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Scale by Geoffrey West focuses on the the principles and patterns connecting the ways that cities, organisms, and companies grow. West, a theoretical physicist, studied the way in which sizes of mammals related to their life expectancy, and further connected these laws to the growth and longevity of cities and the world of business. Nat and Neil unpack these laws and principles on today's podcast episode. We cover a wide range of topics including: The idea of '1 billion heartbeats' per lifetime How COVID has impacted growth of cities and business Human life expectancy Paradigm shifting innovations Growth in its relation to socioeconomic factors And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Scale by Geoffrey West! Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Readwise (0:02) Antilibrary (Umberto Eco) (4:41) Evernote (1:07) Notion (1:07) Roam (1:07) Airr (8:58) Of Mice and Elephants: A Matter of Scale (21:08) Steve Jobs introduces WiFi…with a hula hoop! (48:43) Books mentioned Seeing Like A State by James C. Scott (7:36) (Nat’s Book Notes) Antifragile (7:40) (Nat’s Book Notes) (Book Episode) The Blueprint for Armageddon by Dan Carlin (8:48) The Startup Gold Mine (Neil Soni) (13:05) Scale by Geoffrey West (14:08) (Nat’s Book Notes) Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennett (27:08) (Nat’s Book Notes) (Book Episode) The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch (30:05) (Nat’s Book Notes) (Book Episode) The Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin (35:31) (Nat’s Book Notes) Happy Accidents by Morton Meyers (59:02) (Nat’s Book Notes) (Book Episode) In Praise of Idleness by Bertrand Russell (1:17:44) (Nat’s Book Notes) (Book Episode)   People Mentioned Umberto Eco (4:41) Dan Carlin (8:48) Geoffrey West (14:08) David Deutsch (27:03) Daniel Dennett (27:08) Arthur Clarke (50:14) Nassim Taleb (1:29:30) Show notes: 0:27 - Using Readwise to gather your notes to export to other sites. Scanning book pages of physical books. Nat and Neil discuss their preferences surrounding digital vs. physical books. 6:32 - Re-reading books. The difficulty of finding a ‘mind-blowing’ book to read. If you have any book recommendations for a future podcast episode, send them our way! 8:45 - Airr - Highlight audio as you listen to podcasts. How to make podcast listening more educational for yourself. Purposes of podcasts can be both educational and entertaining. The massive market for “How To” content. 14:08 - This week’s episode is on the book Scale: The Universal Laws of Life, Growth, and Death in Organisms, Cities, and Companies by Geoffrey West. The book talks about how things grow, continue to grow, decline in growth, or decay. The author primarily focuses on growth of organisms, cities, and companies, as the book title suggests, but also within these large structures are smaller substructures that grow and change, too. Some of the same laws of growth apply in seemingly different systems. 20:31 - There are many things that scale along with size that are not growing at a 1:1 ratio. The number of heartbeats in a specific mammal’s life is roughly the same across species. Neil describes an article in which each species receives an average of 1 billion heartbeats per lifetime. The heart rate varies on size of the being. Different lifespans between species. From an objective standpoint, an elephant tends to live longer than a mouse, but subjectively, do life spans feel the same length to each individual creature? 23:45 - How humans fit into this research of lifespan vs. body size. Differences in lifespan pre-technology vs. today’s era. Life extension - whether or not the maximum life expectancy can be extended. The age of 125 seems to be the maximum at this point according to West. 28:02 - Entropy and natural decay in the cell’s ability to replicate. You can bring things from disordered back to ordered, and with that creates externalities. Example: the waste created when we use the bathroom. Are there ways to minimize that?   30:46 - “The problem is that the theory also predicts that unbounded growth cannot be sustained without having either infinite resources or inducing major paradigm shifts that reset the clock before potential collapse occurs. We have sustained open-ended growth and avoided collapse by invoking continuous cycles of paradigm shifting innovations, such as those associated on the big scale of human history with discoveries of iron, steam, coal, computation, and most recently digital information technology.” (pg. 31) This quote is talking about finite-time singularity. This leads into a discussion in paradigm shifting innovations in today’s world. Resetting the paradigm clock. 35:45 - The Three Body Problem by Liu Cixin - One thing brought up in this book is that humans, technologically, are an exponentially developing species. Geoffrey West brings up the possibility of hitting a wall and running out of paradigm shifts. To continue growing at an exponential rate, do we have to keep discovering this innovations at an exponential rate? 37:12 - Growth and the way society is structured. A shrink in population would pose the issue of how a generation smaller in numbers would have to be paying Social Security for the generation above them. Continued growth is ‘built-in’ to the system, and if it doesn’t grow at the anticipated rate, a collapse is possible. 41:09 - Across different cultures and countries comes different values: community, family, the state, society, tradition, religion. In America, it’s perceived that one’s self is the most valued, also referred to as individualism. 45:06 - The release of new inventions and technology in the ‘80s and ‘90s: computers, digital cameras, cell phones, and laptops. From big, clunky, and colorless inventions to high-speed and attractive new pieces of technology. It becomes interesting to think about how unique and magical these inventions feel at the time they come out, and also how quickly the next piece of upgraded technology follows. 52:11 - There are products that improve and add more features at a higher rate, and products where that growth is not as rapid. As noted in the book, these paradigm shifts happen, there’s a massive spike, and new innovations slowly come from that spike. The spike jump starts the innovations, and the innovations slow until there’s another spike. 54:26 - Discussions over whether COVID will bring a new spike. There have been many changes in our society with the way we work, make money, education, etc. that it poses the question on what will follow. Making use of underutilized resources. It comes down to what is more efficient. 56:34 - Intellectual capital has been opened up in a new way since COVID, as we are no longer expected to be in the same place. The downfall of Silicon Valley between COVID, remote work, and being on literal fire. With people working remotely now more than ever, it seems to point us in the direction of growth in the digital space and information innovation. 1:00:07 - How these changes in the way we live and work will affect the scaling laws discussed in the book. Urbanization in the U.S. People moving out of big cities. Changes in the way companies and their employees are now working. 1:06:05 - Companies and their current policies: remote, in-person, or a mixture of both. Depends on the needs and what industry they are in. Coworking spaces and working remotely around people, without actually working with them. 1:10:10 - Human’s ability to regulate their internal body temperature. West brings up global warming, and how an increase of 2 degrees Celsius could increase the pace of all biological lives by 20-30% - living and dying faster. Inversely, if you could lower your own body temperature by 1 degree Celsius, you could enhance your life span by 10-15%. 1:14:32 - Growth of cities and its relation with socioeconomic factors: wages, innovation, crime, pollution, etc. “The multiplicative compounding of socioeconomic interactivity engendered by urbanization has inevitably led to the contraction of time. Rather than being bored to death, our actual challenge is to avoid anxiety attacks, psychotic breakdowns, heart attacks, and strokes resulting from being accelerated to death.” (pg. 332) 1:20:03 - Population size in cities and productively interacting with others - discussions on whether innovations can come from a city that stays stagnant or even decreases in size. Commute times and the ‘one hour’ rule. 1:25:03 - Shared ideologies from across the world without a way to bring those people together. Sense of community from these shared interests and ideas, even if there is no physical meeting place for all to share. 1:29:58 - The next book we will be reading and discussing is Energy and Civilization by Vaclav Smil. Feel free to pick up a copy of the book to read along with us before the next podcast episode! If you enjoyed this episode, let us know by leaving a review on iTunes. As always, let us know if you have any book recommendations! Find us on Twitter @TheRealNeilS and @nateliason. The best way to stay up to date on future episodes and show updates is to join our email list at Made You Think Podcast. Check out ways you can support the show here!

Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show COVID (1:22) TikTok (14:12) Spotify (14:41) Twitter (15:27) Microsoft (15:32) Oracle (15:33) Facebook (17:08) Instagram (17:18) WhatsApp (17:28) Oatly (18:15) LinkedIn (18:18) Netflix (30:14) Confirmation Bias (38:49) Stereotype (39:58) Reddit (45:53) Subreddit: Not the Onion (46:06) CNN (51:25) Fox News (51:26) Wall Street Journal (51:28) CDC (52:11) FDA (52:12) Estee Lauder (56:30) Cargo cult science (59:03) ALS (1:08:09) Right To Try Law (1:10:34) North Korea (1:18:37) Uyghur Muslims (1:20:46) Operation Mockingbird (1:23:00) Wealth Disparity (1:32:11) Amazon(1:33:22) Walmart (1:33:43) Target (1:33:43) Pinterest (1:35:47) Airtable (1:43:26) Zapier (1:43:27) Roam Research (1:43:50) Notion (1:44:00)   Books mentioned Infinite Jest (4:08) (Book episode) Discipline & Punish (5:26) (Book episode) The Denial of Death (5:41) (Book episode) Hiroshima Diary (5:45) (Book episode) Atlas Shrugged (11:02) (Book episode) You Are A Badass (12:42) Outliers (12:44) How to Lie with Statistics (50:22) Scale (1:44:58)   People mentioned Kanye West (5:26) (Album Notes) Dan Carlin (9:58) Jen Sincero (12:42) Mark Manson (13:32) Jeff Nobbs (19:03) David Perell (22:13) Steve Jobs (26:38) Sam Harris (40:20) The Riddle of the Gun (Book episode) Donald Trump (51:29) Nancy Pelosi (51:30) Richard Feynman (59:06)   Show Topics 3:05 - Nat and Neil catch up and reflect on past podcast episodes. How like-minded people have connected over Make You Think (MYT) podcast with nearly 250,000 downloads. The future of MYT and what listeners can expect from the podcast.   9:28 - Podcasts as well as other forms of media have evolved in what it takes to be successful and keep their audience interested. Between making things ‘pop’ and sticking to their roots, authors and artists alike need to balance making money and doing the work they want to do.   14:12 - The rise of popularity in Twitter and Tiktok in both regular users and those looking to earn. Discussions of other social media platforms and how they have evolved in popularity.   19:33 - The price of being an influencer: receiving more criticism over the Internet, nearly everything you say can be taken out of context, internal battles with your mindset. Having a large following can come with downsides, but there are ways you can respond that are helpful and productive.   27:26 - Recognizing what people are trying to get from critical comments or responses. How to respond, diffuse, or block out the incoming negativity on social media. It’s easy to think they’re coming at you from a place of dislike, when it could be for attention, for conversation, or for clarification on a topic.   32:24 - What’s real vs. what’s not? Social media can easily distort our senses about what is going on. Covid, riots, media coverage and confirmation bias. We are quick to discard information that doesn’t match the beliefs of ideas that we support. It’s important to recognize the bias in order to have the discussion.   40:02 -  Stereotypes. Media can paint the picture that a certain idea is contained in an idea set, and if you believe one idea from the set, you believe all within the set. Overlap between ideas are assumed   43:05 - Mask usage during the Covid times. The term ‘anti-masker’. Different states have different laws regarding masks. As of August 10, Wisconsin’s state agency requires employees to wear masks even on Zoom calls   45:58 - With all that’s happening in the world, especially the year of 2020, it’s almost laughable we can’t tell real news from fake news. What institutions can we trust with the most up-to-date news?   50:15 - False information: fault of the media and those in positions of authority, or fault of the people? We want to be able to trust what we read and hear without needing to fact check everything.   55:25 - Health and nutrition research studies. The samples, methods, biases, and why those make a difference in the results of the study. Trials and results often only published when it is in your favor or confirm what it is that you wanted to prove.   59:10 - Richard Feynman’s speech on the dangers of cargo cult science. Feynman’s tells of a tribal society who often received supplies and materials from an airplane during war times. They tried to re-attain these goods by creating imitation runway landings and bamboo radio antennas. Although they were doing all the preparation work to receive the supplies, they did not understand why it didn’t come. Science that lacks integrity, although looks “scientific” is what we call cargo cult science.   1:02:55 - Link between science and marketing. Funding a study that will produce results in your favor to appear more credible and support your message. Hydroxychloroquine and it’s supposed ability to treat Covid topic attracting strong opinions on social media, to the form of bot usage.   1:07:40 - Drug approvals and Right to Try law. Drug companies need to pass phase 3 testing to receive support from insurance companies, and also most report results from treatments of patients from the Right to Try law. Often times with those patients being extremely sick given their only option is to shell out the money without the help of insurance, it could hurt the chances of drug approvals.   1:13:57 - The rate at which the vaccine for Covid is coming vs. treatments for other diseases. There is the ‘hype’ element behind Covid mixed with the way lifestyle has been impacted by the virus that has pushed up the need to find a vaccine for it quickly.   1:17:58 - North Korea: Covid cases in Korea, the death hoax of Kim Jong-un, and North Korean wine.   1:20:01 - Number of cases in the U.S. and how we are perceived by other countries. Uighur concentration camps in China. Propaganda and distrust of media. What is propaganda within our country being spread and being exported out of the country? We have seen a lot of propaganda both for and against Trump during his presidency, that accelerated the distrust of media.   1:23:00 - Operation Mockingbird. While some of the information surrounding Operation Mockingbird is unconfirmed, it’s interesting to read into these theories regarding operations to eavesdrop on journalists, alleged CIA operations to manipulate news media for propaganda purposes, etc.   1:27:11 - Fearful mentality within our country stemming from the upcoming election, riots, protesting, and lingering worry from Covid.   1:30:02 - Reopening schools debate is becoming very politically charged. Not to mention the food distribution that schools provide. With families staying home, and many families disproportionately being affected by Covid, the question becomes how will they be able to physically attend their jobs while the children are home, and provide the extra 2 meals per day that the schools were supplying?   1:32:11 - Wealth disparity. The large companies are benefitting from the downfall of their smaller competitors from the decline of consumer demand due to Covid. Other companies with an online presence saw a boost in business as good and services moved online. The debate whether companies will stay remote long after the virus to lower company costs.   1:39:27 - With work moving online, this brings the option of hiring workers from overseas that’s lower in cost relative to the U.S. Cost of being an employee vs. employer.   1:42:22 - Tools for automation.   1:44:55 - Scale by Jeffrey West is the book used for the next podcast episode. Stay tuned for future episodes. We are happy to be back!   We're back with an off-topic episode of Made You Think after almost a year and a half hiatus. The plan was to catch up on what's been going on, but that didn't happen and we ended up talking a lot about COVID, the economy, politics, some books we'd read, and a whole lot more.   If you've missed us or are new to the pod, this is a great way to dive back in before our next real episode which should be out in a week or two.

Mark Schall is a Certified Professional Coach. He trained at iPEC (Institute for Professional Excellence in Coaching). iPEC is a fully accredited program by the International Coach Federation (ICF). He’s dedicated to assisting people like you to achieve their highest possible level of excellence and effectiveness, be that in your organization or in your personal life.  He’s a  recognized expert coach, motivational speaker, facilitator and educator specializing in human potential and interpersonal communications. In this episode, Michael and Mark discuss: The Coaching Landscape, How he’s Seen it Change Over the Years, and Where it’s Going Marks’ Approach to Having Difficult Conversations Intuition and How it Can Be Used in Effective Coaching Mentioned in this Episode: Mentioned in this Episode: Mark’s Podcast Crucial Conversations https://markschall.com/

I’m letting you in on my practical, realistic life hacks that I use every day to get up really early, get going, get happier, and get more energized every single morning. That’s right, every single morning — even on the weekend. I love it, and it’s changed my life, and I think you’ll love it, too. I’m going to tell you step-by-step what I do and how you can adapt it to your life. No gimmicks. Episode Mentioned: "Overcoming Self Doubt - The Real Way" https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/overcoming-self-doubt-the-real-way/id1439243504?i=1000433886772 Join the InstaFam: http://www.instagram.com/chelsigoulart

Are you missing anything? What is there to do in Japan in October? How's the weather? Any seasonal foods? Today..... Today we ramble! On this episode of the Tokyo Lens Podcast by Norm Nakamura, we are talking about a month that is a clear favorite for so many... October! and how to spend it in Japan! Where to go, what to do, and so much more. Let's consider this a basic October in Japan guide! The Episode Mentioned in the Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7L_9KgBQB9A ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Also... So much love to all of those of you asking how you can support Tokyo Lens! For now , if you do any shopping on Amazon, feel free to click through from my affiliate links! Then you can support just by doing your regular shopping! Thank you all Sincerely - Tokyo Lens Norm Nakamura Or grab something here! www.redbubble.com/people/tokyolens You can find ALL my Gear (Camera/Audio/Editing) Here: www.amazon.com/shop/tokyolens ------------------------ Podcast recorded on this: amzn.to/2DbOcpe (It's been amazing so far!) Videos Filmed on this: amzn.to/2eYRvX0 Edited on this: amzn.to/2mqxTLN With this lens. amzn.to/2u8YgHY And this Mic: amzn.to/2uO5wuG also, my page has some Japanese Snacks! www.amazon.com/shop/tokyolens -------------------------------------------- YouTube: www.YouTube.com/TokyoLens Twitter: www.Twitter.com/Tokyo_Lens Instagram: www.Instagram.com/Tokyo_one Facebook: www.facebook.com/TokyoLens/ Twitch: www.twitch.tv/tokyolens Business Inquiries: www.NormNakamura.com

Alysa is joined by long-time student, Lauren, to discuss the question, “Is honesty always the best policy?” For some individuals, the answer is yes, especially when it comes to friends. However, honesty and deception in friendships may be far more complicated. Have a listen to hear about how honesty fits into the description of friendship, how the “ideology of openness” may not always work well, how lies may operate in friendship, and how to be honest with a friend. Share Your Friendship Stories with Alysa!  Visit the podcast web page for topics= www.bestforeverspod.com/surveys Email Alysa= bestforeverspod@gmail.com Follow Best Forevers Pod! Facebook = https://www.facebook.com/groups/bestforeverspod/ Instagram= https://www.instagram.com/bestforeverspod/ Twitter = https://twitter.com/BestForeversPod Support Best Forevers Pod! Patreon= www.patreon.com/bestforeverspod  Merchandise = https://bestforeverspod.threadless.com Art Work by Kate Cosgrove= http://k8cosgrove.blogspot.com  Theme Music by Trevor Wilson  Promo from this Episode!  Three Gossip Girls Podcast = https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/three-gossip-girls-a-gossip-girl-podcast/id1463196836 Sources 40 Questions = https://www.verywellmind.com/questions-to-build-intimacy-in-relationships-1270942  Afifi, Caughlin, & Afifi Chapter= https://experts.illinois.edu/en/publications/the-dark-side-and-light-side-of-avoidance-and-secrets  Steve McCornack Textbook = https://www.macmillanlearning.com/college/us/product/Reflect--Relate/p/1319103324 Julia Wood Textbook= https://www.cengage.com/c/interpersonal-communication-everyday-encounters-8e-wood/9781285445830 Ope. Freezing. Gucci. (Episode Mentioned)= http://bestforeverspod.libsyn.com/ope-freezing-gucci

In this episode of the Growth Machine Podcast Nat Eliason connects with Mike Colavita from Fat Buddha Glass. Mike heard about Nat on an Ecommerce Influence Podcast episode talking about recovering from the most recent Google Medic Update (2019). He implemented some of the tips discussed on the podcast to improve his website (after losing 89% of organic traffic). Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Ecommerce Influence Podcast - Making A Comeback After The Google Medic Update with Nat Eliason [0:20] Austin Brawner  [0:21] Fat Buddha Glass [2:28] Ahrefs [5:21] Show Topics 2:40 – Mike describes the comfortable situation of Fat Buddha Glass, a glass pipes company founded after a hobby he shared with a friend of him. Ranking for important keywords (waterpipes, bongs, etc) and getting a lot of traffic from a lightly planned marketing campaign. How it was getting a hit from the last Google Medical Update.  4:30 – After the shock of the initial surprise, they started taking action, learning and improving the website. Step 1: Educating themselves. Step 2: in-depth SEO audit. Bad content = bad links. Getting rid of bad content and toxic backlinks. “People have problems paying for good writing, and that was us”. Step 3: Mindset, good content and paying for it. Voice and characteristics of good content. Domain authority score rising after the actions taken. 9:21 – How to evaluate bad links to disavow. Considering score and relevancy of the website linking back. Does it make sense a gardening website pointing to Fat Buddha Glass?  10:56 – Reading all articles and copy, pruning old content. New and better content through investing in industry-experienced writers. Finding good writers for this specific niche. 14:10 – Conversion rate. Structure of the website. Adding internal linking. Making people go from reading the blog to the product page. Goal: answer questions people have. Linking back to collections pages. 16:38 – “At the time we though the Google Update punch was the worst thing it could happen to us. Now that we are moving forward we feel it’s the best thing that had happened”. Future actions: adding product and “how to” videos. Improving the About Us page making people relate more to the founders.  18:34 – Good reasons to include video. Benefits: 1) keep people on the site, 2) double ranking on Google AND on YouTube. How working in a guitar retail store influenced Mike’s decision to invest in video. 20:48 – Getting friends and family audit the website. Feedback and AB testing. Finding out navigation was not optimal and reducing sessions. Contact Mike through email mike@fatbud.com or Instagram https://www.instagram.com/fatbuddhaglass/  

In this episode of the Growth Machine Podcast Nora Schlesinger joins Nat Eliason. Nora is Growth Machine’s Chief Operating Officer as well as the founder of A Clean Bake, a very popular gluten free and healthy focused baking blog. Nora shares how to be successful in an extremely competitive space, and her ideas about the changes with Google, social media and marketing related to food, health and recipes blogging. Heads up! Nora and Nat are planning a Q&A episode about SEO, content, marketing, and everything related. Send your questions to nat@growthmachine.com and subscribe to the mailing list. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Cup and Leaf [8:00] Blogspot [12:19] Moz [17:00] Ahrefs [17:07] Hashtag Jeff [17:30] Build your own content machine [17:58] Dr. Axe [22:07] Austin Brawner [23:02] Ecommerce Influencer podcast with Nat Eliason [23:02] All Recipes [25:07] Epicurious [25:04] The Kitchn [25:05] Food Network [25:06] Parks and Recreation [38:50] Articles mentioned Grow Your Pinterest: The 10 Best Practices for Growth in 2019 [32:50] Show Topics 1:50 – Nora’s role inside Growth Machine and what she has to do to run her recipes blog on the side. SEO and search traffic. 3:19  – How much traffic is the blog doing now. What are the biggest sources of traffic. Steady and seasonal traffic from Google and Pinterest. 5:13 – Seasonality and blog visitors. People’s behaviour related to weather and new year’s resolutions. “New Year New Me”. Impact on healthy focused sites. Why Nora started focusing in SEO. The seasons with most traffic baking or special occasions type of content. Cup & Leaf example.  9:45 – What were the motivations to start a blog about baking cakes. Stress baking, or blogging to release stress during business school. People asking for recipes, almost the same story for every food blog. Complementing with professional food photography. Health issues that forced to change her diet. Knowing the purpose and niching down. Keyword research. Online courses. Community in food blogging.  16:16 – How to find the most useful SEO information. Google the specific questions and look for patterns in the most reliable sites (Moz and Ahrefs blogs). The courses Nora highly recommends for bloggers (Hashtag Jeff and Growth Machine free course).  18:39 – Breaking down A Clean Bake visitors analytics. The problem with Medical content and how Nora avoided being hit by the Google Medical Update. How GM clients and others were hit by the Medical Update. 24:26 – SEO changes to the food and recipe space in the last few years. How competitiveness has changed really drastically and quickly in the last 5 years. Now it’s very difficult to rank, you’re competing with bloggers and content machines with entire teams creating content, optimizing pages, creating videos. Google Updates on food blogs. 27:21 – The correlation between Pinterest and Google performance. Traffic as ranking factor. Value in terms of traffic from Pinterest and Instagram. Topics that do well on Pinterest: food, lifestyle, travel, fashion. What food bloggers should prioritize. 32:42 – How do you start on Pinterest. Prioritization. Mistakes food related bloggers do. Portrait vs landscape pictures for food pictures. How to optimize for food porn. Passion is not enough. If you are not treating it as work, you’re not going anywhere. Finding your purpose. 80/20 planning for food bloggers. "Never half-ass two things. Whole-ass one thing."  40:07 – Find Nora at her site A Clean Bake, e-mail her at nora@acleanbake.com or follow her on instagram at @nora_acleanbake. Nora and Nat are planning a Q&A episode about SEO, content, marketing, and everything related. So don’t forget to send your questions to nat@growthmachine.com or nora@growthmachine.com! Go to growthmachinepodcast.com/freecourse to get the 7 part, in-depth series about building a blog to success. Go to growthmachinepodcast.com and subscribe for future episodes. Lookf for growthmachinepodcast.com on iTunes and Stitcher. If you are enjoying the show, leave a review!  

In this episode of the Growth Machine Podcast we are joined by Wilson Hung, the Director of Growth for Kettle & Fire. Wilson wrote a phenomenal tweetstorm and article about the relationship between the cost to acquire new customers and their lifetime value. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Wilson Hung Kettle & Fire Sumome [1:31] Justin Mares [1:54] Ahrefs [2:17] Joe Rogan podcast [4:49] Tim Ferriss podcast [4:49] Perfect Keto [9:11] Google Trends [9:24] Shopify [13:17] Bridgerock Data [16:39] Babak Azad [18:25] Beachbody [18:25] Blue Apron [20:59] Hello Fresh [20:59] getARPU [23:15] Carthook [24:35] Articles mentioned The golden era of DNVB is over on Twitter The Golden Era of DNVBs Are Over Show Topics 0:41 - How Wilson and Nat new of each other in Sumome’s awesome Alumni network. 30 day strategy proposal to get a new job. Ahrefs and link building with affiliates. Videos and indirectly ranking for bone broth. 3:14 - Saturating growth channels, ads cost started rising. Thought: if customer acquisition costs (CAC) continue to grow, then customer lifetime value (LTV) is the variable to act on to hit the top line revenue targets. 5:25 - Improving LTV. Identifying points of direct LTV improvement (data infrastructure, margins, repeat purchases, etc). Slowing down the rate of increase of CAC (increasing efficiency, diversifying to non-paid acquisition channels, SEO, referrals, etc). Benefits of scaling Facebook Ads when you already have a large audience. When to try non-paid before than paid channels and vice versa. 9:53 - Increasing LTV. Less mature brands tend to measure success only on the first purchase, revenue per visitor or the return on ad spend on the first purchase, vs considering subscriptions. Attention to metrics that aren’t in line with long term goals. 12:08 - Valuing customers differently. Willingness to pay more for a subscriber than a non subscriber. Segmenting customers by the acquisition channel (paid/non-paid). How to build the company’s customer data. Cumulative revenue and blended margins. Cashflow issues if you pick the wrong LTV timeframe. Maintenance and guardrails. Past performance is not a guarantee for future performance. Metrics Wilson receives weekly. 18:55 - Guiding people to subscriptions. Increasing subscription opt-ins at first purchase or at upgrade. How dev agencies come into play to increase subscriptions. Examples of how they are improving opt-ins at K&F. Finding way people subscribe by surveys and identifying potential subscriptors based on keyword search. 22:19 - Developing clever tools for helping do better with LTV. What to focus when sales are in the $10k-$20k range. Tools to optimize for revenue per visitor. Paying attention not over optimizing bundles to break the free shipping barrier, to the point conversion rates start to diminish. 25:52 - Sweet spots with free shipping and pop-up discounts. Understanding the costs of fulfillment. LTV is not just revenue, margins play an important role too. With better margins one can afford more expensive customer acquisition. Margin improvements. 29:25 - LTV and CAC summary. 30:41 - Find Wilson at his website and @. Go to growthmachinepodcast.com/freecourse to get the 7 part, in-depth series about building a blog to success. Go to growthmachinepodcast.com and subscribe for future episodes. Lookf for growthmachinepodcast.com on iTunes and Stitcher. If you are enjoying the show, leave a review!

 In this special episode of the Growth Machine Podcast, Nat interviews Julian Shapiro and Asher King Abramson to talk about learning growth. Julian and Asher are partners of the Bell Curve growth agency, and also Demand Curve, a growth school where they teach everything they’ve learned about growing businesses. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Julian Shapiro Asher King Abramson Bell Curve Demand Curve Streak [1:04] Clearbit [1:04] Imperfect Produce [1:04] Tovala [1:06] Envoy [1:07] Facebook Ads [11:07] Instagram Ads [11:07] Webflow [12:57] Heap Analytics [12:57] Cup & Leaf [14:16] UpWork [15:09] Google Shopping [16:35] Pinterest Ads [16:57] Shopify [22:00] Recharge Payments [27:55] Google Analytics [29:24] Mixpanel [31:34] Whois [36:52] Articles mentioned First part of the training [16:57] Julian Shapiro Growth Marketing Guide [18:10] Show Topics 1:04 – How Julian faked till he make it to learn growth to the point that companies hired him. “Once you get growth results for yourself and people start seeing them, they start asking if you can help them”. What is one of the most important labor shortages in Silicon Valley. 3:33 – How Julian and Asher met at a dinner because of their unique skills: guide writing and freestyle rap. How software engineers neglect the importance of growth. What is growth. Asher first experiences cold outreaching recruiters. 5:42 – How Asher started learning about growth and moving away from engineering. Working for a Private Equity firm that flipped websites. Experimenting and specializing in conversion. Joining Bell Curve. The principles Julian used to partner with Asher and how he thought him growth. 8:45 – Why it is hard to find good growth people, if one can learn in 90 days. Structure and data as the keys to accelerate your growth. Learning alone vs learning from an expert. Instilling confidence with data. A specific example of a subscription ecommerce business: giving the specs, which ad channel one should use, what messaging and which segmentation? 11:36 – The amount of money and time needed to test growth. The need to spend money to learn ads, compared to other skills that don’t. How they get advantage of previous clients’ experience. 14:15 – Starting ads for Cup & Leaf case example. How to approach spending on ads without expertise and with a limited amount of cash. Why going with a freelancer or a new agency is cheaper than going alone. Prioritizing ads channels based on the type of product and business model. Mastering Google Shopping in an afternoon. 18:02 – Julian’s original approach to get insights directly from the source. How to get first hand information from other marketing agency owners. Places to level up growth without saturating the technique. 21:02 – Conversion Rate Optimization. The symbiosis about ads and CRO. Qualitative approaches looking for low hanging fruits. Free Shipping under the Buy Now button. Removing the Buy button from above-the-fold portion of website. Quantitative process and stripping it down looking where people get stuck in the funnel. When to skip A/B testing. When to apply and what to expect from qualitative and quantitative improvements. 26:00 –  The bugged health insurance app story. Debugging a funnel to find why people don’t buy even after selecting a plan. Recharge vs the shopping cart on Cup & Leaf. Auditing websites to find what’s broken and setting up tools to track anomalies. 29:20 – The principle to get the best from Google Analytics. “I use Google Analytics as a fundamental source of truth”. 32:14 – How the growth training works at Demand Curve. 4 stages: strategy, acquisition, conversion, job placement. The 2 arms: startups training and income share. 35:20 – Which areas someone should focus to be more useful for their employer as a growth marketer. 3 core skills that people should know: Facebook and Instagram Ads, Google Ads, intelligent cold outreach. A different type of outreach. The channels that work most for Bell Curve clients. 38:20 – Find Julian at his blog julian.com or on twitter at @julian and Asher on @akingabramson Go to growthmachinepodcast.com/freecourse to get the 7 part, in-depth series about building a blog to success. Go to growthmachinepodcast.com and subscribe for future episodes. Lookf for growthmachinepodcast.com on iTunes and Stitcher. If you are enjoying the show, leave a review!

In this episode Benji Hyam from Grow and Convert joins Nat Eliason to talk about how you can use Pain-Point SEO to create content that will convert for your business. Benji is Nat’s long time friend and collaborator, and co-founder of Grow and Convert, one of the best content web marketing agencies.  Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Benji Hyam on Twitter Grow and Convert Pain Point SEO: How to Produce SEO Contents that Drives Conversions [4:56] Medium [9:10] Mailchimp [11:14] Convert Kit [11:44] 5 Reasons You Should NOT Switch From MailChimp To ConvertKit [11:45] Soylent [16:05] Creative Commons Licenses [16:32] Clearscope [26:05] Ahrefs [26:19] Articles mentioned Growing Cup & Leaf: 0 to 150,000 Monthly Organic Visitors in 8 Months Does Your Blog Has SEO Potential? [4:54] How to Find 100+ Great Keywords in Less than 1 Hour [7:29] Show Topics 0:44 – How Benji got started with content marketing. The problem most agencies had and why Benji focused on improve his tracking and reporting skill to be accountable of content results. What metrics Benji focuses on. When to check traffic growth, lead growth, first and last click attributions. 3:35 – How much the topic influences the sale vs on-page improvements.  Introducing the “Pain Point SEO” idea. Tying the search intent with a blog post content. Which posts will convert better. Why looking at keyword volume alone is not a good tactic. B2B customers compared to B2C. High keyword volume = beginners questions = lower buying intent. Low keyword volume = experts’ pain points = higher buying intent. 7:25 – Types of pain-points blog posts. Why Comparison posts work well in SaaS and competitive eCommerce. Mistakes beginners do with Best Top Services/Products posts. Insights on how to include our service/product in these posts. 10:40 – Alternative to X lists compared to Best Top lists. The difference in buying intent on both types of lists, and how one can “steal” users from their competitors. 11:50 – Reusing content from other posts. How to avoid copying and pasting. Where to look for original content within companies. Pricing. Getting advantage when your competitors’ don’t show their pricing. 13:58 – Ranking on competitors’ terms. How to get traffic if you are a small competitor in the landscape. Risks on trademark infringement. More sources to find content for Comparison posts. 18:02 – Product/Service Use Case post. The most difficult concepts to grasp: how people are using your product and what their intent is behind using it to go after a pain point. Take your products’ most important feature and figure out how a user may be looking to solve for that, or search terms related to the problem. 20:24 – Process to strategize the content plan. The figures and position within a company Benji engages when planning the content. Customer research before content planning. Why it’s important to talk to sales and customer support employees. 23:29 – On-page SEO. Customizing the Call to Action. Where to include the CTAs. Comparing to top-5 ranking posts and improving on them. The way to think when competing with other posts. 27:13 – Examples of the Pain Point strategies applied to an ecommerce site. Purposes of posts on different industries. Ecommerce and SaaS posts are more about discovery mode, while for services it’s more about building trust and alleviate all concerns a client may have about working with you. 31:05 – Where Nat will focus when producing new content for Growth Machine. The importance on still building content based on our own expertise. 33:56 – Find Benji at growandcovert.com and on twitter.com/benjihyam. Go to growthmachinepodcast.com/freecourse to get the 7 part, in-depth series on going from 0 to 100,000 organic visitors. If you are enjoying the show, please leave a review!  

Infinite Jest is a book meant to be an actively read –it’s meant to take a certain amount of work to finish it and try to figure out what’s going on. While David Foster Wallace, the author, spends words and words in beautiful descriptions, he purposefully omitted, exchanged, and told through the characters lenses parts of the story. In this episode Nat and Neil are going through some of the theories people have created to help understand the book. We cover a wide range of topics, including: Hal's relationship with the mold and DMZ Mario's ascendance References to Hamlet, 1984, and other books and authors If Infinite Jest will become a film A MYT classic: Aquatic Apes Theory! And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out the previous episode on Infinite Jest for more in-depth review of the book. Also, Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, another of the longest books we read, that ended up filmed for a movie. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Reddit [3:20] Creative Commons [3:30] What Happens at the End of Infinite Jest? (or, the Infinite Jest ending explained) – Aaron Swartz Blog [3:40] Futurama [11:33] Pineapple Express [11:35] Aquatic Apes Theory [16:02] The Wraith – The Ambiguities Blog [20:11] Lost [23:40] John Wayne and Avril Conspiracy Theories [25:28] Medusa [33:36] Atlas Shrugged (film series) [40:30] Game of Thrones [43:00] The Office [45:10] Books mentioned Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace (book episode) Hamlet by William Shakespeare [5:23] The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka [7:48] 1984 by George Orwell [26:50] The Pale King by David Foster Wallace [36:50] Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand [46:38] (book episode) The Romance of The Three Kingdoms by Luo Guanzhong [47:07] Les Miserables by Victor Hugo [47:10] War and Peace by Tolstoy [47:29] People mentioned David Foster Wallace Aaron Swartz [2:25] 0:00 – Spoiler Alert: this a commentary to Infinite Jest book. We discuss theories about those parts of the book that were left without There will be spoilers. Refer to the previous episode for more deep book review. 3:55 – Theory #1. The ghost/wraith is pretty obviously Hal’s father, the guy who made the Entertainment. He’s spirit was kind of resurrected by the radiation coming from the garbage dumped in the are he was buried. Allusions to Hamlet. JOI created Infinite Jest to take Hal out of his shell of silence. Unreliable narrators. 6:49 – Theory #2. DMZ or Madam Psychosis. The wraith steals the drug to give it to Hal via the toothbrush. Parallel with Kafka’s Metamorphosis. Hal’s experiences with the mold. He couldn’t communicate → Eats the mold → Communicates, but emotionless and stoic → Gets DMZ → Can’t talk again, but gains emotional complexity. 9:55 – Theory #3. Effects of marijuana withdrawal. Hal’s collapse and Gately’s help in the hospital. Digging up Hal’s father’s head. Connection with Gately’s vision. Hal, Gately, Joelle and John Wayne looking for the anti-Entertainment cartridge but it’s not there anymore. The suspect falls on Orin. How he new about it? Probably because of Joelle (they were dating). 13:21 – Weird theories around Avril, Hal-Orin-Mario’s mom. Apparently Avril is modeled after DFW’s mom. Theory #4. She is an A.F.R. or O.U.S. member, the secret terrorists or intelligence organizations. Affairs with John Wayne, Charles C.T. (stepbrother?). 16:10 – Theory #5. Orin, the oldest brother, fathered Mario with Avril. Avril can be the hand model. Orin doesn’t go to his father funeral. Other stories of parents abusing their sons. Who was in the car with Avril? 18:59 – Why was ghost Jim moving stuff around in the tennis academy? 19:59 – Theory #6. Why DFW uses the word wraith instead of ghost? The wraith explains to Don that it takes enormous effort for him to appear to Don: “Wraiths by and large exist (putting his arms out slowly and making little quotation-mark finger-wiggles as he said exist) in a totally different Heisenbergian dimension of rate-change and time-passage.”  Therefore, the wraith has to stand still for extremely long periods of time to appear at all to Don. 21:07 – Theory #7. Speculations that Jim ends up possessing Hal. 22:24 – Theory #8. How did DFW write the book? Did he mapped all out and then intentionally leave out specific sections so people can come up with theories? TV shows with open twists. Apparently Infinite Jest was longer. 24:53 – Theory #9. C.T. is Mario’s father. 25:23 – Theory #10. Avril and Luria are the same person. Theory #11. Orin didn’t die by the end of the book. 1984 flashbacks in the scenes with Luria. 27:08 – Mold in the basement. Mold that feeds on mold. Criticism against mold as a real thing, and more as a metaphor of the teens age difficulties. 29:33 – Theory #12. Did Hal watch the Entertainment or part of it? Doubts about how he got a copy of the movie. 31:11 – Theory #13. Hal has internally self synthesized DMZ because of the mold. 32:26 – Orin thought Joelle and Himself were lovers. Maybe that was because he didn’t want to attend his father funeral. Speculations about covering Joelle: is she disfigured or is she really so beautiful that needs to use a veil? How Joelle got acid in her face. Molly’s story. Joelle using a veil after filming Infinite Jest. 35:30 – What was the movie about? Things the reader is not allowed to know. Other DFW books. Difficulties explaining what’s the book about. Addiction and living passively. 40:00 – Would Infinite Jest make a good movie or not? Problems with Atlas Shrugged bad movie. Formats evolving after Netflix. Most of the value in Infinite Jest comes from the descriptions, not that much happens between the characters. Getting the chaotic feeling to a movie. DFW against an Infinite Jest movie. Longest books. Sierra Leone and Quebequian terrorists. 48:55 – If you enjoyed this weird episode of Made You Think, we appreciate any review on iTunes or if you share with your friends. If you didn’t like it, it’s OK, that’s an experiment, so go listen to a normal episode of the podcast. The previous episode about Infinite Jest is probably a much better introduction to the book than this episode. Find us on Twitter @TheRealNeilS and @nateliason and join the email list at Made You Think Podcast. The email list is the best way to stay up to date on future episodes and things that are going on with the show. Check out ways to support the show at madeyouthinkpodcast.com/support.  

“This wise old whiskery fish swims up to three young fish and goes, 'Morning, boys, how's the water?' and swims away; and the three young fish watch him swim away and look at each other and go, 'What the fuck is water?' and swim away.” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace. This is a huge novel taking time in a fictitious 2010 characterized by a non-conventional timeline and a lack of a plot. Despite it’s challenging structure and the fact of being a fiction, it has a lot of philosophical nuggets about particularly on the activeness vs passiveness way of living. We cover a wide range of topics, including: Hitting goals and sense of satisfaction Letting life happen to you while watching TV Accurate visions of the world in 2020 Best porno-like book titles How Nat & Neil broke and got back together 1-on-1 sports and their secondary effect on us And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman, another book that critics how media and TV are ruining our lives, and The Inner Game of Tennis by Timothy Gallwey, another book that shows how tennis is not just about hitting balls with a racket. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Kindle (link Amazon) [8:06] iPad [9:10] Netflix [17:50] The Office [18:36] BoJack Horseman [19:50] Cup & Leaf [40:44] A Crash Course in Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Cryptocurrency (crypto episode) [42:57] AA - Alcoholics Anonymous [50:30] Ad Blocker [1:05:56] The Trouble With Facebook by Sam Harris [1:06:25] Snapchat [1:07:26] Skype [1:09:10] Mushroom Coffee [1:14:50] University of Arizona [1:18:39] The College Dropout by Kanye West [1:32:20] (album episode) The Matrix [1:33:07] Primer [1:33:14] Books mentioned Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas R. Hofstadter [2:25] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Ulysses by James Joyce [7:16] Finnegans Wake by James Joyce [7:17] The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus [37:59] (book episode) Cleveland is King by Brendan Bowers [38:20] The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz [45:12] Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [46:37] (book episode) Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault  [46:47] (book episode) 12 Rules for Life by Dr. Jordan Peterson [46:55] (book episode) Strange Loops [47:07] (book episode) Mastery by Robert Greene [47:10] (book episode) Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman [47:16] (book episode) The Inner Game of Tennis by Timothy Gallwey [52:05] (book episode) Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell [58:55] Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand [1:15:19] (book episode) Elegant Complexity by Greg Carlisle [1:15:50] Hamlet by William Shakespeare [1:22:44] People mentioned David Foster Wallace Quentin Tarantino [18:10] Michael Schur [18:58] B.J. Novak [19:36] Kyrie Irving [38:15] LeBron James [38:50] Taylor Pearson [42:57] Trump [1:04:20] Sam Harris [1:06:25] Mattan Griffel [1:19:26] David Perell [1:28:23] James Joyce [1:30:00] Martin Scorsese [1:32:00] Kanye West [1:32:20] (College Dropout episode) Joe Rogan [1:35:41] Show Topics 0:00 – Spoiler Alert: it’s a fiction book, there will be spoilers. However, this is not a normal book. There is not much of a plot, so to say. This is probably a book intended to be re-read. It’s self referential, once you reach the end it intends you to go back to the beginning. 2:50 – The book doesn’t follow the timeline of events. If you are confused, congrats! That’s the point of the book :). The “missing” year is where most of the action takes. 3:35 – “Fiction is about what it’s like to be a f**cking human being”, David Foster Wallace. The central plot of our lives is just a narrative fallacy. The book gives a sense that it’s like life, in a weird way. Life is extremely complex, but we try to give it a narrative with sequential events. The characters don’t suffer a major transformation. The book ends right before all the crazy stuff is going to happen, but nothing happens yet. 6:26 – DFW intended the book to be an active work of fiction as opposed to just something you  seat back and read. There are more than 350 endnotes with essential information to the plot, so you can’t skip them. It’s highly suggested to read it on a Kindle because of them. 9:45 – There are no dates to anchor yourself on. The 10 years where the story takes place, they stop using numbers for the years, but a company’s name that sponsors or subsides that year (“subsidized time”). 11:23 – One of the central characters (that is barely referenced btw) created a movie that is so entertaining that people would watch it till they die. This movie is called “Infinite Jest”. Again, the book is chaotic and focus on the characters details rather than a story. Some parts start getting boring (eg. a kids tennis play) but you don’t want to skip them because something important is said in a couple of sentences. Random passages are really beautiful essays. 13:29 – It’s such a weird book to even talk about. It seems we are talking about a dream that we had. Supernatural characters (a ghost, a guy that levitates) may confuse you and make you doubt about your comprehension. 15:12 – Each chapter is made up of many subchapters, that can have from one sentence to 30 pages. Usually, the point of view is changed for any new subchapter, like into a different character who might be in a different place or even year or day. Sometimes you don’t know what day or character you’re getting drop in to until you’re a couple of pages into it, so it’s moving around a lot. 17:05 – What would the book like if it was written knowing Google exists? What would a movie about Infinite Jest be like? Tarantino could direct this movie. Michael Schur, co-producer and actor of The Office TV series owns the movie rights to Infinite Jest. There are many reference to the book and the author in The Office. Other TV show, BoJack Horseman, seems to be loosely based on this book. Addiction component in the book, and addiction issues that the author had. Psychological addiction to marijuana. 21:52 – Broader context of the main characters. There are basically three or four groups that have their own separate stories and those main groups intersect throughout the novel. There is the tennis academy. A particular family with 3 brothers, Hal, Orin and Mario. The addiction home next to the tennis academy. And the groups of terrorists together with those who are fighting them. The book is hilarious at many times, including laughing out loud funny and horrible tragic things at the same time. There are some absurd parts of the book, that are also very funny because of the way they are written. 26:04 – Weird plots. The wheelchair terrorists that want to kill Americans with a movie. The undercovered anti-terrorist agent that dresses like a woman. The male character enamored with “her”. Kid with his forehead stuck in a glass. The way Jim commits suicide sticking his head in a microwave. Hal tricking the psycho therapists having a major breakthrough. The list of people dying watching the film at one guy’s house. Death by passivity. Examples of characters that stuck between an easy passive life and the will of doing something bigger. 36:12 – Beautiful nonfiction parts. Discussion of kids hitting their goals: “one is that you attain the goal and realize the shocking realization that attaining the goal does not complete or redeem you, does not make everything for your life “OK ” as you are, in the culture, educated to assume it will do this, the goal. And then you face this fact that what you had thought would have the meaning does not have the meaning when you get it, and you are impaled by shock.” “It is more invigorating to want than to have”. Kyrie Irving, the basketball player, pissed off after winning everything with the Cavaliers. Finding new hills to climb instead of contenting of reaching the top. Happiness comes from the climb, not much from the achievement. Boredom aversion. Losing the impetus to perform after hitting your goals. Veterans missing the war. “If you’re worried you can feel safe, and if you feel safe you should be worried”. Books with porno titles. 47:34 – Infinite Jest is the fictional version of Amusing Ourselves to Death. Heavy critic on TV. Avoiding letting life happen to you, instead of an active life. Effects of the addiction phase, and breaking through it. Cleanse from addiction hero journey. Self improvement and infinite games found in 1-on-1 sports like tennis, box, or martial arts. Yes, you’re fighting against another player, but mainly the fight is against your brain. 53:53 – Transcending own limits. The opponent is yourself. Most characters are fighting an internal battle throughout the novel. Relationship between DFW and his editor. All typos were intentional. First and third person narrators through the book, and the relation to typos. 1:00:53 – The author sees irony almost like a safety valve that people use to avoid feeling real things. Mario, one of the characters, says (or thinks) “there is some rule that real stuff can only get mentioned if everybody rolls their eyes or laughs in a way that isn't happy.” Laughing to avoid deep conversations. In the book, the author takes serious things and wraps them in absurd and funny incidents to make them tolerable or digestible. 1:05:06 – Predictions of the internet. Advertising invading every surface and communication. Snapchat filters. The rise and fall of video calls: “the amazing things about phones is that you can be paying half attention while assuming the other person is giving you their full attention”. The problem of video calls. 1:12:48 – We broke. No, we haven’t, but we missed the opportunity. 1:15:01 – The support of the reading companion. Getting through the first pages of the book. To read or not to read Infinite Jest. Is it worth it? Signaling. Perceptions about the book, what they liked and what not. Nat: “it’s one of the most incredible books I’ve read that I never ever want to read again”. Neil compares this type of difficult to read books with beers. Endurance and feeling of accomplishment. 1:28:23 – The Infinite Jest Reader’s Club. Writers that want to prove how smart writers they are. Fashion designers showing off. Impressing your peers and justifying your professional existence. Kindle reading time estimation. DFW use of psychotropics. Worsts things of the book. 1:40:26 – Stay tuned if you want to listen to a more spoilered version of this book. Find us on Twitter @TheRealNeilS and @nateliason and let us know your version about what happened in the book. Leave a review and share it with your friends if you like the show. Join the email list at Made You Think Podcast, which is the best way to stay up to date on future episodes and things that are going on with the show. Check out ways to support the show at madeyouthinkpodcast.com/support.

