in humanity
39:38
that people haven't necessarily thought
39:40
much about
39:43
yeah i imagine that one one
39:45
big challenge that young people face
39:47
the that
39:49
they're exposed to video
39:52
games and t the and i'm
39:54
all kinds of entertainment media the
39:56
are vastly better than anything
39:59
ever before
39:59
history right like recent
40:02
avengers movies are just better movies and
40:04
any shots in the twentieth century
40:09
political twitter is more interesting
40:11
than almost any newspaper
40:13
would have been my twenty years or fifty
40:16
years ago i kind of had the the good
40:18
fortune to grow up you know as a teenager
40:20
like
40:21
in the eighties were
40:23
talking to
40:25
intelligent young women
40:27
was far more interesting than
40:30
any of the broadcast television
40:32
that was available there were no
40:35
very compelling video games girls
40:37
were the most interesting thing in the world literally
40:40
my cognitively and
40:42
that's weird spend for ninety for ninety of human
40:45
evolution the people around
40:47
you
40:48
the key sources of education
40:51
and inspiration and inspiration and
40:54
and now you have a global entertainment
40:56
system that means
40:59
like going on a date and
41:01
actually paying attention to the person across
41:04
the table from you like
41:06
is it even doesn't even make the top
41:08
ten list of the most interesting ways you
41:10
could spend two hours
41:12
for a lot of people i think
41:14
not
41:16
and i worry that this leads
41:19
the probably gonna unrealistic expectations
41:22
about like what a real life relationship would look
41:24
like and , know from the data
41:26
on people like not having as much
41:28
sex as they didn't eighties and not being
41:30
in relationships are not living was people until
41:32
they're in their thirties or forties
41:35
ever
41:36
the people are basically treating
41:39
intimate sexual relationships as like optional
41:43
rather than
41:45
the foundation of of like shared
41:47
life with someone
41:49
i mean that that's so interesting and the
41:52
just the other day i may have known about this for years
41:54
but the other day i was looking into our sank
41:57
a thing in the and the and the entire world
42:00
japan that has the lowest
42:02
low birthrate like their population is plummeting
42:05
and i was actually just reading
42:07
just a a articles online
42:09
about this phenomenon and interesting
42:13
because that is also one of the most technologically advanced
42:15
countries in the world and
42:18
you see that as that technology has progressed
42:20
and certain things have shifted that mean
42:22
i'm sure you've heard the term herbivore men which
42:25
they are signs of these men who are
42:27
just not even was , really interested
42:29
in women they just kind of their contract out
42:31
name you know maybe have their career and they played a video
42:33
games and do their hobby and whatever
42:35
but you know everyone's just isolated
42:38
some of them will pay a lot of money just to just
42:40
talk to a woman because they're so socially
42:43
awkward and they feel so isolated
42:46
and i'm you know i i do have
42:48
concerns that things across
42:50
the developed world are is trending
42:53
in that direction and then you've got our concepts
42:56
like you touched on it for you know the metaverse
42:58
which i'm then from from
43:00
a technological standpoint is interesting
43:04
by if you see the way some
43:06
people are so hardcore addicted to their smartphones
43:09
already allegiances how many couples
43:11
have you seen our out on dates in restaurants not
43:13
even talking to each other just sitting there on their phones
43:17
i'm just like man or what
43:19
about having this tool kit where someone
43:21
can just sit sit at home
43:24
and
43:25
basically be and different person
43:27
in a different reality living in
43:29
a different world not just video games not
43:31
just social media but that multiplied
43:34
by virtual reality and
43:36
i'm like mass deaths some
43:40
that it's it's learn and way
43:42
i mean i think extremely good compelling
43:45
virtual reality entertainment is
43:47
is in a way an existential threat
43:49
to humanity because , leads
43:51
people to allocate a lot more time and
43:53
money and energy to sort of
43:55
just interacting virtually
43:58
with like the most
43:59
then arresting people in the world that you can find rather
44:02
than living with sam and
44:04
making babies without
44:06
right then
44:08
humanity goes extinct pretty quick
44:11
pretty quick like and it it is in
44:13
as kind of slow motion extinction event
44:15
in japan and in a lot
44:17
of europe
44:20
like particularly spain and italy for some reason
44:22
have incredibly low fertility rates
44:25
so i think unless we confront this as
44:28
a civilization and
44:30
think yeah how are we actually gonna we then
44:33
serious long term sexual relationships and
44:35
having kids and raising them and having families
44:37
with this , technology
44:41
ah
44:42
yeah we're done for and i feel
44:44
it in my own life i've got to do
44:46
so amazing two month old daughter
44:49
and i find myself
44:52
messing around on twitter when
44:54
i should be in are
44:57
you going , her and
44:59
she gives me these look sometimes like
45:02
i was wrong with you like
45:04
i'm the vessel of your genes
45:07
i am
45:08
you're about to like immortality
45:12
and and descendants and future generations
45:15
and here you are messing around with this
45:17
this
45:18
virtual
45:20
the environment social media site
45:22
i get it i feel that poll
45:24
but i think if weekend
45:27
you know help each other
45:30
ah kind of resist the temptation
45:33
stay based stay grounded stay
45:35
focused on family pro
45:37
natal isn't babies
45:40
create the next generation if
45:42
you know if we fail then humanity
45:45
tales
45:46
the am i am me i is so interesting
45:48
i know that i'm it's
45:51
it's good to to talk to someone who
45:54
who shares that perspective because there
45:56
are also are lot of people especially
45:58
in the west to our for all
46:00
intents and purposes ante natal list
46:03
and , will stick
46:06
by the notion that though the world is overpopulated
46:08
and that the best thing you can do for climate change
46:11
is to not have children or to have fewer
46:13
children in that you know there's
46:15
just too many people on the planet and this is some
46:17
great existential threat which i think
46:19
we will you you you you know that i've i'm
46:22
a i'm no fan of that narrative nor
46:24
the lever in it but
46:26
it does seem to have gained a
46:29
lot of ground and be implanted in
46:31
a lot of people's brains whether or not
46:33
they whether or not they sort
46:35
of explicitly recognize a i think
46:37
over the past few decades it's kind of been
46:40
programmed do a lot of the
46:42
that that the media and culture for
46:45
people to think that having
46:47
children are certainly having a lot of children is
46:49
this kind of know selfish thing that
46:51
harming the planet and feels bad for the
46:53
climate and you know or
46:55
that there's is gonna lead to some type of chaos
46:58
or we're going to run out of fresh water
47:01
or we're gonna run out of this and all
47:03
of that i mean i think all of this has been
47:05
debunked by people who truly study this
47:07
but i'm i think it's still quite a pervasive
47:10
in powerful narrative
47:11
yeah it's really powerful and it's
47:14
in a way it's
47:15
it is the heart of weakness that the thing that
47:17
really pisses me off about woke this it's
47:19
it's not the hostility to free
47:21
speech itself the bizarre gender politics
47:24
it's not the anti science it's it's
47:26
the ante natal us
47:28
it's the justifying
47:31
hey you're
47:32
the message that you're more virtuous
47:35
if you live by yourself and player video
47:37
games and have the minimal impact on
47:40
the planet than if you actually
47:42
make the next generation and
47:45
out to me is it's anti human
47:47
it's actually incredibly selfish and
47:50
it's just a rationalization for
47:53
them
47:54
laziness and at a kind of solid
47:56
says
47:57
this as
47:58
as long as i'm not
48:00
like using too many resources
48:03
i'm better than you guys you
48:06
mormons you baptists whatever
48:08
who are having a bunch of kids on
48:11
well that's fine take that's you but guess
48:13
what and hundred generations it's
48:16
gonna be in the fundamentalist
48:20
christians and muslims
48:21
who will dominate
48:23
the future and the people
48:25
who show up the people have kids that's
48:28
the future so you either
48:30
play that game
48:33
are you opt out but i think
48:35
it's important for you know the
48:37
woke to realize
48:39
workers won't last more than
48:42
there are three generations
48:45
if they don't actually have kids
48:46
do you think that in places
48:49
like japan and certain european
48:51
countries do what what sort of risk
48:53
do you see their have a
48:55
, population collapse