Let us call the collection of these forces that push and pull at us from deep within human nature. Human nature stems from the particular wiring of our brains, the configuration of our nervous system and the way we humans process emotions, all of which developed and emerged over the course of the 5 million years or so of our evolution as a species. In this episode of Made You Think, Nat and Neil talk about The Laws of Human Nature by Robert Greene. The author examines human behavior and suggests that it can be explained by different laws. Each law is presented and described in details: what every law means in your life, what you should do with it, how you should interpret it, and how you should use it. We cover a wide range of topics, including: How humans really behave and how one should adapt to it Historical and contemporary examples to better understand each law How to apply each law to your life Why corporations don’t give much importance to Twitter (and it’s because of Trump) The effect of context on our mood and behavior (yes, Nazis and Twitter examples) Why you may feel miserable even with 1 billion in your account And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of The Laws of Human Nature by Robert Greene! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Mastery by Robert Greene, a fantastic book on sculpting your mind and your life in the pursuit of mastery, as well as Denial of Death by Ernest Becker, another book that delves into the idea that fearlessness is essential for individual success outside of a traditional path, and even within it.   Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we’re running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Irrationality [8:50] Self-awareness [10:37] Narcissism  [12:49] Role-playing [17:16] South Sea Bubble [32:22] Black Swan Preparation [33:05] Herd Mentality [35:16] Instagram Influencer [35:39] The Godfather [38:45] Matrix [39:25] Primer [39:42] Self-sabotage [44:01] Mueller Report [45:45] Around the Horn [46:58] Pardon the Interruption [47:08] Crossfire [47:40] UC Berkeley [49:00] Lyft [49:22] New York Times [49:50] QueensBridge Venture Partners [50:41] Nazi [53:17] College as an incubator of Girardian terror by Dan Wang [59:40] American Psycho [1:01:44] Theranos [1:05:38] Enron [1:07:41] Apple [1:06:13] Nat's Article: Increasing the Difficulty [1:09:29] Social Justice Warrior [1:12:07] Neil's Article: Entertainment Isn't Dumb [1:16:40] Netflix [1:16:51] Cup & Leaf [1:17:45] Estee Lauder [1:21:23] Taco Bell [1:22:09] Slacktivism [1:31:38] Star Trek [1:38:19] Books mentioned The Laws of Human Nature by Robert Greene Mastery by Robert Greene (book episode) [01:33] Antifragile by Nassim Taleb (Nat’s notes) (book episode) [1:34] Letters from a Stoic by Seneca (Nat's notes) (book episode) [1:35] The 50th Law by Robert Greene [03:00] The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene (Nat’s notes) [03:13] Principles: Life and Work by Ray Dalio (Nat’s notes) (book episode) [6:58] Poor Charlie's Almanack by Charlie Munger [10:11] What Every Body is Saying by Joe Navarro [17:42] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Uninhabitable Earth by David Wallace-Wells [25:12] 12 Rules for Life by Jordan Peterson (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) [28:50] 12 Years A Slave by Solomon Northup [55:36] Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) [1:00:31] The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch (book episode) [1:29:26] Made in America by Sam Walton [1:32:30] The Denial of Death by Ernest Becker [1:34:45] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Elephant in the Brain by Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson [1:36:27] (Neil’s notes) People mentioned Robert Greene [01:15] Joe Rogan [07:55] Donald Trump [09:17] Charles T.  Munger [10:11] Bill Clinton [18:17] Barack Obama [20:07] George W. Bush [21:33] Sam Harris [24:41] Daniel Kahneman [24:42] David Wallace-Wells [25:12] Jordan Peterson [28:50] Isaac Newton [32:27] Fredo Corleone [38:45] Nas [50:20] Steve Jobs [1:06:13] Tim Ferriss [1:11:54] Seth Godin [1:22:31] Kanye West [1:25:37] Sam Walton [1:32:28] Ernest Becker [1:34:45] Ray Kurzweil [1:35:44] Show Topics 01:12 – Nat and Nate are major fans of Robert Greene. Takeaways from their top Robert Greene books, Mastery and The 50th Law. 5:12 – The laws of human nature is based on how humans act and behave and what one can infer about other people or learn about them based on their behavior. Each law goes in-depth on historical and contemporary examples. 8:50 – Law of Irrationality: You may think you are rational but you're not. The first step towards becoming rational is to understand our fundamental irrationality. We all fall into this trap of thinking that we're the rational ones and everyone else is irrational. Green believes that we all have irrational beliefs and the best way to become more rational is having that awareness of yourself that you are also not a fully rational creature. What stems out from irrationality is the conviction bias or superiority bias, where you think like you're better than everyone. The key to stop making irrational decisions is self awareness and reflection. Increase your reaction time: when some event or interaction requires your response, train yourself to step back. 12:50 – Law of Narcissism: Transform self love into empathy. The idea of healthy narcissism is everyone is a narcissist to some extent, but if you're healthy about it, you have a stronger, more resilient sense of self and can recover more quickly from wounds and insults. There is not much validation needed from others. Social media is the medium of overly narcissists. Also, there are two monologues happening sometimes on shows like podcasts where you just happen to be speaking at each other, but you're not really having a conversation. Everybody just wants to feel heard, that's why people are posting on social media.. 17:12 – Law of Role-playing: See through people's masks. Bill Clinton never lost sight of the fact that as president, he had to project confidence and power, but if he was speaking to a group of auto workers, he would adjust his accent and his words to fit the audience and he would do the same to a group of executives. Most of the time, trying too hard to adjust to your audience can be offensive. 21:38 – Law of Compulsive Behavior: Determine the strength of people's character. A lot of people do have some form of compulsion in how they act. The toxic types and drama magnets fall in this type of behavior. There are certain people, like in high school or in college, who always have drama no matter what's going on. The Laws of Human Nature can be read in two different ways – with the eye to learning more about other people or with an eye towards yourself. We go through Sam Harris’ interview of Daniel Kahneman and Joe Rogan's interview of David Wallace Wells, author of The Uninhabitable Earth. 26:43 – Law of Covetousness: Become an elusive object of desire. This law is very true for relationships, for instance, people who are using dating apps. The people you're connecting with on dating apps are always seemingly perfect, but then as you get to know them, you realize they're all human beings, they’re not perfect. Also, it states that if you don't give somebody too much information about yourself, then you have that air of mystery and they can project whatever they want to project onto you. In an era of so much advertising and marketing, it affects your decision-making, what is something that you actually want and what's something you need. We tackle the 12 Rules for Life by Jordan Peterson, where he emphasizes on how many of our desires are actually internally-driven versus driven by what we're seeing other people do. 31:52 – Law of Short-sightedness: Elevate your perspective. It's basically civically training ourselves to detach from the heat of the moment. For any group or team, you kind of want someone in charge of revealing all the ways something could fail. Expecting the unexpected, the black swan preparedness. The concept of herd mentality, where you doubt your own logic in money and selfies. Take those Instagram influencers. 38:07 – Law of Defensiveness: Soften people's resistance by confirming their self opinion. Everyone thinks that they're autonomous and acting of their free will. Also, most think that they're intelligent and that they're good and decent. Regardless of whether or not those things are true, it behooves you to confirm people's beliefs in that about themselves. Fredo Corleone is a perfect example. He is the family idiot who also does some sleazy things and gets the family in trouble, but despite all of that and all the evidence staring him in the face, he still thinks he's an intelligent and good human being. Primer on being a Master Persuader: five strategies for instilling those beliefs in the people you're talking to. 42:50 – Law of Self-sabotage: Change your circumstances by changing your attitude. This part lists out a lot of bad mental routines people get into. When you see one of these self-sabotaging mentalities come out constantly from people, it makes it very hard to be around them. This happens in Twitter feed, where if you were constantly surrounded by political or hostile tweets or news, even if they're not directed at you, it changes your mood entirely. The click bait headlines confirming existing biases. 51:22 – Law of Repression: Confront your dark side. Part of the job in studying human nature is to recognize and examine the dark side of one’s character. You can't deny that there are going to be parts of your character that are bad. Seeking those out and figuring out where they're coming from can improve yourself to deal with those parts of your behavior. There's like very little genetic determination for whether you're a good or bad person. There may be some inclinations, but a lot of whether or not you become like a well-socialized or antisocial person is going to be from your environment and your upbringing. We dive in the two circumstances that can bring that type of thing out and study Nazi’s and slavery. Slave owners were not necessarily cruel individuals, it’s just that they were accustomed to such as they grow up. 57:53 – Law of Envy: Beware the fragile ego. This delves into how you can pick up on other people, the little things they say and do that convey some sense of envy or insecurity around you. Women talk about this a lot with other women but men are not exempted from this. The closer you are to other people, the more you will envy them and resent them. We touch on College as an Incubator of Girardian Terror by Dan Wang – how there is no clear sign of any diversity on college campuses. Also, there are different things that motivate people, and all these motivations are mashed up in our brains leading us to have different types of behaviors. The concept of Alpha dog, where it's more on status than the actual money itself. 1:04:58 – Law of Grandiosity: Know your limits. You should tie any feelings of greatness to your actual work and achievements in your contributions to society and not to something special about you because that's where it can get dangerous. A case in point is Theranos. If the projects you attempt are below or at your skill level, you'll become easily bored and less focused. If they are too ambitious, you will feel crushed by your failure. 1:10:18 – Law of Gender Rigidity: Reconnect to the masculine or feminine within you. Some of the things that you find attractive in the opposite sex is something that you need to develop within yourself. This is a good tool for introspection and personal development. Greene used these masculine and feminine traits as descriptors. Opposite traits complement one another. 1:13:13 – Law of Aimlessness: To advance with a sense of purpose. You'll be most motivated and happiest if you have a higher sense of purpose or mission that drives you on what you are doing as opposed to just following the direction or the goals of your parents for you and your peers. Purpose is doing something where you actually want to wake up and instantly start moving. People judge themselves if that sense of purpose isn't something big and special. 1:18:08 – Law of Conformity: Resist the downward pull of the group. Being aware that you're not immune to the way being in a group will change how you think. Notice how being around people changes the way you're behaving and thinking. Making decisions based on what you want think, not just what the group wants or thinks. LinkedIn launch table. Different groups hold different heuristics. Corporate America doesn’t use Twitter, they think it’s a Trump thing. 1:22:35 – Law of Fickleness: Make them want to follow you. You want to turn yourself into someone that people want to follow. There are three core things under this law: listening skills, dedicating yourself by respecting people's individual needs and proving that you're working for the greater good, and then taking the leadership as a huge responsibility and making sure that you're considering the welfare of the group as early on in your career as possible. Not letting other people categorize you so they will pay more attention trying to find out more about you. You want to develop the highest possible standards for your work and training yourself to be super aware of how your manner in tone are affecting the people around you. Reputation is going to play a really big role in whether or not you can succeed in becoming some kind of leader. The idea of sending mixed signals and showing qualities that are ever so slightly contrary. If you send mixed signals, if you're not allowing people to instantly categorize you, they're going to pay more attention because they're trying to figure you out. 1:26:10 – Law of Aggression: See the hostility behind the friendly facade. Too friendly person who you don’t actually know is irritating. We all have aggressive tendencies. Aggressiveness spectrum. Aggressiveness can be seen in sports too, and they can bring out that aggressive part in people who might not have thought they were aggressive. Everyone has an aggressive side, whether you exhibit it overly or passively, and your task is to not deny that you are aggressive, but to learn how you can channel it into something productive. Almost nothing in the world can resist persistent human energy. The trick is to want something badly enough that nothing will stop you or double your energy. And lastly, “most people engage at some cathartic release of their angers, some giant protest, and then it goes away and they slip back into complacency or become bitter”. 1:31:02 – Law of General Myopia: Seize the historical moment. Society moves in cycles of like kind of four generations. The first generation is that of revolutionaries who make a radical break with the past to establish new rules and create chaos. The second generation craves some order, and they want to stabilize the world and establish some new conventions in dogma. Then the third generation has little connection to the founders of the revolution and they're less passionate about it, they just want to make life comfortable and they don't want things to be getting upset. And lastly, the fourth generation feels society has lost its vitality and they're not sure what should replace it. The goal is to understand as deeply as possible the spirit of your generation, of the times that you live in. Learn how you can take advantage of it and how that has affected how you perceive the world. The premise behind Sam Walton’s Walmart. “Hard times create strong men. Strong men create good times. Good times create weak men. And, weak men create hard times.” 1:34:35 – The Law of Death Denial: Meditate on your common mortality. Essentially, we don't like to think about the fact that we're going to die and that makes us act in ways that we might not. It causes us to buy into philosophies that will save us from that fact. We dive into the technological transcendence being the modern version of religion. No one is ever going to upload their brain into a computer. We must think of our mortality as a kind of continual deadline. We must stop fooling ourselves. We could die tomorrow and even if we live for another 80 years, it is but a drop in the ocean of the vastness of time and it passes always more quickly than we imagine. We have to awaken to this reality and make it a continual meditation. 1:41:31 – Find us on Twitter @TheRealNeilS and @nateliason and let us know what are yours thoughts about the book and the episode. Leave a review and share it with your friends if you like the show. Join the email list at Made You Think Podcast, that's the best way to stay up to date on future episodes and things that are going on with the show. Check our supporters at madeyouthink.com/support.  

If psychedelics are one thing we can all agree on, is that it will make a lot of people happy. There's a lot of people who could use a heavy dose of psychedelics to stop being angry. There's something about stepping outside of yourself and even up the reality that comes with these types of experiences that is getting even more useful in a culture that is becoming even more obsessed with the day to day and itself. In this episode of Made You Think, Nat and Mansal Denton talk about Food of the Gods by Terence McKenna. This is a fun book episode about Terence McKenna’s take on psychedelics. First of which is that because mushrooms or “shrooms” basically grow faster in Caledon it leads us to see respect and certain religious adoration towards animals and lastly, that psychedelics are originators of religion. We cover a wide range of topics, including: What are psychedelics and its misconceptions How the society take these substances into account Why animals seem keen into psychedelics How psychedelic substances are lowering the floodgates of one’s experience Terence McKenna’s TWO ideas on psychedelics How religion coincided with psychedelics Mansal’s authentic Ayahuasca experience and the hunt for a good Shaman And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Food of the Gods by Terence McKenna! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Smoke Signals by Martin A. Lee, a book about the history of marijuana and the war on drugs in the US. Check also The Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell that talks about the origin of religions. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we’re running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Nootropedia [1:28] Nootropics [1:35] Psychedelics [1:39] OYASIN [1:46] Psilocybin mushroom/Magic Mushrooms “Shrooms” [4:28] MDMA for PTSD [4:30] DMT [11:43] Ayahuasca [11:59] Chacruna Leaves [13:37] N,N-DMT [13:49] 5-MeO-DMT [14:00] LSD [15:39] Stoned Ape Theory [16:20] Dominator culture [31:38] Marijuana [32:17] Vape [34:30] MAOI [36:01] Nicotine gum [36:43] Juul Vapes [37:00] Hamilton’s Pharmacopeia [38:21] Soylent [39:07] Polio [41:12] Opium [41:21] Ibogaine [44:29] Iboga [44:51] Burning Bush [49:40] Amanita Muscaria Mushroom [50:21] Aztec [54:31] Sweat Lodge Ceremony [55:06] Kundalini yoga [57:43] Ayahuasca Shaman [1:00:00]   Books mentioned Food of the Gods by Terence McKenna How To Change Your Mind by Michael Pollan [4:15] The Doors of Perception by Aldous Huxley [18:23] People mentioned Mansal Denton [0:33] Michael Pollan [4:15] Trump [8:15] Nixon [9:58] Timothy Leary [10:07] Dennis McKenna [17:07] Albert Hoffman [17:46] Ram Dass [17:56] Aldous Huxley [18:21] Hamilton Morris [38:21] Dr. Dan Engle [47:30] Jesus on Psychedelics [49:45] Santa Claus on Psychedelics [50:07] Show Topics 1:25 - Mansal Denton is the co-host for today’s episode! He has recently left an organization called Nootropedia, where his whole focus was helping people optimize their mental performance using nootropics. He found that some of the best nootropics were psychedelics and from that path he moved into another organization called Oyasin, which is a lifestyle brand reharmonizing people with the natural world. A high-level view of what he's interested right now: he believes that all of the external problems in the world are a manifestation of what's going on in our minds collectively at the society and that psychedelics can be a powerful tool to solve what's going on in our minds. He thinks that transformational or peak experiences are things that we all crave and could help change our perspectives someway. 4:00 - Interesting shift of perspective in society about Psychedelics and plant medicines. “How To Change your Mind” by Michael Pollan is a great influence to this. Some of the kinds of psychedelics are Silicide, Magic Mushrooms, and MDMA for PTSD. It is so compelling and helpful for PTSD. 6:25 - If psychedelics are one thing we can all agree on then it will make a lot of people happy. There's a lot of people who could use a heavy dose of psychedelics to stop being angry. There's something about stepping outside of yourself and even up the reality that comes with this types of experiences that is getting even more useful in a culture that is becoming even more obsessed with the day to day and itself. Imaginary world which is everything in the internet, a reality that doesn’t exist in a physical way. Recreating our relationship with our internal map is something everyone can benefit from, like meditation, like a recognition of something lost. 7:55 - Society's take on psychedelics. Safety and inherent risks with these substances despite its legality in some places. Be smart. In today’s generations, there are negative responses to these plant medicines. War on drugs has done injustice to psychedelics. 10:54 - What kinds of drugs people are comfortable taking and which ones they aren't. Coffee, alcohol, tobacco, and aspirin are drugs all of us use that alter our daily experience. 12:00 - Drugs and hunting. Drugs and animals. Ayahuasca doses given to dogs for more effective hunting today in the jungle. Which plants are mixed with Ayahuasca. There’s an archaeological evidence that people were making ayahuasca thousands of years ago. 14:42 - McKenna’s Hypothesis: hallucinogenic compounds may have actually had influence in developing our own self-reflective abilities. DMT vs LSD trips. Stoned Ape Theory. 18:16 - Brain as primarily a filtering tool. Idea that the brain functions not to understand our environment but to filter out all of the less important noise from The Doors of Perception. Consciousness as a subtractive process, not an additive. Psychedelic substances are lowering the floodgates of one’s experience to open your senses to everything that’s going on in your environment that you’re normally unaware of. Examples: appreciating trees, books you never heard of and hearing it a lot of times after within a week. There is some part of your brain that becomes receptive to that specific thing. 20:57 - Research on the brain about finding truth and logic in certain aspects of life are actually developed more with the intention on how can you create truth to make others believe. Humans are actually social animals. Our brain may not be interpreting actual reality rather it is interpreting reality socially. Elements of stimuli not normally present in our normal consciousness. 22:20 - Why animals seem interested in psychedelics. There’s some element in psychedelics that’s completely pressing reset in our consciousness that almost every species can benefit from. It’s actually an evolutionary disadvantage for animals to be tripping but all animals have habitual patterns which are sometimes helpful and sometimes not. Having these patterns interrupts allowed animals to change habits that proved to be more advantageous. Animals know how to micro-dose psychedelics. The higher the dose of LSD the more tolerant you become. 25:53 - Intention VS. External Environment. Psychedelics can be powerful tools or just for recreational use. Retreats for self-reflection. McKenna says there’s a stigma against taking drugs or substances alone. Respectful use in productive settings and not in rave parties. Taking it on your own makes more valuable experiences. When with somebody, sometimes the ideas come from all over the place and it’s hard to have coherent conversations when you are tripping. It is important to identify what’s the intention to take psychedelics, ex. to escape reality or to explore and reflect or connect. It’s harder to be locked into a monotonous routine that you hate if you’re having these psychedelics driven wake ups every few months. 31:38 - Legal drugs fits in the Dominator Culture. How would work, life, and environment be changed if people had access to psychedelics. We’re seeing it a little bit with Marijuana, as it becomes more and more legalized. It will always depend on the intentions. Stimulants and alcohol fall in the legal drugs category. A lot of these drug compounds create a baseline that is manageable. Psychedelics create peak experiences. There’s so much value in doing both in a regular basis. 34:30 - Why is Nicotine addictive? Nicotine itself is not actually a dangerous chemical, cigarettes are. If you’re smoking pure tobacco, that’s probably safe. Vapes are intense smoking administration method. Nicotine is only addictive when it is combined with MAOI. Hamilton’s Pharmacopeia on MAOI Inhibitors. 39:39 - How people seem to believe that Science and Rationality are the new god. Science is great but incomplete and can get things wrong like drugs with side effects. Drugs that you can do while going to work or do more work are okay while drugs that you would have to relax in the process aren’t okay, for instance, Marijuana. The term “Marijuana”. The propaganda on Mexicans and Blacks liking to get high to not do work and then attack people as racism. 43:07 - Empathy is so heightened in psychedelics - you start to feel this sense of protection for the earth. Michael Pollan’s take on psychedelics relating to modern environmental movement came predominantly out of psychedelic experiences in the 60’s and 70’s. 44:27- Ibogaine experience. Effects of Ibogaine. There are so many great applications of Iboga but high doses can harm the ones with heart conditions. It can cure addiction, like alcoholism, as well. Ayahuasca has similar effects, generally less statistically significant than Iboga. You can find Ayahuasca, LSD or mushrooms even in the US. Iboga it’s not something you mess around with on your own. Where do people do or take Iboga? 48:07 - Mckenna’s Idea that because mushrooms grow faster in Caledon we see respect and certain religious adoration towards cows in some eastern religions. A lot of religious and cultural texts have similarities, plausible stories of psychedelics being involved. Was Jesus the effect of collective consumption of psychedelics? Psychedelics are so mind-altering, great substances to help humans write down the myths. 51:13 - McKenna’s Idea that psychedelics are originators of religion. In doing them, you experience many of the same feelings and sense of connection and visual experiences of some of what you might see in religious texts. Experience on DMT. McKenna says, “God is not an idea. God is a lost continent in the human mind”. Divinity schools will agree that psychedelics can reliably create mystical experiences and connect to a Higher Power. Ayahuasca sessions and spiritual connection. Aztec religion takes Silicide mushrooms as flesh of the Gods. 55:06 - What kind of Higher Power you’re relating with -- Nature, External, or Ephemeral? Spirituality is very personal. You cannot really explain it but just feel it. The importance of doing deep multi-experience retreats is that you get to connect to a higher power. Mansal’s Kundalini yoga experience. Sweat lodge ceremony. 1:00:15 - How to find a good Shaman and the authentic Ayahuasca experience. Mansal’s recommendation is find referrals, but you don’t need necessarily to travel Peru. For newbies, it’s best to take Ayahuasca with a Shaman to keep you safe. In his hunting experiences, Mansal finds it valuable to do psychedelics before & after hunting yet never during the hunting. 1:05:50 - How to get connected with Mansal IG: @mansaldenton and grab Mansal’s email listening to the episode. Reach Nat on Twitter @Nat Eliason (@nateliason) and let him know what you are yours thoughts about the book and the episode. Leave us a review on iTunes and let your friends know about it. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

“A Martian scientist with no understanding of visual perception could understand the rainbow, or lightning, or clouds as physical phenomena,  though he would never be able to understand the human concepts of rainbow, lighting, or cloud, or the place these things occupy in our phenomenal world.” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat critically discuss the article What Is It Like to Be a Bat? by Thomas Nagel. This is the most famous piece on the mind-body problem. In it Nagel explores the mind-body issue, freedom, knowledge, meaning and value of human life. This article was penned down at an era where physicalism and materialism were prevalent, the idea that you can reduce all aspects of the mind to simply firings in the brain. However, Nagel was unpersuaded that physicalism of materialism gives an all-encompassing account of human experience. “Without consciousness the mind-body problem would be much less interesting with consciousness it seems hopeless.” We cover a wide range of topics, including The mind-body consciousness problem Creating an objective interpretations of reality. Learning skills to overcome reporters biases Consciousness in animals Artificial intelligence (AI) and hacking of consciousness And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of What Is It Like to Be a Bat? by Thomas Nagel! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our book episodes on consciousness like Godel Escher Bach by Douglas Hofstadter, Sapiens by Yuval Harari, Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennett, and The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show The Beginning of Infinity on Wikipedia [04:52] (book episode) Pod Save America Podcast [19:20] HARO Help A Reporter Out [22:14] Fox News [23:30] CNBC [23:30] Turing Test [30:53] Chinese Room [31:13] Chess [32:00] Go game [32:40] Watson AI [39:53] Joe Rogan interviews Elon Musk [47:34] The Man in the High Castle Television TV series [54:08] Hardcore History ep 62 – Supernova in the East I [54:42] Books mentioned What it is to be like a bat? By Thomas Nagel Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas R. Hofstadter [00:39] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Way of Zen by Alan Watts [01:02] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [01:06] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennett [1:11] (book episode) The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch [01:16] (book episode) The Riddle of the Gun by Sam Harris [16:53] (article episode) How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff [24:30] The Elephant in the Brain by Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson [36:08] (Neil’s notes) Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [56:40] (Nat’s notes) (book episode part 1 & part 2) Trust Me, I'm Lying by Ryan Holiday [23:01] The Man in the High Castle Novel by Philip K. Dick [54:08] Plato's Republic [20:10] People mentioned David Deutsch [05:25] (Infinity episode) Daniel Dennett [08:25] (Darwin’s episode) Bobby McMullen – Blind Bike Rider [09:44] Donald Trump [12:23] Charles Darwin [30:15] Pepper the Poochon [33:40] Sam Harris [37:19] (Guns episode) Yuval Noah Harari [37:19] Douglas Hofstadter [43:36] Nick Bostrom [43:53] Karl Marx [46:02] Elon Musk [47:34] (on this podcast) Hiroo Onoda [55:17] Show Topics 01:00 – Consciousness. The article is about the theory of mind and consciousness, looking into the mind-body problem. Aspects of the mind can be linked to how the brain responds. 01:58 – Challenge to physicalism rather than refute reductionism. Reductionism and physicalism cannot be fully understood; thus, making these two theories flawed. “Every reductionist has his favorite analogy for modern science. It is most unlikely that any of these unrelated examples of successful reduction will shed light on the relation of mind to brain”. Nagel seems not to refute reductionism but rather exposing a big whole in it and saying you can't take reductionism seriously until you fill this hole. 03:43 – Mind-body consciousness problem. Without consciousness the mind-body problem would be much less interesting with consciousness it seems hopeless. “It seems unlikely that any physical theory of mind can be contemplated until more thought has been given to the general problem of subjective and objective”. 05:27 – All problems are soluble given enough intelligence in time. 06:08 – Subjective filter for any information. Physicalism and reductionism create an objective interpretation of reality. Physicalism and reductionism in some ways rely on creating an objective interpretation of reality. All the thoughts human beings have are grounded from the subjective view of the world. 08:00 – Humans cannot understand a “what it is like aspect” because they are not in that very situation. A bat was used to demonstrate this concept. Human beings cannot comprehend how a bat moves and survives by echo-location thus this highlights human cannot understand subjective experience from human data. 09:04 – Humans can learn to echo-locate. An excellent example is Bobby McMullen, who is a blind mountain biker; he uses echolocation and his senses to mountain bike. 10:14 – However, according to Nagel, even if a human could echo-locate, that is still not equivalent to how bats echo-locate. 10:35 – Subjective interpretation of reality cannot be stepped out. This means something outside of one’s understanding cannot be fully grasped or comprehended. This concept applies to understand to someone who is totally different from you. You can never know exactly what they went through or understand what they do why they do some things; it is easy to judge someone thinking they are making irrational actions without viewing their actions from the subjective experience. 12:12 – How would look post-Trump era discussions. Urban Democrats have different interests and value systems than rural Republicans. Where to draw the line for life? Understanding pro-life people. Pro-gunners point of view. Having a gun in Texas is a must. 18:28 – Divided political sphere. Humans choose a side that will agree with their preconceived opinions. 19:58 – Decentralization makes it really hard to create a cohesive story and narrative for a population. 20:20 – Gell-Mann amnesia effect. Phenomenon where one will believe about something they know not about because it has been reported. Journalists are almost never trained to actually understand what they are reporting on, not confirming the authenticity of their sources and misunderstanding statistics. 24:00 – Learning how to read research articles is an important skill these days as we can't rely on media anymore. Famous bad reporters interpretations. Bacon is bad for you as smoking. Coconut oil is bad because saturated fats. 26:26 – Hanlon's Razor. Applying that to even news reporters, they are not doing it necessarily maliciously, they are doing it for one of two reasons- it works, people click on it and read it; the second thing is a lot of these sites are effectively content firms. This circles up to what Nagel is saying about subjective character of experience which we cannot step outside of and not understanding what it is like to be someone else. 28:20 – Test for consciousness. Mirror test for animal self awareness. 30:38 – AI discussion. What means a computer is conscious? Turing test is not enough. Reaching intelligence by brute force. Computers that don't want to play chess. 33:33 – Consciousness in animals. Every animal has a level of consciousness and awareness in the same fundamental way a human does. Dogs dreaming. 35:30 – The self is not necessarily an actual thing. Nagel is trying to keep the sense of self and the potential challenge to him is this thing you are trying to hold on to the mind, the sense of self is an illusion; there is not really anything special for what we think about this consciousness. 37:47 – Challenging reductionism. Nagel is challenging reductionism by pushing for a more helpful theory of mind that says it’s all mental- making it hard to comprehend any one’s mind. 38:43 – Subjective phenomena cannot be explained. Questions that arise with a conscious AI: can you unplug it? Can you reset it? Is it a slave? Riding horses and animals that work for humans. 40:26 – Artificial intelligence (AI) and consciousness. That will just reach a point where it is so competent that it is indistinguishable from interacting with another human. 43:05 – AI scare. An AI is sufficiently intelligent to be a threat to us all, it is sufficiently intelligent to know it shouldn't let us know it exists. AI that optimizes for paperclips can destroy the world. 43:38 – Use of the term is. E = mc2. Knowing that something is true without necessarily understanding why it is true. Consciousness and intelligence exist within its closed system. 50:10 – Knowledge is a justified true belief, based on theoretical understanding. “You can know that something is something without understanding what it means for it to be that thing.” 53:41 – Tangent. Japanese soldiers fighting after the war was over. 57:47 – Subscribe to Patreon to get our book notes, highlights, bonus material and support us without the need of ads. Sign up before october to participate to the next live hangout! Also, recommend us books (even via Instagram), and participate of our private community. Find us on Twitter @Neil Soni (@TheRealNeilS) and @Nat Eliason (@nateliason). Leave us a review on iTunes to get possible guests on the show. You can just write “Love this podcast! Neil and Nat are super fun.”. Check our supporters at madeyouthink.com/support. We are drinking delicious Lapsang Souchong tea from Cup & Leaf. If you want some tangent fuel, try the Mushroom Lemonade  Coffee and Chai Latte from Four Sigmatic. Perfect Keto Nut Butter is amazing. Try it frozen for an incredible texture. Check Kettle & Fire Mushroom-Chicken blend, now available on their site. Use our Amazon affiliate link to support the show effortlessly. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com.

The truly good are those who believe in God and the Last Day, in the angels, the Scripture, and the prophets; who give away some of their wealth, however much they cherish it, to their relatives, to orphans, the needy, travellers and beggars, and to liberate those in bondage; those who keep up the prayer and pay the prescribed alms; who keep pledges whenever they make them; who are steadfast in misfortune, adversity, and times of danger. These are the ones who are true, and it is they who are aware of God. In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss The Quran, the book revealed to the prophet Muhammad, and foundation of Islamism. This is a very special and interesting episode because there is so much discussion about Islam and its roots, Muslims, and the relevance in cultural and political news. We cover a wide range of topics, including: The different writing styles of the Quran at the beginning and the end Interpretation of Arabic and context at the time of Muhammad Strategies to build and spread virally a set of beliefs Changing views on sex, alcohol and women The validity of 600 AD concepts on today’s world And much more. Please enjoy, and try always to build your opinions reading books at their source! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on The Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell, a book that deconstruct the need of religions, as well as our episodes on Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari (book episodes part 1 & part 2), a book that spans on the history of human existence. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Jihad [6:50] The Crusades [9:09] Inquisition [9:10] Bonus Material on Patreon [11:40] Sharia Law [12:45] Buddhism [15:05] Mecca [16:20] History of Islam in India – India: A History. Revised and Updated [34:59] Enforced Monogamy - Jordan Peterson [38:38] Crony Beliefs [39:03] I'm a college philosophy professor. Jordan Peterson is making my job impossible. Post on Reddit [39:10] Islamic State [41:06] Reformation [44:40] Cryonics [49:57] Rick and Morty arcade life simulation episode [53:31] Burqa [1:37:24] Inception [1:52:54] Books mentioned The Bible [5:00] The Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell [5:26] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff [7:40] The Elephant in the Brain by Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson [9:50] (Neil’s notes) Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [10:00] (Nat’s notes) (book episode part 1 & part 2) Old Testament [11:24] New Testament [11:24] Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault [40:04] (Nat’s notes) (href="https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com/discipline-and-punish-by-michel-foucault/">book episode) Code of Hammurabi [58:31] Way of Zen by Alan Watts [1:00:15] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Smoke Signals by Martin A. Lee [1:19:47] (book episode) People mentioned Muhammad The Prophet Moises [19:10] Abraham [19:11] Jesus [19:12] Noah [22:02] Angel Gabriel [31:50] Satan [31:51] Saint Brigid Celtic Goddess [33:36] Jordan B. Peterson [38:15] (on Twitter) (12 Rules episode) Sam Harris [10:55] (Guns episode) Show Topics 2:33 – We think we picked a very good translation/interpretation of the Qur’an. The translator/interpreter includes lots of useful comments in the footnotes, why he prefers to interpret in a certain way, including comparisons with other interpretations. He gives good historical context of the Arabian peninsula at the times of Mohammad. Modern interpretation of ancient books affected by old translations. 6:30 – Politics in translation. Jihad: depending which scholars you listen to, it can mean a religious war limited to the context of when the book was written, or a war that has to be conducted all times. Times when Christianity was militarized. Other religions militarized: Nationalism and Communism. Is Islam a religion of peace militarized for bad use vs a religion violent at its roots? 11:35 – Ancient religious books were less about shared myths and more about legal codes prescribing how to handle human behavior. The problem with religions is when they mandate to impose them on other people. Buddhism is an exception, viewed more as a private practice. 16:15 – Intro. At Mohammad era, in Arabia there were polytheistic tribal religion. Judaism and Christianity were still not spread. People believed in Allah and many other gods. Islam expanded through the whole Arabian peninsula in just 10 years, before the Quran was even finished. Virality at top level. Qur’an is considered the direct words of God, while the Testaments are interpretations of its prophets. The Quran writing style: God speaking directly to you vs a story about God in third person. 22:12 – Mohammad was supposedly illiterate. Mohammad memorized the Quran and just spoke it. The manuscript was compiled later. There were lots of wars for power in the region at the time. Polytheist leaders saw Islam as a threat to their power. Quran is divided in 114 sections. The longest are at the beginning. The shorter ones more to the end, are more repetitive. 27:27 – First part of the Quran is very friendly with People of the Book (Hebrews and Christians). The chief conflict was against the Polytheists. Conflict shifts as the book goes on. Cracks between the three Abrahamic religions. Judaism: we are waiting for the Son of God. Christianity: SoG is Jesus. Islam: no, SoG is Mohammed, or all the prophets together are related to God, but not a direct son. 31:02 – The use of the word We. Polytheism absorbed and organized in Angels and God hierarchy. Christianity absorbed and on-boarded other religions by Sanctification of their deities. Example: Saint Brigid Celtic goddess in Ireland. Islam in India. Converting Hindus to Muslims with tax incentives. 35:50 – Acceptance of Jewish and Christians. Need to declare oneself Muslim, but no need to consider oneself Muslim in private. ‘Produce your evidence, if you are telling the truth.’ In fact, any who direct themselves wholly to God and do good will have their reward with their Lord: no fear for them, nor will they grieve. Double standard when requiring for evidence. Challenging other believes asking for evidence. People need evidence to challenge own beliefs, but don't require it to trust them, word of God is enough. What postmodernism says vs what it is. 41:10 – Reconciling differences in the Quran from the beginning to the end. [This is] a statement of the Truth about which they are in doubt: it would not befit God to have a child. He is far above that: when He decrees something, He says only, ‘Be,’ and it is. ‘God is my Lord and your Lord, so serve Him: that is a straight path.’ But factions have differed among themselves. What suffering will come to those who obscure the truth when a dreadful Day arrives! How sharp of hearing, how sharp of sight they will be when they come to Us, although now they are clearly off course! Warn them [Muhammad] of the Day of Remorse when the matter will be decided, for they are heedless and do not believe. Other books in Islam. Any changes today in religious books means God was wrong. Modern Christianity reconciling writings to today's context. Secular Jewish. Room for interpretation on supernatural events. Quran is much more about political actions than supernatural events. 47:16 – Idea of Paradise is pretty plain: a garden with clean water streams, free food, and attractive virgins. No mention of more complex wishes or benefit. Christian books don't mention heaven, but once we die we just have to wait until the Final Judgement day to come. Large scale conspiracies. 50:20 – Tangent. Cryonics is a religion. You have to wait until the prophet comes and unmelts you. Uploading your brain to a computer is religion for computing people. Need to believe in something. Life simulated. 54:00 – Tangent. Psychedelics revelations. Psychedelics and extension of time. Moises and use of drugs. Psychedelics being a part of spiritual life. When asked about the experience of revelation Muhammad reported, "sometimes it is revealed like the ringing of a bell. This form of inspiration is the hardest of them all and then it passes off after I have grasped what is inspired. Sometimes the Angel comes in the form of a man and talks to me and I grasp whatever he says."[4]:43 57:15 – Definitions of being good. At the beginning of the book a good person worships God and follow dictates of good conduct. Punishment for crimes and forgiveness. Significance of the opening In the name of God, the Lord of Mercy, the Giver of Mercy. Optimizing for mercy by following Quran's principles. Fully repenting because you understand what's really wrong. 1:02:04 – Jewish idea that if everything is going wrong is because God is displeased with humanity. Contrasting of polytheistic religions comparing natural context: Indus Valley vs Nile River. Deities punish humans with floods, or reward them with crops. Omnipotent being seeing what you do may prevent you from acting bad. Useful concept for making a society more cohesive. 1:06:32 – Islam starts to spread beyond boundaries and other regions push back. The book stop preaching peace and encourages fighting for the religion. Fight in God’s cause against those who fight you, but do not overstep the limits: God does not love those who overstep the limits. Kill them wherever you encounter them, and drive them out from where they drove you out, for persecution is more serious than killing. Do not fight them at the Sacred Mosque unless they fight you there. If they do fight you, kill them—this is what such disbelievers deserve— but if they stop, then God is most forgiving and merciful. Fight them until there is no more persecution, and worship is devoted to God. If they cease hostilities, there can be no [further] hostility, except towards aggressors. Fighting is ordained for you, though you dislike it. You may dislike something although it is good for you, or like something although it is bad for you: God knows and you do not.’ They will not stop fighting you [believers] until they make you revoke your faith, if they can. If any of you revoke your faith and die as disbelievers, your deeds will come to nothing in this world and the Hereafter, and you will be inhabitants of the Fire, there to remain. But those who have believed, migrated, and striven for God’s cause, it is they who can look forward to God’s mercy: God is most forgiving and merciful. Politicizing Islam. Violence in Quran was for attack or defense? 1:12:41 – How to bring a God's prescription from 620 AD to modern era. God's prescriptions made in a way you can't be peaceful with non believers. You have to fight for religion or you go to hell. 1:15:36 – Intoxicants and gambling. The sin is greater than the benefit. Marijuana and tobacco were not considered intoxicants at the time. Date wine and honey wine. Changing thoughts on alcohol. 1:20:43 – Women’s place. Your wives are [like] your fields, so go into your fields whichever way you like, and send [something good] ahead for yourselves. Apparently there was a belief in Arabia at the time that certain sexual positions were impure, but the Qur’an is saying you can “enter your wives however you please." 1:21:54 – Why would God care about that? Interesting comments in the footnotes about sex and Jesus. 1:22:50 – Eating. Forbidden foods to avoid illness. Best practices to kill an animal for food. Cortisol releases when strangling an animal. You are forbidden to eat carrion; blood; pig’s meat; any animal over which any name other than God’s has been invoked; any animal strangled, or victim of a violent blow or a fall, or gored or savaged by a beast of prey, unless you still slaughter it [in the correct manner]; or anything sacrificed on idolatrous altars. You are also forbidden to allot shares [of meat] by drawing marked arrows—a heinous practice! 1:25:08 – Prescriptions for lewd acts. Muslim lesbians and gays. Stoning in fundamentalist societies. Condemning and offering mercy as a converting tool. If any of your women commit a lewd act, call four witnesses from among you, then, if they testify to their guilt, keep the women at home until death comes to them or until God shows them another way. If two men commit a lewd act, punish them both; if they repent and mend their ways, leave them alone—God is always ready to accept repentance, He is full of mercy 1:28:19 – Fighting. Prepare whatever forces you [believers] can muster, including warhorses, so that you frighten off God’s enemies and yours, and warn others unknown to you but known to God. Whatever you give in God’s cause will be repaid to you in full, and you will not be wronged. But if they incline towards peace, you [Prophet] must also incline towards it, and put your trust in God: He is the All Hearing, the All Knowing. When the [four] forbidden months are over, wherever you encounter the idolaters, kill them, seize them, besiege them, wait for them at every lookout post; but if they repent, maintain the prayer, and pay the prescribed alms, let them go on their way, for God is most forgiving and merciful. Proselytizing. Simple choice if you were living in the area: either you are going to be hunted down and killed or you join the religion. Islam designed to spread as quickly and effective as possible. We did not wrong them; they wronged themselves. Their gods, which they called on beside God, were no use to them when what your Lord had ordained came about; they only increased their ruin. Absolution of guilt in participating in the fight. 1:30:32 – Start of the separation from Christianity. Underlining Son of Mary vs Son of God. People of the Book, do not go to excess in your religion, and do not say anything about God except the truth: the Messiah, Jesus, son of Mary, was nothing more than a messenger of God, His word, directed to Mary, a spirit from Him. So believe in God and His messengers and do not speak of a ‘Trinity’—stop [this], that is better for you—God is only one God, He is far above having a son, everything in the heavens and earth belongs to Him and He is the best one to trust. 1:31:48 – Adultery. What is considered adultery and what not. You have to cast adulterers out even if it is your children. Integrity of the religion. Strike the adulteress and the adulterer one hundred times. Do not let compassion for them keep you from carrying out God’s law—if you believe in God and the Last Day—and ensure that a group of believers witnesses the punishment. The adulterer is only [fit] to marry an adulteress or an idolatress, and the adulteress is only [fit] to marry an adulterer or an idolater: such behaviour is forbidden to believers. 1:33:40 Prescriptions for women covering their bodies. And tell believing women that they should lower their eyes, guard their private parts, and not display their charms beyond what [it is acceptable] to reveal; they should draw their coverings over their necklines and not reveal their charms except to their husbands, their fathers, their husbands’ fathers, their sons, their husbands’ sons, their brothers, their brothers’ sons, their sisters’ sons, their womenfolk, their slaves, such men as attend them who have no desire, or children who are not yet aware of women’s nakedness; they should not stamp their feet so as to draw attention to any hidden charms. It was not clear what it is acceptable for a woman to reveal even in Arabic language. Preventing sexual attraction. Dancing and sexual desires. Don't go beyond ordinary behaviors. Elderly women allowed to show more than younger because of lower attraction. In case of rape, it is suggested that the fault falls on the woman. Most of practices, especially about woman covering themselves, come from the edicts and not the Quran. 1:41:44 – In the Quran are mentioned 4 prayer times, not 5. So celebrate God’s glory in the evening, in the morning— praise is due to Him in the heavens and the earth—in the late afternoon, and at midday. The burden of proof is on everyone else except for Mohammed, God or Islam. You [Prophet] are not, by [receiving] God’s grace, a madman: you will have a never-ending reward— truly you have a strong character— and soon you will see, as will they, which of you is afflicted with madness. Your Lord knows best who strays from His path and who is rightly guided. So I swear by what you can see and by what you cannot see: this [Qur’an] is the word [spoken by] an honoured messenger, not the words of a poet—how little you believe!— nor the words of a soothsayer–how little you reflect! This [Qur’an] is a message sent down from the Lord of the Worlds: if [the Prophet] had attributed some fabrication to Us, We would certainly have seized his right hand and cut off his lifeblood, and none of you could have defended him. 1:46:22 – Qur'an gets boring at times, describing paradise repeatedly and saying believers will go to heaven, non believers to hell. It was intended to be recited, not written and read. In the name of God, the Lord of Mercy, the Giver of Mercy Say, ‘He is God the One, God the eternal. He begot no one nor was He begotten. No one is comparable to Him. 1:54:00 – Join the Patreon if you're not there yet. We talk about very exciting episodes coming up (and Inception!). Get access to our hangouts, get the book notes we use for the show, and participate on our community. You can support the show in additional ways buying stuff on our Support page. Also, very important, tell your friends and help spread the show through word of mouth. Leave reviews on iTunes. Or leave Amazon book reviews ;) If you hated this episode, make it go viral. This is our first source book. Give us feedback on Twitter: @Neil Soni (@TheRealNeilS) and @Nat Eliason (@nateliason). If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com.