48:57
because i think it
48:59
is very hard for the human brain to think about anything
49:02
that's got an exponential components
49:05
though i think people imagine
49:08
okay that's fine because it's just like a a
49:10
linear decline but it's not cause if
49:12
one generation haven't
49:15
you know sustained doesn't sustain it's numbers
49:17
than a there's fewer people in the next
49:19
one and a can actually declined very very precipitously
49:23
and i don't think people number
49:26
one recognize that just as a kind of mathematical
49:28
function but also think
49:30
about okay well what sort of
49:32
impact would that have on a society
49:35
if you know there are millions fewer people
49:38
manage millions less people than there there
49:40
were previously i'm
49:42
in a country such as back then what
49:45
what does that mean for what
49:48
what does that mean for the country
49:51
yeah i have very mixed feelings about this
49:53
because on the one hand there's a part
49:55
of me that kind of assumes like
49:58
life spans will
49:59
can you to be about as long as a to
50:02
and on that assumption you
50:04
know if japan
50:06
that is only having like one child
50:08
per woman the population dropped by house
50:11
every single generation until pretty
50:13
soon no more japanese on
50:15
, other hand there's a part of me
50:17
very interested in regenerative medicine
50:19
and longevity and new by
50:21
medical breakthroughs said maybe
50:23
could help extend not
50:25
just human lifespan but human what
50:29
david sinclair at harvard calls whole span
50:31
like the number of decades you're healthy
50:33
and active and you could potentially were so
50:37
if you have like an aging population
50:39
but everybody is still
50:42
you know healthy and capable
50:44
and strong and able to function
50:47
at age
50:48
one hundred or hundred fifty then
50:51
it doesn't matter as much
50:53
how many kids around
50:55
could you can sustain the population
50:58
longer so i feel
51:00
this feel this of dichotomy
51:02
really part of me as hoping for
51:05
longevity treatments like
51:08
, don't want to die out for live another hundred
51:10
years i'd prefer to see my daughter's great great grandchildren
51:12
if possible possible
51:15
but on the other hand part of me knows like
51:17
that might not happen
51:19
the might not happen for a while and
51:22
the hedge your bets it's probably good tonight
51:25
keep having kids
51:28
what's it been like for you
51:31
it is this your is your daughter your
51:33
for fresh out not gonna twenty five
51:35
year old daughter okay okay i've smears
51:38
my recruit hotel a check
51:40
out there are many decades ago
51:42
yeah i was what with the new baby
51:45
as like oh man i haven't changed a diaper
51:47
since the nineties okay
51:52
so i'm not gonna say out as i was like
51:54
way out i was because initials about say
51:57
the new five another way that night i
51:59
don't think i don't think the rochelle i'm
52:01
what what's it like having having
52:03
to deal with her and a new born again
52:06
at the stage in the game
52:08
it's it's fine it's on
52:10
she's delightful she's very well behaved
52:14
my , is very very savvy about
52:16
training baby getting baby on a
52:18
schedule making the
52:20
parenting process as easy as possible
52:23
easy as a lot of americans
52:26
brits europeans texas
52:29
, stupid approach to
52:31
parenting that is
52:34
like just do whatever the baby
52:36
seems to want will
52:38
be slaves to babies ah
52:40
desire we won't read anything
52:43
about how to actually get
52:45
them on a schedule and train them and and
52:47
help them flourish in a way
52:49
that fits with our lives right
52:51
they become like fulltime parents in
52:54
a very inefficient way the doesn't
52:56
actually make them or the or the baby
52:58
happy i'm
53:00
also when i sort of and else
53:03
on twitter of got a baby a lot of people are like
53:05
oh man you're too old how can you possibly
53:07
think about having a baby in your fifties or
53:10
the optimal time is you know
53:12
in your twenties when you've got
53:13
energy
53:15
i thought
53:17
honestly
53:18
i have about as much energy now as i said
53:20
the suspect i try to say pretty good shape
53:23
you know
53:24
i don't work out and as much as you do but
53:27
you know i try to stay healthy and
53:30
the rate of decline in physical capability
53:32
and energy level is not that steep
53:36
if you make a little effort to stay healthy
53:38
so
53:40
i think a lot of people have a little more
53:43
hi then
53:46
they might sink
53:47
but that's
53:49
and another guy or or
53:51
a woman
53:55
the lot of women seem to think that they they
53:57
can
53:57
the like wait until forty to find a
53:59
guy
53:59
in and start trying to have kids and like
54:02
hope for the best the know be much they're
54:04
often quite disappointed so like
54:09
my wife and i often talk with women
54:12
about like planning to reproductive careers
54:15
is and how important it is to really seriously
54:17
think ahead about that like
54:20
ah no you
54:22
can get your anti malarial hormone
54:24
a a mates hormone levels checked and that's
54:26
a pretty good predictor of like how
54:28
long until menopause how long do you have
54:30
if you're a woman or ,
54:33
fertile and , of women
54:35
even smart women in academia like
54:37
in their late twenties early thirties have no
54:39
idea what they're mh lovelace never
54:42
checked it day they don't even know
54:44
when their own mother's reach menopause so
54:47
her trying to plan like a career and a potential
54:50
family without really
54:52
knowing realistically
54:54
you know how many more years to them
54:57
yeah well man that leaves onto
54:59
a you know i have a general topic which
55:01
is that you know we i think
55:03
we live really we really live in an age where
55:06
it's the in implicitly determined
55:09
that subject to
55:12
opinions and people's
55:15
emotions are should supersede
55:18
and trump objective facts
55:20
and biological realities on
55:23
and i think one thing that's quite the ranging
55:25
about the time that we live in his there's
55:29
three narratives all going on at once and
55:31
you're supposed to believe all of them number
55:33
one is that what is more than three but on
55:36
this topic you're supposed to believe that men
55:40
are you know men and women are
55:42
the same
55:43
and also that the different
55:46
and also that they're interchangeable or that their
55:49
social construct them that they don't really
55:51
exist and you're supposed to when
55:54
depending on the scenario you're supposed to kind of believe
55:57
the each of those ones at different times
55:59
right you're supposed to acknowledge
56:02
, men and women are are the same and totally
56:04
equal yo from physically
56:06
and mentally in terms their interest in terms
56:08
of their biology in terms of you
56:11
know their reproductive age all of this stuff
56:13
stuff kind of the politically correct position
56:16
in that way but then with other things you're supposed to acknowledge
56:18
the actually know my mentor men are
56:20
these oppressors and women are victors and you
56:22
know this the patriarchy and you know there's this delineation
56:25
and it's very clear and women have these very special
56:27
struggles and need these different parts
56:30
protections and so on as a protected class
56:33
and then there's then entire gender ideology
56:35
thing which is like are you know what is what woman not offer
56:37
a woman is anyone who identifies as anyone woman you know you
56:39
can have a beard and venus and you can be and
56:41
woman and whatever and so it's
56:44
all quite d ranging and i think it leads
56:46
to a lot of people like you said even
56:48
even smart people not
56:50
recognizing just some the
56:53
some realities i mean i i did not create
56:55
biology i didn't invent the way to
56:58
reproduction happens in whatever but
57:00
there are certain things that are in i
57:02
understand they're uncomfortable for for
57:04
people or you know you don't really want to acknowledge
57:06
certain things but something's is to say this
57:08
is just reality and actually i
57:11
would say that you you someone is doing
57:13
a i to get a society
57:15
is doing women a terrible disservice if
57:18
the general message is that
57:21
yeah it's totally fine to you know wait
57:23
until your forties to find a man and
57:25
start a family and by that's totally fine
57:27
oh you know that that so and so celebrity had just
57:29
had a baby at forty eight so you'll be fine to yeah
57:32
mike your that that's it that
57:34
a reckless that iraq was message
57:36
or might make people feel good why
57:40
the you know i think that leads to despair for a lot
57:42
of people and it's it's simply not that's
57:44
simply not true the is is not is not
57:46
correct and i didn't invent now
57:49
it's just
57:50
just how it is and it seemed like in the past people inherently
57:53
new this and it was just like the obvious
57:56
but i now it's like if you say that