Dom DeLuise, celebrity fat man (and five of clubs), has been implicated in the following unseemly acts in my mind’s eye: He has hocked a fat globule of spittle (nine of clubs) on Albert Einstein’s thick white mane (three of diamonds) and delivered a devastating karate kick (five of spades) to the groin of Pope Benedict XVI (six of diamonds). Michael Jackson (king of hearts) has engaged in behavior bizarre even for him. He has defecated (two of clubs) on a salmon burger (king of clubs) and captured his flatulence (queen of clubs) in a balloon (six of spades). Rhea Perlman, diminutive Cheers bartendress (and queen of spades), has been caught cavorting with the seven-foot-seven Sudanese basketball star Manute Bol (seven of clubs) in a highly explicit (and in this case, anatomically improbable) two-digit act of congress (three of clubs). In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer. It is a fun book episode about how Joshua Foer came from nowhere to win the US memory championship with the challenge and coaching of Ed Cook. In the book Josh shows how to train our brain memory “muscle” and remember everything. We cover a wide range of topics, including: Why and how poetry, religion, and epics are interconnected because of memory Mnemonic techniques to remember numbers, names, cards, everything How to hack our brain to “live longer” Incredible memory stats How to impress your crush and make your dates memorable And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our fun episodes on Emergency by Neil Strauss, a book for preppers, as well as our recent episode on How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff, a short an easy book that shows how media can be manipulated. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show How to win the U.S. memory championship [3:12] The Google Effect [8:40] Playstation [15:09] Twitter [19:35] LinkedIn [19:35] Pearl Harbor [21:35] 9/11 [21:36] Anki [26:34] Lindy Effect [29:10] Nat's book notes and Brain [48:49] Evernote [53:00] World Memory Records [59:17] Memrise [1:01:11] Ed Cook on Tim Ferriss Podcast [1:02:11] Duolingo [1:02:58] CMU [1:04:22] Fight Through the Suck – Justin Mares [1:07:28] 10000 Hour Rule on Google [1:12:15] The World Memory Championships [1:17:03] Joshua Foer TED talk [1:17:32] 21 (film) [1:18:04] Books mentioned Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand [1:50] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [1:52] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [1:52] (Nat’s notes) (book episode part 1 & part 2) Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas R. Hofstadter [2:21] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Emergency [2:32] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman [6:11] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Torah [11:00] The Quran [11:00] The Tower – Hotel Concierge [31:16] (article episode) Essays by Montaigne [47:27] 12 Rules for Life by Dr. Jordan B. Peterson [50:15] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Way of Zen by Alan Watts [50:16] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [50:17] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) The Elephant in the Brain by Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson [50:18] (Neil’s notes) The 4 Hour Chef by Tim Ferriss [1:02:34] Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell [1:03:48] Peak by Anders Ericsson [1:03:56] Remember, Remember by Ed Cooke [1:15:52] The Memory Book by Harry Lorayne [1:16:32] People mentioned Joshua Foer Albert Einstein Ed Cook [3:40] Homer [5:36] Plato [5:50] Simba [16:13] Mufasa [16:33] Adil Majid [17:55] (Crypto episode) Sigmund Freud [18:20] Pepper the Poochon [23:06] Montaigne [47:12] Tiago Forte [51:46] Cicero [53:56] Frank Sinatra [56:26] David Beckham [56:32] Superman [56:37] Alex Mullan memory grandmaster [59:43] Tim Ferriss [1:02:11] Anders Ericsson [1:03:41] Malcolm Gladwell [1:03:48] James Franco 1:18:17 Michael Serrick 1:18:24 Show Topics 3:12 – Extreme memory is not innate, comes from training. Until books became affordable, there were no easy means to record and keep information. We had to use our brains and information was passed down orally. There is no need of crazy photographic memory or some innate ability, but just training the "muscle". 7:50 – How many phone numbers do you remember? If you don't have to struggle to remember it, you'll not remember it. For efficiency your body doesn't want to do anything more than needed. Poetry and religion and epics are connected to memory training. 11:20 – The story of how Josh learnt the techniques of extreme memory. First technique: remembering names. Associating name sounds with a vivid image. Remembering not westernized names. What names can you remember with these images? Nailing down in front of a Playstation. A lion's son being chased by an gnat. A wizard dealing cards to Freud. When introducing someone to your friends, name your friends a lot so the new comer can remember their names. 19:04 – Practicing these techniques on Twitter or LinkedIn. Challenges in the competition. Remembering participants' attributes in a fake dinner, cards, string of numbers, and a poem. 20:33 – Second technique. Chunking. Remembering in chunks is easier than in smaller bits. In reduces the pieces of information. Example: string of 12 numbers chunked into the two big surprise attacks on American soil. Combining large chunks numbers into bigger images. Keeping the order of numbers by keeping a path to your memory palace. 25:41 – The time you need to dedicate each day is pretty small compared to its ROI. Remembering cards by associating 3 of each each time. These tactics were used for a long long time, even thousands of years ago. The importance of context. A big part of why this works is because we are good at remembering things in context but not when it's random information. Chessmasters examples. 31:03 – Increased perceived longevity. Nuances and quantity of experiences increases perceptual time. Life seems to speed up as we get older just because life gets less memorable, more repetitive. Monotony collapses time and novelty unfolds it. Downside of the idea of flow. Time experience is based on what we can remember. 37:15 – Tips to make a date memorable. Tips for planning parties. Plan 3 phases of a party, for example move the party in different rooms, different drinks, and change activities. It will feel like a longer party even if it took the same amount of time. It's kind of narrative fallacy used to our advantage. 41:05 – Memory images. Creating images for everything. Our brain prefers visual information and novelty. Collect numbers wandering in your house. The funnier, the looter, the more bizarre images, the better. Our brain takes 20% of our energy consumption. We forget dreams because our brain thinks it's junk data. 44:26 – Make images dirty and sexual. Use multiple senses too. Include smells, feelings, multi-sensory experiences. How we can remember songs even if we don't listen them for 10 years. Write your feelings and thoughts at the end of each book you read. Very useful if you are getting into speed reading or want to remember what the book was about, snippents will give you cues to remember it. Nat's book notes are efficient to remember core parts of a book. Neil's tactic to give attention to books’ concepts. 50:53 – Repetition. Nat's 3 layers strategy: pull out all important sections, bold important parts of sections, then highlight the most important part of the bolded part. Layer 4: adding a summary. 53:02 – The Method of Loci. Using memory images based on your environment. If you have to remember a speech, visualize the points you want to talk about at specific places. You can remember your speech by looking at specific parts of the auditorium or walking through the stage. Useful to remember dance movements. Advantages of the memory palace vs the Loci method. 55:59 – Remembering numbers. The PAO system: Person, Action, Object. First, associate an image to numbers going from 0 to 99. Remembering a 6 digit number can be done mixing the person of the first pair of digits, with the action of the second, and object of the third. 1:01:00 – Tangents. Memory training companies. 1:03:20 – Learning advice. How to get further the OK plateau. Experiments on memorizing. How the early University experiments on memory looked like. Reaching the peak of memory training is not about the hours put in, but the quality of those hours. During the first phase, known as the “cognitive stage,” you’re intellectualizing the task and discovering new strategies to accomplish it more proficiently. During the second “associative stage,” you’re concentrating less, making fewer major errors, and generally becoming more efficient. Finally you reach what Fitts called the “autonomous stage,” when you figure that you’ve gotten as good as you need to get at the task and you’re basically running on autopilot. You could call it the “OK plateau”, the point at which you decide you’re OK with how good you are at something, turn on autopilot, and stop improving. Breaking up the OK plateau. When you deliberately want to get better at something, you may get initially worse. Sometimes you need to go down to get at a higher point later. It's not enjoyable in the short term. You have to deliberately make yourself uncomfortable to break the plateau. Changing variables to find where the weaknesses are. The 10.000 hours rule. 1:14:18 – Other books and resources about memory training. 1:18:48 – Get the story part reading the book! If you want to listen the bonus material, get the book note we use for the show, go to our Patreon page. There you can comment about the book too after they come out. You can also join our monthly hangout. On our first hangout we have a very interesting conversation for an hour and a half. You can support the show in additional ways buying stuff on our Support page. Also, very important, tell your friends and help spread the show through word of mouth. Leave reviews on iTunes. Or leave Amazon book reviews ;)   Find us on Twitter @Neil Soni (@TheRealNeilS) and @Nat Eliason (@nateliason). If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

“When you hear a statistic say that the average American brushes their teeth 1.02 times a day, ask yourself how could they have figured it out? Does it make sense that it could have been researched effectively? In this case they would have had to ask and don't you think it's a safe assumption that people lied?” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff. In this book we learn how to spot deceptive statistics, ways surveys are manipulated and the hidden agenda behind every piece of data. “If you can’t prove what you want to prove, demonstrate something else and pretend that they are the same thing. In the daze that follows the collision of statistics with the human mind, hardly anybody will notice the difference. The semi-attached figure is a device guaranteed to stand you in good stead. It always has.” We cover a wide range of topics, including: Biased samples & discarded data Stereotypes, demographics and diversity in data The Sphinx, Aquatic Apes and Conspiracy Theories Grapefruits, Graphs and Guantanamo How to question and uncover the truth behind statistics And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff! You can also listen on Google Play Music, SoundCloud, YouTube, or in any other podcasting app by searching “Made You Think.” If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Influence by Robert B. Cialdini for a book with a similar structure, or the book Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Taleb for more on the deception of data. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Mushroom coffee [00:22] Caffeine [00:28] Goodreads [03:29] Amazon [06:22] Biased samples [08:17] New York City [09:18] Australia [09:26] Russia [09:31] Africa [09:34] Greenland [09:59] Liberal media [10:39] Republican [10:55] Middle Eastern [11:09] Saudi Arabia [11:14] CNN [11:19] American Flag [11:23] Israeli Soldier [11:27] Have more students been killed in schools than soldiers in combat zones? [12:15] Gallup Poll [14:06] Evolution [14:50] Fox and Friends [16:04] Twitter [16:05] Opioid epidemic [17:10] Biased averages [17:56] Mean [17:56] Mode [17:56] Median [17:56] US income [18:41] Power laws [20:35] MD [21:10] Phd [21:11] Startups [21:34] Revenue [22:07] Mode (statistics) - Wikipedia - Kim and Korean families [25:27] Tweet – Huge Plot Hole In Reality [26:21] Miraval Wellness Resort [26:35] Yoga [26:42] Massages [26:43] Healing Crystals [26:44] Spa [26:45] Plant based diet [27:04] Sphinx [28:15] Patreon [28:19] Crony belief [28:55] American Medical Association [28:58] Heart disease [28:58] PubMed [29:06] Aquatic Apes [29:45] Doctors [31:21] Robin Hanson on Sam Harris’ podcast [32:00] Self-Improvement [33:57] Christianity [33:59] Monogamy [34:13] Tariffs [35:24] Nazi [36:31] Alt-right [36:41] National Debt [38:32] Democrats [38:28] Congress [38:39] Lockheed Martin [39:24] UBI [39:39] Marines [40:22] Navy [40:22] Air Force [40:22] Joint Strike Fighter [40:44] VTOL [40:59] Supersonic [41:00] The F-35 Is a $1.4 Trillion National Disaster – War is Boring article [42:15] FOMO [42:42] Energy subsidies [42:55] Iowa [43:15] Corn State [43:17] Benevolent Dictator [43:25] Legalizing marijuana [43:44] Ethanol [43:48] Guantanamo [43:50] 2020 election [44:27] P-Value [45:50] Zoloft [46:06] ADHD medication [46:35] Big Data [47:49] Correlation and causation [48:34] FDA [50:33] Statins [51:40] Lipitor [51:30] Birth Control [51:31] Aspirin [51:32] Alcohol [51:48] Opioids [51:53] Marijuana [51:55] Naringin [52:24] Grapefruit Drug Potentiator [53:19] Graphs [54:39] Logarithmic Y-axis [57:04] Nostrum [58:08] Nat’s article – Could that Be Explained by Marketing? [58:40] Cigarettes [59:18] McDonalds [01:05:26] Tequila [01:06:56] Gluten [01:06:58] Estrogen [01:07:03] Hops [01:07:05] Phytoestrogens [01:07:8] Soy [01:07:59] Carnegie Mellon [01:10:23] WEIRD research [01:13:45] Harvard [01:14:33] Montana State [01:14:37] Maasai Tribe [01:15:05] Capitalist society [01:15:14] Communist society [01:15:17] Johns Hopkins [01:18:12] Wall Street [01:20:50] Utopia [01:23:02] Nat’s article – Social Disobedience [01:29:14] Medium [01:29:35] The Need for Social Disobedience – Nat Eliason on Medium [1:25:40] PornHub [1:34:10] ARPU [01:34:39] Alexa ranking [01:35:19] Reddit [01:36:43] Xvideos [1:36:45] VK [01:37:04] Twitch [01:37:41] eBay [01:37:47] Books mentioned How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Taleb [02:59] (Nat’s notes) You are a Badass by Jen Sincero [06:51] Influence by Robert B. Cialdini [07:58] (book episode) The War on Normal People by Andrew Yang [20:46] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Elephant in the Brain by Kevin Simler [31:50] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Kanye – College Dropout [01:10:39] (album episode) Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [01:11:29] (Nats’ Notes) (book episode) Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault [01:21:58] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) People mentioned Darrell Huff Nassim Taleb [02:48] (Antifragile episode, Skin in the Game episode) Jimmy Fallon [09:16] Donald Trump [10:37] Hillary Clinton [16:10] Bernie Sanders [16:38] Bill Gates [19:39] Ben Greenfield [30:06] Peter Thiel [30:13] Rhonda Patrick [30:16] Joe Rogan [30:29] Barack Obama [30:35] Robin Hanson [31:48] (Elephant in the Brain episode) Sam Harris [31:55] Jordan Peterson [33:14] (12 Rules for Life episode) Andrew Yang [44:30] (The War on Normal People episode, Q&A episode) Nicolas Cage [48:34] Taylor Pearson [01:11:53] Socrates [01:31:22] Show Topics 01:01 – Fun book to read, great pocket guide. Easy to internalize many of the ideas. Useful for everyday life and not getting tricked by data. People rely on data, easily let their opinion be swayed by statistics. The book shows there are so many ways to game a statistic. Learning these rules will serve you well. 03:02 – Lots of overlap to Fooled by Randomness, similar themes for similar problems. This not a new book. Published in 1954 and is more relevant today than ever. 03:38 – Amazon reviews, can’t rely on reviews to be honest, for books, restaurants etc.  People give arbitrary scores for unrelated reasons. Scoring using 1-5 or 1-10 isn’t a useful benchmark. Don’t use 7 as a score, 6 or 8 have more concrete meanings. Book reviews skewed by the emotion you feel after reading. Books that are feel-good are rated higher even though if they’re not useful over the long term. 07:23 – Bonus material, 25 minutes, mini-episode on Sphinx conspiracy theories. Check out the Patreon to get it. 07:33 – Book structure, 6 chapters. Different ways statistics can be manipulated. Final chapter gives questions on how talk back to statistics. How to think about data. Similar layout and structure to the book Influence. 08:21 – Biased samples. Where a sample is not representative or too narrow, results are also going to be the same. Psychiatrist example – everyone seems neurotic if you only work with neurotic people. Jimmy Fallon sketch, testing people’s geography knowledge. The joke is that Americans are stupid but they only show those that fail. Also the environment and element of surprise impacts data too. Biased data can’t tell you anything useful. 10:39 – Media portrayal of Trump voters. Using unflattering stereotypes that then becomes accepted as the norm. Media also uses the tactic of showing biased stereotypes of protests and violence to influence opinions on the Middle-East. 11:54 – Statistics on deaths in school vs military. Total deaths may be more in school but this data gets used to imply probability and likelihood of death – which is a completely different statistic. Presenting data one way to provoke an alternative interpretation. Data is being used to tell a story that serves an agenda. When we hear a statistic we assume it’s real, we need to question it more. 14:06 – Discarded data – Example of gallup polls, who answers these polls? Do you know anyone who has been polled? This shows that the sample is not truly representative. Twitter surveys on evolution and skewed data due to restrictive demographics in sampling. The method of survey affects the outcome. Phone polls vs online polls change age demographic. Difficulty of getting a representative sample. All samples will be biased in some way.  They key is knowing what is the bias in your sample so it can be corrected or highlighted. Hillary Clinton, opinion polls. Bernie Sanders on healthcare spending. 17:56 – Averages and mean, mode & median. How average can mean 3 different things and are used in certain scenarios.  The term average doesn’t mean a lot, need to understand how it was calculated. Mean is hugely skewed by a single outlier but outliers make little difference to the median. As Taleb says, never cross a river that’s on average four feet deep. Averages for income, height, grades, education and how they should be calculated. You can use mean average on things like education because there is a limit to the number of degrees someone can have. 21:34 – Startups and how they calculate their daily active users or revenue per user can be deceptive. Year to date revenue gives a better understanding than monthly. Incomes in a neighborhood can change depending on the average that is used. Once can seem high to prop up real estate figures. The other can seem low to support home owner association protests. Both use the same data manipulated to serve an agenda and presented in different ways. When to use the Mode? Use mode when dealing with non-numerical values to discover the most fashionable or most popular item. 26:35 – Health resort promoting ill informed seminars on the nutritional value of meat. Lots of common myths that we don’t do much research on. The top result on google is not always accurate, it isn’t being fact checked so we should know to research these things. 28:15 – Bonus material. Sphinx and conspiracy theories. Theories not being taken seriously by archeologists. Aquatic apes, crony beliefs and things we want to be true. 29:51 – Difficult to research for everything you hear, you have a time limitation on having to form a belief.  Find sources that you can trust and discount those who don’t have the authority to speak on a particular matter. Testing authority & parents. Authority and taking advice of doctors despite how long ago their education may have been. 32:01 – Dangers of listening to people who are not experts in a particular topic. Who is qualified to talk on a particular subject? Everyone thinks everyone should have an opinion on everything. If you trust someone in one area, don’t trust them on everything. The danger of intellectual heroes. Being fans of Taleb but knowing he is not always right. Admire someone’s work but don’t look to them for guidance on everything. Don’t agree with all someone’s opinions. Don’t criticize someone for favouring one viewpoint of someone you think is completely bad. 34:32 – Difficulties of political debate. Not possible to openly agree with Trump on a specific idea like tariffs. People automatically assume you agree with him on everything.  Opioid manufacturers being indicted, seems like a great idea but you can voice those opinions. Politics as the new religion. Now is more like picking a side and blindly sticking to it. Loss of discourse. Idea sports. 38:21 – Political parties flip ideals when they are in charge. No incentive to pay down the national debt. Involves imposing unpopular cuts and taxes. Cutting unnecessary spending seems logical. Latest military jet, expensive but unfit for purpose. 43:40 – Changing opinion of Trump. He wasn’t as radical as everyone was expecting. He wants to win a second term. Bernie Sanders may be more the type of person to make radical changes. Bernie Sanders as a dream podcast guest. Debating with Andrew Yang. 2020 Election.   44:54 – Discarded data. Companies continue to run experiments until they get the outcome they want. Significant portions of experiments have been discarded. What is classed as a statistically significant result? If you run 1000 experiments and 999 fail to show significant results. Using the 1 result as showing something significant without presenting the rest of the data. Antidepressant studies show negligible impact compared to a placebo but also had lots of negative side effects. Yet only those studies that showed net positive effects got published. 46:48 – Cosmetics and food companies regularly use skewed samples in their data. Skin complaints and using regression back to the norm as proof of product working. Companies start another study and keep going until they get the results they need. 47:49 – Big Data. The larger size the data set the more likely you will be able to prove whatever you want by slicing the data in particular ways. Correlation and causation. Nicolas Cage movies vs School Shootings. Ice cream consumption vs murder rates. Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Climate change vs Piracy. Nicolas Cage movies vs Swimming Pool Drownings. You can pair any two things together that rise and fall in the same trends. This does not mean that one affects the other. Small samples have a huge variance. It’s possible to get 8/10 heads when flipping a coin but so much less likely to get 80/100 however the result is still the same. You can get a significant result by using a smaller data set. Most pharmaceutical tests are not done on women. Most drugs go to market without being thoroughly tested on the female biology, the interaction with estrogen, birth control. Limited studies on the interactions with other drugs. You would think it should be tested alongside common medications. Grapefruit juice and other fruits have properties in them that amplify the potency of certain drugs so you have to be careful not to take it alongside certain medications 54:39 – Graph manipulation. Show 3 different graphs with the same data but from different perspectives they look totally different. By having axes that don’t start at zero they don’t tell the whole picture. Zoom in on a significant portion of the results making the incline of the line on the graph steeper or shallower according to the data included. How you frame the graph makes a difference in the perception of the same data. 58:08 – Semi attached figure is when you say one thing and imply another. You can’t say something cures colds but you can say it kills 300k germs in 11 seconds in a test tube. This data then lets people make up their own minds and infer an incorrect conclusion. Cigarettes statistics and the preferred brand of physicians. The statistic doesn’t tell you anything. Weather and the number of accidents. Even though fog is more dangerous there will always be more accidents in clear weather because there is more clear weather days than foggy days. Trying to compare 2 stocks by share price is a common mistake. 01:02:08 – Statistics used for catchy headlines and for their shock value. Accidents in the home are more common – makes you feel like it’s more dangerous. True of anywhere that you spend the most time. You can represent the same data in many different ways so it sounds completely different. 01:04:38 – Correlation vs causation. Smoking vs low grades. Easy to infer that one causes the other but it could be the opposite or other lifestyle factors. People who eat McDonalds vs heart disease and correlating that to eating meat. Beer bellies and the correlation to poor health. Often combined factors including environment and other common habits associated to beer drinking. 01:08:40 – Changing attitudes to college. Myth of college equaling success. Negates the other factors of how you got to college that contributes to your success. You don’t get to see alternative histories. College popularity is dropping, poor choice of investment. 01:11:01 – How to talk to a statistic, questions to ask to understand the data you are being presented with. Who Says So? Who is telling you this information and what is their bias or agenda. When presented with impossible statistics think how did they get that data? Look at the demographics of academic psychological studies – most participants are college students. Think about if studies can be replicated. 01:15:29 – How Does He Know? Look out for evidence of a biased sample or a sample that has been improperly selected. Is the sample big enough to give a reliable conclusion. 01:15:44 – What Were their methods? Does it make sense that people could actually know this information? Cancer diagnosis and changing rates. Survival seems longer as we are detecting it earlier, doesn’t actually mean the treatments have an impact. Also people are living longer to become more susceptible to cancer. And a growth in population so naturally numbers will rise. 01:17:25 – What’s Missing? Looking at raw data can give you a true picture. Johns Hopkins and female students. Look at startup growth, how they measure it. Percentages don’t tell you if they have 100 users or 10k users. Raw percentages are misleading. This also happens with diversity, gender. Expecting women to be exactly 50% of elected representatives. However that doesn’t account for the application pool and what happens when you reach that 50%. Do you limit diversity? Male vs Female leadership in Wall Street Organizations. Sexism. Dichotomy creates oppression. When you try to balance you create an alternative discrimination. 01:23:10 – Did somebody change the subject? The reasons for collecting data often skew the results. Do people want to be counted, are people incentivized to give a truthful answer? China example, different census record, one for military and tax reasons the second for famine relief. 01:24:27 – Does it make sense? If you hear a statistic that doesn’t seem plausible or too incredible it’s usually a good sign to be skeptical. 01:25:08 – Bonus material, sphinx conspiracy theories, join the patreon to access it. Overall a good book, quick read, quite entertaining and funny. Super useful. Internalize the questions and use them against outlandish statistics. Look for multiple examples to prove something is good or bad. People often take one or two experiences and extrapolate that to mean always. 01:31:54 – If you want to know everything that's coming up on the show, get access to that on our Patreon. You also get our detailed book notes and really fun bonus material. We also do monthly Hangouts, next one is going to be like mid-September. We don't like ads we're going with the the crowdfunded method. If you want another way to support podcast, go to MadeYouThinkPodcast. com/support. We have some of our wonderful partners there. Tell your friends about the show, shout us out on PornHub. Leave a review on iTunes. Hit us up on Twitter, @NatEliason and @TheRealNeilS, we'll see you all next week. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

"Not long ago kids would argue over which console was better now teenagers whisper cuckold and Nazi like it's considered good manners. We are in the midst of a profound rearrangement of what traits are to be incentivized and rewarded, driven by some 7 billion people each acting with what they believe to be the best of intentions, but who can foresee with what success and with what result." In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss The Tower. In this article we learn about ideas as memes that spread virally and art as a means of being understood. "The Judeo-Christian capital G—o—d, robed, bearded, opinionated, deadlifts, thematically male, is the avatar of civilization, just check the year. Even so, His omnipotence is not uncontested. He knows this. You should see what He did to the guys with the golden calf. God said, “Let there will be light,” and there was light. But just as Nyx preceded Zeus, that means the darkness was already there. And the house always wins at the second law of thermodynamics." We cover a wide range of topics, including: Diversity, privilege, racism & cultural stereotypes The importance belonging and the power of action Memes, memories, outrage and descent into chaos Art, Happiness and Tangents on Tacos & Texas And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to check out the article The Tower on the Hotel Concierge blog! You can also listen on Google Play Music, SoundCloud, YouTube, or in any other podcasting app by searching “Made You Think.” If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on I am a Strange Loop by Douglas Hofstadter for more on self-image and self-invention or our episode on The Riddle of the Gun by Sam Harris for another fascinating article on extreme views. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Cuckold [00:06] Nazi [00:07] Wait but Why blog [00:47] The Last Psychiatrist [02:28] Doxing [02:52] Hotel Concierge [03:16] Samizdat [03:18] Amy Schumer offers you a look into your soul – The Last Psychiatrist [03:32] Tower of Babel [04:31] God [04:45] Virus Theory [05:39] Memes [05:58] Dominance hierarchy [06:21] Humanism [07:08] Bigotry [07:19] Dichotomy [08:38] Multiculturalism [08:55] Diversity [08:56] Nyx [11:22] Zeus [11:25] Second law of thermodynamics [11:23] Bible [12:36] Primordial Chaos [12:42] Religion [12:51] Mythology [12:51] The Big Bang [12:59] Entropy [13:33] Politics [14:20] Eros [14:32] Ananke [14:32] Super-ego [15:28] Socialism [17:02] Communism [17:03] Duration-neglect [17:42] Dilettante [18:24] Nomad life [20:41] Judaism [21:47] Yahweh [21:59] Old Testament [21:59] Circumcision [22:06] Prohibition [22:09] Christianity [22:41] Tyranny of the minority [23:05] Kosher [23:09] Postmodernist [25:44] Dogma [26:38] Superstition [26:39] Toxic Masculinity [27:38] Gene [29:05] Political Correctness [29:15] Democracy [29:18] Evolution [29:42] CNN [30:43] Virality [31:42] Clickbait [32:16] Islam [32:56] Apostasy [32:59] Birth control [33:24] Churn rate [33:57] Non-compete clause [34:00] Spread of Christianity [34:53] Missionary [34:58] Proselytization [34:59] Spanish Inquisition [35:12] Catholicism [35:16] Atheist [35:31] Halal [36:11] Saudi Arabia [36:14] Dubai [36:21] Emirati ID [36:26] Jainism [37:28] Buddhism [37:37] Schizophrenic [40:19] Hollywood [42:22] Agnostic [44:46] iPads [45:40] United States [45:48] World War II [46:38] London [46:48 The Blitz [46:48] Hedonic treadmill [47:16] JavaScript [48:58] Google [53:37] Facebook [53:38] National Memory Championship [54:38] Racism [57:32] Discrimination [57:33] Stereotypes [58:07] Hamptons [01:00:51] Carnegie Mellon [01:01:05] Carnivore Diet [01:01:24] Keto Diet [01:01:53] Paleo Diet [01:01:53] Chinese tourists [01:02:17] Louvre [01:03:53] Opiates [01:06:18] Fox News [01:06:38] World Trade Towers [01:06:51] Gun control [01:10:12] Estee Lauder [1:13:00] YC [01:13:09] Hierarchy of needs [01:15:16] Trade Tariffs [01:16:30] UK [01:17:13] Brexit [01:17:14] Middlebury school [01:18:13] Democrats Are Wrong About Republicans. Republicans Are Wrong About Democrats [1:18:17] Misperceptions of Republicans and Democrats [01:18:17] LGBTQ Cultural appropriation [01:19:50] Microaggression [01:19:51] Colonist [01:20:31] Tacos [01:21:49] Texas [01:21:55] Harvard sued for alleged discrimination against Asian American applicants - Discrimination article [01:22:48] MLB [01:24:24] Affirmative action [01:27:35] Diversity [01:27:41] Exeter [01:28:46] Minerva [01:29:36] Stanford [01:31:42] SATs [01:32:49] Harvard [01:37:12] IIT [01:37:12] UBI [01:47:00] Books mentioned The Tower 12 Rules for Life by Jordan B. Peterson [07:43] (book episode) The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus [17:28] (book episode) Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [22:56] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Torah [25:24] The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins [29:00] The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch [29:29] (book episode) Sapiens by Yuval Harari [29:31] (Nat’s notes) (part I, part II) I Am A Strange Loop by Douglas Hofstadter [38:26] Elephant in the Brain by Kevin Simler [38:49] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Bible [44:11] Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut [45:27] The Motivation Hacker by Nick Winter [49:05] Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer [54:27] The Riddle of the Gun by Sam Harris [01:10:16] (article episode) Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan [01:23:56] Black Panther by Ta-Nehisi Coates [01:23:56] Tibetan Peach Pie by Tom Robbins [01:35:02] People mentioned Hotel Concierge (Author Unknown) Tarantino [01:17] Jordan Peterson [07:43] (12 Rules For Life episode) Thaddeus Russell [09:11] Nassim Taleb [11:40] (Antifragile episode, Skin in the Game episode) Sigmund Freud [15:17] Elon Musk [20:04] Richard Dawkins [28:59] Douglas Hofstadter [38:28] (Godel, Escher, Bach episode) Gwern [42:31] Jesus [44:01] Mary [44:08] Joseph [44:09] Nick Winter [48:52] Joshua Foer [54:32] Ed Cooke [54:47] Mark Manson [58:14] Donald Trump [58:21] Apu [59:15] Jackie Robinson [01:24:19] Ben Nelson - Founder of Minerva [01:29:34] Tom Robbins [01:35:00] Andrew Yang [01:47:04] Show Topics 00:27 – This is one of our occasional article episodes where we have found an article so interesting and profound that it warrants an episode. This article is bordering on us on a short book. Very fun to read. The article is The Tower from a blog called Hotel Concierge. We don't know who this writer is but he/she/they are amazing. 03:59 – The Tower is based on the Tower of Babel which is built to be closer to God and to unite humanity in one place, under one language. This is destroyed by God and humanity is spread across the world. The analogy is that that with modern communication, being able to talk instantly with everyone it is creating this Tower of Babel like effect, leading to outrage culture. 05:48 – Our need to be understood and to feel in control is fuelling that outrage and rebellion. Previously unprivileged groups are now succeeding in the dominance hierarchy. We all need a set of beliefs and having any beliefs are better than none. If you have no beliefs, then you just sort of become a vessel for other people’s ideas. 07:44 – There is always a tendency towards more chaos. Art in all forms is an attempt to be understood. Privilege as how easily your art and memes can be understood. Multiculturalism and diversity go counter towards the goal of assimilation. A lot of white liberals who were fighting for diversity don't actually want diversity. They don't want different cultures. They want the same culture in different colors. 10:21 – This is a well-written persuasive article. “The Judeo-Christian capital G—o—d, robed, bearded, opinionated, deadlifts, thematically male, is the avatar of civilization, just check the year. Even so, His omnipotence is not uncontested. He knows this. You should see what He did to the guys with the golden calf. God said, “Let there will be light,” and there was light. But just as Nyx preceded Zeus, that means the darkness was already there. And the house always wins at the second law of thermodynamics.” The writing style comes off as masculine. Even before God created light, there was still was darkness. Tendency back to the chaos of darkness. You have to deliberately fight against chaos. Human desires for acceptance and control. 14:40 – Acceptance and Control. “Only when we see ourselves reflected by the universe can we believe that it is part of us.” Our tendency towards chaos causes us to feel unhappy and unfulfilled “Ananke hates nothing but entropy. Ananke rewards us for turning atoms into tools and tools into appendages, so much the better if those atoms comprise other humans, viz. the high of domination” “Ananke compels us to learn, to make the universe predictable, to gain control over time, what next happens, and space, what happens next.” 16:23 – A feeling of control is important for us to be able to have any life satisfaction. “Minimum wage jobs are worse because of their pointlessness more than because of their indignity, work harder/better/faster/stronger and no one cares, screw up and you’re replaced without a missed beat.” No control over work and no sense of belonging. Working just like a cog in a machine. 17:35 – “No direction, no story; the days blur together until arthritis leaves you crippled. Stoned summers don’t get you off the hook, duration neglect compresses both good and bad sensations. No matter how pleasant, when nothing is happening, the superego starves. There’s a reason couples fight on vacation.” Not only do we need control and reflection but we need a narrative that has a story to it. Happiness comes from working towards a goal. 18:13 – “Being a dilettante is too easy, flatlines don't form memories.” You need an arc to your story a narrative. “Reinventing yourself between brunches feels good.” 18:52 – It does seem possible to achieve multiple things in your life with focus which is different to bouncing around to new ideas “the illusion of control—until you’ve dreamt the same dreams too many times and they no longer get you high.” Getting excited over a vision is not making progress. If you don’t pick something you will be running around aimlessly. 21:25 – The reason God destroyed the Tower of Babel was he wanted to punish this consolidation under one belief system, one language. Ideas as memes.  If something isn't carefully designed then it can spread fairly naturally. Ideas are going to naturally evolve and spread and so religions get weaker over time. It is easier to wholly conform to a religion than to partially conform and have to make those decisions. Kosher vs non-Kosher. By keeping these very strict rules it made these religious concepts spread virally. Criticism to Humanism because it doesn't really give any prescriptions. Ideas need to take a concrete stand otherwise they are a weak belief system. Your religion becomes a decision making framework but if you are just open to everything then you have no answers. 26:40 – Reasoning through everything is exhausting. Trying to place blame on bad actions on someone's upbringing or genetics means nothing is every anyone’s fault and no-one can be held accountable. “When someone slaps your hypothetical girlfriend's ass in the proverbial club, what does humanism say you should do? At least toxic masculinity has an answer.” 27:45 – If you don't have a code of conduct one will be provided for you. We have a suppressed memetic immune system. It’s statistically inevitable that every meme will attain its most infectious form. A meme is a term introduced by Richard Dawkins in The Selfish Gene to reference an idea that spreads through a culture, like a gene spreads through the animal world. Political correctness is a meme and democracy is meme. 29:42 – Just like evolution happens faster in animals that breed more often, the more iterations memes go through the more viral they become. We are now in an era where free flow of information is causing us to consume all of these viral memes. Do the ideas control you or do you control the ideas? One can actually control their sources of inputs. Then one becomes a vessel for the ideas that take control of her. 31:54 – “A pathogen that is too restrained will lose out in competition to a more aggressive strain that diverts more host resources to its own reproduction.” Replication is the key to success. High switching cost, once one have publicly committed to these ideas. It’s difficult to move out of a religion due to surroundings and strong deterrents. Parents pass their religion on to their children and with few leaving a religion this just creates more people passing on these beliefs. “But as long as transmission continues despite the virulence, virulent pathogens will have the advantage.” 35:31 – Some religions have weakened over time, you can say you're Christian and you don't actually have to do anything. Alcohol consumption in UAE. Compliance due to deterrents. Trying too hard to not have any memes means you become susceptible to becoming a vessel and getting sucked into the ideas that are around you. All art is memes and all memes want to do is spread. Human desire to share information. 38:51 – “Art is compressed communication. The better the compression, with regards to both perceived fidelity and amount of information contained, the more artful the art”. Both writing and art are ways to purify your mind from chaos. Any form of media is art, this podcast is too. 39:15 – “I think “ease of having one’s art understood” is a defensible conception of “privilege”. Being understood is a huge part of life satisfaction. Diversity in Hollywood, it makes sense that it doesn’t get any more diverse as they are making films for their target culture. “Gwern seems to think that if we banned Guardians of the Galaxy the relevant audience would switch to Douglas Hofstadter. The assumption here is that nonfiction exists, distinct from and more truthful than fiction. I don’t buy it.” 44:15 – Pre-Renaissance – The popular memes of the time of religion was the art and message that lasted. Your religion is another form of privilege. “So who has more privilege, a cis-white-hetero billionaire with full-checklist depression or an unemployed transgender black woman who, despite this, is basically content? Either the billionaire has less privilege, in which case “privilege” is a Harrison Bergeron happiness tax, or the suicidal person has more privilege, in which case, how much does “privilege” matter, really.” “I’ve met Upper East Side kids less fulfilled by their iPads than Sub-Saharan kids without running water were with “catch the rock.” Happiness and privilege are not the same. You can be happy without privilege and depressed with wealth. Statistics on suicide being mostly wealthy younger people or those at the end of their life. Suicide and depression rates go down during war time. Being well off is not the solution for happiness, doesn't automatically make you happy. “Saved wealth buffers against tragedy but suffering finds a way.” 47:36 – “Like a forgotten drive to work, we are amnestic to routine, and memories of “eat, menial labor, sleep” blur together in the rearview mirror. The important-yet-oft-forgotten obverse is that, independent of happiness, wealth buys freedom from routine.” “A night at the opera is no more fun than pizza and brewskis, but the former is novel, for a time, and the latter soon fades from memory.” The importance of memory on happiness. Novelty of an experience puts a little placeholder in our memory, a hedonistic measurement. Most of traveling isn’t actually that fun but there are moments that do stick with you. Enjoyment tracking of extreme sports vs video games. We remember the peaks more than the consistent or length of enjoyment. You don’t remember the world like a spreadsheet. Entrepreneurial businesses vs standard job. Earnings might be the same but there are more more memories and signposts throughout the entrepreneurial journey that make it worth it . You only get the peaks from climbing your own mountain. 52:27 – Experiencing self vs Remembering self. You need those indicators in your memories for happiness, to reflect back to you who you are. Ed Cook plans parties with several different thematic parts so that it feels like a multitude of new experiences and memories all within one three hour party. Mark Manson recommends going to multiple bars on dates so it feels like you have a lot to remember and look back on. Same how large or distinct life experiences feel lengthy even if they were just for one day. 57:10 – “Contrary to the pop-ethical consensus, discrimination is not caused by having too many stereotypes but too few. If you wake to find a lithe man dressed in all black standing over your bed and holding a katana, it may be quite reasonable to infer that he is a hired ninja and that you are in grave danger. If, however, you assume this about every East Asian man that you encounter, you lack nuance of stereotypes.” Nuances of stereotypes within race, religion and politics. “Race and gender are social constructs, but the cultural norms that correlate with race and gender—and goth, prep, jock, etc—are real.” Where there are these intergroup conflicts over trivial differences. To counteract a stereotype you need an alternative worldview that narrows down that stereotype into a more nuanced view. Framing an argument against stereotypes as don't be racist join or die, fails and it's infuriatingly counterproductive because it doesn't create a new stereotype to work with. Stereotypes portfolio. 01:06:00 – “The racist stay racist and now feel that society is out to get them. hashtag MAGA.” Being told you are racist is really counterproductive. The opposite of feeling you belong. This causes people to accept the label and not change their world view. 01:07:54 – “Once acceptance becomes orthodoxy even private dissent becomes grounds for ostracization. No matter your other convictions you become a stereotype that society will single-issue-vote off the island, just ask Brendan Eich. Of course I support gay marriage; my point is that if one’s views before were “well, it is kind of weird,” then being told “soon there will be enough of us that we won’t have to deal with people like you at all”—that makes homophobia logical. And at least you can change your opinion of gay marriage. It’s much harder to change being white and low-class.” You can’t talk about the middle ground. It is the two extremes that are virulent. The opinions seem to be all or nothing. False correlation between number of words written about something leading people to think that thing is more prevalent in society, like words in an article relate to more crime. Intermittent fasting and the bubble of understanding within social groups. When we meet someone outside of our own knowledge we realize the bubble that we are in. “No one is born hateful, stranger anxiety doesn’t even start til six months. But culture war is history being written by the winners, first draft. Conservatives are offered the choice of fighting the ever-changing tides of social values or toiling away in obscurity while journalists pretend to like soccer. People want to be understood. And they will rage all sorts of ways against the dying of the light.” 01:14:38 – “The upper-middle class—mostly urban, mostly blue—claims by far the largest share of America’s income, more than the middle class and far more than the 1%. This, despite their protests to the contrary, gives them disproportionate control over the news and entertainment industry, which in cyberpunk America is tantamount to controlling the culture.” Urban culture controls the media so you’ve got the rural conservative that feels constantly misunderstood that leads to Trump. Global need to be understood, “I’m saying that the specific way the media talks about race and culture, creating an incoherent set of rules regarding “appropriation” and etiquette, proudly crying out that this is the end of those boring, selfish white people, has made the situation much, much worse. If the left wanted to prevent assimilation, there would be no more effective way.” When there are all these rules, where everything is cultural appropriation then it makes it easier for people to throw their hands up and admit defeat and continue with their world view as they cannot correct it. 01:21:05 – Every culture has a past. Judge people on how they are today. Stop punishing people pay for what their ancestors did. Forced assimilation doesn’t go well – like asking people to have X percent of your meals as Mexican food vs allowing people to naturally adopt a culture and its food – like tacos in Texas. 01:22:48 – Asians in America are succeeding at everything faster that most other groups ever have. These are positive changes to the power structure. Make what you want to see. Jackie Robinson as the first Black baseball player. His coach knew as the first black player he would receive aggression and wanted to make sure that his reaction to this would offer an alternative stereotype than the expected violence. This would pave the way for others after him. “Ergo, you decide to hire some minority writers to write your minority characters. Applications rush in. How are you going to decide who makes the cut? “You know, the usual. Interview. Letters of recommendation. College transcript—” This is how the system protects itself against change. At every step of the social hierarchy, what is required for a person of color or a woman to succeed is determined by the values of the ruling class. I think that’s “white patriarchal supremacy,” but don’t quote me. Of course, the same principle applies to e.g. homosexuals and Jews; thankfully those traits are easier to hide.” 01:29:41 – Extracurricular activities weed out poor people as they are exclusive to those with disposable income. Is it true diversity if just the rich kids from Buenos Aires or Mexico City get into a school but poorer Latino kids in the US don’t stand a chance. Tom Robbins spent 8 years while trying to get his big break in writing. That takes privilege to have that time to create art and not to have student debt. “These “gifted” but “troubled” people will bumble through their whole lives, getting second through tenth chances, mysteriously finding that anything involving an authority figure goes their way, as they ruthlessly condemn capitalist injustice, never realizing that criticizing privilege is…the language of privilege.” 1:37:30 – When you think of how many do not have privilege and are not understood and cannot express themselves. It's easy to imagine all of the outcasts conspiring to destroy that Tower. Nobody wants to feel like their beliefs are not allowed. 01:41:42 – The Prescription. “What’s the solution? There’s only one and it is so radical that I hesitate to even suggest it: stop being a pleb. You. Stop treating words as a substitute for action. Stop paying time and money into institutions that loan a symbol of mastery in lieu of actual depth. Stop looking for such symbols in others. Stop judging policies by the veneer of good intention rather than the details of consequence. Stop looking past people, because this is all the same, isn’t it? Working from a map, a stereotype, a symbol, instead fighting for the complex truth? None of this horror requires malice or even stupidity. All it requires is taking the easy way out.” 01:42:05 – Such great writing, narrative style is just so fun. Ton of bonus material for this one. If you're not already supporting us on Patreon, you can go to patreon.com/madeyouthink. You'll get all our recordings for the episode, detailed notes on the article including bolding and highlighting everything. You’ll see which articles are coming up and you can also join us for our monthly hangouts. Thank you to everybody who has joined we love you. We do also have a support page on the site madeyouthinkpodcast.com/support. Just tell your friends. Leave a review on iTunes. If you want to get in touch with us tweeting is probably best option. Do it at @TheRealNeilS and @NatEliason. Until next week! If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com  

“The prestige of the government had undoubtedly been lowered considerably by prohibition”, Albert Einstein observed when he visited the United States in the early 1920s. “Nothing is more destructive of respect for the government and the law of the land than laws which cannot be enforced.” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss Smoke Signals by Martin A. Lee. In this book we take a walk through the history of marijuana, from it being a legal, useful plant and the third largest crop in the U.S to it being illegal and harshly but selectively punished. We see how racism and the variety of political backgrounds have shaped the PR of this ancient plant. “It was a move that served as a pretext for harassing Mexicans. Just as opium legalization in San Francisco 40 years earlier was directed at another despised minority, the Chinese. In each case the target of the prohibition was not the drug so much as those most associated with its use. Typically in the United States drug statutes have been aimed or selectively enforced against a feared or disparaged group within society.” We cover a wide range of topics, including: The history of marijuana, benefits and uses Arguments for and against legalization Political figures and their contribution to The War on Drugs Effects of consumption, psychedelics and edibles Tangents on wellness retreats, duels and fact checking fake news And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Smoke Signals by Martin A. Lee! You can also listen on Google Play Music, SoundCloud, YouTube, or in any other podcasting app by searching “Made You Think.” If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Homo Deus by Yuval Harari for more on the domestication of plants and animals. Or for a totally different type of episode check out Godel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter as a counter to this linear, fact based book. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Marijuana [00:32] Neolithic period [01:21] Recreational drug use [02:42] Colorado [02:49] World War I [03:57] World War II [03:58] Virginia [05:27] New York [05:28] Maryland [05:31] Washington, DC [05:32] Austin, Texas [05:38] Shaman [06:18] Biochemistry [06:23] THC [06:26] Psychedelics [06:50] Spirit Journeys [06:53] Hindu texts [07:03] Soma [07:06] Moses [07:52] God [07:53] Ten Commandments [07:54] Ayahuasca [07:59] LSD [08:10] High on Mount Sinai? – Hebrew University’s professor’s theory – Reuters [08:18] The Burning Bush (Ex 3:1–6): A study of natural phenomena as manifestation of divine presence in the Old Testament and in African context [08:18] Hebrew University [08:27] Israel [08:28] Sinai Peninsula [08:31] Amazon Jungle [08:35] Higher Consciousness [09:43] Joe Rogan Experience #1133 – Dennis McKenna [10:25] Silicide [10:26] Mushrooms [10:27] Pharmacological research [10:44] Hemp [12:54] CBD [13:56] Omega 3 [15:18] Declaration of Independence [15:28] Cotton [16:22] Tobacco [16:23] Dietary fat [18:33] Duels [18:40] WeWork [19:01] Estrogen [23:26] Cooking oils [24:46] Soy Oil [24:52] Corn Oil [24:52] Canola Oil [24:57] Arizona [25:32] Miraval Retreat [25:38] Mindfulness [25:38] Healing crystals [26:34] Mysticism [26:39] Civil war [28:26] Hashish candy [28:28] Sears Roebuck Catalog [28:30] Sativa [28:53] Indica [28:54] Edibles [30:11] Salvia [31:30] Paris [32:15] Prohibition [32:54] Mexican Revolution [33:35] California [35:03] Texas [35:11] Ivy League [39:23] FDA [41:18] Patents [41:27] Marinol [41:42] Whey protein [41:57] Keto Diet [42:11] Epilepsy [42:29] Skin diseases [42:32] Autoimmune disorders [42:34] Obesity [42:37] Glaucoma [42:56] Parkinson's [43:24] Federal Marijuana Farm [43:52] California Cannabis Law [44:10] Syria [44:48] Marijuana Tax Act [44:57] Federal Bureau of Narcotics [46:17] FBI [46:27] Great Depression [46:28] Opiate Epidemic [47:06] Alcoholism [47:08] Maryland [47:14] GreenDoc [47:31] San Francisco [48:38] Eaze App [48:44] Postmates [48:47] Ubereats [48:48] Skype [49:10] GrubHub [50:17] LaGuardia committee [50:57] New York Mayor [50:59] Jews [52:23] African-Americans [52:23] Mexican Government [52:56] Congress [54:34] Homophobia [54:39] Pro-family [54:43] Amphetamines [55:13] NIDA agency [55:30] Jamaica [55:38] Postpartum Depression [57:23] Nausea [57:25] Stress [57:33] Anxiety [57:35] Cortisol [57:41] Breast milk [57:45] Meditation [58:15] Heroin [01:01:42] Oxycodone [01:01:59] Libertarians [01:01:23] Protein [01:02:54] Amino acids [01:02:56] Iron [01:02:58] Magnesium [01:02:59] Vitamins [01:03:01] Self-medication [01:05:50] Chemo [01:05:54] Leukemia [01:06:04] Endocannabinoid system [01:06:54] Cannabinoid Receptors [01:07:06] Types of cancer [01:08:20] Peripheral nervous system [01:08:52] Immune system [01:08:54] Lymph cells [01:09:01] Endocrine glands [01:09:02] Reproductive organs [01:09:03] Alzheimer’s Disease [01:09:07] MDMA [01:12:00] Books mentioned Smoke Signals by Martin Lee Godel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter [04:45] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Finite and Infinite Games by James Carse [05:11] (book episode) The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus [05:17] (book episode) Brave New World by Aldous Huxley [07:08] The Bible [07:52] Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [20:44] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Sapiens by Yuval Harari [20:46] (Nat’s Notes) (part I, part II) Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas [31:58] People mentioned Martin A.Lee Albert Einstein [00:06] Barack Obama [02:37] Joe Rogan [10:31] Terence McKenna [10:35] Dennis McKenna [10:40] Thomas Jefferson [15:24] George Washington [16:30] Donald Trump [18:51] Al Capone [36:53] Nassim Taleb [44:36] (Antifragile episode, Skin in the Game episode) Franklin D. Roosevelt [44:59] Malcolm X [45:56] Harry J. Anslinger [46:07] Richard Nixon [51:23] H. R Haldeman [52:03] Newt Gingrich [54:48] Ronald Reagan [58:49] Nancy Reagan [58:53] Bill Clinton [01:05:08] Show Topics 00:31 – This seems to be one of the longest marijuana books in existence. 390 pages but incredibly detailed. So much history of this ancient plant. Includes scientific, medical and recreational history as well as legislative and political history. The book focuses on the US history of marijuana and some within Europe too. 02:09 – The book starts as soon as the U.S was colonized around 1776 and includes insights right through to 2009. The push on recreational legalization started happening right after this book came out. We knew that cannabis had been illegal for a long time but didn’t know how it became that way. It’s strange to consider that there used to be a law that farmers had to grow hemp. Lots of things in the book are counter to what your original impression might be. We are not high for this episode, this book is too linear and fact-based for that. 05:47 – The book includes a little bit of background on the history of cannabis and the uses. We know old tribes around the world were using psychedelics and other plant medicines to induce spirit journeys or healing rituals. It seems to be a global constant that people are using mind-altering drugs for spiritual experiences. There are theories around certain bible stories being a recounting of a psychedelic experience. 07:59 – Ayahuasca as an incredible psychedelic, several plants found in the Amazon are known for their mind altering capabilities. Drugs have been used in rituals for a long time. Cannabis seems to be like revered for that reason in many of these cultures. Marijuana is a psychedelic when consumed certain ways. It would be pretty easy to think that by taking this plant you're communicating with God. You can't really get these experiences any other way. 11:03 – Looking at the benefits of marijuana and how it can change your perception of the world. Dennis McKenna explains that your brain filters everything you interact with in life and you're looking at it through a lens. With psychedelics and even marijuana some of those filters start to fall away. In some ways you start to see things more clearly. You see things from a different perspective. It puts you in an altered state of consciousness. The uses and harms of marijuana – marketing problem vs framing problem. 12:54 – The distinction between hemp and marijuana is really interesting. They are the same plant but owning hemp products is legal as it is non-psychoactive. So much of society depended up on hemp up until the 1800’s, clothes, paper, rope, oil. It is nutritionally dense too. The production of hemp was so important it was a matter of national security. It’s amazing how public opinion of a product can change. It was the third largest crop until it was criminalized. 200 years later people are getting thrown in jail for possession. Are there any things that we take for granted that will just be like completely illegal in the future? 19:01 – WeWork banning meat consumption on expenses. Vegetarianism would contribute to the reduction in numbers of animals if meat consumption goes down. We can’t sustain the numbers of animals if it is not for consumption. In Homo Deus it mentions that 50% of all non-domesticated fauna have either gone extinct or are on the road to extinction in the last 200 years. 21:18 – Argument against eating chicken. Smaller animal with less meat, not eating chicken is the easiest way to reduce the amount of suffering created through your diet. Also for dietary reasons due to excessive estrogen. 25:49 – Wellness retreats and limited health science knowledge. Some people are vegan for health reasons, some for virtue signalling reasons. They only make choices that are externally visibly as being health conscious. Behind the scenes, like cooking with lower quality oil, poorer choices are made. 28:15 – Origin of the word marijuana from Mexico. Modern strains don’t have much CBD any more because they have been bred to have increased THC. THC is the psychoactive component and CBD is the healing component. Eating it is a very different experience to smoking it. Four times as strong as it is digested and processed by the liver. Varying trends over the years in consumption. Chewing, ingesting, smoking. Hashish clubs and dinner, as part of puddings. 32:44 – The term marijuana came from Mexican slang. Prohibitionist started using it take advantage of growing racism against Mexicans. Became attributed to being a Mexican thing. California was the first to outlaw it in 1913. 35:21 – “It was a move that served as a pretext for harassing Mexicans. Just as opium legalization in San Francisco 40 years earlier was directed at another despised minority the Chinese. In each case the target of the prohibition was not the drug so much as those most associated with its use. Typically in the United States drug statutes have been aimed or selectively enforced against a feared or disparaged group within society.” Recurring theme of using drug laws as a form of racism. Looking at the arguments to keep marijuana illegal, some say this is a way to like catch people who are doing other crimes. Also that the police choose to not go after the actual drug dealers. There are more low level consumers who are easier to prosecute. Laws seem to be enforced extremely selectively. By being put in jail that increases the likelihood of becoming a more serious criminal. 40:23 – Marijuana has so many medical uses. As a society we are used to single target drugs but cannabis has over 200 different active compounds. The pharma industry is mostly interested in patentable compounds – a plant isn’t patentable. Cannabis has been found to reduce side effects of lots of conditions. Remarkable stories of it stopping the progress of glaucoma, stopping people turning blind. People in states that do not have legal marijuana access for medical purposes have to rely on friends bringing it to them illegally. 44:36 – False narratives portrayed to the public about the effects of cannabis use. Taleb said that if any time somebody uses children or women as the reason for something being bad, they're probably lying. It was said that “marijuana will make Mexicans and blacks lust after your wives”. 44:59 – Acts of cannabis taxation were brought into force and enforced harshly before people even knew the law existed. The punishment does not fit the crime at all. Harry J. Anslinger put together a campaign against marijuana for more funding and to keep his job. Doctors are now getting tired prescribing opiates and seeing people get addicted to them so are turning to dispensing cannabis where usage is legal. In San Francisco there are startups that will deliver marijuana products in under 30 minutes. 50:47 – So many research initiatives are being done and they overwhelmingly say it's not harmful however Anslinger ignores them. Side effects are debunked and the LaGuardia committee refutes every claim. 51:41 – Moving on in history to Nixon. “Nixon linked cannabis to loudmouth to racial protesters. ‘They're all on drugs’. He brusquely told an aide. Susceptible to bouts of paranoia the commander-in-chief blamed the Jews for spearheading efforts to legalize cannabis. ‘You know, it's a funny thing every one of those bastards that are out there for legalizing marijuana is Jewish, what the Christ is the matter with the Jews Bob?’ Nixon asked his closest advisor HR Haldeman. In private conversations with his inner circle tricky dick also Savaged African-Americans. Nixon emphasized that ‘you have to face the fact that the whole problem is really the blacks. The key is to devise a system that recognizing this while not appear in to’ Haldeman wrote in his diary.” 52:30 – You can't like just make a law that it's illegal to be black or Jewish but you can pass a law that targets them. Crackdowns on production did nothing except increase the price of marijuana and make more Mexicans want to farm it. Distinctions between alcohol and marijuana. “Nixon, a heavy drinker, drew a rather fuzzy distinction between marijuana and alcohol. ‘A person doesn't drink to get drunk a person drinks to have fun while a person smokes pot to get high’, the president told a friend” “Addicted to sleeping pills and amphetamines and often South on liquor Nixon staggered through the White House in a daze talking to portraits of past presidents that hung on the walls" 54:08 – Everybody who's heavily against legalization is a hypocrite in one way or another they're either alcoholics or they're taking painkillers. It seems like a fairly common theme. Studies on effects of marijuana consumption in Jamaican mothers. “The ganja moms and their kids did not appear to be harmed by marijuana exposure in the womb. There were no physical abnormalities, no cognitive deficits and no neonatal complications nor were there any discernible differences between the three day old babies of mothers who used marijuana and the three-day-old non-exposed babies. They were surprised to discover that after one month the babies of mothers who had used ganja throughout their pregnancy were actually healthier more alert and less fussy than one month old infants whose mothers did not take cannabis. Test results for one month old infants whose mothers also ingested ganja while breastfeeding were even more striking heavily exposed babies were more socially responsive and more autonomically stable than babies is not exposed to cannabis through their mothers milk. Alertness was higher motor and autonomic function or autonomous systems were robust. They were less irritable less likely to demonstrate in balance of tone needed less examiner facilitation than the neonates of non using mothers. And then when they were tested at four and five their team found absolutely no difference between the children of ganja moms and children of non-users.” 56:58 – These studies showed little side effects, seems quite beneficial. Nancy Reagan was a chronic user of prescription tranquilizers. Her daughter basically said her mother's anti-drug advocacy may have been a form of denial. Dangers of overstating the harmful nature of cannabis has other effects. “Uncle Sam cried wolf too often first. Marijuana was said to create maniacal Killers then to produce inert masses of lazy indulges when teens caught on they weren't getting the Straight Dope about marijuana. They were more likely to ignore warnings about genuinely dangerous drugs.” 01:00:26 – Perception of marijuana impacts other harder drugs. Whenever an authority says something is unhealthy we now re-consider if that is true or not. Fortunately we are now in a time we can fact check anything instantly. Nutritional value of red meat and checking what is true. 01:04:04 – It's really clearly a racism thing, whites and blacks use illegal drugs at the same rate however blacks were arrested prosecuted and jailed at much higher rates. This book covers the war on drugs and how it escalated from the 50’s through to the 90’s. Benefits of marijuana, fasting and ketosis on chemo patients. There could be so much more research on these things. Feels like a crime to make something so helpful, illegal. Horribly ironic in some sense because you know Reagan died of Alzheimer's. It seems like doctors just have known of these benefits it for years. 01:10:37 – Oxycontin and number of deaths. It’s crazy how something so deadly is legal. “Purdue Pharma multi-billion dollar blockbuster was linked to thousands of Overdose deaths. Of the almost 500,000 Hospital emergency room visits in the US in 2004 more than 36,000 involved Oxycontin.” No one has ever died from marijuana ever write as far as we know. People will say it's a gateway drug. The only way it's a gateway drug is when it's illegal as it forces you to create a relationship with a dealer. 01:12:53 – Since legalization teen marijuana use is unchanged in both, Colorado and Washington State. Amazing how political the history is, in a mix of racism and fear mongering. All of the research around the benefits is fairly compelling. “The Economist, the blue-chip British magazine editorialized that the FDA's stance on marijuana lacked common sense adding, if cannabis were unknown and bio-prospectors were suddenly to find it in some remote mountain crevice, its discovery would no doubt be hailed as a medical breakthrough. Scientists would praise its potential for treating everything from pain to cancer and marvel at its rich pharmacopoeia, many of whose chemicals mimic vital molecules in the human body.” 01:15:46 – There has also been significant reduction in opioid usage in the states with active dispensaries for cannabis. 01:16:08 – If you’d like to support the show go to patreon.com/madeyouthink. You get access to fun things like all of our bonus material our detailed notes for each episode and hangouts. You can get that at Patreon and we appreciate the support of the show. We like to keep it ad free and natural. We appreciate everyone who is already supporting us there and everyone who is going to go support us after this show. It means a lot. If you haven't left a review on iTunes, we'd really appreciate that as well. Let your friends know about the show and you can always message us on Twitter at @NatEliason and @TheRealNeilS. There are other options at madeyouthinkpodcast.com/support related to shopping. We'd love to hang out with you in the Patreon community and talk more there we'll see you there and we will see you next week. Thanks everyone. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com  