57:58
out loud the people kind of the you
58:00
like your some misogynist or something
58:04
the or and
58:05
i think one of the really toxic i'm
58:08
views a tree communists basically that biology
58:10
is nothing more than oppression and
58:13
and biology is limitation and constraint
58:16
and that everybody should present their
58:19
biology they should resent their genes they
58:21
should resent any saying that
58:23
evolution gave them amir
58:26
great thing about evolution biology of
58:28
looseness ecology studying all
58:31
that stuff is that the huge amount of gratitude
58:34
you feel towards like your dna
58:37
and your biology and
58:39
being able to wake up every morning and go oh
58:41
my god this is amazing like my heart beats
58:44
millions of times and lifetime without me having
58:46
to pay any attention to awesome
58:49
i have the three pound brain that can
58:51
think all these thoughts and have experiences
58:54
and
58:55
you know
58:57
most to the universe isn't like that it
58:59
isn't sentiment that isn't aware it's
59:02
it's just
59:03
why condolence stupid and
59:06
yet a lot of people seem to
59:08
grow up with the idea that
59:11
well it's only it weren't for biology
59:14
we would all be like infinitely free
59:16
and infinitely equal and everything
59:19
would be awesome if if we didn't
59:21
have bodies and then we didn't have dna and
59:23
we didn't m jeans and
59:25
so me that is just so
59:27
stupid and delusional because i'm
59:32
biologists the foundation of everything beautiful
59:36
and important and valuable asset go
59:38
about
59:39
humans
59:40
them and now i know in a religious
59:43
perspective you know there's there's
59:45
a different view you can take on that isn't
59:48
even there i'm i'm kind of
59:50
a fan of john paul the seconds
59:53
or theology the body and and catholic
59:55
doctrine that says respect
59:59
the body
1:00:00
because if you believe in a divine
1:00:02
creator the creator made
1:00:05
it and made it
1:00:06
war
1:00:08
spiritual and theological reasons
1:00:10
that her worth diving into
1:00:12
the i think there's a a funny
1:00:16
overlap between evolutionary biology
1:00:18
gratitude due to the body
1:00:20
and two and two or jeans and
1:00:22
even like a
1:00:24
i'm a a catholic
1:00:26
respect for it as sort of a manifestation
1:00:29
of like divine providence
1:00:31
and providence and you feel grateful to god
1:00:34
rather than just grateful to your genes
1:00:36
the
1:00:37
the only a lot of people who reject both
1:00:39
of those perspectives and are just like
1:00:41
god i hate my body i hate my
1:00:43
jeans i hate my parents i hate my ancestors
1:00:47
they brought me nothing but he no
1:00:50
guilt and shame
1:00:51
yeah why thing to to big problems
1:00:55
the way we face again in a modern
1:00:57
west are number one
1:00:59
lack of gratitude the
1:01:01
number to lack of perspective i
1:01:03
think as our a modern american
1:01:06
or brick or whatever you know it's it's
1:01:10
easy to you know the truth is that
1:01:12
the world is full of was
1:01:15
it positive and negative it's full of
1:01:17
light is full of darkness is full of love
1:01:19
and joy and happiness but sorrow
1:01:21
and violence and injustice and
1:01:24
it's it's complicated then
1:01:27
you know whether whether you view the glass
1:01:30
as half full or half empty you
1:01:32
are correct but there does seem to be
1:01:35
a relatively recent addiction
1:01:37
on focusing on the negative
1:01:40
all of the time
1:01:41
right just just focusing on the negative
1:01:43
focusing on the hopelessness are
1:01:46
kind of getting stuck in this doomsday
1:01:49
mentality and and i see this his
1:01:51
own people are across the across the political
1:01:53
aisle the doomsday narratives might be might
1:01:55
be slightly different but
1:01:57
either way it's kind of like well we're
1:02:00
we're all doomed the future is gonna be worse
1:02:02
than the present on and
1:02:04
we can do anything there some external
1:02:07
there's some external power whether it's it's climate
1:02:09
change or it's the globalist elites or
1:02:11
whatever and there's just you know we're
1:02:15
all gonna be screwed kind of thing and
1:02:17
i think that's think that's think that is
1:02:19
a dangerous notion in itself but
1:02:21
also i think there's this lack of perspective
1:02:24
on both a historical and and global
1:02:26
level i
1:02:28
think one of the biggest problems in the usa
1:02:31
is that i don't think
1:02:33
most americans know how good they have it would
1:02:35
say i think that actually leads to so
1:02:38
many problems because the usa is not
1:02:40
a perfect country
1:02:43
why
1:02:46
i mean when and where
1:02:49
where the is the place that so much better
1:02:52
there and the usa
1:02:54
and the twenty twenties right which other
1:02:56
country would you rather be in what what
1:02:58
other time period would you be and we're i'll be in nineteen
1:03:00
twenty two aged eighteen twenty two seventeen
1:03:03
twenty two i'm you
1:03:05
know or look here's a world
1:03:07
map point out the countries that
1:03:09
you'd you'd you'd prefer to live in so
1:03:12
you know and it only
1:03:14
people truly recognize that so
1:03:17
that that and grant and it leads to the uffizi
1:03:19
and gratitude as well because people
1:03:21
are always to stuck on the problems but they never think
1:03:24
about the progress it's been made
1:03:26
over the last few decades alone
1:03:28
they don't think of just how blessed and lucky
1:03:30
and fortunate they are there
1:03:33
have all of these things that billions of people
1:03:35
in the world do not have even just basic
1:03:37
things like a decent functioning roads
1:03:40
proper electricity running clean
1:03:43
water plumbing let alone
1:03:45
you know you go into the what are we
1:03:47
both knew my mind when i go to the us and when i go in
1:03:49
there like a supermarket and i look at
1:03:51
the okay the numbers of different types of milk
1:03:53
they have milk from things i didn't know you could get milk
1:03:56
rob right to have issues
1:03:59
like sixty different
1:04:02
types of milk out just like do like
1:04:04
you going to most places where you got the are why maybe
1:04:06
it's very two different maybe two different
1:04:08
time
1:04:09
the
1:04:10
by you know people will still find a way to complain
1:04:12
about
1:04:14
yeah i think that the the gratitude point
1:04:16
is so important and there's a lot of empirical
1:04:18
psychology research that says hey if you
1:04:21
want to be happy and life it helps a lot to
1:04:23
do some gratitude exercises right down
1:04:25
things you appreciate end
1:04:27
of every day
1:04:29
right down some highlights things
1:04:31
that you value and
1:04:33
whether it's sort of like
1:04:36
remembering these things and kind of format
1:04:38
of like prayer or just and kind
1:04:40
of secular like this , worth
1:04:42
remembering and and feeling grateful about
1:04:45
that's really valuable and
1:04:48
most people don't most people
1:04:50
com
1:04:52
yeah you appreciate america live
1:04:54
some other places you know i've lived in britain
1:04:56
germany
1:04:58
australia for different lengths of time
1:05:00
i've traveled lot of countries and
1:05:04
every country has problems but arm
1:05:08
it's very easy to take first swirls
1:05:10
lifestyles for granted if
1:05:13
you've never been anywhere else
1:05:15
absolutely
1:05:16
absolutely jeffrey man there's
1:05:18
so much that we can discuss can discuss we want to have
1:05:20
you back on the podcast in the future but
1:05:23
i wanted to keep this around
1:05:25
the length of most my episode so where
1:05:27
can people find you online
1:05:29
and follow
1:05:31
i have a website primal poly
1:05:33
dot com that has a lot of information
1:05:35
about my books and interviews and
1:05:37
all my scientific papers are
1:05:39
up there and bought a great resources
1:05:42
you can follow me on twitter as prime appalling and
1:05:46
saw you can read my books like the mating mind
1:05:49
spent mate virtue
1:05:51
signaling
1:05:52
where where did the where
1:05:54
did the term primal polycom from what's the source of
1:05:57
com
1:05:59
well how he is one of my favorite
1:06:03
kind of pre sexes because it
1:06:05
sort of
1:06:06
alludes to bunch of different things
1:06:08
polymorphism which is a term from biology
1:06:10
poly jannik which is like a way of
1:06:12
adding up gina fact that that
1:06:14
predict traits polyamory which
1:06:16
is kind of relationship style
1:06:21
i need a twitter handle that kind
1:06:23
of captures a little bit a science, he vibe
1:06:25
and , the primal is just
1:06:27
kind of an the blue stripe on
1:06:29
a, okay so it's
1:06:31
not the ideal twitter handle it's kind of confusing
1:06:33
to a lot of but it's kind of what i'm stuck
1:06:36
with it the moment i
1:06:37
was jeffrey miller, thank you so much for coming
1:06:39
on the show appreciate you my pleasure we
1:06:41
take our
Podchaser is the ultimate destination for podcast data, search, and discovery. Learn More