“There is but one truly serious philosophical problem and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy.” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus. In this book we learn about the Legend of Sisyphus and his never-ending toil. How to find meaning in the struggle and hope for the future. “The workman of today works every day in his life at the same tasks and this fate is no less absurd but it is tragic only at the rare moments when it becomes conscious.” We cover a wide range of topics, including: Meaning of life, Suicide, Law & Death Evolution, the Brain as an Illusion & the Decline of Religion Tangents on Tesla, Twilight Zone & Twitter The Absurd Man, Consciousness and Japanese Duels And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus You can also listen on Google Play Music, SoundCloud, YouTube, or in any other podcasting app by searching “Made You Think.” If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on The Elephant in the Brain for more on taboo subjects of the mind or our episode on The Book of Five Rings for ideas on philosophy and a retrospective look over life. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Syphilis  [02:10] Antibiotics [02:21] Suicides [03:06] Meaning of life [03:35] Ethics [03:56] Metaphysics [03:57] Antinatalism [04:27] Evolution [05:48] Humanity [05:54] Post Modernists [07:05] Last Will and Testament [07:32] Absurd Man [08:50] Freakonomics Podcast – The Suicide Paradox [11:34] Euthanasia [12:30] Libertarianism [13:15] Stroke [13:24] Prohibition [13:48] Morphine [14:02] Life Insurance [14:16] Hospice Care [14:27] Painkiller Medication [16:57] Facilitated Suicide [17:11] Malpractice [17:24] Hospital [17:53] Liability [18:05] DNR [18:53] Washington [19:24] Legality of Cannabis[19:30] Alcohol Laws [19:44] California [19:50] Colorado [19:51] Byzantine [19:57] Mississippi [20:13] Texas [20:14] Pennsylvania [20:14] Nebraska [20:15] Lawsuit [20:44] Small Breweries [20:51] Lobbying [20:53] Alabama [20:58] Government [21:22] Nanny state [21:47] Austin [22:12] Dallas [22:19] Houston [22:20] Pickup Trucks [22:40] Red Pill [23:20] Atheist [23:50] God [23:53] Consciousness [24:36] Solipsism [27:58] World Simulation [28:15] Automaton [28:38] The Matrix [28:44] Costa Rica [34:19] Dog Refuge in Costa Rica [34:24]   Japanese Duels [36:59] Akane no Mai – Westworld episode on Musashi [37:10] Character Map [38:14] Kindle X-Ray [38:57] Game of Thrones [39:35] Emergency Awesome - YouTube [39:51] Click (film) [42:31] Post Religious [46:12] Secular [46:19] Genetics [47:32] Nihilism [47:45] Nationalism [48:01] Dichotomy [49:22] Hedonism [53:24] Ivory Tower [56:07] Intellectual Yet Idiot [56:09] Frugality [57:44] Stoicism [57:45] Minimalism [58:25] Confirmation Bias [59:10] Rome [59:54] Amazon [01:00:10] Amazon Valuation [01:00:23] Microsoft [01:01:13] Netflix [01:01:18] Apple [01:01:25] Nokia [01:01:43] Twitter [01:01:47] iPhone [01:01:49] Google [01:02:08] IMDb [01:02:32] Alexa [01:02:46] Twitch [01:02:59] Zappos [01:03:00] Pillpack [01:03:03] Audible [01:03:05] Kiva Systems [01:03:06] Goodreads [01:03:08] Stack Overflow [01:03:15] Basecamp [01:03:17] Domo [01:03:17] Business Insider [01:03:18] Washington Post [01:03:21] LivingSocial [01:03:27] AmazonBasics [01:03:40] Tesla [01:03:57] Hyperloop Transportation System [01:04:28] Legend of Sisyphus – Wikipedia [01:07:52] Nomad lifestyle [01:22:37] A Nice Place to Visit - Twilight Zone episode [01:23:02] Uncomfortable Reading – Neil Soni [1:24:14] Crony Belief [01:26:06] Lindy Rule [01:26:24] Gestalt [01:26:49] Guardians of the Galaxy [01:26:59] Disney [01:27:08] New York Times [01:27:43] Wall Street Journal [01:27:44] Harvard discrimination [01:31:01] Books mentioned The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [05:01] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Sapiens by Yuval Harari [05:27] (Nat’s notes) (part I, part II) Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch [05:29] (book episode) Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennett [05:32] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Stranger by Albert Camus [08:22] Mastery by Robert Greene [09:55] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Cowboy Conservatism by Sean Cunningham [21:14] Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [24:23] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Elephant in the Brain by Kevin Simler [25:07] (Nat’s notes) (Neil's notes) (book episode) I am a Strange Loop by Douglas Hofstadter [26:41] Godel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter [26:47] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Musashi [37:13] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy [38:06] The Inner Game of Tennis by Timothy Gallwey [44:58] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Letters from a Stoic by Seneca [58:36] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Happy Accidents by Morton A. Meyers [01:17:39] (book episode) Finite and Infinite Games by James Carse [01:17:56] (book episode) The War on Normal People by Andrew Yang [01:41:56] (book episode) The Jungle by Upton Sinclair [01:25:40] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) People mentioned Albert Camus Anthony Bourdain [03:01] Young Jamie [06:44] Joe Rogan [06:44] Kafka [07:28] Jordan Peterson [23:57] (12 Rules For Life episode) Musashi [37:02] (The Book of Five Rings episode) Adam Sandler [42:22] Yuval Harari [46:58] (Homo Deus episode, Sapiens episodes Part I, Part II) Seneca [57:56] (Letters from a Stoic episode) Tim Ferriss [58:30] Epictetus [59:27] Jeff Bezos [59:53] Elon Musk [01:05:00] Nietzsche [01:06:37] Dostoevsky [01:12:05] Mark Manson [01:21:57] Nassim Taleb [01:25:39] (Antifragile episode, Skin in the Game episode) James Gunn [01:26:47] Sarah Jeong [01:27:57] Andrew Yang [01:41:46] (War on Normal People episode, Q&A episode) Show Topics 01:28 – This week’s episode is Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus. It is a philosophical book exploring the meaning of life, questioning if suicide is ever the rational choice. Themes include, humans questioning their cosmic significance and when life is a struggle, is it still worth living? 06:19 – The book is an essay in 4 sections, Absurd Reasoning, Absurd Man, Absurd Creation & Myth of Sisyphus. Camus was insecure about his work, similarly to Kafka who didn’t wish for his uncompleted works to be published after his death. Camus’ other work, The Stranger, was good, entertaining but it’s easy to hate the main character. Having read more by Camus it’s easier to understand his other works better. 10:03 – Taboo topic of suicide, often discussed as a wholly bad thing and something we should prevent at all costs. This book is a personal exploration of whether or not it makes sense. There are plenty of statistics to suggest that talking about suicide and reporting on suicides causes an increase. We have a natural aversion to talking about it. This essay is an argument against it as none of the reasons presented for it are considered convincing. 12:40 – For those in unbearable pain, what is the compassionate thing to do? This directly competes with the human with the human instinct for not ending a life. If someone is in pain, should it be illegal to let them go? Is it cruel and selfish to extend someone’s life artificially? The practice of assisted suicide still exists even though illegal but just via more illicit means. 14:38 – Insurance has no incentive to keep people alive as they stop paying out for care but hospitals stop getting paid when people die. Waiting for people to pass naturally is often a long drawn out process. Hospitals have to be vigilant in these situations before death to avoid malpractice lawsuits. Their desire is to minimize liability when someone does die. It is often a morally difficult decision for families. Legality of negative actions (not giving an intervention) vs positive action (assisting or speeding up the process of dying). 19:31 – Laws around alcohol and cannabis. Texas is very polarized compared to other states like Pennsylvania. 22:37 – “Living naturally is never easy, you continue making the gestures commanded by existence for many reasons. the first of which is habit. Dying voluntarily implies that you've recognized even instinctively the ridiculous character of that habit. The absence of any profound reason for living, the insane character of that daily agitation and the uselessness of suffering” 24:00 – The brain as an illusion. Consciousness doesn’t have much control, just along for the ride. Can often result in a feeling of chaos or overwhelm. Hard to explain this concept to others not familiar with these subjects. Internal vs external experience of “I”, sub personalities and the internal chatter of the mind. It’s hard to consider that everyone experiences that about themselves. Considering everyone has their own unique experiences, it’s easier to think that it’s just me and the world and you’re all part of the simulation. Perhaps everyone else's consciousness is a figment of our imagination. 29:16 – Determinism vs Free Will & Evolution vs God. You can also think there is third option between non free-will and non determinism, where your brain is still deciding things, there is free will but it’s not yours. Very philosophical episode so far, contemplating the randomness in the universe. 32:07 – Man’s attachment to life. We get into the habit of living (surviving) before we acquire the habit of thinking. Animalian Drive, social bonds and the coexistence behaviors of other animals like chimps & dogs. Human’s drive to co-operate overrides our other urges. However scarcity causes confrontation. 35:52 – Violent crime can be thought of as failure of the cognitive mind. Crime levels show that we co-exist together relatively peacefully. Especially considering density of population, e.g on the island of Manhattan, most of which haven’t killed someone while living there. Getting through lengthy books, taking notes and needing character maps to follow plot. 40:27 – “Rising, streetcar, four hours in the office or the factory, meal, streetcar, four hours of work, meal, sleep. And Monday Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday according to the same rhythm. This path is easily followed most of the time but one day the ‘why’ arises and everything begins in that weariness tinged with amazement begins. This is important weariness comes at the end of the acts of a mechanical life, but at the same time it inaugurates the impulse of consciousness.” Meaningless of the routine. Moment of clarity after extended periods of working hard. The movie Click and fast forwarding through the autonomous parts of life. How often are you in the driver's seat? How often is life on autopilot? Autopilot can used as a function to get out of your own way. You couldn’t function if you were aware of the absurdity of life for your whole day at your factory job. That would cause more suffering. You have to be satisfied with your life so that when the consciousness comes in you don’t feel weary of how absurd it is. 45:38 – “He feels within him his longing for happiness and for reason. The absurd is born of this confrontation between the human need and the unreasonable silence of the world” Changing notions of religion, no longer an unhesitant belief - without religion people are now ‘woke’. Science answers the how and what but doesn’t answer the why. Science and religion should be separate. If religion and nationalism are fading away, what are we a part of then? Jordan Peterson is an example of figureheads that people are looking up to in place of religion. Externalize the meaning of our lives onto these people - like an over obsessive mother who won’t let their child grow up, or obsession in romantic relationships. 49:13 – There is no objective meaning of life however we have an innate longing and desire for meaning - how do you reconcile those two things? “The mind's first step is to distinguish what is true from what is false. However, as soon as the thought reflects on itself what it first discovers is a contradiction. Of whom and what indeed can I say I know that? This heart within me I can feel and I judge that it exists. This world I can touch and I likewise judge that it exists. There ends all my knowledge and the rest is construction for if I tried to seize this self of which I feel sure. If I try to define a to summarize it it is nothing but water slipping through my fingers.” 50:06 – What does the mind do that the brain doesn’t do? We are always stuck within that contradiction. Lots of overlapping themes with GEB episode. “If through science I can seize phenomena and enumerate them I cannot for all that apprehend the world. Were I to trace its entire relief with my finger I should not know anymore” Simply having the data from science isn’t the same as understanding and knowing. The mind is like water dripping through fingers, we can’t hold on to the concept. “What is absurd is the confrontation of the irrational and the wild longing for clarity whose call echoes in the human heart. The absurd depends as much on man as on the world. At this point of his effort, man stands face to face the irrational, he feels within him his longing for happiness and for reason. The absurd is born of this confrontation between the human need and the unreasonable silence of the world.” We want to be happy and we want reasons for existing but the world has nothing to offer us we can never find an external explanation for being and so we either have to create one ourselves or just accept that we will never have one. It’s a hard concept to be comfortable with. 52:51 – Chapter 2. Examples of the absurd life. Revolt, Freedom, Passion. It's the actor who recognizes that everything is ephemeral. Life ends at the end of the role. Mini universes are created within plays. The actor - in those 3 hours he travels the whole course of the dead-end path that the men in the audience take a lifetime to cover. You can sit and observe an actor but you can never do that with your own life. 54:40 – The Conqueror. Fighting and taking action, demands respect. Not sitting thinking. But they are not contemplating their life. Comparison of the conqueror to business. Choosing action over contemplation. 56:47 – Who is the "I". Discussing this topic makes you very self aware. These observations are not reasons not to pursue things in life. Stoicism and Minimalism are great philosophies for people who don’t want to feel bad about giving up on their goals. However some people interpret Stoicism as saying to go for your goals. There is fun in accomplishment. Your mindset is often reflected in what you’re reading. Our differing mindset applies different meanings to the same books. Our minds don’t hold on to thoughts we disagree with. We extract what is valuable. Our struggles and wealth can play a part on our viewpoint. Epictetus in poverty vs Seneca with wealth. 01:00:00 – Tangent. Modern wealth, Jeff Bezos and the escalating new heights of wealth. Which tech companies would you be least surprised to not exist in 10 years? Amazon, IPO’s, Tesla and stock prices. 01:06:05 – Humans long for happiness and reason but absurdity is born from our need and the silence of the world. It’s a philosophical contradiction. Nietzsche said we had killed God in becoming God ourselves. That we are taking power and trying to be the arbiters of our faith. We decide what is meaningful. The goal is to not wait for heaven in the afterlife but to create that eternal meaningful life here. 01:07:42 – The Myth of Sisyphus. He defied the Gods and put Death in chains so that no human needed to die. When Death was liberated and it became time for Sisyphus to die, he tried to escape. The Gods decided to punish him for all of eternity. He would push a rock up a mountain and upon reaching the top, the rock would roll down again leaving Sisyphus to start over. Is Camus saying that we are all Sisyphus now? Trying to defy death? Stuck in the absurd meaningless tasks of life. Despite being the Absurd Man, Sisyphus has accepted his fate and continues doing it. “He is as much through his passions as through his torture. His scorn of the Gods, his hatred of death and his passion for life won him that unspeakable penalty in which the whole being is exerted toward accomplishing nothing. This is the price that must be paid for the passions of this Earth.” Trying to live eternal life here on Earth means we have condemned ourselves to the meaningless repetition. We are doing this senseless toil and we are occasionally conscious of it and trying to find meaning. To live a meaningful life you stay in the routine and stay “unwoke”. Once you’re conscious of the absurdity of life and try to do something about it you are trying to become like God. 01:11:59 – However there is meaning in the task itself, there’s a happy ending to this story. Camus was saying there’s not a God but there doesn’t have to be for your life to have meaning. There is hope in the returning steps of Sisyphus. “A face that toils so close to stones is already stone itself. I see that man going back down with a heavy yet measured step, toward the torment of which he will never know the end. That hour, like a breathing space which returns as surely as his suffering, that is the hour of consciousness. At each of those moments when he leaves the heights and gradually sinks toward the layers of the Gods, he is superior to his fate. He is stronger than his rock.” In those moments, walking back down after the rock, he still has some control and he is conscious of it. 01:14:24 – “I leave Sisyphus at the foot of the mountain, one always finds one's burden again. But Sisyphus teaches the higher fidelity that negates the gods and raises rocks, he too concludes that all is well. The universe henceforth without a master seems to him neither sterile nor futiile. Each atom of that stone, each mineral flake of that night filled mountain in itself forms a world. The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.” 01:15:03 – “All of Sisyphus' silent joy is contained therein. His fate belongs to him. His rock is his thing.” A struggle can make your life meaningful. Tackling a goal can be uplifting. Finite and infinite games and horizon thinking idea. Goals as directional, metrics to shoot for. Being obsessed with a goal you ignore other opportunities and miss out on serendipitous discoveries. Tangent on goal setting, and adapting and changing the goal as you progress. Reaching the goal is not what makes you happy. You have to enjoy the struggle. 01:22:29 – The appeal of a nomadic life. However living the easy, happy life isn’t possible all of the time. Only by losing, does winning mean anything. Sisyphus can choose how he feels about the struggle. 01:23:22 – It’s very easy to keep reading books you already agree with, to avoid struggling with difficult feelings. When you read things that challenge your belief, feeling and challenging that discomfort is something necessary to do. Discriminating some races feels wrong while others not. 01:32:30 – “For the rest of men he knows himself to be the master of his days. At that subtle moment when man glances backward over his life. Sisyphus returning toward his rock in that slight pivoting he contemplates that series of unrelated actions, which become his fate, created by him combined under his memories eye and soon sealed by his death. Thus convinced of the holy human origin of all that is human, a blind man eager to see, who knows that the night has no end, he is still on the go, the rock is still rolling.” The book ends on a hopeful note, answers the question of suicide. Even though life may seem absurd, you can find meaning in the absurdity and the struggle. You can find your rock. 01:34:36 – Thank you to everyone supporting us on Patreon. We have some lovely bonus material to go with this episode. The first tier is $5, if you think we’re worth more than a fancy coffee we would love it if you supported the show. At that level you get the bonus material, notes for each episode, community area to talk about the show, Q&A. At the $10 tier you get to join at monthly one-hour hangout for a casual chat. We feel Patreon is a better model for the future than advertising. Check us out there or you can go to MadeYouThinkPodcast.com/Support - we’ve got our sponsors there. We’ve got a link through to Amazon you can bookmark, you can go to Kettle & Fire for their delicious Bone Broth - use code THINK for a discount at checkout. Go to Perfect Keto for their healthy supplements. Four Sigmatic for the great mushroom coffee and Cup and Leaf . You’ll get 20% off with code THINK. Also check out our Made You Think Tea Bundle. 01:41:46 – Keep telling people about the show. If you haven’t listened to the episode with Andrew Yang we’d love to hear what you think about the format. We also love getting book recommendations, let us know on Twitter. I’m @TheRealNeilS and I am @NatEliason Until next time, have a good one everyone. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com.

“Discovery requires serendipity but serendipity is not a chance event alone. It is a process in which a chance of event is seized upon by a creative person who chooses to pay attention to the event, unravel its mystery and find a proper application for it.” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss Happy Accidents by Morton A Meyers. In this book we look at the serendipity of so many scientific discoveries and the author suggests how we can foster these chance happenings to make giant leaps in research and discovery. “Penetrating intelligence, keen perception, and sound judgment — is essential to serendipity. The men and women who seized on lucky accidents that happened to them were anything but mindless. In fact, their minds typically had special qualities that enabled them to break out of established paradigms.” We cover a wide range of topics, including: Penicillin, Petri Dishes and Moldy Mary The impact of freedom on research Tangents on Private Schools, Social Media & Conspiracy Theories Modern Diets, Drugs and Toxins turned into cures Self experimentation, Ostracism and changing Medical opinions A possible special kayaking retreat for supporters And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Happy Accidents by Morton A Meyers! You can also listen on Google Play Music, SoundCloud, YouTube, or in any other podcasting app by searching “Made You Think.” If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episodes on Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb where he shares other stories of scientists trying treatments firsthand, and Merchants of Doubt by Naomi Oreskes and Erik Cornway for more on controversial science, academia and Pharma companies. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Bottom Up Methodology [01:31] Scientific Method [1:48] Penicillin [05:27] LSD Discovery [05:48] Contact High [06:01] Dogmatic [06:19] Petri dishes [08:01] Lifehacker [08:47] The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas S. Kuhn [9:31] Narrative Fallacy [16:17] Fleming Nobel Prize Speech [17:38] Peoria, Illinois [26:03] Corn Steep Liquor [26:09] Merck [26:48] Squibb [26:48] Pfizer [26:48] World War I [27:42] Aquatic Apes [29:04] Sippy Diet [30:27] Tetracycline Antibiotic [31:47] Acid Inhibitors [34:14] Statins [34:36] Carbohydrates [36:16] LDL [36:20] LDL receptors [36:33] Viagra [38:26] Asbestos [39:46] Facebook Groups [42:14] Discord Groups [42:15] Carnivore Diet [42:49] Shake Shack [44:04] M&M’s [44:07] Purina Dog Food [46:08] Stats of College Debt – Tweet [46:32] CMU [52:40] Choate School [53:45] Sidwell Friends [54:23] Boarding Schools [54:34] Alkylating Agents [57:15] Geneva Convention [58:08] Patreon [01:02:08] Google Trends on episode 35 [1:02:00] Epidemics [01:02:27] SARS [01:02:54] Influenza [01:02:56] Syphilis [01:03:22] Fish Aquarium Antibiotics [01:04:53] FDA [01:07:51] Nazi Testing [01:08:04] Japanese testing on Chinese prisoners [01:08:08] Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male [01:08:19] Eugenics [01:10:18] Darwinism [01:10:31] (related podcast) Russian Gulag [01:11:38] Thalidomide [01:11:52] Diethyl Glycol [01:12:59] Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act [01:13:10] Accutane [01:15:06] Doxycycline [01:16:26] Microbiome [01:16:52] Eczema [01:17:43] Steroids [01:17:36] Spartan Race [01:20:09] Nat’s Instagram [01:20:15] Blockchain [01:21:06] X-Rays [01:22:29] Morphine [01:23:51] American Urological Association [01:24:48] CVS patient statistics for Viagra [01:29:42] Netflix [01:31:18] Spleen [01:32:47] Confirmation bias [01:34:43] Ego death [01:39:38] Dissociative experience [01:39:40] Magic mushrooms [01:40:02] LSD Therapeutic Research Study [01:41:03] NASA [01:46:22] Direct to Consumer Drug Advertising [01:46:29] ADD [01:47:41] Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder [01:47:58] Prozac / Seraphim [01:48:09] Paxil [01:48:18] Female Sexual Dysfunction [01:48:24] Lipitor [01:48:57] Zoloft [01:49:16] UBI [01:53:07] Ethereum [01:59:48] Books mentioned Happy Accidents by Morton A Meyers Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch [00:42] (book episode) The War on Normal People by Andrew Yang [00:51] (book episode) Antifragile by Nassim Taleb [07:02] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas S. Kuhn [9:31] Boron Letters by Gary C. Halbert [14:44] Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [30:00] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Merchants of Doubt by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway [01:02:02]] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Merchants of Doubt by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway [01:02:02] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [01:02:36] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Words that Work by Frank Luntz [01:28:24] LSD My Problem Child by Albert Hofmann [01:40:51] Brave New World by Aldous Huxley [01:48:46] People mentioned Morton A Meyers David Deutsch [00:42] (Beginning of Infinity episode) Andrew Yang [00:51] (The War on Normal People episode) Winston Churchill [05:04] Alexander Fleming [05:29] Nassim Taleb [07:02] (Antifragile episode) (Skin in the Game episode) Thomas Kuhn [09:21] Peter Thiel [10:12] Gary C. Halbert [14:44] Charles Darwin [18:39] (Daniel Dennett’s book) Ernst B Chain [22:31] Moldy Mary [25:56] Barry Marshall [31:07] Robert Koch [32:10] Bill Clinton [01:00:32] George W Bush [01:01:18] Erik M. Conway [01:02:02] Yuval Harari [01:02:45] (Homo Deus episode) (Sapiens part I and part II) FDR [01:13:08] Claude Bernard [01:22:24] Frank Luntz [01:28:24] John William Gofman [1:31:35] President Eisenhower [01:34:48] Timothy Leary [01:40:28] Albert Hofmann [01:40:51] Steve Jobs [01:41:00] Louis Pasteur [01:45:32] Aldous Huxley [01:48:46] Show Topics 00:26 – The book is fun to read, light, enjoyable, easy going. An exploration of scientific discovery and progress and how consistently it is influenced and driven by the role of Serendipity. A case opposite or complementary to the Scientific Method. Serendipity defined as a combination of accidents and sagacity. 05:05 – Not all discoveries are immediately realized or understood. Winston Churchill – “Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened”. Penicillin and LSD examples. The dangers of being dogmatic without leaving room for the unexpected. 06:53 – Central theme of the book–How do you foster that serendipitous mindset? Nassim Taleb says that serendipity comes from chance encounters, like a cocktail party. The potential gain from a chance encounter is worth the effort of stepping outside your comfort zone. 07:42 – Trying to harness serendipity for your own benefit. Serendipity through disorder and randomness. Investigating how scientists can foster serendipity in their lab work and how academia and education and research grants, peer review could change because of that. 09:41 – Normal vs revolutionary science, Meyers is dismissive of puzzle solving. Normal science is making incremental improvements on existing knowledge, whereas serendipity fosters revolutionary discoveries as they come from a change in the ordinary methods. 10:51 – Two stages to serendipity. You need something unusual to happen and you have to recognize it to take advantage of it too. 11:21 – Innovation departments rarely come up with paradigm-shifting ideas and products. Need a certain mindset to make the most of these opportunities. Reason, intuition and imagination. Too much experience in a field can cloud your judgement on new ideas. 13:51 – The book is primarily about serendipity in medicine and science but it can be applied to most fields. Breaking out of the norm and finding inspiration for innovation in other industries. Looking at magazines to apply to blog copywriting. 15:33 – "Analogical thinking has certainly been a cornerstone of science." Another theme in the book is looking for one thing but ending up on a totally different path. All of the people making discoveries seemed to have a level of independence in their research to follow a new path when it interests them. The narrative fallacy involved in serendipitous scientific discovery or startups growth. 17:40 – Alexander Fleming and discovery of Penicillin as anti-bacterial.  Fleming said that if he was working on a research team at the time it would have been ignored as it wasn’t what he was working on. Being free allows you to pursue these anomalies. 19:04 – Darwin and the finches in the Galapagos. Being told to go and study something brings different results than if you’re free to follow your own curiosity. The constraints of research impose harmful limits on discoveries. 19:54 – Structure of the book is Introduction of the premise, 30+ chapters of examples and the conclusion. Myers suggests at the end of the book that the structure for scientific research and funding is counter to the ability for these serendipitous events to happen. 20:50 – More on Fleming and Penicillin. Odds of it happening were astronomically low. He was away for two weeks and on returning and viewing his petri dishes on his desk discovered an anti-bacterial zone around the mold. It wasn’t until 7 years later that another researcher realized what he had found. 23:09 – For Fleming it took a number of environmental factors that allowed Penicillin to be discovered at all: heat, location, time. Penicillin wasn’t originally pitched as a drug, originally suggested as a way to isolate bacterial colonies. Then there was the huge scale up and production process of the drug. Peoria (IL), the role of corn syrup, and the mold discovered by chance. 29:00 – Bonus Material Discussion, Aquatic Apes, Patreon, future episode ideas. 29:52 – Causes of ulcers, used to be thought of as stress and spicy food. Discovery that it is caused by bacteria in 1981. Marshall ran an experiment on himself to take the bacteria, give himself ulcers and cure himself with antibiotics. Pharmaceutical industry had a strong incentive to not prove this as the cause, current drugs of acid inhibitors were reaching sales of $6 Billion dollars in 1992. 35:04 – Pharma companies lobbying to decrease acceptable cholesterol ranges to induce more people into treatments. Changing opinions of statins within last 10 years. Effects of low cholesterol on longevity, links to all-cause mortality. Reducing cholesterol and precursors to creating testosterone in diet has lead to a reduction in testosterone and erectile dysfunction requiring a need for Viagra. 39:59 – What are we currently doing in society now that we will look back on and question in the future? Possible future problems associated with over consumption of social media. Mental and physical health complaints are unknown. 41:53 – Pull away in society from open sharing, moving towards private communities. Effectiveness of diets, feeling good vs having long term health benefits. Benefits of adopting a new diet may be equal to reducing other harmful choices – like stopping drinking for a month. The changing conventions of meal-times, quality of dog food, college debt. 47:12 – Tangent. Education and the need to change the K through 12 program instead of starting with College reform. The benefits of private vs public school. Mixing with different socioeconomic backgrounds, expense of private school. Both build very different sets of social and academic skills. Bay Area dystopia, where citizens pay lots in taxes that go into public schools, but parents end choosing private ones. 55:53 – Chemical weapons, World Wars and the changing use of toxins into cures. Bombing a ship leading to the first chemo treatments for cancer. North Korea and the development of nuclear tech (more info in the Bonus material). Google health trends being able to predict health outbreaks based on search volume. Sex hormones and noticing the change of tumors in animals after castration. 01:07:55 – Consequences of controversial testing on wartime prisoners that have given us useful data. Study of African-American men with syphilis, they were told they were having free medical treatment but they were mislead and were being studied for the untreated effects of syphilis over 40 years. Possibilities of current testing on prisoners or other conspiracies. 01:11:52 – History of Thalidomide being marketed as a sedative and pain management. Widely distributed before it was realized it had the side effect of severely inhibiting fetal development. U.S avoided this because the FDA already setup due to a drug being administered alongside Diethyl Glycol which was toxic, killing over 100 children. Testing required before products could be marketed. Thalidomide now used as an anti-cancer drug as it inhibits new blood vessel growth. 01:15:05 – Acne treatments and the imbalanced side-effects on fertility. Use of cleanser on the face strips natural oils. Use of antibiotics for acne which causes destruction of the microbiome. Latex gloves that may transmit more bacteria than your hands. Effects of steroids and keto on curing eczema. Nat not using shampoo even after a Spartan race. Body naturally cleansing. 01:21:06 – Tangents, aquatic apes, blockchain, negative reviews. 01:21:59 – Heart chapter and testing of catheterization. Self-experimentation and the need to prove theories. Ostracism and dangerous procedures. 01:24:44 – Viagra, originally for treating angina, it was found that this medication increased blood flow and became a cure for impotence – renamed to erectile dysfunction. Self-experimentation on erectile dysfunction. "The annual scientific meeting of the American Urologic Association is usually a pretty staid Affair but one meeting has entered the annals of folklore in the early 1980s. During the course of his lecture on the effectiveness of injecting substances directly into the penis to increase blood flow one urologist announced that he had performed such injections on himself only an hour earlier. Stepping from behind the lectern and he dropped his trousers and proudly demonstrated to the audience his own erect manhood. Urologists who attended this meeting still shake their heads at the memory." 01:28:00 – The power of names and the words used, like pro-life and pro-choice. How you phrase something changes the impact. Pharmaceuticals changing the names of conditions to promote sales of new drugs. Sales of Viagra were $780 Million in the first 9 months of 1998. 01:30:02 – 1% of women take Viagra to increase arousal and sensation and orgasm strength. Netflix’s biggest competitor is sleep, Viagra’s biggest competitor is death. 01:31:48 – Cholesterol testing on rabbits. Cholesterol data seems outdated with the book being 11 years old. Comparison of Chinese soldiers and lifestyle and diet. Lack of nutrition education in Doctors, mostly educated by pharmaceutical companies. People seem to want to take a pill rather than change their lifestyle or diet and doctors have lack of trust in the patient that they will try to improve their own situation. 01:38:07 – Psychiatric stuff. Hoffman discovering LSD by accidentally pouring it over his skin. LSD microdosing experiences. 01:42:40 – Tangents on kayaking, LSD microdosing and the Made You Think – Patreon $1000 Tier. 01:43:06 – Conclusion. Modern sciences are antithetical to the process of serendipity and how our institutions penalize our ability to take advantage of it. Government contracts and grants impose constraints. If you're getting money to research a specific topic you will be disincentivized from exploring things that deviates. If you're a free agent, then you can run down those rabbit holes. 01:44:31 – Peer reviews. Most businesses are judged by their customers but academia is judged solely by their peers. Ostracism as a consequence of investigating fringe theories. Direct to consumer advertising for drugs. Diseases and disorders that seems to be created and renamed just to increase drug sales. Long terms effects of drugs. 01:52:19 – On Patreon you get all kinds of goodies. Bonus materials, detailed notes for each episode and book highlights. You get a space to discuss the show with both of us. You can also join for our monthly live Hangouts. If you join the $1000 a month tier you can join us for a major excursion – Made You Trip! 01:54:57 – Patreon is a great way to support the show and let us keep doing this ad free. So we don't have to break up the episode with ads and we keep rolling with the tangents. 01:55:48 – Leave a review on iTunes that is super helpful for us because we show up as a recommended podcast and also is a great way for us to book guests. Other ways to support the show, you can go MadeYouThinkPodcast.com/support and tell your friends. 01:57:58 – If you want to talk to us, you can talk to us on Twitter anytime. I'm @TheRealNeilS and I am @NatEliason. If you're shopping on Amazon click through on our link. We super appreciate that.  All right, we will see everyone next week. See you guys next time. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

“That's really one of the most powerful things about Universal Basic Income. You start to believe in a sense of abundance and possibility.” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat speak to Andrew Yang, the author of The War on Normal People, a follow up to our previous book episode. Today we are discussing the possibility of Universal Basic Income for all. “The bigger people think, the more they wake up. We can make this real together.” We cover a wide range of topics, including : Objections and barriers to adopting UBI The cost of UBI and if can we afford it Video games vs the real world Social Credit Systems and Basic Jobs VAT and economic migration Trump and running for president in 2020 And much more. Please enjoy this interview with the author of The War on Normal People by Andrew Yang. You can also listen on Google Play Music, SoundCloud, YouTube, or in any other podcasting app by searching “Made You Think.” If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson and our episode on Emergency by Neil Strauss for related topics discussed in today’s show. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Universal Basic Income [00:30] Roosevelt Institute [04:02] VAT [06:16] Freedom Dividend [07:49] Twitch [10:00] Social Credits [13:24] World of Warcraft [13:50] Pink Collar Jobs [11:19] Blockchain [16:45] (Crypto episode) Ypsilanti, Michigan [18:15] Yang Ventures [18:18] Mynt  [18:31] UBI Pilots [18:59] Solyndra [20:18] The Hamptons [34:32] Enlightened Self-Interest [34:38] Allegiance [30:36] Scrooge McDuck [39:48] Reddit Andrew Yang AMA [43:35] State of the Union Address [43:47] Yang2020.com [47:23] One For Humanity [48:14] Cryptocurrency [54:09] (Crypto episode) Joe Rogan Podcast [59:40] Tim Ferriss Podcast [59:41] Vocal fry [01:01:59] Books Mentioned The War on Normal People by Andrew Yang [00:17] (book episode) Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [07:10] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson [35:20] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Emergency by Neil Strauss [38:08] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Raising the Floor by Andy Stern [47:44] Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [52:02] (Nat’s Notes) (Neil’s Notes) (book episode) Sapiens by Yuval Harari [53:22] (Nat’s Notes) (part 1, part 2) Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch [01:00:40] (book episode) College Dropout by Kanye West [01:00:56] (book episode) People Mentioned Andrew Yang Yuval Harari [07:06] Sam Altman [19:09] Chris Hughes [19:10] Cory Booker [25:11] Jeff Bezos [32:04] Donald Trump [40:43] Barack Obama [41:50] Bernie Sanders [41:47] Chris Rock [42:31] George Bush [42:34] Jesus Christ [42:41] Kanye West [1:03:24] Questions Asked 01:01 – What are the main challenges and objections to UBI? 01:36 – Are any of these objections compelling? 05:04 – Isn’t UBI just cycling money from the top consumers to those that are below $120k a year in spending? 08:18 – Do you see any differing objections between liberals and conservatives to UBI? 09:24 – Do you think there will be a portion of society that replaces work with video games and do you see a growth in the gaming industry because of UBI? 14:40 – How would we implement the social credits app in cities for real? 17:33 – Does it have to be the government that starts a social credit initiative? 20:35 – If you were elected, how are you viewing the idea battleground? 21:10 – How do you get past the inertia to convince people UBI is necessary? 25:00 – How do you feel about basic jobs? 26:40 – What makes the basic jobs idea attractive to other candidates and some voters? 29:15 – Is making the majority of the population reliant on a government subsidy making it easier for a totalitarian president to take control after you? 30:58 – You said in the book we are moving to a winner-take-all economy in a variety of fields, where you have a handful of companies controlling Government policy. Do you see a future where that is possible and how do you stop that? 35:20 – Have you read Sovereign Individual? 35:32 – In Sovereign Individual there is an idea that as wealth disparity grows, eventually the elite will separate themselves from the rest of the population. Do you see any concern for that? 38:54 – Will we see countries trying to attract citizens to move and will VAT be a factor in that? 39:59 – How bad would it have to be before more people left? What’s the threshold? 41:24 – Do you think that Trump getting elected is helpful to someone who’s not a career politician, helping them get elected in 2020? 45:40 – Has communicating a very statistics and quantitative approach been a struggle for you when speaking to audiences? So much of politics is about the emotional appearance. How have you adapted to that? 54:09 – Extra Question that we didn’t get to ask - Would adoption of a VAT accelerate a crypto economy and how does that change the estimates of how we would pay for UBI? Show Topics 1:11 – The main objections to UBI are : How can we afford it? Will it turn people into less happy, lazy wastrels? Won’t it cause mass inflation? 1:44 – Universal Basic Income is affordable but we’ve poorly managed budgets in the past and there is stigma around hoarding money. We need to believe in sense of abundance and possibility. Culture and mental barriers and block around hoarding money. 3:28 – Cost of UBI in the US would cost $2 Trillion. It would be $1000 per month given to each person, we call it the Freedom Dividend. It would cause economy growth due to increased taxes and spending. 4:27 – Benefits of UBI. We would get more out than we put in. It reduces health issues, crime and has many secondary benefits to putting the money into the hands of the people. 05:57 – How the money would be spent. The wealthy vs the majority. VAT taking from those who spend the most and given to the bottom 80%. Money sitting in bank accounts causes a stagnant economy. 07:27 – Basic Income as both appealing Liberals and Conservatives. Most people seem to think it is impossible, shows decline of society and lack of faith in democracy. 10:21 – Video games and the growth of the eSports economy. Parents as an early form of UBI for large groups of young people. Will additional income cause people to withdraw into games more or will it allow them to participate in real life more? 11:03 – Lack of appealing opportunities for men in the real world. The digital world as the cheapest form of entertainment, more money equals more options and less time spent in the digital world. 12:05 – Games used as a sense of accomplishment and emotional highs, which can wear off over time. UBI will give opportunities at a time when people are looking for something new. 13:24 – Social credits as a socially constructive gamification of the real world. Gaming impulse transferred into the real world and other outlets. Current philanthropic trials are small by comparison and Government could apply resources. 20:02 – Yang’s plans as president. Government currently too risk averse. Electing a president with UBI as a main objective would be a huge step towards it. Congress people would have to listen to their constituents. 24:08 – Nothing is as effective as cash to people when talking about control of programs. People losing faith in government programs. Basic jobs as a bad idea, no long term value in unproductive work as more jobs get automated. Unproductive jobs lead to unhappy people. Instead find out what work is inside of each person. The idea of Basic jobs doesn’t value people. Valuing people as stakeholders and not serves. 30:10 – People heading towards reliance on the government. UBI as better way, gives people a higher-level of integrity and self-determination. Any government change to UBI would cause riots and is still a powerful check on the government. Doing nothing will lead to bloodshed and revolution. Antitrust laws and harm to consumers. 32:38 – Defining human success independent of economic or monetary measures. Wealth getting concentrated in ever smaller pools is bad for all businesses. Riots in America looking more likely, how can we prevent that instead of waiting. 37:54 – Enlightened self-interest and lifting others up. Renouncing citizenship for tax reasons. Ad campaigns trying to encourage economic migration. VAT not a powerful factor. 40:17 – Lack of entrepreneurial migrants. Electing Andrew Yang would be a compelling message to immigrants. The opposite of Donald Trump is an Asian guy that likes facts and figures. Clear message through recent politics, people are desperate for change. 44:54 – Using Universal Based Income as a lever to address a crisis. The road to the 2020 election. Challenge of evolving as a person over time. Humanity First and One For Humanity project. Reduction of labor as a central role, the rise of automation and an economy that values people first. 48:36 – Possibility of a follow-up episode. Listeners, send in any questions. Next time we could dive deeper on Venture For America and his other policies. Check out his site Yang2020.com. Follow Andrew on Twitter @AndrewYangVFA and @andrewyang2020 53:29 – Influences of Yuval Harari. Andrew’s perspective is super refreshing for a politician. Getting other authors on the podcast. 57:44 – If you’re enjoying this show we would love to see you over on our Patreon page. You get the bonus material, detailed book notes, all of our questions from interviews and upcoming books and the opportunity to join Neil and I on a live Q&A hangout. Patreon helps us to keep the show as we want it without ads interrupting the flow of the conversation. 01:01:22 – Keep telling your friends about the show, leave a review on iTunes. It helps us to show as up as a recommended podcast. We read all of them and we super appreciate it. If you want to support the podcast in another way you can go to MadeYouThinkPodcast.com/Support. We do have a bunch of products there that we use on a regular basis. If you click through or use the coupon code it does help support the show, I guess we should mention Amazon as well as listed on there and you can go do your normal shopping on Amazon doesn't cost you anything. 01:03:08 – The interview format is new for us so we’d love to know what you think. Send us an e-mail or tweet. On Twitter I’m @TheRealNeilS and I’m @NatEliason and we will talk to you there, see you all next week. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

"The normal American did not graduate from college and doesn't have an associate's degree. He or she perhaps attended college for one year or graduated from high school. She or he has a net worth of approximately $36,000, about $6,000 excluding home and vehicle equity and lives paycheck to paycheck. She or he has less than $500 in flexible savings and minimal assets invested in the stock market. These are median statistics with 50% of Americans below these levels” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss The War On Normal People By Andrew Yang. This book is a balanced and optimistic view on Universal Basic Income, the economic impact of the automation of jobs and our options for the future. "half of American households already rely on the government for direct income in some form." We cover a wide range of topics, including: Universal Basic Income and Government benefits Statistics on unemployment, labor and the changing workforce Technology, automation and robot dog walkers Centralization of certain jobs in certain cities Remote work, freelancers, the gig economy Taxes, Cryptocurrencies & Video Games Tangents on Fortnite, Rolex and ad revenue in sports And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of The War On Normal People By Andrew Yang. You can also listen on Google Play Music, SoundCloud, YouTube, or in any other podcasting app by searching “Made You Think.” If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Sovereign Individual for opposing views. Along with our episode on The Elephant In The Brain for more on human nature and the desire for success. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Waking Up Podcast [01:08] Universal Basic Income [02:48] Mass Shooters [04:43] Social Revolution [04:46] Median Statistics [05:33] Labor Participation Rate [06:22] Manufacturing States [12:33] Detroit Riots [13:11] W-2 [13:43] Retraining Programs [15:12] Technology Industrial Wave [15:43] Amazon Warehouses [17:17] Walmart [17:25] Paralegals [19:33] The Sims [23:02] Hive Mind [23:27] UpWork [32:56] Slack [36:40] Esports [37:00] Twitch [37:09] Extremistan [37:12] Mediocristan [37:14] Gig Economy [40:44] Rover [40:52] Wag [40:52] Twilight Zone [42:10] Flywheel effect [45:35] Lincoln University [47:24] Biggest question Nat had have from reading @AndrewYangVFA's UBI book (on Twitter) [55:00] Unlimited Brewing [55:55] The world’s top economy: the US vs China in five charts [57:50] Cryptocurrencies [01:05:50] (Crypto episode) TransferWise [01:09:05] Blockchain [01:09:26] Winner-takes-all effect [01:09:54] Patreon Bonus Material [01:12:19] Fortnite [01:17:46] Call of Duty [01:18:03] Mad Max [01:21:11] ISIS [01:21:17] Social Credits [01:22:48] Million Dollar Bill [01:22:48] Vietnamese Dong [01:23:51] Trump’s Tax Plan [01:27:20] Totalitarianism Article [1:31:45] Yang2020.com [01:31:58] The New Deal [1:32:38] The Great Depression [01:33:40] Obamacare [01:35:22] Selection Bias [01:39:03] Books mentioned The War On Normal People by Andrew Yang Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson [03:17] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Dreams From My Father by Barack Obama [01:12:47] Sapiens by Yuval Harari [01:18:47] (Nat’s Notes) (part 1) (part 2) Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [01:18:48] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [01:31:47] (Nat’s Notes) (Neil’s Notes) (book episode) Elephant in the Brain by Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson [01:38:43] (book episode) People mentioned Andrew Yang Sam Harris [01:00] Winston Churchill [04:25] Nassim Nicholas Taleb [37:06] (Antifragile episode) (Skin in the Game episode) Donald Trump [01:03:10] Barack Obama [01:12:12] Youval Harari [01:19:04] Robin Hanson [01:38:05] Show Topics 01:42 – The book feels optimistic and fairly balanced and offers Universal Basic Income as a good solution to our current situation. Andrew sets the stage well with the magnitude of the problem. 03:04 – We have both come from a place of not thinking UBI was a good solution and our views have been changed several times on this, since reading Sovereign Individual and now this. 04:19 – It feels like this could the best of the option that we currently have if we want to maintain this current system and avoid social revolution. 05:10 – Yang starts the book off by emphasizing the scale of the problem using median statistics or labor participation rate, unemployment rate and number of disability claimants. 06:30 – There is a massive number of people who are working age but are no longer looking for work. This is not evident when viewing the unemployment rate as they are discounted. However the labor participation rate is 63% which is lower that all other industrialized economies. 06:58 – One in three people have left the job market entirely. They have self-selected to no longer participate in the search for work and are not counted as unemployed. 08:09 – "half of American households already rely on the government for direct income in some form.". The majority of these are on disability for muscular tissue issues, mood disorders, anxiety or depression. 09:09 – There is a whole industry of lawyers who help people get onto disability who then take a cut of the back dated payments. 10:26 – Similarities between the level of disability payments and the proposition of UBI. However with disability payments, you are dis-incentivized from trying to find work as payments would stop. This causes a large number of people to stay on disability for longer and find untraceable ways of earning additional income. 11:10 – Yang says that 94% of all jobs created within the last 10 years were temporary contractor jobs with no benefits. People are not going to risk their $12,000 disability payment for a job at $7 per hour. 11:35 – Disability has less than 1% churn rate, very few people get off it. It’s like the anti-SaaS startup. 11:59 – Increases in disability payments correlate to the areas with the biggest job losses. Highest in the old manufacturing states. Does the government recognize that these payments are just another type of welfare for those that have lost their jobs? 12:31 – In Michigan of the 310,000 who left the workforce between 2003 and 2013 half went on to take disability payments. They don’t have any other options available. 13:29 – The Government doesn’t seem to actively fight benefit fraud with more people joining but few leaving. Missing of checks to see who is health is improving enough to move back into work. 14:29 – Inefficiencies of job retraining programs and the lack of transferable skills between old industries losing jobs and new (mostly technical) industries with jobs available. "The test is not 'Will there be new jobs we haven't predicted yet that appear?' Of course there will be. The real test is 'Will there be millions of new jobs for middle-aged people with low skills and levels of education near the places they currently reside'. And the answer to that seems almost certainly no." 15:44 – In previous industrial waves people have been able to adapt due to similarities of skill. Automation is now removing low skilled jobs entirely. Automation in car factories, Amazon warehouses. 18:30 – Automation isn’t solely for low skilled, Blue Collar jobs. Anything repetitive and routine can be automated. This will impact White Collar workers too. “Routine jobs of all stripes are those most under threat from AI and Automation and in time more categories of jobs will be affected.” 19:21 – Automation in law, research and reduction in personnel. Repetition as a tool for learning. Loss of high-level expertise as no-one has the foundational knowledge that comes from early repetition. 20:42 – Tangent. A Science Fiction story to make you think! In a distant future, expertise on computers has been lost and no one knows how to resolve a computer bug. A future where humans are reliant on computers to retain the knowledge for them. 22:42 – Computers no longer needing humans. The Sims, the hive mind of the Internet. Memes, Russian hackers, and Wikipedia created by AI destroying humanity. 25:19 – Assumptions of UBI imply an increase of entrepreneurship. What happens when you pay people to not work? Current level of cash wealth for the average American is $500. The expense of Healthcare means that one ER visit can put people into long term financial difficulty. Defaulted medical bills are then just another form of welfare. 27:50 – Median salary in the US is $31,000. Cost of living in New York and San Francisco. Impact cost of living has on average job wages. Manhattan vs Brooklyn. 32:14 – The author criticizes the idea that those that lose their job can just start working remotely. Those in the US can’t compete due to cost of living with locations like the Philippines and Sri Lanka. Tech skills required are also a barrier to entry. 36:10 – Professional eSports players and the popularity of Twitch and the platform reinforcing the popular streamers causes them to be more popular. Extremistan vs Mediocristan. 39:11 – Lack of service jobs, the rise of the gig economy, dog walking apps. Robot dogs and cyborg owners. 42:39 – Hyper-concentration of money and talent in 6 cities: Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York and Washington DC. Reinforcing loop effect. Venture Capital money and secondary cities that are on the rise. The effects of anchor companies in smaller cities. 50:01 – Potential to see an exodus of people moving away from high cost of living areas due to remote work. The increase of remote working technologies which helps team collaboration. 52:32 – Geography is destiny. Jobs disappear where society falls apart and the smartest leave first. Reduction in families relocating across state lines. 54:14 – The ‘useless’ class being subsidized by the 1%. Will this cause talent to leave on a international level? Yang says inertia, lower taxes, standard of Education keep people in the U.S. 55:40 – VAT, international transactions, selling to the UK from the US. Micro economies and city-states. China GDP. Impact of taxes in lower cost of living regions. 01:01:50 – Moving abroad, spending in different economies. Moving to Canada because of Trump. Tipping point for people leaving their state or country because of high tax levels. 01:05:41 – Tangent. Cryptocurrencies as an alternative to being taxed. Adoption of Bitcoin and untraceable payment systems. Exchange rates and paying freelancers. TransferWise, PayPal. UBI as being a better option than the status quo. 01:10:20 – Yang doesn’t present UBI as a perfect solution but it’s an option to divert us from the direction we are already headed in. 1:12:00 – If you want to hear Neil’s comments about Obama’s book, support us on Patreon and listen to the bonus material for this episode. 01:13:14 – The explosion in popularity of video games for unemployed men. The average playing time went from 3 hours per week to 8 hours per week in just a few years. 01:14:32 – E-sports, ad revenue, disposable income of an unemployed audience. Comparisons with NBA, NFL, tennis, golf and other sports. Sponsorships vs engagement of an audience. 01:16:35 – Power of in-app purchases, revenue making game mechanics. Popularity of Fortnite, going to $318MM in monthly revenue in just eight months. Comparisons with Call of Duty, game play and enjoyment. 01:18:55 – Harari's comments on the ‘useless’ class moving to VR as a stimulus. Swapping religion for video games. Lack of creative outlets and sense of reward in modern life. People turning to games for the feeling of progress and adventure. 01:20:31 – Implications of having unemployed young men roam the streets are a recipe for disaster. Preventing social unrest of large group of unemployed people by videogames. 01:21:35 – Lack of stimulation causes unwanted behaviors. People don’t always direct their energy in productive ways. Social credit apps, psychology of spending millions in other currencies. 01:24:07 – UBI as an economic stimulus, makes new businesses more viable. Additional disposable income. Decreasing customers causes decreasing investment. Spending on subscriptions like Netflix causes income to flow back to those already rich cities. 01:26:55 – Trump’s tax plan, government waste. UBI puts money in the hands of the individual and reduces government control. Appealing to both political sides - as a safety net and as a way for individuals to have more control. 01:29:52 – Welfare increasing risk of totalitarianism. Government and citizens in harmony - taxes in exchange for infrastructure and protection. Does reducing taxes reduce how much the government listens to the people? 01:31:36 – Andrew Yang is a presidential candidate for 2020 against Trump. Danger of using UBI as a re-election tactic. An issue so powerful could lead to a potential dictatorship. The Great Depression, introduction of Social Security. Congress, altruistic presidents and Obamacare. 01:35:47 – If you want to hear more about some of our thoughts related to the book get the bonus material for this episode at Patreon. We got to say it a lot of times to make sure everyone remembers what it is. Patreon.com/madeyouthink 01:38:03 – You can also leave a review for this show on iTunes. That is probably one of the best ways to support the show, that helps us show up as a recommended podcast. It makes us feel good. It'll make our mother's proud of us. Keep tweeting about it. We love hearing from you guys and getting your questions and your thoughts. 01:40:23 – You can check out some deals from our wonderful sponsors at MadeYouThinkPodcast.com/Support. That's where you can find the mushroom coffee, the Perfect Keto ketones the Kettle and Fire bone broth, the Cup and Leaf tea and also you can click through to Amazon. Buy anything there and that helps support the show as well. This is a topic we're definitely interested in so if there are articles, other books, videos definitely send them our way on Twitter. I’m @TheRealNeilS and I’m @NatEliason. See you guys next week. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

“Of every thousand dollars spent in so-called charity today, it is probable that $950 is unwisely spent, so spent indeed as to produce the very evils which it proposes to mitigate or cure.” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss The Gospel of Wealth by Andrew Carnegie. An essay written later in Carnegie’s life on his philosophy on using money, wealth (and the power that comes with it) well. While still very relevant today it goes against the idea that successful business people are bad people. It’s a model for how wealthy people should use their money for the good of the community. "The man who dies thus rich dies disgraced." We cover a wide range of topics, including: Billionaires through the ages Monopolies and antitrust laws Ways of disposing of wealth (including our Patreon page) Tangents on life expectancy, intergalactic travel and cyborg pets! Carnegie’s legacy of libraries, music halls and universities Using wealth to enrich the lives of others How to help others and effective altruism And so much more! Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of The Gospel of Wealth by Andrew Carnegie You can also listen on Google Play Music, SoundCloud, YouTube, or in any other podcasting app by searching “Made You Think.” If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on The Psychology of Human Misjudgements by Charlie Munger to uncover your mental biases and Skin In The Game by Nassim Taleb for more on responsibility and reciprocity. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we’re running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Carnegie’s Wealth [01:50] Richest People in History [01:58] Monopoly & Antitrust laws [02:55] Microsoft [03:24] Google [03:33] The Giving Pledge [04:58] Robber barons [06:08] GM [06:28] Amazon [06:45] Medicare [07:08] Income Tax [07:13] Hunter-Gatherer Tribes [07:41] Feudal Societies [07:49] Invention of the Telegram [08:05] History of the Railroad [08:08] Stratification [08:18] Mæcenas [08:44] Ghana [09:21] Garden of Eden [09:29] Socialist Societies [10:01] Subsistence Farming [10:19] Internet Explorer [11:33] Bing [11:35] Safari [11:38] Yahoo [11:39] Google Ventures [12:16] Alphabet Inc [12:22] Google AdWords [12:33] Justice Department [12:42] Carnegie Steel [13:00] AT&T [13:05] Market cap [14:20] Dell [14:25] Microsoft Windows [14:28] Microsoft Office [14:30] Skype for Business [14:32] Windows Phones [14:47] Microsoft Hardware [14:49] Facebook [14:54] Apple [15:16] iPhone [15:36] iMac G3 [16:55] Instagram [17:25] WhatsApp [17:26] Facebook Messenger [17:28] Growth Machine [19:13] WordPress [19:27] AmazonBasics [20:23] FBA [20:38] Costco [21:03] Bud Light [21:21] Super Bowl Ads [21:43] Kirkland Products [21:48] Absolut [22:00] Anheuser-Busch [22:35] Strand bookstore [24:19] Forest fire analogy [24:39] Economics [25:11] Mythology [25:19] Psychology [25:33] MadeYouThink Podcast Patreon [25:36] Bitcoin [28:35] Monarchy [30:29] Denial of Death [30:39] Darwinism [31:35] Evolution [31:37] Creationism [32:30] Dictatorship [34:27] Democracies [34:32] Russian Roulette [35:16] Athenian Democracy [35:28] Gmail [35:33] Hotmail [35:37] Social Security [35:37] Skin in the Game [35:55] Ponzi Scheme [37:09] Baby Boomers [37:14] Life Expectancy [37:28] Genetic Engineering [38:22] Stem Cells [39:24] Telomeres [39:26] Mars [40:06] Carnegie Library [41:49] Carnegie Mellon University [41:52] Carnegie's Daughter [43:30] Facebook Aquila Drone [46:01] SpaceX Satellites [46:03] Amazonian tribes [46:29] MIT Courses [46:36] Stanford’s Courses [46:38] DuoLingo [47:04] Reddit [47:26] Pornhub [47:36] Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation [49:16] Gates Centre [50:01] Steve Jobs Theatre [50:21] Effective Altruism [50:31] GiveDirectly [50:45] Kiva [51:51] Heifer International [52:24] Toms Shoes [53:23] Medium [56:34] Marshmallow Test [57:13] Power Posing [57:14] Stanford Prison Experiment [57:15] Smiling To Make You Happier [57:17] Inattentional Blindness [57:25] Relativity [59:34] Flat Earth Theory [59:51] Flat Earth Subreddit [01:00:05] Climate Change [01:00:37] Twitter [01:01:17] Ice Wall Theory [01:01:49] Strong man Argument [01:02:22] Sphinx [01:02:26] Aquatic Apes [01:02:41] Polynesian Islands [01:03:36] Intergalactic Travel [01:03:52] Milky Way [01:04:04] Hawaii [01:04:38] Jupiter Moons [01:06:03] Give a Man a Fish Quote [01:08:33] Compound Effect [01:09:05] Almsgiving [01:09:21] Cannibalism [01:10:28] Gun Control [01:12:01] (podcast episode) Books mentioned The Gospel of Wealth by Andrew Carnegie Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand [00:34] Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [04:38] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (Book Episode) Andrew Cargegie - A Biography by David Nassau [05:11] The Jungle by Upton Sinclair [25:33] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Denial of Death by Ernest Becker [30:39] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Fat Tail by Ian Bremmer [35:14] Godel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter [43:07] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch [59:07] (book episode) People mentioned Andrew Carnegie Rockefeller [01:58] J. P Morgan [01:59] Jeff Bezos [02:08] Mellon family [02:34] Vanderbilt family [02:38] Henry Frick [02:40] Paul Allen [3:25] Google Founders [03:33] Warren Buffett [04:56] Elon Musk [27:01] (Elon Musk episode) Socrates [27:15] Ron Paul [36:20] Bill Gates [49:10] Nassim Taleb [51:30] (Skin in the Game Episode) (Antifragile Episode) Charlie Munger [55:41] (The Psychology of Human Misjudgments Episode) Amy Cuddy [59:27] Kanye West [01:11:51] (The College Dropout Episode) Senator Stanford [01:13:03] Show Topics 00:14 – This episode has been planned since April, however other books and travel got in the way. So we pushed it on so we could record a good episode for us. Carnegie’s still here and relevant whenever we do the episode. 00:46 – Background on the book, written as an essay later in life. Covers his philosophy of wealth, based on his experience of getting more money and power as he got older. 01:25 – Historical context for the book, how the era it was written in was one of the first periods where it was possible to amass such wealth as an individual business man. 01:36 – Excess of money as a new problem to be solved. Posing the question - How do we use it well? 01:50 – Converting Carnegie’s wealth in today’s dollars and how far beyond current wealth it still is today. Comparing wealthy figures from the past like Rockefeller, Mellon, J.P Morgan and Vanderbilt with the likes of Jeff Bezos today. 02:55 – Monopoly laws, levels of wealth and disparity between the business owner and the second layer of workers within the company.  Microsoft, Google and their worth. 03:52 – Relevance of the advice Carnegie gives today. Going against the idea of super successful business people as inherently bad people. He says that people should be able to gain heights of success and then they can do good things with their wealth. 04:21 – Carnegie’s model of distributing wealth for good acts. He also followed these rules using his own money. This essay was a call to arms to voluntarily use wealth wisely. 04:56 – Warren Buffett and The Giving Pledge. Carnegie wanted to convince others but also rehabilitate his own image following strikes by his workers. Carnegie’s biography contained context to this essay. He originally saw himself as a self-made man however he realized that during the strikes at his own companies that he had lost his connection with the poor. 05:48 – He described the issues with amassing wealth as ‘the problem of his age’. First national corporations, the catalysts of the railroad creating a transformational era. 07:00 – Lack of social safety nets during Carnegie’s era which created freedom to build runaway success. Levels of wealth, tribal equality through poverty. 08:20 – He poses the question - is inequality a bad thing? Or are we all better off today? Irregularity of income is better than universal squalor. Garden of Eden concept. "The good old times, were not good old times. Neither master nor servant was as well situated then as today." 10:49 – Acceptable levels of inequality. Monopolies in technology today, Google, Yahoo, AT&T and the dismantling of corporations. Antitrust lawsuits impacting on the innovation of Microsoft. Apple, iPhones and the ‘non-corporate’ design of their devices. Breaking up Google and Facebook in smaller companies. 17:34 – Competition in business and the improvements it brings. Lowering prices caused by competition. Amazon as hyper-efficient. Removing bloat from traditional businesses. Costco and their own brand product range passing cost benefits on to the consumer. 24:04 – Revival of independent bookstores, clearing the playing field for those that can deliver true value. Competition forest-fire analogy. Podcast themes and common topics. 25:36 – Join our Patreon to get book notes, bonus audio, upcoming book info. 26:19 – Ways of administering wealth when it’s in the hands of the few. Three modes - Inheritance, Government or use it yourself. Bad impact on society when generational wealth is handed down or wasted when given to government. 31:30 – Darwinism, Evolution. Financial competence of government officials. Dictatorships vs democracies. 35:46 – Tangent. Opting out of social security, skin in the game problem. Young vs Old and who benefits most. Biological limiters for aging, extension of life expectancy. Intergalactic space travel and cyborg Pepper. 40:52 – Lump sums of money making the most difference. Small monetary gains don’t change the individual but collectively that could benefit the community. Libraries and universities as great uses for wealth. Books as a way of speaking to great people throughout history. 43:30 – Carnegie family and descendants. Priorities in wealth building. Unostentatious living followed by surplus revenues given to the community. By building wealth you are better placed to distribute it wisely. 45:29 – Modern community benefits, Internet access as equivalent to libraries. University education as accessible knowledge. Language learning simplified by technology. Impact on exposing tribes to technology. 49:10 – Bill Gates, philanthropy as a legacy. Effective altruism. Charity organizations and the second order effects of disrupting economies. 56:13 – Book on second-order effect follies. Medium blog posts, psychological fallacies. Gorilla tests and inattentional blindness. 59:51 – Flat earth theory, getting angry on the Internet. Climate change denial, ice wall theory. Strongman arguments. 01:02:26 – Sphinx, aquatic ape theory, Polynesian Islands and travel within our galaxy. Communication and sustaining life in space. 01:07:53 – Carnegie suggested that the goal of being wealthy should be to enrich the lives of others. Helping those that help themselves first. Compound effect of aiding those who are motivated to improve. Dangers of charity. "Neither the individual nor the race is improved by almsgiving those worthy of assistance except in rare cases seldom require assistance." 01:09:56 – How to help those that won’t help themselves? Tune in next week! Nat the cannibal. Kanye West episode, positive role models in society. 01:12:27 – Dying rich means dying disgraced. Wealth is like a trust fund that should be used for the betterment of society. 01:14:01 – So if you enjoyed this episode, definitely check us out on Patreon. It's a good way to use your wealth. It gets you access to discussions for these episodes, the book notes, show notes, what is coming up and any bonus material we record before or after the episode. Leave us a review on iTunes that just helps more people find the show. Tweet us, we love hearing from you guys. I'm @NatEliason and I'm @TheRealNeilS. Send book recommendations, what you think about the show, feedback. 01:17:31 – You can always also go to MadeYouThinkPodcast.com/support. We've got some show supporting sponsors there that'll give you discounts that give us a little kick back at no cost to you. We will see you all next week where we will continue some of the themes that we discussed today. Join Patreon if you want to know what that is ahead of time so you can read the book before then. Cheers everyone. See you next time. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

“It is inevitable that we face problems but no particular problem is inevitable we survive and thrive by solving each problem as it comes up, and since the human ability to transform nature is limited only by the laws of physics none of the endless stream of problems will ever constitute an impassable barrier” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch. It’s a playful, meandering book on explanations that transform the world, covering evolution, physics, philosophy, politics, ecology, money, memetics, epistemology, history. It ties everything to the central idea that with enough knowledge anything possible, is achievable. “Every putative physical transformation to be performed in a given time with given resources or under any other conditions is either impossible because it is forbidden by the laws of nature or achievable given the right knowledge.” We cover a wide range of topics, including: Wrapping our brains around the concepts of advanced topics like infinity Thinking of problems as a gap in our knowledge that can be solved The repeating cycle of problem > solution > new problem Tangents on Aquatic Apes, Egyptology and Sphinxes Universality of systems Optimistic vs Pessimistic view points And so much more! Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Godel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter for a similar kind of book covering a wide range of topics. Also our episode on Leverage Points by Donella Meadows for how we should approach complex systems. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we’re running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Lindy Effect [3:20] Multiverse Concept [5:03] Quantum Entanglement [5:05] Theory of relativity [5:13] Infinity [5:25] Cholera [8:17] Empiricism [11:38] Fallibilism [15:02] The Mediocrity Principle [18:50] Anthropocentrism [19:00] Geocentrism [19:38] Garden of Eden [20:35] Rare Earth Hypothesis [20:40] Anthropomorphism [22:20] Quantum Theory [26:22] Aquatic Apes [30:43] Darwin’s Dangerous Idea [31:32] Confirmation Bias [31:50] Universality [33:22] Roman Numerals [33:30] Hieroglyphics [35:42] Reductionism [39:50] Lady Lovelace’s Objection [42:00] Chinese Room [48:00] Turing Test [48:02] DARPA [48:15] Netflix - Eddie Murphy Shows [50:55] Chris Rock - Controversial stand up [51:25] Chris Rock - Gun Control stand up [51:50] AlphaGo [52:43] MadeYouThink Podcast - Patreon Support [54:10] Death of the Universe [56:10] DMT [59:30] Neuralink [59:47] Neural lace [59:48] Malthus [1:01:04] X Prize [1:07:50] The Jungle - Characters [1:08:35] Sphinx [1:10:17] Joe Rogan Experience Podcast - Sphinx Episode [1:10:17] Semmelweis Reflex [1:15:30] Kevin Simler - Crony Belief [1:20:25] The China Study [1:23:30] Dos Toros [1:27:05] Toms Shoes [1:28:52] Postmodernism [1:29:30] XKCD Comic - Purity of Fields [1:34:01] Books mentioned The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas R. Hofstadter [1:22] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Jungle by Upton Sinclair [3:36] (Nat’s notes) Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand [3:39] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennett [3:56] (book episode) The Denial of Death [8:55] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Rational Optimist by Matt Ridley [9:44] I Am A Strange Loop - Douglas Hofstadter [17:20] (Podcast Episode) Rare Earth by Donald Brownlee [20:25] Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [24:23] (Nat’s notes) (book episode part 1 & part 2) The Secret by Rhonda Byrne [25:56] The Nicomachean Ethics by Aristotle [39:40] Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [41:55] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [43:45] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Elephant in the Brain by Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson [43:50] The Jungle by Upton Sinclair [1:08:41] (Nat’s notes) Leverage Points by Donella Meadows [1:29:20] (article episode) Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault [1:30:10] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Merchants of Doubt by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway [1:33:05] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins [1:45:40] People mentioned David Deutsch Daniel Dennett [1:45] (Darwin’s episode) Flatgeologist [3:00] Nassim Nicholas Taleb [2:50] (Antifragile episode) (Skin in the Game episode) Seneca [8:40] Matt Ridley [9:33] Nicolas Cage [13:43] Socrates [16:55] [1:09:00] Hermes [16:56] Jordan Peterson [21:29] Richard Dawkins [23:35] John Haldane [23:36] Freud [40:55] Plato [1:10:00] Dan Carlin [1:43:30] Show Topics 2:47 – In this book the author, David Deutsch, calls out some of the other authors that we have covered on the podcast before. He calls out Nassim Taleb on some of his ideas, which is something we almost hold sacred on this podcast. This book made us change the way we think about some of these things. 5:03 – Diving into advanced concepts like multiverse, quantum entanglement, relativity and infinity. You have to take your time to wrap your head around this. Our minds are not used to grasping these concepts. Explaining what’s the highest number to a kid. 7:00 – In the introduction the author says “all progress both theoretical and practical has resulted from a single human activity, the quest for what I call good explanations”. Everything is possible if it is not prohibited by the laws of physics. 8:10 – Deutsch uses the example of disease and cholera. People dying of diarrhea when they were right next to a fire and could have boiled their water. The problem was actually a problem of knowledge. A lot of problems we have today are the same and given the right amount of knowledge, can be solved. 8:55 – All other books that we have looked at, Seneca, Taleb and even the book Denial of Death. They all are predicated on the idea that we all will die. Deutsch says most likely yes we will die, but it doesn’t mean it’s not possible to solve. He isn’t saying there is one solution but there maybe solutions to each of the discrete problems - accidents, cancer etc, they are all problems waiting for the right knowledge to be able to solve them. 10:40 – Wealth as a society was another thing he called out in this book, as a species having the resources as well as the knowledge. Even if you had given cavemen the knowledge of how to build a plane, they don’t yet have the resources to get the metals out of the ground and shape the parts needed. Progress is a factor of both knowledge and wealth. 11:25 – He starts the book off in the intro with his refutation of empiricism, where we gain knowledge by experiencing things then learning from them. He makes this good distinction: “Experience is indeed essential to science but its role is different from that supposed by empiricism, it is not the source from which theories are derived its main use is to choose between theories that have already been guessed”. You really can’t learn from experience unless you have some guess about what should happen. You need to have conjecture or a hypothesis before you can actually test something. You’re trying to figure out what the truth might be. Startups “finding” insights in Big Data without an hypothesis to test. 15:00 – “Fallabilsts expect even their best and even most fundamental explanations to contain misconceptions in addition to truth and so they are predisposed to try to change them for the better.” This is like a life philosophy - anything you assume is true you should also assume part of it is wrong. Always look for ways to improve your understanding. 17:46 – Deutsch rounds out the first chapter by saying that “every problem is a signal that our knowledge is flawed or inaccurate.” Our goal as humans is to come up with better explanations which then inevitably leads to a new set of problems. That is this beginning of infinity, each problem leads to infinitely many more problems and the solutions that come with them. We are stuck with this continual loop of solve problem > discover new one > solve problem etc. The Principle of Mediocrity idea and Anti-Anthropocentrism. 23:20 – Deutsch says that humans can understand anything with enough time and knowledge. He is referencing John Haldane who said “The universe not only queerer than we suppose it is queerer than we can suppose”. Deutsch says that nothing is beyond our potential comprehension. 30:43 – Tangent. Aquatic Apes fringe theory. Go listen to Darwin’s dangerous idea episode. We don’t want the aquatic apes theory to be refuted, plus it would make a really good band name. 31:42 – Chapter 4. Form of infinities in the Universe: the process of biological evolution and knowledge growth. Ideas can be replicators same as genes can. 33:22 – Chapter 6. Universality. Some ideas are useful and functional in a contained, local sense and some make the jump to actually being universal and infinite. Roman Numerals were never really universal. It would always require more numerals to count higher and higher. Where as our Arabic system 0-9 they are just 10 symbols plus 1 rule, gives us an infinite number. Same as using an alphabet vs hieroglyphics, having a character represent a word, you will always need more characters. Asian scripts. 40:10 – Reductionism and the concept of the brain as a computer, the way we think about our brain is influenced by the technology of the day. Scaling problems. Knowledge creation for AI. Knowledge ownership. “First the brain was supposed to be like an immensely complicated set of gears and levers, then it was hydraulic pipes, then steam engines, then telephone exchanges, and now that computers are the most impressive technology brains are said to be computers. This is still no more than a metaphor and there is no more reason to expect a brain to be a computer than a steam engine” 47:55 – Tangent. Hofstadter and the DARPA Turing Test, AI joke creation and changing nature of humor through generations. Consciousness Test. 54:44 – Hotel Chapter. Understanding Infinity. Being at the beginning of infinite progress. Time subjective to our mental processing power. 1:00:11 – Optimism Chapter. All problems and evils in the world are caused by insufficient knowledge. All can be solved with enough knowledge. Evils are just situations where we haven’t solved the problem yet. There is never going to be a Garden of Eden state as you always unlock new problems. Deutsch says “We do not yet know what we have not yet discovered.” Sounds similar to the idea of blind faith, that we will just figure it out. We can be optimistic because if there is a necessity to solve something the market really impacts it, it’s a powerful corrective force. Investment and money gets put towards solving the problem. Ebola example. 1:08:33 – Multiverse Chapter. Funny dialogue between Socrates and Plato. 1:10:20 – Tangent. Sphinx theories, Egyptology and the Semmelweis reflex. Respecting and disproving Fringe Theories. Politics vs science in Medicine. 1:17:05 – Tangent. Anthropomorphising food. Now low cholesterol is tied to mortality causes. Where as previously high cholesterol was considered a huge health issue. Eating fat doesn’t make you fat, like Taleb says eating a cow doesn’t make you bovine. The cause for bull penis powder. 1:20:07 – Bad philosophies. Philosophies that prevents you from developing other philosophies. Religions, top-down theories, bad company traits. Crony beliefs. if you feel personally attacked when someone questions your belief, that shows it’s not a well reasoned idea and a bad philosophy for you – that may show you what you are believing because you want to. You often only believe things that are socially beneficial. Vegans, palm sugar, plastic activism, foreign orphanages and stupid activism. 1:29:40 – Postmodernism as bad philosophy. Problems in different types of Sciences. Explanational science. Tossing old knowledge requires an explanation. Chemical imbalance for depression. Second and third effects of drugs use. 1:39:41 – Politics Chapter. Separate essay. Beauty Chapter. There is objective universal beauty. Beauty in flowers and music. 1:45:33 – Evolution of Culture. Rational and anti-rational beliefs. Memes as a way of spreading ideas “Consider how you would be judged by other people if you went shopping in your pajamas or painted your house with blue and brown stripes - that gives a hint of the narrowness of convention that govern these objectively trivial inconsequential choices about style and the social cost of violating them. Is the same thing true of the more momentous patterns in our lives, careers, relationships, education, morality, political outlook and national identity. Consider what we expect to happen when a static society is gradually switching from anti-rational to rational memes”. Liberalism-conservatism conflict. Turning child into political statements. 1:58:15 – The Unsustainable Chapter. Easter Island culture diminished as they didn’t solve their problems. We often think things are finite when they can be solved in other ways. Pessimistic and Optimistic conceptions. “Pessimistic conception is that humans are wasters - they take precious resources and madly convert them into useless coloured pictures. This is true of static societies those statues were what my colleagues were what color televisions which is why comparing our culture with the old society of Easter Island is wrong - we are not a static society. The optimistic conception is that people are problem solvers, creators of the unsustainable solution and hence also of the next problem. In the pessimistic conception that distinctive ability of people is a disease for which sustainability is the cure - sustainability is the disease and people are the cure.” Trying to get people to work against their selfish desires isn’t going to work, so find a way to make what you want to work out for the greater good. For example with hotels and reducing washing. It’s a win-win for both the hotel and the environment. They will then encourage environmental acts like that. If it cost them money then they would not encourage that. "What lies ahead of us in any case, is in any case infinity - all we can choose is if it is an infinity of ignorance or of knowledge, wrong or right, death or life." 2:03:48 – Subscribe to Patreon to get our book notes, highlights, bonus material and more for the price of a book. Also, Nat will stop doing saying “it will make you think” once Patreon hits 10k. Participate of the private community! Leave us a review on iTunes to get possible guests on the show. You can write just a 1 sentence description of the show and how you like the tangents. Check our supporters at madeyouthink.com/support. We are drinking delicious Lapsang Souchong tea from Cup & Leaf. If you want some tangent fuel, try the Mushroom Lemonade  Coffee and Chai Latte from Four Sigmatic. Perfect Keto Nut Butter is amazing. Try it frozen for an incredible texture. Check Kettle & Fire Mushroom-Chicken blend, now available on their site. Use our Amazon affiliate link, it doesn’t costs you anything extra and helps support the show. Keep tweeting to us at @Neil Soni (@TheRealNeilS) and @Nat Eliason (@nateliason). If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com  

"Now happiness, more than anything else, seems complete without qualification. For we always choose it because of itself, never because of something else." In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss The Nicomachean Ethics by Aristotle. Aristotle "wrote" this book for his son, Nicomachea, in which philosophizes about the pursuit of happiness and how to find the point of flourishing of our lives. “We become builders building, we become harpists by playing the harp. Therefore we become just by doing just actions, temperate by doing temperate actions, brave by doing brave actions.” We cover a wide range of topics, including: How to find the perfect middle point to flourish in our activities Why happiness is a path that requires action, and not a destination Why sons may vote for the opposite of their parents Stones, horses and slaves that find their purposes in life Harvard admission problems with Asian-Americans Blaming the 2a.m. pizza And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of The Nicomachean Ethics by Aristotle! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Letters from a Stoic by Seneca, a book that approach happiness from another perspective, as well as our episode on Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, whose author proclaimed to be strongly influenced by Aristotle. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Nihilism [2:55] Postmodernism [2:55] The Donald on Reddit [22:39] Eugenics [23:21] The Office “Business School” – 4 types of business [26:33] 23andme [31:29] Asian-Americans Suing Harvard Say Admissions Files Show Discrimination – NYTimes [35:05] Chinese Room Experiment [55:38] Turing Test [55:46] Kantian Deontology [1:26:35] Lindy Effect [1:27:54] Books mentioned The Nicomachean Ethics Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand [10:03] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Blank Slate by Steven Pinker [20:40] Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [30:06] (Nat’s notes) (book episode part 1 & part 2) Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [42:38] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) The Power of Habit - Charles Duhigg [50:16] (Nat’s notes) Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [55:05] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Letters from a Stoic by Seneca [1:14:27] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) People mentioned Aristotle Socrates [0:59] Plato [0:59] Alexander the Great [0:59] Saint Thomas Aquinas [2:23] Ayn Rand [10:03] (Atlas Shrugged episode) Steven Pinker [19:57] John Searle [55:46] Scott Adams [1:05:18] Lucius Annaeus Seneca [1:14:27] (Letters from a Stoic episode) Zeno [1:14:45] Marcus Aurelius [1:15:02] Epictetus [1:15:02] Nassim Nicholas Taleb [1:26:59] (Antifragile episode) (Skin in the Game episode) Show Topics 0:00 – Were these philosophers famous at their time or they became famous later? Plato's and Aristotle legacy and influence up to our days. Christianity and Virtue Ethics. Aristotle’s argumentation as a lawyer and dichotomy in opening speeches. 5:19 – Human flourishing as a better translation for happiness from Ancient Greek. 8:07 – Book 1. A book of ethics, how we should behave. Being able to judge what is happiness. Happiness Hierarchy. City Happiness before the Individual Happiness. Who decides what happiness is? How the Christian Church decided it was the source of morality. 11:51 – Aristotle and Buddhism. Appropriate level of moderation in all things. Difficulty to know what the a good middle is, but extremes are always bad. Alcohol during pregnancy. Using edge cases to find a good mean is not always possible. 16:46 – Extremism in politics. Family and switching to the opposite extreme view. 20:40 – Personalities traits pre-influenced by genes. Questions not allowed to be asked. "Nepotism" in professional basketball. Where to draw the line from extreme left or right. 25:56 – Hierarchies of a good life. Pleasure, political activity, philosophy. 28:06 – The perfect version of anything is what is most meant by nature. What sets human nature apart. Neanderthal and Sapiens stats. 32:02 – Hairy tangents. Why Indian people are hairy. Shaving dogs by mistake. Harvard discriminating Asians and Jews. Why colleges can ask for your race. 41:42 – Being virtuous requires action. One can't say its virtuous and become automatically it. Going to church doesn't make you a good person. Fasting before a feast. 44:20 – Learning the boundaries by experiencing and living. How to find the middle point by shooting to extremes first. Dating, relationships, meditation, etc. 47:24 – Book 2. Virtues of character. Virtue of thought arises and grows from teaching. Pulling from the observable to apply to the unobservable. The power of habits. Blaming the pizza for feeling bad after staying wake up past 2am. Post hangover foods. 52:48 – Being virtuous while being asleep doesn't count. Avoiding sin while sleeping. Concept of mind. The Chinese room experiment. Religion not being true, however still being useful to control people's behavior. One just can't just hope to do the right thing. One should know why it is a good thing, it is our duty as citizens to learn the why. 59:40 – Criticisms to religion based more on faith than reason. Christianity, Muslim, Pagans. Book as instruments to spread a Church's mission. Realism of a perfect God or person. Paganism vs monotheistic religions. 1:02:54 – Virtue ethics does not try to perfect ethical laws, it's a find-what's-good-by-yourself approach. Natural tendencies. Looking down on other people's tendencies while not recognizing our owns. Vices. 1:07:28 – Skimming through books 3, 4, 5. Common idea at the time: everyone knows everything, one just have to draw out of them (by using the Socratic method). Learning as a mutual discovery between teacher and student. 1:10:40 – Aristotle's Physics. Stones and horses flourishing, chemical stable states. Slaves feeling fulfilled. 1:13:11 – Book 7. Incontinence. People who know the right thing but then they don't do it. Putting down Stoicism. 1:15:21 – Book 8. Friendship. Land owning as a proxy for a good person throughout history. Proxies for intelligence or wealth: job, city where you're living, table manners,etc. 1:18:10 – Book 10. Pleasure. Main dichotomy: happiness of a base nature vs happiness of a higher nature. What pleasure is and why it is not sufficient for happiness. Pleasures relative to context. The problem of pleasure as a metric. 1:21:35 – The problem of happiness as a destination. The importance to know what shit one is able to put up with. Why entrepreneurship porn is popular. Acting in such a way it can become a universal rule for people in the same situation. Taleb's Platinum Rule (compared to the Golden Rule). Aristotle principles vs postmodernism. Ranges of mean where things are acceptable. Good enough vs overspecialized. 1:32:20 – Subscribe to Patreon to get our book notes, highlights, bonus material and more for the price of a book. Also, hang out with us, recommend books, and participate of our private community. Find us on Twitter @Neil Soni (@TheRealNeilS) and @Nat Eliason (@nateliason). Leave us a review on iTunes to get possible guests on the show. You can just write "Love this podcast! Neil and Nat are super fun.". Check our supporters at madeyouthink.com/support. We are drinking delicious Lapsang Souchong tea from Cup & Leaf. If you want some tangent fuel, try the Mushroom Lemonade  Coffee and Chai Latte from Four Sigmatic. Perfect Keto Nut Butter is amazing. Try it frozen for an incredible texture. Check Kettle & Fire Mushroom-Chicken blend, now available on their site. Use our Amazon affiliate link to support the show effortlessly. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

Our second recap! In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat revisit the previous books and topics discussed on the podcast. We delve into the most useful lessons that we’ve learned so far. It's perfect for newer listeners to catch up with the older episodes. Listen to this episode irrigated with Malbec. We cover a wide range of topics, including: The first 20 episodes summarized in one sentence. Reviewing books, speeches, articles, and even a music album. An article that changed our view on guns. Two books with an opposite view on Capitalism. Harari’s three part saga. Which book episodes were the most listened. And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to check out all of our episodes here. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our first Recap episode. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Sesame Street [7:08] Blinkist [21:44] MentorBox [22:14] GE – General Electric [23:50] Aquatic Apes Hypothesis [25:03] Joe Rogan on Gender Warfare with Milo Yiannopoulos [38:20] Jordan Peterson on Joe Rogan’s Experience [38:32] Jordan Peterson on Jocko Podcast [38:59] Breaking Bad [44:58] A vegan diet in children may lead to spinal cord degeneration [46:51] Psychological Priming [47:20] Marshmallow Test [48:15] Lindy Effect [49:37] Vox [49:52] Fox News [1:07:01] Tesla [1:09:41] Prius [1:09:41] Starbucks [1:21:56] Distracted Boyfriend meme – Socialists vs. reality [1:36:26] Freakonomics [1:38:58] Genius [1:41:39] Stitcher [1:47:56] Books mentioned Antifragile by Nassim Taleb [2:46] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Letters from a Stoic by Seneca [3:30] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Mastery by Robert Greene [4:00] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell [4:18] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson [4:42] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) In Praise of Idleness [5:44] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman [7:02] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Finite and Infinite Games by James Carse [7:22] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Way of Zen by Alan Watts [8:23] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Emergency [9:06] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas R. Hofstadter [10:09] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Goal [12:52] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Principles [13:50] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Inner Game of Tennis by Timothy Gallwey [14:39] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Psychology of Human Misjudgments by Charlie Munger [15:03] Work Clean [15:35] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Denial of Death [16:55] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Influence by Robert Cialdini [17:18] (book episode) Revolt of the Masses by Ortega y Gasset [19:01] The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck [22:41] Lean Startup [23:10] Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennet [24:24] (book episode) What Every Body is Saying by Joe Navarro [28:50] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Hiroshima Diary by Michihiko Hachiya [32:59] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) 12 Rules for Life by Dr. Jordan B. Peterson [35:59] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Merchants of Doubt by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway [42:18] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Leverage Points by Donella Meadows [49:55] (article episode) Daily Rituals by Mason Currey [54:15] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [59:40] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) The Black Swan by Nassim Taleb [1:01:03] The Bed of Procrustes by Nassim Taleb [1:03:14] Blink by Malcolm Gladwell [1:01:48] The Riddle of the Gun by Sam Harris [1:06:11] (article episode) Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault [1:12:20] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [1:16:42] (Nat’s notes) (book episode part 1 & part 2) Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [1:16:42] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Solitude and Leadership by William Deresiewicz [1:22:44] (speech episode) Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand [1:25:22] The Book of Five Rings by  Miyamoto Musashi [1:29:58] (Nat’s notes) The Jungle by Upton Sinclair [1:32:55] (Nat’s notes) The Elephant in the Brain by Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson [1:37:58] The College Dropout [1:41:15] (album episode) People mentioned Jordan B. Peterson [0:51] (on Twitter) (12 Rules episode) Jeff Bezos [5:40] Adil Majid [6:05] (Crypto episode) Elon Musk [12:08] (on this podcast) Flatgeologists – Flat Earth Society [12:35] Joseph Campbell [14:09] Nassim Nicholas Taleb [19:49] (Antifragile episode) (Skin in the Game episode) Tim Cook [19:50] Eric Ries [24:19] Albert Einstein [41:42 Taylor Pearson [51:21] (Crypto episode) Ayn Rand [56:07] (Atlas Shrugged episode) Eric Weinstein [1:13:31] Friedrich Nietzsche [1:14:20] Malcolm Gladwell [1:21:11] Winston Churchill [1:35:36] Show Topics 1:25 – This episode is entirely sponsored by YOU via Patreon! Follows this link to directly support us. Check out the lovely bonuses you receive by supporting the show. 2:46 – Antifragile. Barbells strategy. Learning how to take advantage of chaos in the world. 3:30 – Letters from a Stoic. Acquire a new mental model for handling stress and challenges in your life. 4:00 – Mastery. 4:18 – The Power of Myth. Why we should take religions more seriously. 4:42 – Sovereign Individual. Rethink the permanence of the nation-states and what your future might look like in a society dominated by technology. 5:44 – In Praise of Idleness. Stop working so hard and reasons you should consider working less hard. 6:05 – Crypto episode. Principles of the tech behind Bitcoin and why you should care. 07:02 – Amusing Ourselves to Death. Don't watch the news, but listen to MYT. 7:22 – Finite and Infinite Games. Look at yourself as part of parallel finite and infinite games played in the world, and recognize artificial constraints to play infinitely. 8:23 – Way of Zen. All what you know about Buddhism and meditation is wrong. 9:06 – Emergency. Steps you should take to protect yourself when the society breaks down. 10:09 – GEB. Strange loops. Patterns that hint at the meaning of intelligence and why it may create issues while trying to understand our intelligence or building AIs. 12:08 – Think Like Elon Musk. Thinking independently vs copying the routines of others. Reasoning for firsts principles. 12:52 – The Goal. Theory of constraints, bottlenecks in businesses. 13:50 – Principles. Lots of business tactics. 14:39 – The Inner Game of Tennis. Learning how to get out of your own way to perform better. 15:03 – Psychology of Human Misjudgments. Guide for better decision making and catalog of human misjudgements. 15:35 – Work Clean. Keep your desk organized to get less distracted. 16:55 – Denial of Death. Our lives are driven by our fear of our mortality. 17:18 – Influence. Classic marketing tactics to make people trust you. 18:06 – Recap #1. 19:01 – Revolt of the Masses. Interesting ideas of the stratification of society. Against rent seekers and bureaucrat layers. Reading summaries will not convert you in Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. 24:24 – Darwin’s Dangerous Idea. There's really no meaning to life if Darwin's evolutionary theories are correct. Aquatic Apes theory! Evolution makes life inherently meaningless. Superstition in animals. Should we eat humans? 28:50 – What Every Body is Saying. Textbook to decipher body language. Communicating with body language, and dating. 32:59 – Hiroshima Diary. Private diary of a doctor from Hiroshima injured in a blast. How much humans are capable of enduring without breaking. Perspective on hardship. 35:59 – 12 Rules for Life. Peterson is a quite controversial character. Gender ideas, misinterpretation, toxic masculinity. 42:18 – Merchants of Doubt. Scientists that get paid to create fake science to support destructive practices of some companies. The problem of Media communicating science. 49:55 – Leverage Points. 12 points you can intervene in a complex system to create some change, and the relative power of each of them. Which President is sitting in the Oval Office is less important than the rules, the government and context inside and outside the country. 52:26 – Support the show on Patreon and help us buy a Tangents Button. 54:15 – Daily Rituals. People doing a lot of drugs. Historically geniuses were drug nubs, drunks, and not sleeping. It's hard to evaluate instant productivity. 59:40 – Skin in the Game. Appendix to Antifragile. Comparing this book with others by Nassim Taleb. Good way to structure your own compensation. Curious notes on Taleb's personality. 1:06:11 – The Riddle of the Gun. A concise, clear, apolitical, view-changer article in favor of gun ownership. Nuances of a black-or-white issue. Micro and macro level incentives. The naive reaction of liberal people. 1:12:00 – Subscribe to the show's Patreon, and discover the secret Nat's misadventures on Facebook. 1:12:20 – Discipline and Punish. Not a BDSM-sex book. It requires discipline to go through the book, and, after it, you'll feel punished. Better to listen to our episode :). A book about post-modernism. Listen to our analogy on Nietzschism and Nazism. 1:16:42 – Harari's 3 parts saga. Sapiens part 1, part 2, and Homo Deus. Mythology and shared stories as big driving forces for human development and organization of large sets of humans. Examples: Money, Cities, Companies. 1:21:21 – Listeners Questions #1. Flow, happiness, power, future of work, personal backgrounds. Subscribe on Patreon to ask questions for the next Listeners' episode. 1:22:44 – Solitude and Leadership. Our first speech. Spend time on your own having the freedom from interruptions, to become a better thinker, doer and leader. Otherwise, amuse yourself to death or be an excellence sheep. There are so many differences between our reality and our biology that we have to construct our reality to be more in line with our biology. Think about your solitude the same way as your diet. 1:25:22 – Atlas Shrugged. The Behemoth. Compelling case for physical Conservatism. A book that will make you respect entrepreneurship. 1:29:58 – The Book of 5 Rings. Applying strategy, military tactics, and sword fighting, to life. 1:32:55 – The Jungle. A "funny" counterpart to Atlas Shrugged. Differences between Anarchism and Libertarianism. "Capitalism is the worst economic system except of all the others". 1:37:46 – The Elephant in the Brain. Secret motivations for doing things that we don't like to talk about because they are ugly and focusing on the pretty side of our actions. Evolutionary reasons to hide those motives even to ourselves. A case for not being so introspective. 1:41:15 – The College Dropout. Our first music album! Growing up poor and making it big. Poetry, well constructed, and with many levels of interpretation. even if you don't like rap, consider listening to the episode, it will make you like rap a little bit more. Kanye as a brilliant marketer. 1:45:05 – Sponsors. Sign up to Patreon to get more notes, goodies, and chat with us. Try Perfect Keto's Nut Butter. A frosting experience, great texture, great flavor, macadamia, cashew, coconut and MCT oil and sea salt. Try Four Sigmatic’s Lemonade, a jet black lemonade with activated charcoal along with chaga mushroom. Reach us on Twitter, TheRealNeilS and nateliason.  Review us iTunes. Keep telling your friends, that's the #1 way people hear about MYT. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

NEW: Support us via Patreon at www.patreon.com/madeyouthink/ to get bonus material, exclusive hangouts, episode discussions, and more! This is a special one! In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and I discuss a music album, The College Dropout by Kanye West. The flow of the album is based on Kanye's decision to drop off out of college. It starts with graduation, it discuss problems in university, growing poor in Chicago, rap bragging and more. Man, I promise, she's so self-conscious She has no idea what she doin' in college That major that she majored in don't make no money But she won't drop out, her parents'll look at her funny We cover a wide range of topics, including: Antifragile marketing, or the art of turning negative things in sellable points To play in a rigged game Kanye’s self made singer and producer story Consumerism as the new black drug Why people still believe in higher education Why all breweries have at least one IPA And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to listen to The College Dropout by Kanye West! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on In Praise of Idleness, an essay that talk about the importance to balance work and life and not falling into consumerism, as well as our episode on Antifragile by Nassim Taleb, a concept well known by Kanye and famous people that act weird. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Ye by Kanye West [1:42] Life of Pablo by Kanye West [1:59] Yeezus by Kanye West [2:13] Kanye West - Lift Yourself [2:20] The Blueprint by Jay-Z [5:14] Kanye West - Big Brother [5:36] 50 Cents - 21 Questions [19:17] Genius Lyrics [21:43] Booz Allen [25:44] Conor McGregor throwing a dolly to a bus [33:41] The Gap [41:05] GLC [41:59] Consequence [42:45] Cheesecake Factory [1:11:16] Nat Chat [1:11:28] It's Not Liberal Arts And Literature Majors Who Are Most Underemployed [1:13:09] Monopoly: A Manifesto and Fact Post - article about rent seeking in medicine and education [1:15:05] University of Phoenix [1:17:04] CNBC [1:21:57] Juul e-Sig company [1:28:20] Going Clear documentary [1:31:14] Chaka Khan - Through the fire [1:32:20] Who wants to be millionaire [1:32:48] MTV [1:33:02] Get Rich or Die Tryin by 50 Cents [1:33:22] 8 Mile [1:34:04] Roc-A-Fella Records [1:36:56] Capitol Records [1:37:40] Damn by Kendrick Lamar [1:39:21] Books mentioned Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand [0:14] Antifragile by Nassim Taleb [1:34] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [3:24] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Jungle by Upton Sinclair [3:47] (Nat’s notes) The 50th Law by Robert Greene [33:03] (Nat’s notes) Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault [36:41] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Elephant in the Brain by Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson [40:02] In Praise of Idleness [1:08:43] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) People mentioned Kanye West Jordan B. Peterson [0:47] (on Twitter) (12 Rules episode) Nassim Nicholas Taleb [1:34] (Antifragile episode) (Skin in the Game episode) Metro Boomin [6:29] Ludacris [7:48] Twista [10:06] Eminem [10:06] The Beatles [12:22] Bernie Mac [13:04] John Legend [21:04] Naval Ravikant [30:41] Jamie Foxx [22:13] Jamie Foxx on the Tim Ferris Show [22:13] Pusha T [30:21] Drake [30:21] Conor McGregor Throws Dolly at UFC 223 Fighter Bus video - YouTube [33:41] Floyd Mayweather [33:41] Myke Tyson [34:42] Muhammad Ali [34:54] LeBron James [35:04] J Cole [38:56] Kendrick Lamar [38:56] William Shakespeare [44:22] J Ivy [51:06] Talib Kweli [52:17] Common [52:17] Aisha Taylor [1:04:17] Earth Wind & Fire [1:04:48] Keith Sweat [1:04:48] Maze [1:04:48] Teddy Pendergrass [1:04:48] Luther Vandross [1:04:48] Mark Zuckerberg [1:17:32] Mos Def [1:23:33] Freeway [1:23:33] The Boys Choir of Harlem [1:23:33] Donald Trump [1:29:15] Colin Kaepernick [1:29:15] The Rock [1:30:54] Pepper the Poochon [1:42:00] Show Topics 0:00 – Kanye's been a lot in the news lately because he is an interesting character, a provocateur. Kanye knows how to get media attention for his last albums by acting weird and insane in a very antifragile manner. Even Nassim Taleb mentioned him! Kanye grew up in Chicago and probably experienced some stories about being poor. Connections between the album and books and concepts from books discussed. 5:04 – He was a producer and produced some famous hip hop albums. Change in how producers are considered today, compared to when Kanye produced Jay Z's Blueprint. Producer as a brand. Kanye is a "full-stack" artist, he produces and signs his own songs. 10:24 – While this album was in progress he had a car accident that injured his jaw. Appreciating rap from an outsider perspective. Interwoven comedy element in the album. Why he included a song about Christianity. Kanye's soul signature. 13:41 – 1. "Intro (Skit)". Impersonating a professor asking Kanye for a graduation speech/song for kids graduating. Sets the tone for the rest of the album. 14:33 – 2. "We Don't Care" – Kanye responding to the request. Growing up poor in the slums of Chicago. Drug dealers as ideal of prestige and claiming other people's kids on income tax. Success is living beyond 25. Sense of being a self-made singer. Fuck you for the game being rigged, but also fuck you for not playing it. 20:53 – 3. "Graduation Day". His professor is really mad and tells him he is not graduating. Kanye invited unknown artists (at the moment) to sign together some songs. 22:36 – 4. "All Falls Down" (featuring Syleena Johnson). People in college who is not upper-middle class and is unsure what they are doing. The illusion of college as a ticket to upper-middle class. Parental pressure to go to college. "It's nice to have white parents" argument. 27:41 – Consumerism. Buying stuff to come up with insecurity. Kanye and Antifragile. There's nothing bad he can do to sell less albums. Starting beefs as strategies to up rappers popularity. Black people feeling continually under surveillance by internalizing the view of society. Reference to slaves' promised land. 38:00 – Kanye's uniqueness to escape the braggadocious rap era. Saying the things everybody is thinking, but sounds impolite if said by other than comedians or rappers. 40:16 – 5. "I'll Fly Away". Gospel cover. 40:50 – 6. "Spaceship" (featuring GLC and Consequence). Experiences working, from a black person perspective. Being the token blackie of a Gap store.  Working for the mob. Chicago state of mind. Dead end feelings. 43:11 – 7. "Jesus Walks". This song was, at the time, was out of place because it talked about God. Layers of meanings. Doing the bad thing, being conscious about that, but willing to be OK with God. The need for an ideal of better life, more positive and constructive than a drug dealer. Challenging the radio stations to broadcast music outside the mainstream topics, 48:38 – #8 "Never Let Me Down" (featuring Jay-Z and J. Ivy). Poor Jay-Z verse. Civil right activists in Kanye's family. Comparing the great injustices our grandparents had to deal with, with our current inability to vote. Racism still being alive, despite all the progress made. 52:17 – #9 "Get Em High" (featuring Talib Kweli and Common). Upbeat and funny song. Building self confidence and middle fingers up. Becoming famous and hitting up girls. First solo appearances, opening Talib Kweli's shows. Name-dropping. Featuring guests as guest posting. Dancing for cash, or publishing under independent labels as a way to being antifragile from industry cycles. 59:07 – 10. "Workout Plan (Skit)". Intro skit. Girls talking about losing weight workouts. 59:18 – 11. "The New Workout Plan". 1:02:32 – 12. "Slow Jamz" (with Twista and Jamie Foxx). Bluesy soul song "for the ladies". Tribute to big soul R&B musicians. 1:05:15 – 13. "Breathe in Breathe Out" (featuring Ludacris; co-produced by Brian "All Day" Miller). Probably a filler song, or a song that ties the artistic sides of the album. The need to do gangsta rap to widen the audience and give the album a push. Parallel with breweries, that need to have at least one IPA in their portfolio. Dichotomy of doing mainstream stuff to support the artistic stuff. 1:09:04 – 14. "School Spirit (Skit 1)". How school screws you and wastes your time. Getting class after class, but not knowing anything and don't make any money. 1:11:07 – 15. "School Spirit". School hierarchy is not synced to the real world. 1:11:32 – 16. "School Spirit (Skit 1)". Funny skit. Dying broke but covered by degrees. School getting more and more expensive, and more and more useless.Sentiment that everyone should be given an opportunity to move up vs effective paths to get people out of poverty. Option to move back home and not taking loans. 1:15:05 – Why people still believe in higher education and why it is a bubble like the housing one. Schools getting paid regardless of the graduates being employment situation. The problem of online certifications. Alternative signalling mechanisms. How to demonstrate competence in any field. Entrepreneurship and Marketing can't be learnt on books. 1:23:21 – 18. "Two Words" (featuring Mos Def, Freeway and The Boys Choir of Harlem). The game is rigged. Reference to the '70-'80 crack addiction in poor communities. Different treatment for drugs used by different ethnics. Why marijuana is being legalized (as more and more is used by white or rich people). Why Hemp was ostracized by the Paper industry. 1:31:58 – 19. "Through the Wire". A song recorded while still recovering from a car accident where he could have died. Despite all the horrible things happening, he will not stop doing music. Turning a negative into a positive. 50 Cents playing up the story of being shot 9 times. Tragedy helps the triumph make possible, or at least, making a strong selling point. Eminem's case. 1:35:00 – 20. "Family Business". Coming up with a new rap style. Family gatherings. 1:36:22 – 21. "Last Call" (co-produced by Evidence; additional production by Porse). A summary of Kanye's story. Record labels would not give Kanye a chance because he was not dressing as a typical gangsta rapper. Kanye being so sure to sign with Capitol Records and being dropped at the last minute. The need of one big shitty thing before everything else goes well. 1:40:07 – Announcement. Patreon is a site where you can support your favorite show (like MYT) for small amounts in return of goodies you wouldn't get otherwise. Support us via Patreon at www.patreon.com/madeyouthink/ and be the first to interact with us in unique ways. You can always support our supporters, Perfect Keto, Cup & Leaf, Kettle & Fire, Scentbird via our Support page. Reach to us via the newsletter, we had pretty interesting conversations with listeners. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

We, human beings, are a species that’s not only capable of acting on hidden motives—we’re designed to do it. Our brains are built to act in our self-interest while at the same time trying hard not to appear selfish in front of other people. And in order to throw them off the trail, our brains often keep “us,” our conscious minds, in the dark. The less we know of our own ugly motives, the easier it is to hide them from others. Self-deception is therefore strategic, a ploy our brains use to look good while behaving badly. In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss The Elephant in the Brain Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson. In this book the authors dig into the true motives that drive our decisions and behaviors. We cover a wide range of topics, including: Being selfish without noticing it Outsmarting other humans Gossiping, signalling and laughing The truth about Rolex watches (and is not about time precision) Metrics used to measure a charity effectiveness Mona Lisa conspiracy theories And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of The Elephant in the Brain Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on What Every Body is Saying by Joe Navarro, a cited book that explains the true language of our body, as well as our episode on Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault, another book that talk about different types of signalling. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show The Redistribution of Sex - Robin Hanson’s Tweet [1:18] Jordan Peterson about the Toronto school shooter [2:00] Chinese app to watch attractive women [3:18] PornHub [3:35] Melting Asphalt – Kevin Simler’s Blog [4:20] PayPal Mafia [23:40] Spotlight Effect [24:26] Bret Weinstein & Heather Heying on the Joe Rogan Experience - hot vs beautiful [30:25] Game of Thrones [40:40] Uber [4224] Bill Simmons Podcast [47:33] Game of Chicken [47:55] Birchbox [57:01] Superbad film [1:06:48] Harvard students case publishing offensive memes in a private Facebook group [1:10:02] Buzzfeed [1:25:00] Pavlovian Theory [1:29:57] Mona Lisa ashes vs replica [1:35:14] Against Malaria Foundation [1:40:07] Good Street [1:41:14] Effective Altruism [1:42:04] Give Well [1:42:09] Red Cross [1:46:30] Susan G Komen Charity [1:46:50] United Way [1:47:30] Books mentioned The Elephant in the Brain Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson (Nat’s notes) Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [6:56] (Nat’s notes) (book episode part 1 & part 2) Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [6:56] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Daily Rituals by Mason Currey [7:47] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Chimpanzee Politics [14:20] 12 Rules for Life by Dr. Jordan B. Peterson [24:14] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Lying by Sam Harris [38:18] Switch by Chip and Dan Heath [40:26] Lord of the Rings [40:40] What Every Body is saying by Joe Navarro [1:03:20] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson [1:21:50] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas R. Hofstadter [1:25:14] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Antifragile by Nassim Taleb [1:25:14] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault [1:53:02] (Nat’s notes) (book episode)   People mentioned Kevin Simler Robin Hanson Jordan B. Peterson [] (on Twitter) (12 Rules episode) Adil Majid [38:29] (Crypto episode) Sean Spicer [54:00] Donald Trump [54:00] Ronaldinho [1:13:37] Geoffrey Miller [1:33:53] Alex Jones [1:39:21] Nassim Nicholas Taleb [1:49:11] (Antifragile episode) (Skin in the Game episode) Show Topics 4:50 – “Elephant in the brain, n. An important but unacknowledged feature of how our minds work; an introspective taboo”. Is there a survival advantage to not being too much introspective? Pros and cons of meditation. Stated reasons for doing things when we interact with other people. The effect of open offices, cafes and music on Neil. 9:17 – Underlying motives of our actions. Figuring out other people: what's making them tick? Example: parents who believe that college is a good idea for their kids, once they already paid. Starting a bitcoin mining company to pay studies at CMU. 11:41 – Thesis outline: we all have selfish modisms. However: People are judging us all the time. Because they are judging we are eager to look good. It’s better if we don’t show our selfishness. This applies not just to our words, but also to our thoughts. In some areas of life, especially polarized ones like politics, we’re quick to point out when others’ motives are more selfish than they claim. But in other areas, like medicine, we prefer to believe that almost all of us have pretty motives. 12:51 – #1 Animal Behavior. Biological social reasons for selfish modisms. Social grooming. The monkeys example: they over spend grooming others, much more than really needed and they'll fight to groom the higher rank monkeys. Analogies with employees in the corporate context. We do things that on the surface look pro social, but in reality we are just looking to increase our social standing. Altruistic behavior is not quite what it seems. 15:18 – Altruistic babblers example: these birds work to earn “prestige” in their community. Prestige will give them more mating opportunities. Analogies with student and religious groups. Knowledge suppression: we hide our big motivators from ourselves because other people are better at reading to our intentions. For example we can read bad sellers. 19:06 – #2 Competition. We are more selfish than we let ourselves think. Evolution first was about competition with the environment. Since we outsmarted other animals, we evolve to outsmart other humans. Unconsciously we try to increase our elements of social status: dominance (intimidate others) and prestige (being an impressive human being). 23:04 – Envy. “But the prestige-seeking itself is more nearly a zero-sum game, which helps explain why we sometimes feel pangs of envy at even a close friend’s success”. Signalling. The most honest signals are expensive. Nowadays being in shape is more expensive than being fat. Facebook and Instagram as tools for signalling. The King and the whisperer. 26:46 – Deceiving signals. Digital Nomads showing off while not being able to support themselves in the US. Behaviors that can be explained by competitive signalling. Luxury consumption is our version of the peacock tail. No one buys a Rolex to tell the time. There is sexual sense to men paying for the first meal on a date. Hot vs Beautiful: most products are advertised to make women hotter than attractive, and that may be a cause of unhappiness. 33:21 – #3 Norms. Gossiping and reputation. Gossip is to tell our group other people is not following norms. We lose reputation when others gossip of us. Gossip is cross cultural, and it seems to exist to enforce reputations and norms. Useful and harmful gossiping. Gossiping as valuable recommendations of people to employ and work with. 37:27 – Gossip are learned behavior or inherited genetics? Gossiping to get attention. Arguments that telling small lies in front of friends erodes your reputation and trust. Telling small lies to ourselves to prove ourselves an action we took. Analogies to the book: Chip & Dan’s elephant and the writer in Switch, Plato’s horses and the chariot driver. 41:01 – #4 Cheating. In order to cheat people, we need to be able to hide our intentions because we are good at sniffing out cheaters. Drinking in public, hiding the bottle in brown paper bags. Pipes and vape pens for... tobacco? Finding ways to encourage good behavior that one wouldn't do otherwise. Recycling. 44:09 – Tangent. Danish study on grocery bags: plastic bags beat paper bags 40 to 1. Electric cars CO2 impact much larger than gas cars. 47:53 – #5 Self Deception. Convincing others that you had sabotaged yourself, and the best way to convince someone for something is for you to actually believe it. Iran’s nuclear deal with the US. North Korea wanting to be taken seriously. Looking like the mad man in town. Closing or degrading a channel communication. Strategic ignorance. Avoid looking at kidnappers face. 52:02 – #6 Counterfeit Reasons. We make up reasons to explain why we do things or why we want things. Split brain patients test. Narrative fallacy. Making up reasons to deny a disability. Press secretary. Sean Spiner on the podium trying to explain Trump's decisions. We accentuate and exaggerate our pro-social motives and downplay our ugly selfish ones. 55:32 – Sponsor! Scentbird. Monthly subscription for premium perfumes and colognes, delivered at your door in convenient packaging for only $15/mo! Avoid the weird and bulky shapes of perfume bottles. Scentbird has a very compact and handy rechargeable cartridge system. Neil is using Dolce & Gabbana’s Light Blue which is very summery. Nat buyed Gin by Commodity, Bergamote by Commodity, and Encens by Rag & Bone. Use our code to get 50% off the first month. Neil is drinking Milk Oolong from Cup & Leaf Tea (a tea that tastes milky but doesn’t have milk!). You can reinfuse Oolong up to 5 times! Try it iced too. Cup & Leaf will give a 10%  lifetime discount to its first 100 customers. The Cream Earl Grey is great too. Replace-your-coffee and MYT kits coming soon. 1:03:11 – #7 Hidden motives in everyday life. Body Language. Cue is like a signal but it only provides value to the receiver. Catching cues reading other people while playing poker. Eye contact ratio while speaking and listening is a sign dominance. 1:06:12 – #8 Laughter. “We laugh far more often in social settings than when we’re alone—30 times more often”. Laughter is a social way of initiating play with each other. Flirting with the edges of acceptable behavior. Comedians can talk things in ways no one else can talk in public. Laughing seems to come from an instinct. Great apes laugh too. Oscar Wilde said, “If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh; otherwise they’ll kill you”. Making offensive statements in a playful manner with friends. 1:11:39 – Theory that laughter relieves nervous energy. Comedians make jokes about things they really don't believe, but many people extrapolates them wrongly. Laughter to test relationships with new people. Argument that humor normalizes bad behavior. Rape jokes. Jokes in the wrong audience. 1:22:49 – #9 Conversation. Conversation is not primarily an exchange of information, but mainly we do it to prove we are a reliable and good source of information. The backpack full of tools analogy. Reading and curiosity. Staying on topic, but not repeating ourselves. 1:27:43 – #10 Consumption. We buy things to look good. Prius example: it was designed ugly on purpose. Lifestyle ads. Corona beer theories: the first, Pavlovian, associating Corona and the beach, the second, one would buy Corona worrying about what others may associate the brand with. Super Bowl ads. BMW have to show their ads to poor people as well, so rich people associate the brand with luxury. Car ads reinforcing owners' believes. Products can be marketed for utility or lifestyle. Guinness and Budweiser have the same amount of calories, but they are marketed and perceived differently (surprisingly, Guinness is very keto-friendly). 1:33:33 – #11 Art. We find waste sexually attractive, because wasting resources is kind of a proof of wealth. People that hold a group in conversation are attractive. We tend to value art because we associate effort and skill with it. Mona Lisa's ashes and replicas survey. Is it the real Mona Lisa in the Louvre? Motivations behind mass shooters. Dinosaurs bones in museums. Conspiracies. 1:39:54 – #12 Charity. People donate in very inefficient ways. Donating for malaria vs high schools. Ivy League schools as hedge funds with an educational side. Comparing malaria deaths with other diseases that lower the quality of life. Is it dollar-to-lifes the best metric to look at when donating? The problem with Red Cross and other famous non-profits. Hollywood movies as non-profits. 1:49:34 – #13 Education. Kids don't learn much in class compared to unschooled ones. National GDP does not rise with education, but individual earning does. School seems more a filtering mechanism where, if you graduate from Harvard it doesn't mean you learned a ton but that you survived it. School as domestication. The most performant students are those more domesticated. 1:52:08 – Required attendance shows that the teacher is insecure of being interesting. Learning topics through other mediums than class subjects. School is more a signalling tool to show conformity to society and employment. For parents, it's a tool to brag that “made it”. School may be useful from a network standpoint. Why we haven't franchised the Ivy League. 2:01:54 – #14 Medicine. We get much more medicine than we need mostly as a way to show we take care of each other. Medicine is great for saving lives, but doesn't perform well on life and quality of life extension. 2:03:21 – #15 Religion. Proving you are a member of the community by sacrificing part of your freedom, time, resources and even identity. 2:04:10 – #16 Politics. We often vote to show loyalty to a community. You’d better don't want everyone to participate in an election, especially if they'll vote the opposite candidate you'll vote. Cheering for your party, as in sports.   2:06:31 – #17 Conclusion. It's easy to spot others doing it, it's difficult to pick up ourselves doing it. “The biggest lesson from Part I is that we ignore the elephant because doing so is strategic. Self-deception allows us to act selfishly without having to appear quite so selfish in front of others. We have a gaping blind spot at the very center of our introspective vision. If we’re going to second-guess our coworkers and friends, we shouldn’t give ourselves an easy pass. In fact, knowing about our own blind spots should make us even more careful when pointing fingers at others”. 2:07:56 – Support us by buying the book through our Amazon affiliate link. Support us by buying stuff from our sponsors, Perfect Keto for all your keto diet needs, Kettle & Fire for grass fed bone broth, Four Sigmatic for delicious mushroom coffee and other low caffeine drinks. If you enjoyed this episode and want to read along with us, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

Jurgis, too, had heard of America. That was a country where, they said, a man might earn three roubles a day; and Jurgis figured what three roubles a day would mean, with prices as they were where he lived, and decided forthwith that he would go to America and marry, and be a rich man in the bargain. In that country, rich or poor, a man was free, it was said; he did not have to go into the army, he did not have to pay out his money to rascally officials—he might do as he pleased, and count himself as good as any other man. In this episode of Made You Think, we discuss The Jungle by Upton Sinclair It is a novel that portraits realistically the life at the time of immigrant families. Aimed to promote socialism, it ended conceiving the first laws of consumer protection in the United States after the scandal created by the revelation of meat packing malpractices. “Leave it to me; leave it to me. I will earn more money—I will work harder. Jurgis.” We cover a wide range of topics, including: The 3-day weekend A list of malpractices in the meatpacking industry that ended Embalmed meat killing soldiers in Spain Children labor in tech startups Monstrous sized apples and food stamps diets Businesses taking advantage of illegal immigrants Fiverr ads in NY and the Gig economy And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of The Jungle by Upton Sinclair! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, counterpoint to The Jungle, a book that vows for Capitalism, as well as our Recap episode, where we summarize our first 20 books, all under the effects of alcohol :). Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more.   Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Lacroix [0:41] Pure Food and Drugs Act [2:46] Meat Inspection Act [2:46] Kettle & Fire [48:26] Food stamps don’t cover the cost of healthy eating [49:01] Costco [50:43] Peter Attia at the Joe Rogan experience - Cocaine Revolutionized Surgery [59:19] Snus – Chewing Tobacco [1:01:28] Lindy Effect [1:02:34] Verizon AT&T-Time Warner Trust [1:14:17] Interstellar [1:15:52] North Star Podcast [1:17:29] Foxconn [1:19:50] Nike [1:19:50] Patreon [1:38:19] Distracted Boyfriend meme - Socialists vs. reality [1:42:17] Uber [1:50:25] Fiverr Ads in NY [1:50:25] UpWork [1:51:28] Hinge [2:01:55] Books mentioned The Jungle by Upton Sinclair (Nat's notes) Uncle's Tom Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe [3:20] Seeing Like a State by James C. Scott [3:52] Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand [4:11] The Denial of Death by Ernest Becker [24] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Liar's Poker by Michael Lewis [25:] Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [37-42] (Nat’s notes) (book episode part 1 & part 2) Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [1:03:18] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Leverage Points by Donella Meadows [1:22:15] (article episode) The Elephant in the Brain by Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson [1:23:32] Animal Farm by George Orwell [1:44:49] The Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell [1:48:12] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson [1:49:38] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Das Kapital by Karl Marx [2:04:37] War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy [2:05:22] Zen and Art of Motorcycle Maintenance [2:05:35] People mentioned Upton Sinclair Adil Majid [37:42] Nassim Nicholas Taleb [56:01] (Antifragile episode) (Skin in the Game episode) Chris Christie (sports betting in New Jersey) [56:52] Neil deGrasse Tyson [1:17:02] David Perell from the North Star podcast [1:17:29] George Orwell [1:44:21] Jordan B. Peterson [1:45:16] (on Twitter) (12 Rules episode) Warren Buffet [1:46:23] Elon Musk [2:04:05] (on this podcast) Jeff Bezos [2:05:06] Show Topics 0:00 – The Jungle It is a book commonly read in High School, but probably the intention gets missed when read young. The content of the story is very dark. At first it seems to be a book about the terrors of the meat industry, but Sinclair aimed at the perils of Capitalism. It shows the problems with pure Laissez-faire economic systems (while other books as Atlas Shrugged critique Top-Down economies). 4:28 –  Sinclair was upset that his book didn’t meet the goal to promote socialism, all it had was the effect of changing how the US regulates the meat industry.  The value of safety nets and consumer protection laws. 7:14 – We didn't had weekends as we know them today. Some people suggest we will be able to mitigate some of the effects of automation by shortening the work week even more. Some startups and companies already offer Summer Fridays, where employees take Friday off. This is backed by noticing that does not affect productivity. 11:47 – Sinclair disavowed Socialism, he said it was not well implemented. Also, that Unions are an equally corrupt part of the system too. However, the book seems quasi religious, as lacks critics to Socialism. 14:39 – The book tells the story of Jurgis, who decides to move from Lithuania to Chicago with his family. He first feel betrayed with his friend, which he thought was rich. At that time, moving was one-way, people didn't have the money to travel back. The experience to moving to a completely extraneous place you never saw and with different language. Practically there is no culture living in complete isolation today, given the spread of the Internet and the English language. 20:02 – Jurgis gets his first job is sweeping guts and parts of cattle into a pit. The joy of having a job and the feeling of being settled. Not being paid for partial clock ours or waiting ours. Investment banking seems like a modern upper middle class version of the same problem. 25:44 – No security. Jurgis get injured and rests at home, without being paid. Hard work spirit. “Leave it to me; leave it to me. I will earn more money—I will work harder.” 26:05 – Sinclair attacks meritocracy. It's not those who work hard that are the ones who are wealthy. The people who had made it are not the people who'd done a good job, it's the people who'd figured out how to rig the system. Meritocracy, honesty (or dishonesty), conditions at birth and luck as the shapers of one's future. Reconciling the victim mentality with the meritocratic attitude. 28:45 – White privilege is probably true, but people started very poor and developed wealth through generations. The leap from "making money to stay alive" to "making money and build wealth". College funds compounding. 32:52 – Part of why we create wealth is to pass it to our children. Taking out inheritance plus giving immigrants upper-middle class quality of life from the start, as Socialism suggest, would take out incentives to create wealth. Socialism as the evolution of King-and-Serve model, in the way that somebody else take care of you once you pay the access to the system. 35:30 – Parents that bring their kids to America but want them to maintain their customs of origin. Contingencies buying a house. Having to send the kids to sustain the mortgage payment. Our senses ignore the static, concentrate on changes. 38:45 – Child labor was common 100 years ago. Is it OK to forbid child labor? Imposing modern values to pre-modern societies. China negating climate protocols. What if children work in tech positions at startups? 43:36 – How bad the meat packing industry was in terms of what went into the final product. A list of malpractices in the meat industry. Embalmed meat killing soldiers in Spain. Poisoned bread for rats. Sausages diluted with potato flour. Diluted or doctored food. The bargain of the peasant and hunter-gatherer lifestyle vs modern society. 49:01 – Optimizing food stamps to get the best diet. Why produce are not nutritious any more. Charging crops by weight as a bad incentive to produce nutritious crops. Size difference between wild and domesticated fruit species. Comparing fruits with candies and soda. Coca tea good for altitude sickness. 56:00 – Drugs and gambling becoming ubiquitous in the US. Libertarian trend legalizing gay marriage, suicide, drugs, poker and weed, MDMA. Cocaine and marijuana schedules for trials for medical treatments. Consuming opioids and tobacco in natural form, reducing cancer and other unwanted long term effects. Overdosing sugar. 1:03:18 – Jurgis back to the job market at Packagetown, finds a job in the fertilizers plants. 1:05:27 – Scentbird: monthly subscription for premium perfumes and colognes, delivered at your door in convenient packaging and at incredible rates! Nat's favorite is Blue by Chanel, Neil's using Dolce & Gabbana's Light Blue. Use our code to get 50% off the first month. 1:08:43 – Jurgis passes through jail. Spoiler alert! Jurgis is blacklisted from all jobs and becomes a bum. Parallel between the beef trust and the communications trust. Jurgis finally gets a better job in Downtown. 1:18:09 – When the supply of work is much greater than the demand. Working by the day. Immigrants taking US jobs working in illegal conditions. Unfair systems that can't be fixed by just replacing the pieces at the top. Businesses aren't much penalized, individuals are, when talking about illegal immigrants. 1:24:24 – The Government job to protect citizens. Markets can take care of most of their problems, but sometimes rules are needed. GMOs at Walmart. 1:26:24 – Jurgis loses all his family and becomes a bum, a modern version of the hunter gatherer. Jurgis gets into the underground. Suggestion that the only way to get rich in America is by breaking the law. 1:32:52 – Jurgis gets back in a meat packing business, but in a better position. Finally gets out of Chicago. 1:35:35 – The book slides down into Socialism. Blind political speeches. Distinguishing Socialism from Communism. Free associations and Patreon. Degrees of Libertarianism. Anarchism. Countries not implementing Socialism properly argument. 1:42:17 – Is Socialism impossible because of Human nature? Strong man arguments for and against Socialism. Orwell and Peterson common background at the Socialist Party. Socialism as a satisfying and seductive system for the intellectual part of our brains. 1:46:00 – Top-down beats Bottom-up messy chaos on paper, but the opposite happens in reality. We tend to give more importance to things that can be measured, but that doesn't mean unmeasured things doesn't exists. Argumentative tactics. The miss of a Socialist hero in the plot. The Gig economy. 1:53:14 – Sinclair shows that each individual who is involved in the system is following the incentives they have. Seeing a true need for government. 1:54:08 – Sponsors! Scentbird. Only $7.50 for your first month subscription using our code. Kettle & Fire’s grass fed bone broth to reconstitute your gut health, up to 28% discount plus free shipping using our code. We highly recommend the mushroom chicken and mushroom flavor. Get 20% off for your keto related products on Perfect Keto. Exogenous ketones supplements, and MCT oil to supplement your good fat needs. Drink Four Sigmatic, delicious mushroom coffee. Try their new Golden Latte Mushroom Mix with shitaki and turmeric, and the Chai Latte Mush with turkey tail and reishi. None of these have caffeine, ideal to drink them the whole day. Get 20% off your first order from Cup & Leaf. Try the Cream Earl Grey and the Lopson su chong, the whiskey of black teas. Get the black tea sampler to try all black teas. De-fund Bezos' rocket company by using our Amazon affiliate link. Hit us up on Twitter (Neil, Nat). If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

"When I reached thirty I looked back on my past. The previous victories were not due to my having mastered strategy. Perhaps it was natural ability, or the order of heaven, or that other schools’ strategy was inferior. After that I studied morning and evening searching for the principle, and came to realise the Way of strategy when I was fifty." In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss The Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Musashi. Musashi was the greatest Samurai ever, famous for winning over 60 samurai duels. In this book he uses the art of sword fighting to develop a set of principles that can guide you through your personal and professional life. Study strategy over the years and achieve the spirit of the warrior. Today is victory over yourself of yesterday; tomorrow is your victory over lesser men. We cover a wide range of topics, including: Strategy in business and in life Lots of Japanese aphorisms Giving excuses when failing The importance of mastering different skills How it’ll look like when we reach 100 podcasts And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of The Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Musashi! The teacher cannot force learning on the student, and the student cannot learn in isolation: "The teacher is as a needle, the disciple is as thread. You must practice constantly."   If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Way of Zen by Alan Watts, a book that about Buddhism and mastering skills, as well as our episode on Inner Game of Tennis by Timothy Gallwey, another book starts with a specific activity to infer global principles. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Kindle [0:49] Quip Toothbrush [11:58] ButcherBox [11:58] Kettle & Fire [11:58] Perfect Keto [11:58] Four Sigmatic Mushroom Coffee [11:58] Cup & Leaf [11:58] Uber [14:42] Black Mirror [15:16] Jocko Podcast [17:46] Virtue Signalling [42:59] Joe Rogan’s Podcast [47:08] Haidong Kumdo [49:10] Tailored Fit [53:48] ModCloth [53:48] Chess [57:11] Go [57:11] StarCraft [58:13] DOTA [58:13] Lyft [59:19] Tesla [1:00:31] Books mentioned The Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Musashi (Nat’s notes) Musashi the Novel by Eiji Yoshikawa [1:25] Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand [2:51] Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [2:51] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [2:51] (Nat’s notes) (book episode part 1 & part 2) Striking Thoughts by Bruce Lee [3:56] (Nat’s notes) Levels of the Game by John McPhee [7:11] The Inner Game of Tennis [7:33] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Principles [7:52] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Mastery by Robert Greene [8:00] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas R. Hofstadter [8:08] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Letters from a Stoic by Seneca [19:03] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Way of Zen by Alan Watts [19:39] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Lanterns on the Levee by William Percy [25:23] Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [26:19] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Secret by Rhonda Byrne [34:35] Fifty Shades of Grey by E. L. James [34:57] 12 Rules for Life by Dr. Jordan B. Peterson [35:33] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) The Art of Seduction by Robert Greene [35:38] (Nat’s notes) Tao Te Ching by Laozi [45:27] (Nat’s notes) Finite and Infinite Games [1:08:54] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Zen and Art of Motorcycle Maintenance [1:12:23] People mentioned Miyamoto Musashi Rumi, Persian Poet [2:21] Bruce Lee [3:56] Lucius Annaeus Seneca [19:03] Robert Greene [36:40] Jocko Podcast [37:42] Nathan Latka [38:58] Elon Musk [1:00:06] (on this podcast) Sebastian Marshall [1:11:15] (on Nat Chat) Jocko’s book on the Tim Ferriss’ blog [1:11:28] Adil Majid [1:15:14] Show Topics 3:14 – Musashi's background and how he became the most famous samurai. In this book he writes about strategy and philosophy through the lens of sword fighting. His writing style starts with examples at micro level and unfolds them into general principles. Development of the Niten Ichi-ryū school, the style of fighting with one short and one long sword. Books that use sports or physical activities as a canvas to explain strategy, psychology, and philosophy. 9:45 – Sponsor time! Scentbird. Online subscription plan to receive at home all perfumes you want to try. Go to Scentbird, build your queue, and get 50% OFF with the coupon mentioned in the episode. They don't take much space in or bag, so very convenient to travel with. Very helpful if you want to go into subscription mode for everything in your life like Nat. 12:40 – Time period where guns were spreading but swords were still popular. 15:26 – Ground. Foundation for the other books and the most applicable to real world problems beyond sword fighting. Four personas: the gentlemen, the farmers, the artisans and the merchants. The teacher can be guidance but one has to move through the process. Symbiotic relationship between teacher and student. 19:16 – “The way of the warrior is resolute acceptance of death”. Does acceptance of death make you a better warrior? "The Dojo" example applied to Marketing. There are so many marketing gurus pushing for their school as it is the only true alternative, while they are truly looking for profit. 23:12 – “This is a truth: when you sacrifice your life, you must make fullest use of your weaponry”. It is false not to do so, and to die with a weapon yet undrawn. You can't allow yourself to fail without trying everything you have at your disposal. Romanticizing failures and not learning from them. The fine line of failure and ego protection. Not going all in gives you an excuse if you fail. 26:23 – “It will seem difficult at first, but everything is difficult at first”. Everything is hard when you start. Having a diversity of abilities. In sports, a winning strategy is to water the opponents favorite strategy. Having a favorite weapon or skill is a weakness. Bruce Lee's fighting against his own Martial Arts school, by following his philosophy of non-philosophy. Coping other does not make sense because what works for others may not work for you. 31:39 – Water. “With water as the basis, the spirit becomes like water. Water adopts the shape of its receptacle, it is sometimes a trickle and sometimes a wild sea”. Being able to break over the rocks and not being stopped by them. Being able to work around an obstacle and being fluid. The difference of learning indoor techniques with learning into the wild. Book summaries visitor stats. 36:56 – Our private behavior and public behavior should be the same at all times. Instagram and social media push us to build a fake personality, and pretend we are a different person from what we really are. Me too stuff. White people trying to win points between minorities. 43:45 – “In strategy it is important to see distant things as if they were close and to take a distanced view of close things”. Japanese aphorisms. Detaching from personal feelings to get the big picture. How Rogan can make so many podcasts. 48:15 – Fire. Here Masashi starts to get very technical on fighting. Training to the point it becomes an innate knowledge. You know when something is natural to you when you have a hard time explaining it. The best mentor is not someone far along and super successful but most of the times, just a few steps ahead from you. 55:12 – Methods to slow down enemies' attacks. Attacking first, counter attacking, and attacking at the same time. Maintain control of your position. It is bad to be led about by the enemy. Taking the initiative may have psychological advantages by not being responsive to the enemy but making him responsive to you. Acting vs reacting. Having the enemy to respond to your moves so they don't have time to develop their strategies. Staying relevant and on the news in order to push the competition to show their cards. 1:01:46 – Wind. “Crossing at a ford”. Knowing when to enter in a negotiation, in a position of strength. Having the discipline to delay to act when it's the right time. Being able to put oneself in the enemy's shoes. Criticizing other schools. 1:08:00 – Void. Conventional and unspoken knowledge. True mastery is something you cannot put into a book, it has no end. Anti dogma. 1:14:08 – Sponsors. If you want to smell lovely and have an easy solution for all your perfumes and colognes needs checkout Scentbird. Use our code to get 50% off your first month subscription. Get your mushroom coffee from Four Sigmatic. They have a new Think blend! Try also the Cordyceps blend, their Reishi blend for sleep. Nat is drinking Lapsang Souchong black tea from Cup & Leaf. It tastes like a brandy, whisky, smokey dark liquor flavor scotch. Try the Earl Grey cream one too! Kettle & Fire has mushroom-chicken bone broth available on their site now! Great flavoring. You may get up to 28% off your first ordering using our code. Nat likes to cook with their beef broth and Neil turns his quinoa in a nutritional powerhouse. Perfect Keto is perfect if you are trying to get into keto. Check out their ketones supplements and their exogenous ketones. They have a mocha flavored MCT oil powder. It’s of the best kind of fats, and you can mix it in your smoothies, have it straight in the morning, or mix it with athletic greens. Use our Amazon link to help support the show. Hit us up on Twitter (Neil, Nat). Join the mailing list to participate of the next Q&A episode and recommend us books to discuss.

“If you saw Atlas, the giant who holds the world on his shoulders, if you saw that he stood, blood running down his chest, his knees buckling, his arms trembling but still trying to hold the world aloft with the last of his strength, and the greater his effort the heavier the world bore down on his shoulders—what would you tell him to do?” “I . . . don’t know. What . . . could he do? What would you tell him?” “To shrug.” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, a piece of philosophy disguised as a novel. Probably the 10th longest book in Latin language, Atlas Shrugged is a controversial, polarizing book that attacks Socialism, references Postmodernism and develops Objectivism, Rand’s philosophical system. So you think that money is the root of all evil?” said Francisco d’Anconia. “Have you ever asked what is the root of money? Money is a tool of exchange, which can’t exist unless there are goods produced and men able to produce them. Money is the material shape of the principle that men who wish to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for value. Money is not the tool of the moochers, who claim your product by tears, or of the looters, who take it from you by force. Money is made possible only by the men who produce. Is this what you consider evil? We cover a wide range of topics, including: Money as the root of all evil or source of all good Why academics and politicians see successful businessmen with distrust Wealthy kids arguing for socialism The truth about law (spoiler: you are not obliged to obey it) A 3 hour long discourse Writing sex scenes And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson, a book that foresee how governments will react with new tech, as well as our episodes on Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari (part 1 & part 2), a book about the power of myths and humans collaborating for a greater outcome. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Ford [11:11] Delta [11:11] American Airlines [11:11] Cup & Leaf – Nat's Tea Project [24:05] Effective Altruism [32:03] CMU [33:09] Tony Robbins on the Tim Ferriss Show [34:22] UBI – Universal Basic Income [35:52] Crypto episode [36:48] Patreon [37:30] Drizly and Minibar [42:56] AirBnB [44:09] Uber [45:32] IRS [46:25] Neil Soni on Nat Chat [55:30] Harari on UBI [56:33] Al-Qaida [1:02:40] ISIS [1:02:40] Amazon [1:05:02] NASA [1:06:16] SpaceX [1:06:16] Boeing [1:05:40] Voldemort Effect [1:15:17] Books mentioned Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand Harry Potter [6:49] Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [20:47] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode part 1 & part 2) Money Master the Game by Tony Robbins [34:22] Sovereign Individual [36:48] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Finite and Infinite Games [41:55] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [42:44] (book episode) The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand [1:17:59] People mentioned Ayn Rand List of Atlas Shrugged characters Francisco d’Anconia Hank Rearden Dagny Taggart John Galt Plato [5:10] Socrates [5:20] Tony Robbins [34:22] Peter Thiel [48:30] Aristotle [50:40] Ron Paul [1:09:23] Nathaniel Brandon [1:17:02] Leonard Peikoff [1:17:45] Simone de Beauvoir [1:21:07] Show Topics 6:55 – The structure of the book is an interwoven of essays spoken by the characters. Re-reading the book may help understand better the concepts. 9:05 - The book starts with a parallel world set in the 50ties, with two kinds of people: the industrious productive ones running big infrastructure businesses of the Nation, and the socialists, government ones (described as parasites). The main plot is that the productive ones start disappearing, and the socialists intervene to try to keep the economy running and avoid collapsing. 13:19 – The idea is that the more one tries to control the economy, the worst it's going to get. The example of limiting book sales to 10k. 15:24 – Introducing the characters of Francisco d'Anconia and Hank Rearden. Money as the root of all evil. Criticism of money made by people that never understood how someone actually makes money. 19:00 – Tangent. Most of the critiques to money as the origin of all evil originates between academics or congressman, people that project their experiences "playing politics" and assume businessmen are filthy rich because of a more aggressive political game. 21:11 – Examples of activities that make money without creating value. High frequency trading, hardcore rent seeking. The money test, or how to know if you are effectively creating value. Feeling guilty when asking money, cutting through bullshit. 25:05 – Counter-argument: money as the source of all good. Money allows us to cooperate. 29:47 – We don't see that many successful people in business arguing for socialism. On the opposite side, we can see many wealthy kids arguing for socialism. Why people in the artistic communities advocate for socialism while earning millions on performances. The different approach to socialism between wealthy kids and kids with scholarships. Forced redistribution may not be sustainable in the long term. 34:22 – Tony Robbins about the ideal amount to tax, so to pay for public services, and not to discourage taxpayers to fly away. Striking a fine balance is even more important when technologies that enable us to avoid taxation are widely available. 38:28 – Hank put on trial by the government. The nature of laws is that they have to be enforced by force. Most people won't voluntarily do what government order them to do unless pointed with a gun. 42:56 – Most people think of laws and rules as things they have to follow, instead of options that have consequences. The idea that a rule is just something that typically advantageous to follow. Startups influencing how new rules for grey areas will be legislated. Why NY regulators don't go after illicit listing on AirBnB. 47:24 – John Galt speech (spoiler alert). Layout of objectivism, Ayn Rand’s main contribution to philosophy, as some sort of adaptation of Aristotelian ethics and metaphysics. In Rand's objectivism there can't be contradictions. Or, going against postmodernism, there is no complete subjectivity. 51:39 – Objectivism: Existence is Identity, Consciousness is Identification. Reality is not going to change if we hide away from it. Meaning of life and meaningful work as the purpose of life. Reason, purpose, self-esteem. 55:00 – Why people is unhappy with their job. Our jobs is where we spend most of our active ours, and if that is not purposeful, it's hard to be satisfied. Corollaries from Sovereign Individual. We are in a time where in response to new technologies, government reacts in a more socialist direction, so the more productive people go somewhere else. The importance of cryptocurrency in this movement vs gold. 59:52 – Logic against postmodernism. Not saying anything, keeping the mouth shut and dying, is the only way to fulfill the argument of objectiveness non-existence. 1:01:43 – The roles of governments. The need of a third-party force as a result of the concept of property. Protection, Roads, Public Parks: how would they work if left to private initiative. Social Security, a legalized Ponzi scheme, works only if enforced. Alternatives to Social Security and who pays for it. 1:11:29 – Tangent. Criticism to Atlas Shrugged as it doesn't convince someone who is convinced of the opposite. University is very liberal biased. It's very tough to get grants to do research that doesn't confirm liberal ideology. 1:13:56 – Outlawing ideas make them more compelling. The case of silencing gender differences. 1:16:43 – Diving into objectivism in School. The contrast of female characters of Ayn Rand books. Sex scenes and description of scenes. 1:22:11 – Tangent. Rand’s sex scenes are more emotional-psychological than physical. Philosophy of love, related to the meaning of life. Love as a sense of achievement. Interpretations of love possession. 1:26:29 – Closing quote. “In the name of the best within you, do not sacrifice this world to those who are its worst. In the name of the values that keep you alive, do not let your vision of man be distorted by the ugly, the cowardly, the mindless in those who have never achieved his title. Do not lose your knowledge that man’s proper estate is an upright posture, an intransigent mind and a step that travels unlimited roads. Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish, in lonely frustration for the life you deserved, but have never been able to reach. Check your road and the nature of your battle. The world you desired can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it’s yours.” 1:27:30 – Sponsors! With Scentbird you select and queue perfumes you want to try, and receive them on a monthly basis. Their cartridge system is very convenient, very discounted  and travel-friendly. Use the coupon mentioned in the episode to get 50% off on the first month. Perfect Keto's MCT oil is one of the best fats to keep a ketogenic diet. Their MCT oil powdered version is fantastic to mix in to your coffee drinks, or mushroom coffee. It is much easier than cutting a piece of butter, and it has a creamy texture. For the mushroom coffee, go to Four Sigmatic and get 15% off. Their mushroom coffee energizes you with less caffeine. Kettle & Fire for delicious, organic, grass fed, bone broth, good for getting the micronutrients that it's difficult to get if you don't eat organ meats. You can cook it, drink directly from the carton, or try it with cumin and chili, heat and sip it. It is shelf stable for a really long time. New sponsor! At Cup & Leaf you can find the finest teas reviewed by Nat, with a 20% off! Try the organic Earl Grey cream and milk Oolong, a pretty unique tea. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

Solitude is what you have the least of here, especially as plebes. You don’t even have privacy, the opportunity simply to be physically alone, never mind solitude, the ability to be alone with your thoughts. And yet I submit to you that solitude is one of the most important necessities of true leadership. In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat cover the first speech on this show! Solitude and Leadership by William Deresiewicz is a speech held by the professor at West Point Military Academy. In it, Deresiewicz goes against the common thinking that Yale’s professors or MBAs are leaders, just because they are the best at following what they are told to do, and looks at solitude and moments of deep work the roots for true leadership. Multitasking is not only not thinking, it impairs your ability to think. Thinking means concentrating on one thing long enough to develop an idea about it. [...] Developing your own ideas. In short, thinking for yourself. You simply cannot do that in bursts of 20 seconds at a time, constantly interrupted by Facebook messages or Twitter tweets, or fiddling with your iPod, or watching something on YouTube. We cover a wide range of topics, including: Turning chaos into order vs maintaining the order The “clever” app that interrupts you to check if you are in the flow Guns and drug wars in Chicago Nat and Neil's rituals for solitude Why starting your podcast with your friends will bring you to the best of deep thinking A new sponsor that will make you smell better And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to read Solitude and Leadership by William Deresiewicz! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on The Way of Zen by Alan Watts, a book that lingers in the benefits of meditation, as well as our episode on Work Clean by Dan Charnas, a live episode with the author of the book brings the shows how to work and manage like a chef. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show William Deresiewicz on Nat Chat [2:12] On Political Correctness by William Deresiewicz [2:46] William Deresiewicz Speech at West Point 7:26 Yale University [7:32] CMU - Carnegie Mellon University [7:56] McKinsey [12:35] Kanye West tweets [16:49] AirPods [20:14] Slack [23:36] Asana [23:36] IKEA [30:39] Salesforce [32:03] HelpSpot 32:28 Ephemerality vs Value by Nat Eliason [37:29] Snapchat [37:40] Blinkist [38:43] Mentorbox [38:43] Joe Rogan and Colion Noir on Chicago's gang violence [47:22] Russell Brand - Legalisation of Drugs [48:47] Ron Paul’s view on abortion [50:36] Stephen Colbert’s The Late Show [51:52] Wait But Why articles on AI part 1 and part 2 [51:59] Melting Asphalt [52:25] Sam Harris’ reply to Robert Spencer about immigration [52:32] Books mentioned Solitude and Leadership by William Deresiewicz Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [1:25] (book episode) Excellence Sheep by William Deresiewicz [7:38] (Nat’s notes) Extreme Ownership by Jocko [11:34] 12 Rules for Life by Dr. Jordan B. Peterson [18:09] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Antifragile by Nassim Taleb [18:09] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault [25:29] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) In Praise of Idleness [26:44] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Ulysses by James Joyce [27:08] Way of Zen by Alan Watts [30:08] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Work Clean [31:08] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Rise of Superman by Steven Kotler [34:23] Amusing Ourselves to Death [36:02] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [45:19] (Nat’s notes) (book episode part 1 & part 2) The Riddle of the Gun by Sam Harris [47:10] (article episode) The Elephant in the Brain by Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson [52:25] People mentioned Sam Harris [47:10] (Guns episode) Kanye West [16:49] Jordan B. Peterson [17:09] (on Twitter) (12 Rules episode) Dave Rubin [17:21] Donald Trump [44:14] Show Topics 3:13 – New sponsor! Scentsbird are the Netflix for perfumes. They will send you premium perfumes and colognes like Dolce and Gabbana, Chanel and Armani on a monthly basis. Their their cartridge system is very clever and light, super convenient and easy to carry even on airplanes (try getting big bottles on airplanes). Listen the episode to get 50% OFF the first month subscription. 7:13 – Leadership. "Excellence sheep" concept, or what people do to get a position at Yale. Being the best at following orders doesn't make you a leader. People's confusion between leadership and being good at what one is supposed to do. Turning chaos into order vs maintaining the order. 12:05 – West Point vs Yale Leadership concept. One line Commander's intent employees. 13:18 – Solitude. Bringing Chaos back to Order requires solitude and focus. Creative thinking is not possible nowadays unless we take the concentrated effort to avoid all kind of interruptions. Kayne West and Jordan Peterson on tour. Multitasking and interruptions vs learning. 16:29 – Generally, our first though may not be the result of our creativity, but a subconscious recall of someone else's idea. Places where many ideas come because we are concentrated (and not multitasking), even on other activities. 21:07 – Meditation and background processing. Tips for reducing notifications distractions. Training your friends to not expect immediate response. Following a team at bird's eye view without babysitting them. 25:00 – The effects of talking about ideas on this podcast. 27:02 – Good work starts slow and needs time to get up to the core ideas. Experiences writing good articles or books. Japanese Zen practices and working clean are part of the many activities that foster conditions for creative spark. Organizing the CRM. 33:43 – Different types of flow. Getting "lost" in a mindless activity or reading a fiction book that helps "defrag" your hard drive. The absurd notification app to check if you are in flow or not. Differences between a book and a tweet or the newspaper. Nat & Neil's secret to read 60 books a year like top performers CEOs. Discover the fiction book we are reading listening to back episodes and participate of the give away! 40:43 – What is solitude: introspection, concentration of focused work, sustained reading. And... deep friendship. The traits of good long conversations with friends. Taking the part of the Devil's advocate, and the problem to link our identity with ideas. Not reasonable ideas are just as logical as reasonable ones, but with different inputs. Trump's voters example. 45:18 – Immigration. Extreme views like open borders and racism. Naturally moving toward the middle. Tailor-made narco-economy and guns in Chicago. The reason to legalize drugs. Libertarians against Abortion. 51:59 – The bad habit of everyone should have an opinion on everything. Replying emotionally on Twitter without being informed. Trump bringing peace in Korea. 57:07 – Solitude being the essence of leadership. Nat and Neil's rituals for solitude. Physical stresses that help freeing the mind. 1:01:40 – Sponsors! Scentbird is a monthly premium perfumes subscription service. It’s very convenient, for guys and girls. Use the code mentioned in the episode to get 50% off on the first month. Go to Four Sigmatic for your mushroom coffee needs. Perfect Keto is the one-stop shop for all your ketogenic diet needs. Learn on their blog why MCT oils and powder are amazing fats for your diet. Kettle & Fire for your collagen ancestral needs. Try the meat one with quinoa. The chicken one is good for sipping. Amazon has crushed their earning thanks to the MYT affiliate link! Let your friends know about the show. Share angrily on Twitter as our show is antifragile. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

“We act as though comfort and luxury were the chief requirements of life. All that we need to make us happy is something to be enthusiastic about.” Albert Einstein No books today, but a selected list of questions asked by Listeners! Neil and Nat answer one by one detailed questions about topics you had but they never talked about. We cover a wide range of topics, including: What Neil and Nat do to survive Routines to get into flow Favorite podcast show and why they stopped listening to Tim Ferriss The future (and present of work) Balancing power and happiness And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to ask more questions replying the mailing list! (What? You still haven’t signed up for the mailing list?!) If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Daily Rituals by Mason Currey, a book that discuss the crazy schedule creative people have to get into the flow, as well as our episode on Homo Deus by Yuval Harari where we talk about how AI may make humans useless.   Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Unlimited Brewing [4:22] Made You Drink Beer. Coming Soon? [5:14] US regulation doesn't allow to sell beer online [5:14] Brewmaster’ Reserve, Neil’s beer blog [5:49] Neil Soni on Nat Chat [6:40] LegalZoom [8:45] Maryland Government incorporation website [8:47] Incorporate.com [9:51] W-2 Form [10:52] Nat Chat [11:22] Growth Machine [11:47] Nat's personal site [12:15] Wendy’s Twitter campaign [16:52] Deep House Relax playlist [27:56] Asana [33:03] Evernote [33:12] Sam Sheridan [36:42] Fat Tony [40:05] PwC [52:33] Tiago Forte’s Progressive Summarization [55:05] Flatgeologist [57:32] Slack [1:04:02] Vitalik Buteron, founder of Ethereum [1:10:53] Nat’s articles on sex [1:14:21] Stamena app - Nat’s app [1:14:21] Black Mirror [1:38:46] Trump-Miller story [1:41:55] Books mentioned Daily Rituals by Mason Currey [28:59] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder by Nassim Taleb [32:21] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand [37:58] Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennet [38:07] (book episode) The Goal [44:29] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter [37:58] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [43:20] (book episode) Work Clean [44:29] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Principles [44:33] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene [46:30] (Nat’s Notes) Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [48:12] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins [57:13] Finite and Infinite Games [57:42] (Nat’s Notes) (Made You Think episode) 12 Rules for Life by Dr. Jordan B. Peterson [58:06] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) East of Eden by John Steinbeck [58:48] (Nat’s notes) Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk [59:22] (Nat’s notes) Deep Work by Cal Newport [1:03:01] (Nat’s notes) So Good They Can’t Ignore You [1:03:01] (Nat’s notes) Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault [1:10:10] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Sovereign Individual [1:19:29] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Mastery by Robert Greene [1:28:04] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) People mentioned Albert Einstein [0:00] Donald Trump [18:28] Elon Musk [18:28] (on this podcast) Dan Bilzerian [18:33] Adil Majid [19:17] (on this podcast 1, 2, 3) Pepper the Poochon [32:54] Taylor Pearson [44:20] Nassim Nicholas Taleb [48:02] (Antifragile episode) (Skin in the Game episode) Flatgeologists – Flat Earth Society [57:32] Jeff Bezos [1:11:31] Bill Gates [1:11:31] Mark Zuckerberg [1:11:31] Warren Buffet [1:11:31] Randall Eliason [1:42:42] Show Topics 0:00 – Perfect drinks to enjoy the warm weather. 3:38 – Question #1. Why do you actually do for a living and how you've got there? Neil has a company that helps you build your brand beer, either for events (weddings, parties, conference, etc), venues (chef that wants to pair beers), and already established brands. How Neil bootstrapped his company while trying to have reduce his home brewing costs, and even before having customers. If you ask enough, you can see the Made You Drink beer soon. “You don't know where things are going to go until you actually start working on them”. 8:20 – Nat helps ecommerce and tech startups appear on the front page of Google and increase traffic from Google through SEO and content. Stats of his company. 1428 – Funny fact, Nat and Neil went to the same university in Pittsburg, and went through the same Startup Accelerator, but never met before. Why Twitter is the catalyst for the best friendships, and why it's so hard to monetize it. Paying twice to build and reach your audience on Facebook. Who controls Twitter and Facebook celebrities' accounts. 19:58 – Question #2. Favorite podcasts. Mentioned Jocko Podcast Joe Rogan Experience Sam Harris’ Waking Up Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History Invest Like the Best podcast History on Fire Unchained A16z Kevin Rose Shane Parrish’s The Knowledge Project Rhonda Patrick’s Found my Fitness Bill Simmons Podcast Skip and Shannon: Undisputed Podcast Good Beer Hunting Brewers' Journal Podcast Episodes: Jordan Peterson on Joe Rogan’s, Daniele Bolelli from the Drunken Taoist on Joe Rogan’s, Jordan Peterson's Biblical Series, Al Pacino and Kevin Durant on Bill Simmons’. Recommended Tim Ferriss Episodes: Jamie Foxx, Jocko Willink, The Erotic Playbook of a Top-Earning Sex Worker (NSFW), Naval Ravikant, Peter Thiel, Dom D’Agostino, Kevin Rose, Kelly Starrett, Derek Sivers, Kevin Kelly, Ed Cooke 27:56 – Question #3. Routines to get into flow, specially If you need to write a 2-3000 words blog post. How much coffee Neil needs to get into flow. Neil's realization to keep going until getting a decent piece of work. The playlist to get into the mood. Nat tips: making super easy to start, getting all notifications off, being super clear on what are the next steps, changing context. The template Nat use for writing a massive article, and why he doesn’t starts with the intro. The endure-for-20min-and-then-you-can-quit psychological trick. Being in-interruptible. 28:18 – Question #4. Is doing business an intellectual challenging activity? What if it is not? The overlap of intellectually curious people and entrepreneurs. Early days of a business are very intellectual and exploration, while growth stage is a lot tweaking and optimization. Why intellectual people have the need to compulsively start new companies. Books that coincided with the business stage. How to find motivation to start exploring. 48:23 – Question #5. Advice for college student graduating in 2018? What problems to work on? First thing: think before graduating. Find an internship that has the potential to get you full time, in an area you are interested in. The problem with Ivy League students going to Google, Facebook or big consulting firms. Realize how low risk your life is. Focusing on skills rather than problems. The awareness that you may not know what problems are out there. 55:05 – Question #6. How do you apply the insights from books? Start a podcast and speak with your friends every week :). How Nat takes detailed notes "reading" the book 4 times. Writing as an exercise to build the synopsis with other books' concepts. No need to change the structure of your business. New concepts are useful to see problems from different angles, not overhauling processes. 59:39 – Question #7. How to network online? Tips to connect through the most powerful platforms, Twitter and cold email. 1:02:59 – Question #8. Future of Work: Deep Work vs Shallow Work, solopreneurship, and attention deficit, etc. Trade off between Improved communication and increased interruptibility. The problem with open office workspaces. Trends: remote working, polarization of work between employees and contractors, performance based work environment. Before, power was a function of the organizational structure or buildings, now it's a function of ability or what you do, because it's much easier to show usefulness. 1:13:20 – Single person companies that make over $1 million a year. Personal branding. Having proof of concept on our own site. 1:14:21 – Nat’s proof of concept that you can have 1 person business based on SEO. How Nat arrived to get 8k daily visitors by chance writing sex articles. 1:19:00 – More trends about work: It will be possible for fewer people to do more. The Internet as the effect of compounding of technology. AI is starting to replace White collar jobs. How AI would be able to replace the 90% of the writing work right now. 1:28:04 – Question #9. Is there a trade off between happiness and achievement? Does a gain in power detract from happiness? The Internet gives us the ability to compare us to the whole world, in detriment of the in-group. Opportunity costs of least profitable ventures. The problem with Digital Nomadism. Considering second and third order effects in the happiness-power equation. The intersection between personal achievement and service to the community. What's happiness anyway? Doing sacrifices for achieving joy, as athletes do. 1:43:00 – Sponsors! Get new questions through the email list. Sign up. Find upcoming books, events, and know about new sponsors! A new cool sponsor coming. Hop on Four Sigmatic for their mushroom coffee and other mush wonderful goodness. Suggestion: enjoy an iced mushroom coffee Mocha flavor. Check Kettle & Fire for their delicious grass fed bone broth, one of the only companies that do this. Suggested: the beef for cooking, the chicken for drinking. Perfect Keto for all your ketogenic related needs. A ketogenic diet is high in fat, and your body burns ketones instead of glucose for energy. Some benefits include improved mental functioning, much lower hunger swings, and ancestral body functioning. The supplementary ketones are very useful to pop in and out the diet and speed the process. Definitely try the coffee or the sea salt chocolate. Leave reviews on iTunes. Everything you buy on Amazon through our link supports the show. Bookmark it with an emoji :). If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

“In the early twenty-first century the train of progress is again pulling out of the station – and this will probably be the last train ever to leave the station called Homo sapiens. Those who miss this train will never get a second chance. The main products of the twenty-first century will be bodies, brains and minds, and the gap between those who know how to engineer bodies and brains and those who do not will be far bigger than the gap between Sapiens and Neanderthals. In the twenty-first century, those who ride the train of progress will acquire divine abilities of creation and destruction, while those left behind will face extinction.” In this episode of Made You Think, Adil, Neil and Nat discuss Homo Deus by Yuval Noah Harari. This book can be considered a sequel of Sapiens. In Homo Deus, Harari summarizes what has been the source and reference of our specie decisions and make predictions on how data and algorithms will shift humans as the source of power in our history. “Yet in truth the lives of most people have meaning only within the network of stories they tell one another. Meaning is created when many people weave together a common network of stories. Why does a particular action – such as getting married in church, fasting on Ramadan or voting on election day – seem meaningful to me? Because my parents also think it is meaningful, as do my brothers, my neighbors, people in nearby cities and even the residents of far-off countries. And why do all these people think it is meaningful? Because their friends and neighbors also share the same view. People constantly reinforce each other’s beliefs in a self-perpetuating loop. Each round of mutual confirmation tightens the web of meaning further, until you have little choice but to believe what everyone else believes.” We cover a wide range of topics, including: Religion as a body of beliefs and shared Anticipating Trump’s election with the help of Facebook Humanism religion where humans replace Gods Brain vs Mind, Intelligence vs Consciousness Losing control over technology Challenges in medicine to make us immortal And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Homo Deus by Yuval Noah Harari! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episodes on Sapiens Part I and Part II, a summary of Human history that will shape how you think, as another lenses through which you can look at reality. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Google Maps Timeline [6:19] Pinked-Taleb argument about people dying from wars [9:34] Jiro Dreams of Sushi [18:40] Estée Lauder [18:58] Altered Carbon on Netflix [23:21] Aterol [25:16] Ether [34:43] Split Brain Experiment [48:14] Sunk Cost Fallacy [1:00:40] Universal Basic Income [1:09:11] Return of the city-state [1:13:44] Crypto episode [1:20:12] Gun Control episode [1:21:37] Cortana [1:23:54] Plato’s Republic [1:24:20] Turing Test [1:28:00] Deepmind playing DOTA [1:29:48] Spire [1:30:33] Hang the DJ - Black Mirror episode where AI decides who you date and marry [1:34:27] Books mentioned Homo Deus by Yuval Harari Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [0:55] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode part 1 & part 2) The Denial of Death [20:23] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas R. Hofstadter [33:00] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Free Will by Sam Harris [40:52] Finite and Infinite Games [1:00:17] (Nat’s Notes) (Made You Think episode) The Sovereign Individual [1:09:11] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) What Every Body is saying by Joe Navarro [1:44:57] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Motivation Hacker by Nick Winter [1:44:57] People mentioned Yuval Noah Harari (official website) Karl Marx [4:30] Donald Trump [5:37] Sam Harris [40:52] (Guns episode) Plato [1:24:20] Show Topics 0:00 – Harari tries to write about the future but he knows there's no way to predict it. People in the ‘50s predicting flying cars and moon bases but nobody predicting the Internet. Communism example: it didn't take place effectively even if Marx predicted it. Narratives and stories affect how we view technology. 5:15 – It is much more acceptable to be critical about Social Networks today than it was 2 years ago. At the beginning everyone was considering only convenience. Privacy wasn't that much of an issue. 7:23 – Up until now the human agenda was: don't die, procreate, protect your tribe. The new agenda considers: how to become Gods. More power, more money, how we live forever. 8:12 – Humans collectively are concerned solving three things: Famine, Plague, War. All three seem to be controlled (until Black Swans happen) but they seem fragile. 12:58 – Modern Medicine has saved us from premature death, but haven’t extended our lives by that much. We would be able to lengthen our live spans if we can re-engineer the length of splitting cells. 16:03 – For people over 40, there's a high probability they’ll die because of heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer, and suffer cognitive decline. The challenge with cancer, a disease of aging, is that its origin is not unique, there are many reasons one can get cancer. What happens when we become immortal or live much longer than we do today. Incentives to improve, competition against technology, and appreciation of life under eternal conditions. 25:00 – Historically we manipulated environment to fit us. In the future it seems we will try to manipulate us to transcend the environment. States regulating bad drugs that threaten stability and allowing and even encouraging those that strengthen social order and productivity. Overusing medical advancements not to cope with a disability, but to surpass the norm (Viagra example), creates a race to the bottom: if you are not cheating you are in disadvantage. Legalizing steroids. 30:04 – First part: How Homo Sapiens conquered the World. You can skip this part if you have read Sapiens or listened to our episodes on it (part 1, part 2). The modern manifestation of Religion, which is Humanism, is what this book focuses on. Progression: agriculture revolution gave rise to Teism religions. The scientific revolution gave birth to Humanism religion where humans replace Gods. We look humans as the source of power. Examples of Humanism: Liberalism, Communism, Nazism. “Everything that happens in the cosmos is judged to be good or bad according to its impact on Homo sapiens” 31:46 – Critiques to Humanism. Reliance that there's something special with humans. Mind or consciousness for modern religion is the equivalent of the soul for ancient ones. Brain vs Mind. The concept of mind doesn't square with anything scientific. 35:06 – Knowing exactly how the mind works, would affect our day to day living? Do we perform conscious choices under free will or are we subject to environment and past experience? How to interpret "negative" actions like murdering or hard ones like starting a company even when we don't need to. Free will as an evolutionary result to improve survivability. 40:48 – Examples against free will. First mover concept. Regardless we have or not free will, we still are responsible for our lives. Punishment should be still used to protect society from bad not-free-will behavior. 46:34 – Deciding to do something is based on our own desires. But probably we never decided what our desires are. Concept of Intersubjective Entities. Money has value only because most of us believe we can trade with it. Life meaning exists only within the network of stories we tell one another. 51:55 – Second Part: How we measure ourselves. Physical things can be measured and interpreted unequivocally, but other concepts as school performance, change based on the yard stick we use. Intersubjective believe that living longer is better, instead of shortly and intensely. Science and religion viewed not as opposites but as complements of each other. 56:28 – Religion-Science dichotomy. Aiming to maintain social structure vs looking to acquire power to solve world problems like famine, diseases and fights. 1:01:04 – Development of Humanism. Liberalism (orthodox humanism): focus on the individual liberty. Two sprouting: Socialist Humanism (communism) which says human experience is shared among societies, and Evolutionary Humanism (Nazism) which focuses on the Sapiens supremacy. If Germany had won in WW2, we would see Nazism (Evolutionary Humanism) as a positive thing. What makes our morals true or objective. 1:07:26 – The trend towards Liberalism is a natural consequence of technological evolution. What happens when we begin this phase of transcendence? Many social developments seem to be sons of the current economic forces. Slavery ended and women gained the right to vote because it was better for the overall Economy, not because of a genuine interest of their lives. Governments give only people rights because they need them to pay taxes. Problems with UBI, incentives to become an artist or entrepreneur, and stability. Wars don't happen if there is no economical benefit. 1:13:20 – City States. City majors seem more important than State governors. Belong feelings to cities and not the country. When a Government is losing power it creates a conflict. City States would not exist as they existed in the past or as an equivalent to today's Countries. The rise of Digital Governments. 1:18:38 – Slow government is good because you don't want incompetence spreading fast. Big Companies are gaining Nations-like power. Google is much faster at predicting an epidemy than UK's Health System. The thread is Corporate regulations moving faster than Governments. Democracy looks like the worst kind of government, except all the other ones. 1:23:10 - Third Part: When humans lose control. Beyond Humanism. Individual vs Dividual: the Experiencing Self and the Narrating Self. Plato’s Rationality, Energy Spirit, Desires chariot analogy. Tech intelligence is/will be better than Human intelligence, but consciousness will be optional. Consciousness as an emergent property of processing speed. Current improvements in AI are geared to improve sales, rather than improving the solutions to our needs. Foretelling Trump’s use of Facebook in the 2016 political campaign. 1:30:33 – More and more our decisions are made by machines and data. Apps that decide for us: Uber and Diet apps examples. Letting machines monitor health parameters and suggesting habits. If we rely too much on others to make decisions for us, we lose that "muscle". The "attention helmet" makes people less patient to confusion, doubts or contradictions. 1:33:55 – Apps that shift from an Oracle service to an Agent service. Consult vs Entrust. Situations in which our trusted app would interact on our behalf: scheduling a meeting, job application, dating. 1:35:41 – Tinder on autopilot. Dieting app hooked up with a micro-needle patch that trace your blood glucose needle and prevents you from breaking a diet. 1:39:55 – Dataism, the New Religion. Data and algorithms will be the supreme force and we will trust them as the new Bible. Liberalism is completely challenged by Life Sciences. 3 points, I'm an individual, I've a single essence, myself is completely free. Science says we are just a set of bits dominated by algorithms. The tech sector seems to be unattached to the emotional consequences of the things they are arguing for. What do we care more, the objective truth data reality or the subjective experiences of individuals. 1:43:21 – Are emotions the result of data processing in the background? Moving more and more to data-based decision algorithms. Would you ask your Google Home / Alexa to move to NY? 1:50:03 – Dataism extreme form. Algorithms would own everything like corporations do today. Software eating the world. From the Data viewpoint, we can see our whole specie like a single processing system. The end goal of Data is to create the Internet of all things, a completely interconnected system of consciousness. 1:53:01 – “These three processes raise three key questions, which I hope will stick in your mind long after you have finished this book:  Are organisms really just algorithms, and is life really just data processing?  What’s more valuable – intelligence or consciousness?  What will happen to society, politics and daily life when non-conscious but highly intelligent algorithms know us better than we know ourselves?” 1:53:59 – Sponsors! Kettle & Fire delicious bone broth is excellent if you are feeling sick. You can toss it directly into the microwave. Try it with cumin and ginger, a nice spicy treat for the end of the day. Get advantage of the free shipping. Four Sigmatic mushroom elixirs and coffee. Nat's on the subscription plan, which is a great deal because you can pick different flavours and get them every 30 days. Try the new Mocha flavor, with cocoa and chaga. Subscription gives you 20% off. Perfect Keto for all your keto needs. Look out for our next keto episode. Grab their Exogenous Ketones,  their Keto Pre-Workout, their Collagen blend, and their Protein Powder. You can't get knocked out. Buy everything through Amazon as Adil using our affiliate link. Bookmark this link. Subscribe to mailing list to participate to the show as people in the next episode has done. Your feedback is instrumental to this show. Let us know of books or article ideas. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com  

Today, we are used to thinking about the whole planet as a single unit, but for most of history, earth was in fact an entire galaxy of isolated human worlds. In this episode of Made You Think, Adil, Neil and I continue to discuss Sapiens by Yuval Harari. In this second part we cover the most recent part of Human and Society evolution and how we moved from scattered collection of isolated human beings to a cohesive global civilization. Prior to the Industrial Revolution, the daily life of most humans ran its course within three ancient frames: the nuclear family, the extended family and the local intimate community. Most people worked in the family business or their neighbours’ family businesses. The family was also the welfare system, the health system, the education system, the construction industry, the trade union, the pension fund, the insurance company, the radio, the television, the newspapers, the bank and even the police. Yet throughout history, such imagined communities played second fiddle to intimate communities of several dozen people who knew each other well. The intimate communities fulfilled the emotional needs of their members and were essential for everyone’s survival and welfare. In the last two centuries, the intimate communities have withered, leaving imagined communities to fill in the emotional vacuum. The two most important examples for the rise of such imagined communities are the nation and the consumer tribe. We cover a wide range of topics, including: Cognitive Dissonance as a survival feature of human beings The absurd of national identity when talking about ethnic cuisine Industrial Revolution, Internet, and the re-framing of communities Who was the first guy to circumnavigate the world How merchants shaped today’s world Meaning of Happiness And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Sapiens by Yuval Harari! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault, a book that covers Postmodernism, a kind of Religion according to Harari, as well as our notes on The Way of Zen, to know more about Buddhism and the search of Peace. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Four Sigmatic Mushroom Coffee [0:45] Polytheism [13:46] Christianity [13:46] Judaism [13:46] Muslim [13:46] Mahomet [13:46] Janaism [19:01] Buddhism [19:40] Postmodernism (Discipline and Punish episode) [24:59] Pepe the Frog Meme [27:29] Was Magellan the first person to circumnavigate the globe? - Ask History [33:30] Tea if by sea, cha if by land: Why the world only has two words for tea [35:50] Crypto episode [40:00] Ethereum [40:30] Mechanical Turk [45:41] Fancy Hands [45:41] Netflix [48:30] ESPN [48:30] Twitch [49:31] /r/The_Donald sub-reddit [52:42] Woman subreddit forgetting her passport in Japan [55:25] The Yacht Week [1:00:00] Books mentioned Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari (Nat’s Notes) (book episode part 1) Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault [24:59] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins [24:59] Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [13:58] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Way of Zen by Alan Watts [21:43] (Nat’s Notes) (Neil’s Notes) (book episode) Bowling Alone by Robert Putnam [51:58] People mentioned Yuval Noah Harari (official website) Adil Majid [0:36] (Crypto episode) Nassim Nicholas Taleb [27:29] (Antifragile, Skin in the Game) Barack Obama [15:56] Constantine the Great [15:56] Richard Dawkins [24:59] Carl Jung [24:59] Jordan B. Peterson [24:59] (on Twitter) (12 Rules episode) (Order and Chaos) Pepe the Frog Meme [27:29] Ferdinand Magellan [33:30] Show Topics 1:37 – The Arrow of History. How we moved from scattered collection of isolated human beings to a cohesive global civilization. 2:11 – From considering cognitive dissonance a bug of our mind to a feature that helps us manage contradictory beliefs. Examples: Democrats and Republican, Religion, and positions on immigration examples. The truth is that we don’t think in binary. 6:35 – "Traditional" ethnic recipes are made with non traditional ingredients. The idea of national identity fall into the absurd. Countries that claim an identity did not exist 200 or 300 years ago. 11:06 – The result of today's globalization comes from 3 groups: Money, States, and Religion. Commerce would be the first thing that started tying people together. Money as the foundation of States and Religion. 15:56 – The moment religions scaled. How Christianity may have spread to support Constantine the Great’s plans for the Mediterranean. The traits of "successful" Religions. 19:56 – Tangent. Buddhist Monks that accept and inflict violence. Zen Buddhism. 21:16 – Politics in the new Religion. Constitution as the new God. Ways Catholicism's circumvented monotheism to absorb local religions. 24:38 – The challenge of growing and functioning all together. Science, the secret of success. Memetics vs Postmodernism. 25:33 – Globalization leading us to two concurrent and opposing directions: integrating us on a global scale (access to the same stores/products/music/culture) while dividing us in islands (internet groups). Subcultures. Turning point where we assumed we know what was in the world, to assume we didn't. Maps with empty spaces example. 28:25 – Space exploration and old World exploration is driven by greed and money. Science and dominance comes as an effect rather than a cause. 35:30 – Tangent. How tea got into India. Origin of Tea. 37:09 – Merchants and Capitalism. The importance of credit to enable entrepreneurship and permit the development of the current world. Crypto may spread with the availability of cryptocredit. 41:12 – War of merchants. The history under Wall Street. Why the British took Hong Kong. The main problem with pure market capitalism is that it's going to create growth, but we are not sure if it is in a good direction. People blinded by Capitalism. 47:00 – Industrial Revolution. Mentality shift to optimize for our own pleasure rather than building something bigger than ourselves. Gunpowder and steam engines example. E-Sports may lead the trend to monetize attention. 50:48 – Internet and micro-communities replacing local intimate physical ones and old “imagined” ones like States. Peculiarities, power, and limits of such communities.  Some people argue that the Donalds subreddit was one of the big factors to turn Trump president. 57:11 – The costs and levels of different levels of communication: personal meeting, phone call, texting. The pattern that occurs with new technologies. Being aware and controlling unwanted effects of tech, to not fall tangled in it. 59:55 – Happiness. The lottery ticket and car accident examples. Happiness as a function of baseline, and framed under objective conditions vs subjective expectations. Effects of the Internet and Social Media on nowadays expectations. Buddhism goals and nuances of the translation of old Sanskrit to current languages. 1:08:08 – Sponsors! Here ends Sapiens. Check the 1st part or buy Homo Deus (kind of a 3rd episode on Sapiens) and prepare for the next episode. We were enjoying Cordyceps Elixir Mushroom Coffee from Four Sigmatic. We also suggest the Adaptogen one. Get 10 to 15% discount with our link. Also, try Jocko White Tea (buy it using our Amazon link). Always, Perfect Keto for all your ketosis needs. Really good products to get into and sustain ketosis. They have keto friendly protein powder, MCT oils, and nice pre-workout boost. Kettle & Fire is our provider of fine bone broth. They’ve got beef, chicken, chicken with mushroom. It helps you get over the flu and is a perfect treat for a cold night. Get up to 33% OFF with our link or get it at Whole Foods. Give us a review on iTunes, tell your friends, register to the email list and you’ll know about books that are coming. Hit us up on twitter, @nateliason, @therealneils, and @adilmajit. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com  

Three important revolutions shaped the course of history: the Cognitive Revolution kick-started history about 70,000 years ago. The Agricultural Revolution sped it up about 12,000 years ago. The Scientific Revolution, which got under way only 500 years ago, may well end history and start something completely different. This book tells the story of how these three revolutions have affected humans and their fellow organisms. Sapiens by Yuval Harari is one of those books that shapes how we think, as another lenses through which we can look at reality. It’s central theme is the evolution of Human History, and gives special importance to myths and shared ideologies. It explains how shared myths underlie human narrative and everything we find meaningful. There's a lot of power in these shared ideas because they end up regulating how a society and people function. We cover a wide range of topics, including: The power of shared myths and their impact in Human History The Cognitive, Agricultural, and Writing Revolutions Why Sam Harris and Jordan B Peterson quarrel each other Why Agriculture counterintuitively fucked us up Self-perpetuating ideas and cultures Ideas to reduce the wealth gap And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Antifragile by Nassim Taleb, about why hunters are in better shape than gatherers, and The Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell, another book that explains the influence of shared mythology. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Cryptocurrency [0:36] (theme episode) Age of Empires [11:55] Why everything might have taken so long [12:14] 23andMe [17:56] Aquatic Ape Theory [27:08] Zoroastrians [28:31] Ubermensch [41:41] Ancient data, modern math and the hunt for 11 lost cities of the Bronze Age [1:02:52] Pareto Distribution [1:25:08] Hardcore History Podcast by Dan Carlin [1:31:29] Books mentioned Sapiens by Yuval Harari (Nat’s Notes) Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennet [1:54] (book episode) Gödel Escher Bach by Douglas Hofstadter [1:54] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Finite and Infinite Games [1:54] (Nat’s Notes) (Made You Think episode) The Selfish Gene [4:10] Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault [4:21] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Rare Earth [7:50] The Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell [23:16] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Primitive Mythology by Joseph Campbell [28:41] What Every Body is saying by Joe Navarro [39:23] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Denial of Death [59:45] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Lessons of History by Will and Ariel Durant [1:25:45] Leverage Points by Donella Meadows [1:26:34] (article episode) The Sovereign Individual [1:30:33] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Emergency [1:30:33] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [1:33:15] People mentioned Yuval Noah Harari (official website) Adil Majid [0:36] (Crypto episode) Sam Harris [34:33] (Guns episode) Jordan B. Peterson [34:33] (on Twitter) (12 Rules episode) Nassim Nicholas Taleb [35:25] (Antifragile episode) Jocko [51:51] Peter Thiel [1:07:34] Stephen Hawking [1:08:58] Show Topics [1:29] The mechanism of shared myths where you end up doing what other people tell and reinforce about you scales very well to micro (relationship disputes) and macro levels (political movements). [5:48] How meaningless we humans are as a species. Being just like another animal. The path to genetic and technical advantages. The role of fire that helps us consume less energy when digesting food. Energy that can go to our relative big brains. [11:08] Agriculture seems to have sprung out all around the globe at the same time. The increasing pace of progression between ages. Domestication of wild plants and animals did not increase in the last 2000 years. [16:12] Tolerance and the extinction of Neanderthals. Two theories about the extinction of Neanderthals. The first based on the intolerance trait of Sapiens, leads to think they were the target of the most significant ethnic-cleansing campaign in history. The second, less probable, talks about interbreeding and mingling. French vestiges in Vietnam. [21:39] Cognitive, the first revolution, defined by language. We switch by chatting about resources or danger, to be able to communicate richly about abstract ideas. Shared methodology becomes our main competitive advantage in nature, with the ability to pass out knowledge. Poetry as a mnemonic technique (ability to remember more). [24:26] Challenges in interpretation of spoken languages. The Bible example. Jesus walking on water can be translated to walking by the water. There exist some evidence that The Big Flood really existed. [27:08] Why there's a limit to the size a community can bond together and the the role of religion or "shared myths and methodology" to get past this number. The fact that Sapiens were able to cooperate in larger groups may be one of the reasons they wiped out Neanderthals, despite their physical and mental superiority. [33:30] What reality means for Harris, Peterson, Taleb, and Hirari. The roots of the Sam Harris and Jordan B Peterson disagreement may lie on the definition of reality. Porcupine example: a lot of people believes porcupines shoot their quills, which is not true, but helps us not to get injured. There are too many variables to consider when interpreting our environment, but our minds can feel something is odd even if we can't rationalize it. [40:11] How some Cultures are able to self perpetuate. Islamism vs Judaism. [43:10] The omission of evidence does not mean omission in reality. The only evidence that has survived is the one recorded in physical devices. All immaterial things went lost. Stone Age should be called the Wood Age. [45:31] Agriculture. History's biggest fraud: The agricultural revolution didn't led to a better life, but to an explosion of population and diseases. Agriculture societies are more fragile. Introduction of the concept of private property. Differences between hunters and gatherers, and losing skills. In Social Media, as in Agriculture, is difficult to see the end game. Successful Evolution is generally counted by numbers, not quality of life. We think that we domesticated other species, but it seems we domesticated ourselves. [54:53] As gatherers we are more prone to less Black Swans, but more variability. History of yeast and weed domestication. [59:45] Pyramids as objects of cult. Past and modern pyramids. Multiple levels of games to conquer pyramids. Nomadic Lifestyle as a cult. [1:02:52] The Writing Revolution. The first use of writing was financial accounting records. The origin of different bases for counting. Base 6 or 24 for hours in a day, base 10 related to our digits, base 2 as a valid alternative. [1:05:09] Writing originated because of agriculture. Phoenicians were prolific writers, but their main support was papyrus which went lost. On the contrary, Egyptians wrote less but on walls, so we have much more records from them. Ways to codify an idea understandable by every creature and the NASA experiment. Would aliens look to us as annoying spiders or cute kittens? [1:12:40] The idea of justice is alien to history. Theories of male dominance in human history. Comparisons to other mammals that form non-male societies. [1:20:34] Institution of family related to the concept of private property. Marriage is thought to be beneficial for women, but there’s a theory that states is much more beneficial for (loser) men [1:24:05] The role of shared myths to perpetuate the status quo. Wealth goes to wealth, poverty back to poverty. The correcting mechanism trickle and stop. Ideas to stop wealth differences should reduce the compounding effect of each situation. Taxing more capital gains and less income tax, or distinguishing between founder's capital from investor capital may level the ground between rich and poor and stop self-perpetuating statuses. [1:32:06] Here ends Part 1 of Sapiens. Pick the book and read the rest before Part 2 comes out. Sponsors! Buy a Canon EOS D5 through Amazon and help us support the show. Kettle & Fire is our provider of fine bone broth. They've got beef, chicken, chicken with mushroom. It cures disease, or at least there's no side effect when trying to cure from sickness with it. Get up to 33% OFF with our link. Four Sigmatic make great mushroom drinks, elixirs, coffee, and chocolates. We suggest the Adaptogen, and the Cordyceps to picnic up later in the day. Get 10 to 15% discount with our link. Perfect Keto is for all your ketosis needs. Really good products to get into and sustain ketosis. They have keto friendly protein powder, MCT oils, and nice pre-workout boost. Give us a review on iTunes, tell your friends, but not on facebook because Nat deleted his profile. Register for the email list and you'll know about books that are coming. Hit us up on twitter, @nateliason, @therealneils, and @adilmajit.

Traditionally, power was what was seen, what was shown and what was manifested and, paradoxically, found the principle of its force in the movement by which it deployed that force. Those on whom it was exercised could remain in the shade; they received light only from that portion of power that was conceded to them, or from the reflection of it that for a moment they carried. Disciplinary power, on the other hand, is exercised through its invisibility; at the same time it imposes on those whom it subjects a principle of compulsory visibility. In discipline, it is the subjects who have to be seen. In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and I discuss Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault. In this book Foucault discusses the history of, and differences between, discipline and punishment. We find that, despite being one of the founding fathers of postmodernism, Foucault’s ideas are reasonable and well thought out. “In monarchical law, punishment is a ceremonial of sovereignty; it uses the ritual marks of the vengeance that it applies to the body of the condemned man; and it deploys before the eyes of the spectators an effect of terror as intense as it is discontinuous, irregular and always above its own laws, the physical presence of the sovereign and of his power.” We cover a wide range of topics, including: Freedom of speech vs. Freedom from offense Whether language is interpreted by the speaker or the receiver Hierarchy in modern society A gruesome public execution How obtuse writing is intellectual signalling by serious philosophers And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on The Riddle of the Gun about other types of Freedom, and Daily Rituals, about artists and geniuses that achieve great things because of their "discipline". Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show North Star podcast [12:30] Hardcore History podcast episode [14:15] Egalitarianism [26:28] Turnover in the richest people [29:15] The Panopticon [33:18] Nat Chat with Adil Majid [37:47] Machiavellism [38:35] Growth Machine [38:44] Self-driving cars [44:20] Slate Star Codex [46:56] Black Mirror [57:13] Unregistered podcast [58:00] UK man arrested for making offensive joke [1:08:56] V for Vendetta (2005)  [1:11:30] Students no longer support free speech [1:12:00] Kaepernick kneeling during anthem [1:13:32] Cognitive dissonance [1:21:36] Power Law distribution [1:23:40] Bruno Mars’ cultural appropriation [1:27:32] Books mentioned Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault (Nat’s Notes) Daily Rituals by Mason Currey [5:47] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Stoics [7:16] The History of Sexuality by Michel Foucault [9:26] Hiroshima Diary: The Journal of a Japanese Physician by Michihiko Hachiya [20:06] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Riddle of the Gun by Sam Harris [20:06] (book episode) Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [21:12] (Nat’s Notes) Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [28:32] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Sovereign Individual [30:21] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) In Praise of Idleness by Bertrand Russell [31:28] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Recession Proof Graduate by Charlie Hoehn [35:40] (on Nat Chat) Seeing Like a State by James Scott [40:00] Albion’s Seed by David Fischer [46:56] Homo Deus by Yuval Noah Harari [48:25] Godel Escher Bach [1:07:52] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Das Kapital by Karl Marx [1:20:05] People mentioned Michel Foucault Jacques Derrida [4:40] Immanuel Kant [5:20] Steve Jobs [5:25] David Perell [12:30] Emperor Hirohito [20:38] David Selverian [32:15] Charlie Hohen [35:40] Andrés, our Podcast Editor [36:37] Adil Majid [37:45] Eminem [39:58] Nietzsche [59:10] Aristotle [1:00:50] Stephen Fry [1:09:40] Ron Paul [1:09:55] Jordan Peterson [1:19:30] (12 Rules for Life episode) Karl Marx [1:20:05] Show Topics 00:55 - We broke a record! Up to now, every book we’ve done we’d recommend - this one we don’t recommend. We would not wish this book on other people. 01:20 - We’d intended to read a postmodernist book, having been so negative about them in the past, but it turned out this wasn’t so much about postmodernism. While it doesn’t have a lot of the key themes we see today in postmodernism, the ideas are still very relevant to the conflicts that are talked about. Big focus on power-dynamics. 02:35 - Foucault’s not really arguing for anything in particular, it’s more his interpretation of the history of punishment. The language is very verbose, it’s almost unreadable. Derrida and Foucault are both famous for being difficult to read. Intellectual signalling. There’s a temptation in philosophy to write like this. 05:30 - Fallacy of correlation: just because great people happen to have bad habits does not mean you must copy them to become great yourself. They were great despite the bad habits. 06:20 - The idea that if something is easily understood it’s not suitable for teaching at uni. 07:40 - Kept pushing this episode back because it was a slog to get through the book. There are interesting ideas in it, regardless. 08:20 - The evolution of the prison system. The book is a four part history of discipline and punishment. 09:16 - This is said to be Foucault’s best work. The writer was born in France and moved to Berkeley to teach, he was gay, and an early advocate for gay rights. He later moved to the San Francisco area to be around that scene. He eventually died of HIV/AIDS. 10:15 - Foucault’s book The History of Sexuality book is very supportive of the non-heteronormative lifestyle which is where the postmodernists get a lot of their ideas about sexuality from. 10:50 - Sign up for our email list, we send out what books we are going to cover ahead of time and because of that we feel obliged to always finish a book. Sign up to help pressure us, it’s a great email list. 12:00 - Possible follow-up episode for this that’s more about postmodernism in general. Would be interesting to see a pro argument for it. 13:30 - Let us know on twitter (@nateliason) (@TheRealNeilS) if you’d like us to try out a slightly different format for the podcast where we do more of a deep dive into a school of philosophy, find out where it came from and its key ideas. 13:50 - The history of punishment. A brutal public execution with fireworks. One of the last public executions in France. Very graphic, an all day event that people traveled to see happen, in the 1750s. It was gruesome and every part of it got botched. 16:00 - In this section, Foucault says that punishment was historically a warning to others. Punishment was a way of the sovereignty speaking to the masses, saying to them what would happen if they out-stepped their boundaries. 17:30 - Part of what Foucault is arguing is that in the transition to prison, society moved from pure punishment - in which the person who commited the crime serves as a broader example to society - to rehabilitation of the individual. 18:00 - There is a thread of humanism in the book. The idea of rehabilitation is linked to the idea of every person having a soul that can be redeemed. The idea of making a person pay in life so that God would judge them less harshly in the afterlife. 19:00 - Believing in the value of people seems to be a major shift in humanity in the last 2-300 years, but this could equally just be a function of telling history. Previous societies more communal than the modern-day, individualistic US. 22:55 - Foucault points out here that while punishment was confined to those who did wrong, discipline became a part of life. All elements of society were built around these disciplinary structures. 23:40 - Punishment started as crimes against the sovereign and shifted to crimes against others. An individual has a place, but a place also has an individual. Everybody is integrated but also interchangeable and expendable. 25:35 - The strict imposition of hierarchy in all parts of life. Before, people could be punished for breaking the law but now you could be punished for only breaking societal norms. Start of a class system. Foucault suggests these are all artificial constructs imposed on us but that we all go along with. The postmodernist idea that the patriarchy is an artificial manifestation of power rather than an emergent result of inequality. 28:32 - Taleb said in Skin in the Game that it’s not how close together wealth classes are that a society uses to measure its equality it’s how easily there is movement between those classes. In Florence, the same few families are at the top of society since the 1600s. 29:15 - 80% turnover in the richest people in the last 20 or so years. Also above 50% of people will have at least one year of being in the top 5 income. 30:26 - Possibilities of a return to city-states. 31:28 - Any idle time is a waste. Punishment punishes you for not being somewhere you’re supposed to be according to a timetable but discipline allows you to make a greater use of that time. Through discipline you can multiply your positive output, like negative reinforcement vs positive reinforcement. 32:15 - Apprenticeships are still around in the modern day only not codified as they were previously. Cold calling/emailing firms can work as a way in if you can offer them something valuable. Like Andrés, who puts together the podcasts. 39:58 - Some of Foucault’s sentences are so long you need Eminem’s lungs to read them out loud. 40:00 - Foucault says that buildings become designed to maintain control over the people within them. Cities that have emerged organically are very much unknowable from the top. So they are redesigned to zone them or make them into grids. 43:00 - Washington DC was designed from the top-down to be more organic feeling. Apparently they designed it to be hard to navigate to prevent invasions. In places like India, the cities have been constructed from the bottom up and so eCommerce is difficult as deliveries are really hard to do. 44:20 - Question of how self-driving cars will change the layouts of cities. 45:10 - There’s no great way to take skyscrapers down or even deal with them when they age, they were never planned to be taken down. In Munich there are a lot of pedestrianized areas with pop-up bars and cafes. 46:55 - There were a few main groups who founded America including the Puritans, the Quakers and Catholics, a lot of whose beliefs are codified in law, leading now to a more socially conservative country compared to much of Europe. 49:50 - Ranks and hierarchies play on our nature as social creatures and our in-built desire to know where in the hierarchy we fit in. This can be seen in the importance of titles in big companies, how it’s taken so seriously on the inside that from the outside it can seem almost funny. Titles are a cheap form of compensating somebody, like giving kids gold stars. 54:08 - Division is a big theme in the book. Among the Postmodernists the oppressor is like the entity that has the plague. Foucault calls out that humans have always had this distinction between good and bad, healthy and unhealthy. A tribal view. This is one of his ideas that we see the most in the modern day. 59:07 - Nietzsche was not a nazi, you can see how some of his ideas led to nazism but there is not a complete match up. 59:46 - There are a lot of things we think are normal now but were thought of abnormal in the past. 1:00:50 - Aristotle said that women can’t think well enough to vote; he wasn’t sexist, that’s just what people thought at the time. 1:01:10 - People take Foucault’s basic ideas too far when they say that all distinctions between individuals have to be disregarded. Foucault would say that it’s wrong to say one difference is abnormal where the other is normal but differences in themselves are fine. The difference can’t be argued but any judgement made on those differences is subjective. 1:03:00 - There was nothing objectionable in this book besides the writing style. 1:03:35 - The word “normal” is very loaded. Supermajority and outliers. Distribution judgements vs. value judgements. Gender normative views. It’s all about terminology. 1:06:32 - Words shape people’s thoughts, the use of words can change opinions and win arguments. People’s interpretations of language shapes their worldview. 1:08:00 - Postmodernism treats language as interpreted by the receiver whereas in most of life we have to treat language as interpreted by the speaker. 1:09:36 - You don’t have a right not to be offended. You can’t have freedom of speech and freedom from offense. Freedom of speech is not there so people can talk about the weather. 1:10:40 - Germany has so many anti-Nazi laws meaning that people can go to prison for things they say. It is thought of as a free country but the interpretation of freedom is very different to that in America. 1:11:50 - It’s strange that freedom of speech is something that needs to be defended. 1:13:44 - Virtue signaling with upper-middle class white kids feeling the need to do walkouts to defend minorities from being offended. Very patronizing and even offensive. 1:18:30 - Postmodernists say you have to not assume anyone’s gender because gender is fluid, and people who decide to change gender are now that gender. Logic is a patriarchal concept! These ideas are not from Foucault so the modern postmodernists must be getting them from somewhere completely different. 1:19:30 - Jordan Peterson and Foucault would get along. 1:20:00 - The issue a lot of philosophers have where their ideas get taken way further past where they themselves drew their conclusions. Karl Marx, towards the end of his life recanted some of the more extreme ideas of Das Kapital. 1:20:44 - If there is something we are missing about these arguments, please let us hear about it, tweet us (@nateliason) (@TheRealNeilS)! 1:21:36 - A lot of the most post-moderny kids on campus are the outcasts. 1:25:40 - Racial jokes used to be part of bonding but now it seems that people are too afraid to say things. 1:28:12 - Closing thought: anytime you see a modern philosophy it’s worth going to the original source. 1:30:00 – People that make this show happen: Perfect Keto is the one-stop shop for all your ketogenic diet needs. The ketogenic diet is really effective for weight loss. Perfect Keto’s exogenous ketones helps you get into ketosis. Use the 20% coupon mentioned in the episode or go to www.perfectketo.com/think. Kettle & Fire bone broth helps you warm in this winter. Theory says we were scavengers and sucked up the bone colagens. K&F bone broth is excellent to get all those nutrients we don’t get anymore. Also it helps combat modern diseases like small intestine bacterial overgrowth. The mushroom coffee from Four Sigmatic energizes you with less caffeine. Chaga mush, linesmain mush stimulants give a really nice buzz, and the Cordyceps elixir is a caffeine-free stimulant. They hot cocoas are instead relaxing and a good dessert They have a new matcha product. Finally, you can help the show for free shopping on Amazon through our affiliate link. Subscribe to the Mailing List to receive bonuses, giveaways, future episode links and more. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

Fantasists and zealots can be found on both sides of the debate over guns in America. On the one hand, many gun-rights advocates reject even the most sensible restrictions on the sale of weapons to the public. On the other, proponents of stricter gun laws often seem unable to understand why a good person would ever want ready access to a loaded firearm. Between these two extremes we must find grounds for a rational discussion about the problem of gun violence. In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and I discuss The Riddle of the Gun by Sam Harris. In this blogpost, Harris weighs arguments and anti arguments for and against gun ownership control. We still have more guns and more gun violence than any other developed country, but the correlation between guns and violence in the United States is far from straightforward. Thirty percent of urban households have at least one firearm. This figure increases to 42 percent in the suburbs and 60 percent in the countryside. As one moves away from cities, therefore, the rate of gun ownership doubles. And yet gun violence is primarily a problem in cities. It is the people of Detroit, Oakland, Memphis, Little Rock, and Stockton who are at the greatest risk of being killed by guns. We cover a wide range of topics, including: Motivations behind shootings in America Why the US situation cannot be compared to other countries and the need of a unique solution The difficulties our brains have processing statistics, and the skewed importance we give to events School guards and gun use training and licensing Why it’s very unlikely that we will talk with aliens one day And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to read The Riddle of the Gun by Sam Harris! A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Amusing Ourselves to Death, a book that discuss our brain limitations, as well as our episode on Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb, on the topic of the importance of having personal experience and true knowledge when talking about hot topics. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show National Rifle Association – NRA [14:18] AR 15 [15:13] Parkland High School’s shooting [14:15] Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting [22:15] Aurora Cinema in Colorado shooting [22:58] Orlando Nightclub shooting [22:58] Virginia Tech shooting [28:48] UT Austin shooting [28:59] Revolver Speed Reload video [37:23] Warrior Gene [45:47] I gave you power - Nas [56:40] Vegas shooting questions of investigation [1:03:48] Unabomber [1:04:55] DC sniper attack [1:05:41] Columbine killers [1:17:36] Books mentioned The Riddle of the Gun by Sam Harris Godel Escher Bach [29:41] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb [2:19] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Hiroshima Diary: The Journal of a Japanese Physician by Michihiko Hachiya [08:40] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Amusing Ourselves to Death [15:37] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion by Sam Harris [01:33:20] People mentioned Sam Harris Kid Rock [12:18] Jocko [20:50] Elon Musk [45:18] (on this podcast) Pepper the Poochon [48:49] Nassim Nicholas Taleb [46:21] (Antifragile episode) Chris Rock [57:48] Barack Obama [1:01:02] Show Topics 0:00 – Escalation of gun violence and controversy about the definition of mass shooting. The lack and the need of rational arguments in favor or against gun control. 4:48 – Two ways of talking about guns and regulation. The perfect world scenario, where guns do not exist. The current world, where they do. Reasons to why America may not be able to copy and paste regulations from other countries which have a completely different contexts. DNA of countries: starting with the individual freedom vs starting with the collective and scaling down to individual. 9:57 – Hedge against tyranny. It's not about the individual right to have arms, but the State's right to have militia. An armed country makes it more threatening to be invaded. 13:06 – Safe and unsafe gun use. Most of people have a very skewed opinion about guns but lacks deep knowledge about them. Campaigns for and against resort in fear rather than education. Sides attack the weakest argument of the other, instead of dismantling the strongest one. Story behind the AR15 name. 17:56 – Arguments in favor of gun ownership. Police will never arrive on time in a home invasion situation. In a world without guns, the bully wins over the others. Guns even the physical playfield. A weak person could defend itself from a physically strong one. Limitations of Martial Arts in real life. Escaping a dangerous situation as a better strategy than engaging in it. 22:15 – Comparing gun deaths to car accidents and medical errors. According to statistics, gun problems are a problem of population density and not a problem of guns ownership: there are more weapons in rural America, but mass shootings occur in cities. Murder rate going down after assault weapon federal ban expiration coincidence and possible causes. 29:4 – Why Media and people would care more about the life o a kid in New Talents Life than the life of gangsters in Detroit. Different reactions for 9/11 and what happens everyday in Middle East. Difficulties to process statistics and emotional attachment in 1-to-1 relationships. Mass shooting deaths represent just 0.1% 37:42 – Original meaning vs evolved meaning of the American Constitution. Different ban treatment for assault weapons and handguns. Drawing the line in which weapons to ban and which not. 41:33 – California and New York banning 17 rounds magazines. Arming Mars' colonizers. 47:48 – Logistics of breaking ins would be easier with a ban law. Dogs as deterrents to break ins. Civilians shouldn't intervene in dangerous situations. When speaking about gun ownership, we should always include training. The Japanese case, where to own a weapon you have to be trained and your license renewed as for driving cars. For cars and certain businesses training is mandatory. How to circumvent the Second Amendment requiring infinite training. 53:27 – Mental health issues and buying guns. Suicide and domestic violence may be reduced without weapons. Abortion sucitates such much discussion and viewpoints as guns. Cause vs magnitude of events. Knife problems in Chinese schools. Guns do enable to kill people faster. 58:58 – Putting guards for schools instead of arming teachers. Politicians against school guards lacking skin in the game, because they have personal guards. Coincidence of mass shootings happening in gun-free places. 1:03:56 – Motivations behind mass shootings. Armed teachers may introduce more "variability". Deterrent effect is difficult to measure. 1:09:51 Idea: giving guns to kids! Training kids how to behavior in dangerous situations. Many schools do have cops around, but probably not because of terrorist events. 1:13:47 – Imperfect Justice system may be corrected by private justice. Some countries may not have guns problems because of a "barbaric" Justice system. Physical punishment as a deterrent. Mass attention as a motivator for shooting. 1:17:47 – Symbolic steps towards more gun control. Veterans could be re-included as school guards and would be better experienced in fire situations. Guns training and licenses would be a billion dollars/year business. 1:23:29 – Considerations for a Constitutional Amendment modification? 1:24:25 – Shift in attitudes and shared responsibility is the way to solve a unique US problem. Tweet to us and share your inputs! 1:27:34 – Sponsors time! Four Sigmatic has a new Adaptogen Mushroom Coffee, which has Tulsi and Astragalus. A special one to make you go on tangents! Use the Chaga one, perfect for brainstorming, and Adaptogen for execution. You get 15% off with our link. Check out Perfecto Keto for all your keto related needs. Check the Peaches & Cream, and Chocolate & Vanilla Exogenous Ketones. They also have a Keto Pre-Workout for a boost before exercising. Use the coupon code revealed in the episode to get a discount. Kettle & Fire are the purveyors of artisanal bone broth, with all the collageny ancestral goodness. You can keep it in your cabinet, perfect for a warm treat during a snowstorm. 1:31:24 Leave a review on iTunes, but not a bad one! :) Support the show by using our Amazon sponsored link. Subscribe to the Mailing List and tell your friends! Tell Evernote to listen to our bonus material.

“Skin in the Game is about four topics in one: a) uncertainty and the reliability of knowledge (both practical and scientific, assuming there is a difference), or in less polite words bullshit detection, b) symmetry in human affairs, that is, fairness, justice, responsibility, and reciprocity, c) information sharing in transactions, and d) rationality in complex systems and in the real world. That these four cannot be disentangled is something that is obvious when one has…skin in the game.” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and I discuss Skin in the Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life by Nassim Taleb. In this book, Taleb touches in many of the topics he’s covered in his previous work, such as virtue signaling and probability, and most of all, true risk taking. "[...] what people resent—or should resent—is the person at the top who has no skin in the game [...]" We cover a wide range of topics, including: Academia and its capability —or lack of it— of predicting real life. Having skin in the game and how it affects your behavior. How minorities impose their preferences to majorities. Judging a complex system by its elements. Sam Harris’ scalding opinion of Nassim Taleb. Virtue signaling. And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Skin in the Game by Nassim Taleb. "Not everything that happens happens for a reason, but everything that survives survives for a reason." If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Antifragile by Nassim Taleb to dive deeper into Taleb’s work, and our episode on 12 Rules for Life by Jordan Peterson, so you too can imagine the awesome podcast Jordan and Taleb could create together. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Nassim Taleb on Medium [01:45] Nat Chat [01:04] (Antifragile episode) Twitter [03:48] Uber [13:04] Venture Capital [15:30] Y Combinator [15:37] Startup Company [15:37] Hedge Fund [17:09] Cryptocurrency [18:16] Gilgamesh coin [19:00] Lindy Effect  [21:40] Virtue Signaling [24:32] Middlebury College [24:43] Statin [28:25] American Heart Association [31:30] Coca-Cola [35:20] Confirmation Bias [38:47] The Placebo Effect [38:50] The Most Intolerant Wins: The Dictatorship of the Small Minority by Nassim Taleb [40:29] Kosher Food [40:29] New Atheism [45:16] Reddit [45:26] Facebook [45:27] Starbucks [45:30] Dick’s Sporting Goods [46:00] Box Company [46:52] Google [56:42] Mutual Assured Destruction [01:02:04] JPMorgan Chase [01:09:00] Apple Inc. [01:09:30] Amazon [01:09:30] Uber [01:09:33] Instacart [01:09:33] Fat Tony [01:09:52] The National Football League (NFL) [01:18:36] Tesla [01:12:54] In-n-Out Burger [1:23:33] Chipotle [1:23:33] D'Souza rips apart smug leftist student over "white privilege" [1:27:30] Humanitarians of Tinder [01:33:17] Toms Shoes [01:33:45] Malaria nets [1:34:33] Sam Harris on Nassim Taleb “insufferable” quotation [1:43:10] The best podcast ever by Sam Harris [1:49:10] Russell Brand Podcast’s Under the Skin [1:49:10] Books mentioned 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos by Dr. Jordan B. Peterson [00:39] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder by Nassim Taleb [01:04] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets by Nassim Taleb [02:00] The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable by Nassim Taleb [02:00] The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms by Nassim Taleb [02:00] Happy Accidents: Serendipity in Modern Medical Breakthroughs by Morton A. Meyers [14:05] Charlie Munger: The Complete Investor by Tren Griffin [26:30] Merchants of Doubt: by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway [34:54] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas R. Hofstadter [39:34] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Leverage Points: Places to Intervene in a System by Donella Meadows [52:13] (book episode) Hiroshima Diary: The Journal of a Japanese Physician by Michihiko Hachiya [01:01:28] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford [01:37:03] A History of Private Life by Paul Veyne [01:40:39] Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion by Sam Harris [01:47:35] Lying by Sam Harris [01:47:35] People mentioned: Nassim Nicholas Taleb (Antifragile episode) Hillary Clinton [06:58] Steven Pinker [06:58] [1:35:59] Ayn Rand [07:54] Anne Hearst [24:52] Charles Murray [24:57] Aaron Levie [46:51] Donald Trump [01:06:40] Marco Rubio [01:07:22] Chris Christie [01:07:31] Jeff Bezos [01:11:58] Bill Gates [01:12:05] Mark Zuckerberg [01:12:14] J.K. Rowling [01:33:00] Alexander The Great [01:36:39] Jordan B. Peterson [01:41:32] (on this podcast) Sam Harris [01:41:32] Scott Adams [01:49:26] Russell Brand [01:49:47] Jocko [01:53:40] Show Topics 01:30 – Taleb's bibliography, his previous releases. Contrasts and relations between his previous works and Skin in the Game. A greater focus in philosophy and morals, rather than the mathematical focus of his other books. Skin in the game concept for business and non-business people. 06:38 – Taleb's use of criticism of other people, perhaps partially for publicity reasons. Criticizing people at your own weight vs needless harassment. The Ayn Rand effect. 08:50 – The books’ introduction. Academia vs real life. You can’t predict the behavior of a system by studying the behavior of individual elements within the system. Emerging qualities of complex systems. Academia back-explaining knowledge that’s created practically. Skin in the game for Roman architects and medicine scientists. 14:57 – True progress is only possible when you actually stand to lose something should you fail. Defining “rent-seeking” as opposite for “skin in the game”. Different types sorts of investments and whether they constitute rent-seeking. 19:25 – The contents of the book can become a lens through which you see the world. 20:03 – Sponsors. Get a shot of Four Sigmatic Mushroom Coffee mixed with MCT oil powder from Perfecto Keto. Follow our advice, we have skin in the coff… in the game. 20:59 – You can’t judge whether something is robust, if it can survive stressors, if you’re not at risk in case it can’t. The test of time. 23:30 – Business plans and their usefulness, or usefulness for procrastination. 24:54 – Book 2: A First Look at Agency. Advice, and knowing when to listen to it. Advice that’s helpful to the person offering it, rather than who’s being advised. Incentives and metrics under judgement. 26:50 – Judging actions by their intentions, rather than their effects. Nazism vs Communism. Diets, cholesterol, weight, and its effects on health as single elements of a complex system. 35:36 – Avoiding doctors when you have low-risks health issues. Prayer and religion developing related to health, and the high risk of medical procedures. The Placebo Effect. 39:20 – Book 3: That Great Asymmetry. Ant and ant colony metaphor. Predicting a complex system’s behavior through the behavior of singular elements. A small vocal minority affecting the behavior of large groups. The minority effect on holiday greetings and restaurant choices. 45:56 – Gun regulation, and changes in policy meant for advertising. Virtue signaling and what you do out of your beliefs, versus what’s done for public recognition. Standing up for your opinions even if, or specially if, it has social consequences. 50:57 – The free market, bottom-up or top-down models. Changing the parameters of individuals will not change the parameters of the emerging system. 52:57 – Book 4: Wolves Among Dogs. The trade off between security and freedom. Working as a dog, comfortably but restrained, versus working as a wolf, with much more freedom, but less safety. Tactics big companies use domesticating their employees. English manners as a way to domesticate lower classes. 00:59:39 – Suicide bombers and Mutual Assured Destruction. Reasoning and incentives in terrorists perspective, and how to discourage them to commit suicide. Sacrificing oneself and sacrificing the whole nation. 01:02:26 – Freedom and social media. Voluntarily adopting habits of the lower class as a signal of freedom. Nassim Taleb and Twitter. 01:05:53 – Book 5: Being Alive Means Taking Certain Risks. Politicians and relatability. Feeling like a politician is a real person, or simply a scripted facade. The case for Trump and his relatability. 01:08:36 – Resentment against people at the top who don’t have skin in the game, who are not really risking anything. Economic equality and what it truly means. Unfair barriers put up to keep people in the 1% when they might not really be earning their spot anymore. Florence example, where a handful of  families has kept the power for more than 5 centuries. 01:14:38 – Peer approval, the minority effect, and real freedom. 01:17:06 – Book 6: Being Alive Means Taking Certain Risks. Between two people who are equally qualified, the person who looks less “the part” is a wiser choice, as they have had to overcome more challenges to get to where they are. Quarterbacks vs common sense. Elitism and food: steaks, fast-food, and wine. Big mansions and living away from everything. 01:27:38 – Virtue signaling. Protesting or complaining without putting action behind your beliefs. Charity that’s mostly for show and its negative consequences. 01:35:12 – History and violent events: decreasing in frequency, but increasing rapidly in intensity. War, urban violence, and the magnitude of violence. Life that isn’t covered in history outside of big, dramatic events. 01:41:26 – Book 7: Deeper Into Agency. Religion, Beliefs, and Skin in the Game. Sam Harris, Nassim Taleb, and Jordan Peterson. Religion, science, and scientism. 01:49:22 – Sam Harris’ podcast and its infamous guests. 01:50:38 – Book 8: Risk and Rationality. The last section of the book, and concepts in it that are being explored in-depth by Taleb for the first time. “Skin in the Game” as an entry point for Taleb’s work. 01:52:26 – You don’t necessarily need to know what is the reason for something, even if you know that there is a reason. 01:54:31 – Ergodicity and non-ergodicity, or assembled probability vs individual probability. Paranoia and risk reversion. Risk taking and relative risk rather than objective risk. Bathtubs’ and bullets’ potential to scale to kill people. Terrorism, gun violence and non-multiplicative risks. 02:01:35 – Ties back to Taleb’s previous work. Static and dynamics probabilities and life expectancy. 02:05:37 – Wrapping up and sponsor time! Make sure to grab your own copy of “Skin in the Game” through our Amazon sponsored link. To help the podcast maintain the freedom of the market, check out as well our sponsors: Kettle & Fire for all your delicious bone broth needs, with up to 30% OFF! We recommend Perfecto Keto’s coffee-flavored exogenous ketones. Four Sigmatic: for your mushroom coffee and all your other mushroom needs. And as always, don’t forget to check out our Support page. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com    

A solid routine fosters a well-worn groove for one’s mental energies and helps stave off the tyranny of moods. In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and I discuss​ Daily Rituals by Mason Currey. In this book, Currey edits together first-hand accounts from different artists and creative thinkers of how they went about their everyday lives. “I write when the spirit moves me,”  said, “and the spirit moves me every day.” – Faulkner. We cover a wide range of topics, including: The problem with lifestyle gurus. Whether drugs enhance genius. Coffee’s role in causing the Renaissance. How people in far-off countries let each other know they were alive before the internet. Beethoven’s perfect cup of Joe. Why you should pin notes to your clothes' Night Owls vs. Early Birds - who gets more worms. Hacks to become an morning person. And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Daily Rituals: How Artists Work by Mason Currey! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on 12 Rules for Life by Jordan B. Peterson for more tips on how to order your day, as well as our episode on Elon Musk to discover what rituals a modern-day success keeps. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show: Sleep debt [8:00] Dymaxion sleep [8:46] Polyphasic sleep [9:05] Alt-right [11:55] Benzedrine [12:58] Ritalin [18:34] The Renaissance [22:26] Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder – OCD [29:10] Franklin’s 13 Virtues [32:21] How to Plan your Ideal Day by Taylor Pearson [39:48] Maker’s Schedule, Manager’s Schedule by Paul Graham [40:05] Growth Machine [40:10] On-demand economy [44:58] 1099 economy [44:58] Peterson’s guide to essay writing [51:44] Mnemonics [57:10] Keto-adaptation [59:50] Hormetic stress [1:07:55] Night Owl Mutation [1:12:36] Gilgamesh Platform [1:20:50] Books mentioned: Antifragile by Nassim Nicholas Taleb [12:28] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Come Again? by Nat Eliason [19:26] Benjamin Franklin by Walter Isaacson [32:21] The 4-Hour Body by Tim Ferriss [34:36] Skin in the Game by Nassim Nicholas Taleb [34:47] Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller [48:42] The War of Art - Steven Pressfield [50:44] The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath [1:02:18] Merchants of Doubt by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway [1:07:55] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand [1:10:50] Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand [1:11:10] People mentioned: Francis Bacon [2:30] Nassim Nicholas Taleb [3:54] (Antifragile episode) Tim Ferriss [5:00] Jocko [5:08] Buckminster Fuller [8:46] Steve Pavlina [10:00] V. S. Pritchett [11:30] W. H. Auden [12:58] Immanuel Kant [13:58] Michel Foucault [13:58] Ryan Holiday [14:44] Beethoven [29:16] Nikola Tesla [29:34] Tom Cruise [30:37] Benjamin Franklin [32:32] Charles Darwin [36:30] (on this podcast) Henry Miller [48:42] William Faulkner [50:27] Ann Beattie [50:58] Haruki Murakami [52:37] Scott Britain [53:11] Ramit Sethi [53:11] Jonathan Edwards [57:10] Sylvia Plath [1:02:12] Woody Allen [1:02:37] Jean Paul Sartre [1:03:00] David Lynch [1:06:20] Paul Erdős [1:10:25] Ayn Rand [1:10:50] Show Topics 00:50 – Book covers daily rituals of a bunch of people, not just artists. Broad interpretation of artists, anyone who does creative or critical thinking work. 01:24 – There’s a surprising amount of drug-use in this book, lots of alcohol, and not sleeping. On the one hand this seemed undisciplined, but on the other these people did have very regular schedules. There was discipline to keep these activities in a well-worn groove. 01:53 – A hangover can make it easier to write – your brain can be more focused. In some ways it’s like the opposite of being caffeinated. 03:10 – The book has an interesting layout, there’s no attempt at narrative, each chapter is about a new person’s routine. 03:54 – Taleb keeps no routine, he doesn’t even use a calendar. 04:00 – Small gripe with books like this as these are idealized and narrativized versions of these rituals. None of them get drunk and yell at people on Twitter. Wouldn’t be surprised if they’re only true 20-50% of the time. 04:55 – Problem with a lot of the lifestyle guru type people. They don’t do all of that stuff everyday. Except Jocko, he’s never overslept in the last 15 years. His morning routine seems to be the same wherever he is. 06:02 – Maintaining a normal schedule when you travel across time zones helps you adapt way faster. The minute you go back to your hotel you’ll crash, it’s game over! Jet lag is a strange tiredness, especially if you drink coffee, like you’re wired and drunk at the same time. 08:00 – Questioning whether you can save up a store of sleep for a rainy day. Apparently you can’t front load it, but when you get into debt you need to pay it back! 08:46 – Types of polyphasic sleep. Buckminster Fuller developed dymaxion sleep, he did it for two years and he’s the only one who’s ever been able to do it. 5-10% of the population legitimately need less sleep. Everyone else thinks they’re in that group but they’re not. 09:05 – When they tried one study on polyphasic sleep the subject just crashed and they could not wake him up. 11:43 – Is it quote or quotation? Don’t want to anger the grammar people! 11:55 – Download all of our episodes to find out whether one of our team is part of the alt-right. 12:58 – Auden was popping Benzedrine all the time. He regarded it as a “labor saving device,” a daily multivitamin. In the mental kitchen alongside alcohol, coffee and tobacco. 13:40 – Were these people great producers because of these habits or despite them? Question of whether the live-fast, die-young lifestyle enhances genius. 16:22 – Personal experiences and use of some drugs. Coffee for work and productivity, micro-dosing LSD for the same. Marijuana for an after wine session. Fear of getting hooked with tobacco vs alcohol. 18:34 – Ritalin/Aterol for effortless full-speed ahead concentration. 20:12 – Doctors overprescribe Aterol – 90% of people taking it don’t need it. It’s very hard to quit, people get frustrated at never hitting the same level of quality. In some ways similar to steroids. 22:26 – The Renaissance happened when people stopped drinking beer all day and switched to coffee. 22:36 – Drinking habits around the world. Beer used to be brewed as water wasn’t safe to drink. They would steep the same grains up to four times. In Asia they would drink tea all day, which is probably why they were historically more productive than Europe. 24:55 – In sushi bars in Tokyo they have a tap of green tea. In Germany they give you beer, Americans drink water and now they’re more productive because they’re hydrated. 25:53 – Tangent – Most people who are in America now, their ancestors were the risk-takers. The people who took the initiative to leave behind everything they knew. So culturally this is ingrained. 26:59 – People used booked calls to let family on the other side of the world know they were alive before Skype. 27:40 – The history of pokes on Facebook – they would let a non-friend see your profile for a few days without actually becoming your friend. 29:10 – A significant number of people featured in the book seemed to have OCD, they were trying to control chaos. Beethoven’s coffee had to have 60 beans a cup. Kant had an extremely orderly schedule. The clock tower in town stayed on time less passionately than Kant. 32:00 – Everyone has odd habits, especially artists who spend a lot of time in their heads. 32:21 – The general impression of Benjamin Franklin is “early to bed, early to rise” but he seemed to set his 13 virtues up as goals rather than things he’d achieved. Comparing Ben Franklin to Tim Ferriss. People disapprove of others not following their own advice to the letter. 35:53 – Controversy when one updates his opinions. 36:16 – It’s surprising how few hours people worked – the bulk of the creative work was 5-6 hours a day, max. Darwin was famous for having two 3 hour work blocks. It’s hard to do creative work for longer. But good for mental energy. 38:00 – Tangent. It’s hard to be spontaneous in New York. Phone calls are scheduled a week in advance.  Time management tips: set regular stand-ups, only book meetings at certain times. Color-code your calendar. 40:30 – Work environments are moving towards being more results orientated, moving away from people just sitting at their desks doing nothing. A relic of the production line. Schedule Tetris in large corporations. 43:26 – Hack. Schedule hour meetings for 40 minutes, or half hour meetings for 20 minutes. It forces people to condense. 44:58 – Data should make it easier for people to get paid based on productivity rather than time. For consulting jobs, it doesn’t make sense to charge based on time. Historically, time was the best way of measuring output and so this made sense. 47:43 – Education is also stuck in this time loop since it was originally influenced by factory organization. Most interesting ideas that end up leading somewhere come from play, from free time. 49:21 – After unsuccessfully trying for ten years in New York, Henry Miller had given up writing, when he finally wrote a novel in Paris it was published without editing, there’s sentences that just stop mid-way. Seeing from outside, it seems these creatives are able to follow a routine without anyone forcing them. 51:44 – Jordan Peterson says there’s no such thing as writer’s block. If you’re stuck it’s because you have run out of things to say, you need to unblock yourself. 53:10 – Sleep and wake up at the same time every day, even on weekends, may make you feel much more energized. Sleeping in on the weekend it’s almost like changing time zones every five days. 56:41 – Giveaways are coming, sign up for the email list. 57:03 – To remember to do important things pin a piece of paper on a different piece of your clothing, a form of mnemonics. 58:15 – When you first wake up, that’s a different person. You have to find ways of tricking him into not hitting snooze. Routines and replacement can help you get past undesirable behavior. 59:04 – Sponsor time. Mushroom elixir from Four Sigmatic and bone broth from Kettle & Fire along with Perfecto Keto collagen. Use them to replace alcohol in the evening! 1:01:38 – Despite living in climate controlled environments, we still feel like it’s cold outside when it’s winter, even though it’s the same temperature where we are. 1:03:30 – Some people’s capacity for alcohol is so far beyond the average. If you’re regimented and disciplined you could physically drink a bottle of spirits a day. 1:07:15 – Sugar is like a mild form of cocaine. It’s a stimulant followed by a crash. Hormetic stressors are only “natural”. 1:09:20 – Psycho-active drugs don’t make your brain do things it can’t do, they mimic neural pathways. Maybe adaptation is down-regulating the amount of neurochemicals being released in response to the trigger. If you know, write in! 1:11:36 – Morning Working vs Night-time working theme. More of the creators were geared towards mornings but it wasn’t across the board. Evolutionarily, it doesn’t make sense for humans to want to work at night. 1:14:20 – Waking up hack. Trick yourself into getting up by telling yourself you can go back to bed in 30 minutes if you’re still tired. 1:14:45 – Wrap-up and sponsor time. Perfecto Keto is perfect for all your ketogenic diet needs. Exogenous coffee-flavored ketones. Their matcha MCT oil powder is highly recommended for focusing. You can use the MCT oil with a Four Sigmatic mushroom coffee or your hot chocolate, all 15% OFF through our sponsored link or use the coupon code mentioned. Kettle & Fire will give you 20% OFF on their delicious bone broths –beef recommended for cooking, and chicken for a good, hot wintery drink– and free shipping! Listen to know how to get a mushroom-flavored bone broth. And you can always support us by going through our Amazon sponsored link and checking out our Support page. 1:20:50 – The new Gilgamesh cryptocurrency is building a social network built on knowledge sharing. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

“Time after time I’ve done an analysis of a company, and I’ve figured out a leverage point — in inventory policy, maybe, or in the relationship between salesforce and productive force, or in personnel policy. Then I’ve gone to the company and discovered that there’s already a lot of attention to that point. Everyone is trying very hard to push it in the wrong direction!” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and I discuss Leverage Points: Places to Intervene in a System by Donella Meadows. In this article, Meadows goes through her twelve “leverage points” in which you can affect change in your company or any complex system, from least to most effective. “Magical leverage points are not easily accessible, even if we know where they are and which direction to push on them. There are no cheap tickets to mastery. You have to work hard at it, whether that means rigorously analyzing a system or rigorously casting off your own paradigms and throwing yourself into the humility of Not Knowing. In the end, it seems that mastery has less to do with pushing leverage points than it does with strategically, profoundly, madly letting go.” We cover a wide range of topics, including: All of Meadow’s 12 Leverage Points Positive and negative feedback loops The NRA and gun control How individuals can change the system in small and big ways Brexit and the Eurozone The paradigms that shape our thinking And much more. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on The Goal by Eliyahu M. Goldratt for its meta-theory of business, and our episode on Finite and Infinite Games by James Carse, about how employers and employees can create, change, and play in systems. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show: The Titanic [10:43] Paleolithic diet [12:40] Ketogenic diet [12:40] The Bike-Shed Effect [14:17] Evernote [23:20] Rule of 3 and 10 [23:19] American Eagle [25:15] Zara [25:35] Cryptocurrency [30:15] Apple Inc. [35:00] The Big Mike – Banana Species [39:00] Slippery Slope Argument [41:47] Veil of Ignorance [42:00] The Selfish Gene Hypothesis [47:25] Intuit [54:00] 9-9-9 Plan [54:20] TurboTax [55:40] QuickBooks [55:40] The Florida Shooting [01:05:15] National Rifle Association — NRA [01:05:20] Net Neutrality [01:05:30] The Riddle of the Gun by Sam Harris [01:09:15] Game Theory [01:09:55] The Daily Wire [01:14:13] The Ben Shapiro Show – Podcast [1:14:13] Justworks [01:24:00] MomTrusted.com [01:24:47] AirBnB [01:35:50] Uber [01:35:50] Scott Galloway Says Amazon, Apple, Facebook, And Google should be broken up [1:39:22] Socialists of New York [1:53:59] Flatgeologists [02:01:50] Books mentioned: The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement by Eliyahu M. Goldratt and Jeff Cox [2:57] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Way of Zen by Alan Watts [3:00] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Finite and Infinite Games by James C. Carse [04:31] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas R. Hofstadter [07:36] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Into the Cool: Energy Flow, Thermodynamics, and Life by Eric D. Schneider and Dorion Sagan [07:23] The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable by Nassim Taleb [16:49] Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder by Nassim Taleb [16:49] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) ​ 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos by Dr. Jordan B. Peterson [23:59] (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) (book episode) Banana: The Fate of the Fruit That Changed the World by Dan Koeppel [39:25] Merchants of Doubt: by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway [40:29] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Hiroshima Diary: The Journal of a Japanese Physician by Michihiko Hachiya [01:04:30] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) The Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson and William Rees-Mogg [01:47:50] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari [01 :49:24] (Nat’s notes) The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn [02:01:07] Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennett [02:02:00] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) People mentioned: Donella Meadows Elon Musk [3:10] (on this podcast) Bill Clinton [11:23] George H.W. Bush [11:23] Jordan B. Peterson [47:26] (on this podcast) Herman Cain [54:20] Emperor Hirohito [01:04:50] Ben Shapiro [01:14:04] Donald Trump [01:23:05] Adolf Hitler [01:43:23] Margaret Thatcher [01:44:40] Joe Rogan [01:48:23] Thomas Kuhn [02:00:35] Show Topics 02:01 — Meadows is a corporate consultant, who helps companies increase productivity through what she calls “leverage points”. Her focus is on companies, but it really could be applied to any system. Even the podcast itself! 3:17 — How people try to change complex systems by focusing on the wrong parts, or intervening in the right parts, but in the wrong ways. Meadows’ list of ways in which you can intervene from least to most effective. 6:53 — Each intervention point makes sense in connection to the others. Looking at them in simpler system helps understand their role in complex systems. The bathtub analogy. 10:30 — The 12th point: Constants, parameters, numbers. A person occupying a role doesn’t have as much leverage as the role itself. It’s easier to change small parameters than it is to change a broader picture. Eg.: changing the soda you drink instead of changing your whole diet. The Bike-Shed effect. 16:00 — The 11th point: The sizes of buffers and other stabilizing stocks, relative to their flows.  The check account metaphor; the amount of money that’s usually left in your account, doesn’t come in or out. That’s your buffer, and can be changed. The size of your buffer can really affect your system. It can increase your security, but also liability. Tradeoff between creativity and redundancy. 20:41 — The 10th point: The structure of material stocks and flows (such as transport networks, population age structures).  This rule is harder to immediately apply to the business case. The pipes metaphor; it’s sometimes necessary to set up a system entirely from scratch, or rebuild it, because it’s almost impossible to reach your goals with what’s already present. The rule of 3 and 10. 24:05 — The 9th point: The lengths of delays, relative to the rate of system change. The importance of consumer feedback. Systems with long loops of feedback, such as politics, have trouble self-regulating. At the same time, when there’s lots of immediate feedback, you risk overshooting. 35:08 — The 8th point: The strength of negative feedback loops (...). A negative feedback loop means a system that can turn itself off, such as a thermostat, which’ll stop working once the room reaches the desired temperature. It’s important to have a failsafe that’ll intervene on the event of a worst-case scenario, even if it’s rarely necessary. You can very easily miss the long-term effect of actions that don’t affect the short-term, such like monocultures (the or overworking yourself. 41:00 — Fake news. Ways you could keep fake news from spreading, and how that could slide into censorship. Social media and censorship. The ultimate goal of any company is always to make money. 48:21 — The 7th point: The gain around driving positive feedback loops. Positive feedback loops feed and grow on themselves (the more people have the flu, the faster it’ll spread), but a system with an unchecked positive feedback loop will destroy itself. At some point, a negative feedback loop must kick in, such as what’s happened with the birth rate in western countries. 51:07 — Poverty and wealth as functions of positive and negative feedback loops. Ways you could effectively lessen poverty. Taxing laws and lobbying. 56:00 — Tangent about payment methods. 58:00 — Adjusting positive feedback loops depends on the ultimate goal of the system. How to use commissions as incentives. 01:01:29 — The 6th point: The structure of information flows (who does and does not have access to information). Access to information, and how it affects people’s and company’s behaviors, and creates accountability. 01:05:01 — Accountability in the age of the internet. The NRA and gun control. The NRA as a symptom of America’s pro-gun mentality, not the source of the issue. 01:10:28 — Arguments for both sides of the gun control debate. Initiatives to lessen the instant fame acquired by mass shooters. Comparing different country’s policies without thought to the countries’ different situations. 01:17:12 — Misinformation on the topic of guns in the public and in media: what guns are actually available to the public, which models were used in mass shootings. 01:21:00 — Clickbait. McDonalds’ fries and baldness. 01:22:43 — The 5th point: The rules of the system. The rules of a system are more influential than the people who must play by the rules. Being both an employee and a boss. Benefits and health plans for employees, and how to attract and retain talent. 01:29:18 — The rules of a system can work as incentives and disincentives. 01:30:19 — The 4th point: The power to add, change, evolve, or self-organize system structure. The level to which people can change the system. Utilizing platforms in ways the creators had not originally intended. Unexpected behaviors from children and puppies. 01:33:33 — Religion and superstition. Bottom-up and top-down systems of power. 01:35:15 — Uber, AirBnB, free market and diversity in the market. 01:37:23 — The 3rd point: The goals of the system. The highest level related to the system itself: its ultimate goal. The goal of keeping the market competitive must trump the goal of each company to accumulate profit. Companies that have little to no competition at this point. 01:41:51 — Changing one player in the system doesn’t affect much, except when one individual player can drastically change the goals of the system. Trump, the Conservative Party and Russia. 01:44:20 — Brexit, the UK’s economy, and the Eurozone. City-states and how do you decide the borders of a country. 01:48:36 — The 2nd point: The mindset or paradigm out of which the system — its goals, structure, rules, delays, parameters — arises. The mindset from which the system’s goals come from. Shared mythology and cultural paradigms in today’s society. Digital goods vs physical goods. Shared paradigms as a basis for cooperation and shared goals. 01:58:41 — The 1st point: The power to transcend paradigms. Ever-changing paradigms; your paradigms, as well as scientific paradigms, will keep changing. Not one holds all the truth. 02:05:30 — Wrap-up and sponsor time!. Perfecto Keto is perfect if you’d like to pursue a ketogenic diet! Their matcha MCT oil powder is highly recommended. Kettle & Fire will give you 20% OFF on their delicious bone broths — beef recommended for cooking, and chicken for a good, hot wintery drink! Four Sigmatic: get your mushroom coffee or your hot chocolate, all 15% OFF through our sponsored link. And you can always support us by going through our Amazon sponsored link and checking out our Support page. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com  

“If we read an article in the newspaper presenting two opposing viewpoints, we assume both have validity, and we think it would be wrong to shut one side down. But often one side is represented only by a single ‘expert’.” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and I discuss Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming, by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway. In this book, Oreskes and Cornway talk about media and science, and scientific consensus that became controversial in the public eye — from the SDI to tobacco to global warming. “Rome may not be burning, but Greenland is melting, and we are still fiddling. We all need a better understanding of what science really is, how to recognize real science when we see it, and how to separate it from the garbage.” We cover a wide range of topics, including: The tobacco industry and the regulations on smoking today Global Warming and all its many causes. Are all causes equally serious? How media talks about science and creates controversial topics out of scientific consensus The SDI and nuclear winter The sugar industry vs working out And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Merchants of Doubts by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway! Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Flatgeologists [0:49] Strategic Defense Initiative [2:05] DDT Pesticide [2:19] The Sugar Film (2014) [06:05] Neighbourhood Effect [16:27] Tragedy of the Commons [16:27] Magnetic Resonance Imaging – MRI [18:30] Toshiba Corporation [18:30] Yamaha Corporation [18:30] The Spacex Launch [19:10] Black Mirror: Men Against Fire [22:06] Jordan Peterson’s interview on Channel 4 [26:24] Futurama: Crimes of the Hot [27:58] Mutual Assured Destruction Doctrine [32:30] CFC – Chlorofluorocarbons and Ozone depletion [38:06] Philip Morris USA [51:50] Krispy Kreme [53:48] Moore’s Law [1:14:08] Books mentioned Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman [1:13] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Gospel of Wealth by Andrew Carnegie [15:14] Principles: Life and Work by Ray Dalio [18:42] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety by Eric Schlosser [31:40] 12 Rules for Life by Jordan Peterson [1:07:16] (Nat's Notes) (Neil's Notes) (book episode) The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves by Matt Ridley [01:09:35] (Nat's Notes) People mentioned Naomi Oreskes Erik M. Conway Elon Musk [1:05] [28:00] [39:30] (on this podcast) Michelle Obama [10:25] Andrew Carnegie [15:07] Adolf Hitler [21:34] Jordan B. Peterson [21:27] (on this podcast) Nassim Nicholas Taleb [27:08] (on this podcast) Ronald Reagan [31:18] Richard Feynman [35:20] Freeman Dyson [35:34] Carl Sagan [36:43] S. Fred Singer [42:16] Show Topics 0:44 — Science and media. Topics that have become controversial in the public sphere, through media, that weren’t so within the scientific community; tobacco, the sugar industry, pesticides, etc. 03:58 — The sugar industry and its history of media deception; people’s perceptions on sugar, then and now. The industry’s attempts of bettering their images as sugar is more and more seen as unhealthy. 07:21 — Sugar and artificial sugar: its effects on your body and microbiota. The inexistent proofs that help losing weight. 09:16 — What about exercise? The food industries’ attempts to shift responsibility for health and fitness into “lack of exercise”, overblowing the importance of exercising. 11:05 — Two issues that are not necessarily separated by the book: on one hand, people should be better informed of the risks of their behaviors, like eating sugar, or drinking. On the other hand, should they not be allowed to engage in certain behaviors? Or simply have awareness of the risks if they do engage? Advocating for control, instead of banning, like the taxing on the tobacco industry. 13:15 — The public perception of tobacco as incredibly dangerous, and different perspectives in different countries. 15:21 — The conclusion of the book helps understands the author’s overall thesis. Many people who fought back against restrictions to industries had been Cold War veterans, looking to protect free market. There are certain areas in which free market doesn’t work, like air quality. 17:47 — Regulation is the mother of innovation: they force people to create new solutions, often starting from the beginning. 20:05 — Surprisingly, Hitler banned cigarettes once it was known they were lethal. He had various issues with what he considered “dirty” or “unclean”, which links back to his view of the people he persecuted. 22:35 — All the Nazi research regarding smoke got discredit following their defeat, since no one wanted to use nazist research. But were there such qualms about other research, like rocket science? Is it ethic at all to use research created unethically? 24:06 — Likewise, many studies for controversial topics just can’t be conducted for ethical reasons, or at times there’s too many variables. Epidemiology is useful in this case; though correlation doesn’t necessarily means causation. 25:55 — Climate change, and how its many causes often get simplified to just one problem. And even if we’re wrong about its causes, isn’t it too dangerous to ignore the chance human intervention is responsible? 29:41 — Good science focuses on what’s not yet known; but media often then latches on to these doubts, advertising what scientist don’t know and obscuring the science of what they do know. 30:48 — The SDI: Reagan's program against nuclear strikes through satellites. Was it a serious project? Was it a proposital rumor? Could it have started a nuclear war? How did the idea get so far when it had such opposition? 35:10 — Richard Feynman, Freeman Dyson, and their views on nuclear winter and global warming: two issues that were somehow conflated. Were the models being used accurate? 36:34 — Scientists often focus on areas of doubt, rather than what is already known. A topic largely discussed in the book is that scientists aren’t necessarily good at understanding public policy, media, or how to get their ideas across to the public and vice-versa. 38:06 — CFCs. Once again, many factors contributed to the damage to the ozone layer, but all were given equal weight when certain factors were much more damaging than others. The same was done regarding skin cancers, where many other factors were pointed out that were true, but not as relevant. This seems to be a common tactic to detract from central issues. 43:58 — Second-handed smoking and e-cigarettes: are they as dangerous as regular cigarettes? What of second-hand damages that come with alcohol, like drunk driving? Should alcohol and driving be more strictly regulated? 51:05 — The companies knew what they were doing: memos from tobacco companies show their strategy of trying to keep the doubt on whether or not cigarettes were bad for your health. The ethical dilemma around working for such companies. 54:46 — School’s approach to drug education: are abstinence arguments really effective, or are them increasing drug use? Alternative methods for decreasing drug use and its harmful effects. 01:00:45 — Global Warming is still very much a current issue. What arguments that are in vogue today could be misinformation? It can be difficult to find a balance between suspecting statements that challenge the current scientific consensus, and not completely shutting them down. 01:05:00 — The book has a critical stance on Capitalism and Technology. “Technology won’t save us”. However, it is possible to join business and sustainability. 01:09:30 — The book has a certain one-sided point of view, which can be true for most of the topics discussed, but can also be a dangerous attitude. Radical changes are also much more difficult to execute, such as suddenly switching entirely away from fossil fuels. 01:12:24 — Alternatives to developing without fossil fuels. What about nuclear power? Could that be a solid green alternative? Can solar power progress as fast as our technological needs? 01:18:05 — Sponsors time. You can support us by going through our Amazon sponsored link, and buy iPads for your family, Louis Vuitton bag, or maybe puppies in the future. Use Perfecto Keto for all your keto needs. Try the Coffee Flavored Exogenous Ketones and the MCT oil powders. Try their new MCT oil to help you achieve perfect hair. “If you stop using shampoo, your hair starts being a barometer of your health”. Kettle & Fire’s bone broths will help you keep up your health, and you can put it in your hair, if you want! And Four Sigmatic for all your mushroom coffee needs and reduce your caffeine intake, though unfortunately it will not help you achieve the perfect hair. Check always our Support page. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com  

 “Order and chaos are the yang and yin of the famous Taoist symbol: two serpents, head to tail. Order is the white, masculine serpent; Chaos, its black, feminine counterpart. The black dot in the white—and the white in the black—indicate the possibility of transformation: just when things seem secure, the unknown can loom, unexpectedly and large. Conversely, just when everything seems lost, new order can emerge from catastrophe and chaos. For the Taoists, meaning is to be found on the border between the ever-entwined pair. To walk that border is to stay on the path of life, the divine Way. And that’s much better than happiness.” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and I discuss​ 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos by Dr. Jordan B. Peterson. In his book, Peterson –a professor at the University of Toronto, and a practicing psychologist who has spent his life studying mythology psychology, religion and philosophy– writes about discipline, freedom, adventure, and responsibility, distilling the world’s wisdom into 12 practical and profound rules for life. "Winning at everything might only mean that you’re not doing anything new or difficult." We cover a wide range of topics, including: Free speech and the nature of truth Why post-modernists are right… to an extent How to be a winning lobster Positive feedback loops and your own heaven and hell Why danger is important Appreciating the moment but planning for chaos And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos by Dr. Jordan B. Peterson! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Antifragile by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, a book whose concepts will similarly change your outlook, as well as our episode on The Power of Myth, to further learn the power of mythology can be relevant to our everyday lives.   Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more.   Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show: Peterson’s Patreon page [5:21] C-16 Amendment to the Canadian Human Rights Bill [5:40] Interview with Peterson on Joe Rogan's podcast [06:23] Pareto distribution [13:21] Virtue Signalling [17:05] Positive Reinforcement Loop [30:20] Mushroom Coffee [31:28] Perfect Keto [31:28] Ship of Theseus [34:40] Slaying the Dragon Within Us [38:35] Self Authoring [49:57] Growth Machine [54:21] Greatness All Around Us by Neil Soni [55:18] Space X’s Falcon Heavy [1:01:47] Positive reinforcement training [1:13:55] Voldemort Effect [1:19:11] Crony Beliefs Podcast by Kevin Simler [1:20:37] BlackRock [1:22:34] Columbine Killers [1:25:05] Puja [1:34:32] The Marshmallow Experiment [1:36:16] Cain and Abel [1:38:42] Entropy [1:48:47] Google’s Ideological Echo Chamber [1:58:20] The Office - TV Series [2:00:51] Dominance Hierarchy [2:05:16] Jumanji (2018) [2:07:39] Jordan Peterson on the Jocko Podcast [2:32:03] Psychological Significance of Biblical Stories [2:32:13]   Books mentioned: 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos by Dr. Jordan B. Peterson (Nat’s notes) (Neil’s notes) The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene [03:20] (Nat’s Notes) Maps of Meaning: The Architecture of Belief by Dr. Jordan B. Peterson [04:23] Emergency by Neil Strauss [13:59] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Seeing like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed by James C. Scott [16:12] Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas R. Hofstadter [16:57] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Last Lion: Winston Spencer Churchill: Visions of Glory, 1874-1932 by William Manchester [1:00:20] Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson [1:02:58] The Inner Game of Tennis [1:07:21] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Letters from a Stoic by Lucius Annaeus Seneca [1:07:44] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Principles: Life and Work by Ray Dalio [1:08:14] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Work Clean by Dan Charnas [1:09:44] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Antifragile by Nassim Nicholas Taleb [1:10:55] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Finite and Infinite Games by James C. Carse [2:03:10] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Emoji Dick by Fred Benenson [2:28:53] Skin in the Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life by Nassim Nicholas Taleb [2:29:43]   People mentioned: Dr. Jordan B. Peterson, @jordanbpeterson Charles Darwin [09:30] (Darwin’s Dangerous Idea episode) Jacques Derrida [10:22] Charles Murray [19:26] Nassim Nicholas Taleb [26:39] (Antifragile episode) Sam Harris [38:20] Dave Rubin [38:20] Winston Churchill [1:00:20] Elon Musk [1:01:47] (on this podcast) Jeff Bezos [1:01:47] Naval Ravikant [1:02:19] Steve Jobs [1:02:42] Lucius Annaeus Seneca [1:07:44] Carl Jung [1:09:13] Dan Charnas [1:09:48] Kevin Simler [1:21:25] Laurence Tosi, AirBnB’s ex-CFO [1:24:00] Karl Marx [1:40:20] Ray Dalio [1:43:39] (on this podcast) Robert Greene [1:43:47] (on this podcast) Daniel Tosh [2:01:53] Louis CK [2:01:53] Chris Rock [2:01:53] Alfred Adler [2:08:35] Sigmund Freud [2:08:35]   Show Topics 01:00 - The title of the book is misleading, and surprising if you know Peterson’s other work. But don’t judge a book by it’s cover, this is a very detailed and valuable work.   03:39 - Peterson is a practicing psychotherapist and also a lecturer. He’s has spent most of his life studying religion and mythology. 05:26 - Peterson’s notoriety because of his opposition to a bill in Canada that essentially makes calling somebody by the wrong gender pronoun a hate crime. He was opposed on the grounds of free speech and argues that you can’t compel anyone to use any specific word. 07:11 - Peterson fights against the post-modernist idea that nothing is true, everything is subjective. He believes that postmodernism has taken the idea of subjectivity and pushed it too far.   09:00 - Math is something we’ve discovered, not a human invention. Fundamental nature of numbers is unchanging. Argument linking math and logic to patriarchy and power.   11:14 - What is the goal of the postmodernists? If you continually tear down the hierarchy then at some point the oppressors become the oppressed.   12:41 - Communist China is what you get if you tear down an authority that is there due to the natural order. There will always be a Pareto distribution. If you try to perfectly level the playing field you end up with a controlling regime.   17:05 - Peterson is harsh against virtue signalling. Is the goal of most postmodernists just to 'look moral'?   18:11 - Science should not be ideology driven. It's still science. Nobody wants to talk about sex and race in terms of science. Charles Murray example where he researched IQ differences across different races. He proved there were differences and he's been treated as a bigot because of this.   22:50 - Peterson does a great job at maintaining what the science says about us as humans. What that means in what we should do in our day to day.   25:12 - The rules of the book come off as simple but there's a lot of rich material underneath them. The titles of the rules are there to remind you of the big idea, as easy to remember snippets.   27:03 - Rule 1: Stand Up Straight With Your Shoulders Back. How lobsters are similar to humans. How to look like a winner. Positive reinforcement loop. Head off depression.   31:28 - Sponsor. Hack your physio-psychological behavior by waking up at the same time every day and have breakfast. Get some mushroom coffee and keto from the MYT support page. Support the podcast and you'll become a winning lobster.   34:40 - Lobsters brain reaction when losing. All the cells in your body recycle every seven years. The ship of Theseus: if every cell in your body is different in seven years are you still the same person?   38:00 - Breaking out of the negative loop. Slaying the dragon within us. Problems get bigger until you acknowledge them.   40:16 - The subjective truth is still truth. Rules don't become useless because there is an exception to them. As Peterson says, the truth is fluid.   43:23 - Noah; predicting floods doesn't count, building arks does. If you get your house in order now, when total chaos comes, you'll be ready.   44:03 - Rule 2: Treat Yourself Like Someone You Are Responsible for Helping. Internal tyrant - we are too harsh on ourselves. The result is that we inevitably rebel. Our two selves end up hating each other.   45:48 - Prescriptions for medicine for pets gets filled much more frequently than medicine for humans. People better at taking care of their pets than they are of themselves.   47:57 - Think about what is good for you rather than what would make you happy. What might my life look like if I were caring for myself properly?   50:35 - Rule 3: Make Friends with People Who Want the Best for You. One bad apple spoils the bunch example.   51:30 - If you have friends who are obese or who smoke there is a higher chance you will become obese or start to smoke! Normalising effect, it's not bad it's just what everyone else is doing. You become the five people you spend the most time with. Be selective!   55:02 - If your friends do good, you do good. If you live in a place where there are a lot of people you don't want to be like, read more books, like Andrew Carnegie and Jay-Z.   1:00:29- Rule 4: Compare Yourself to Who You Were Yesterday, Not Who Someone Else is Today. Comparing to others is a fallacy, you always lose. No matter how far along you are you'll still have someone to be jealous of.   1:02:19 - Naval Ravikant: Being jealous of someone is really silly because you can't pick and choose parts of someone else's life. Steve Jobs was miserable, he never enjoyed his money.   1:03:50 - Sponsor. Take a shot of Kettle and Fire Bonebroth.   1:04:21 - Feeling good when you find something bad of someone who you are jealous. If you always win or always lose, it's no fun, but a video game at just the right difficulty is perfect. Similarly, comparing yourself to who you were yesterday is the perfect opponent.   1:07:44 - Seneca: Don't compare yourself to what others have, compare yourself to who you were before. Grand Theft Life! Control the machine, don't operate it.   1:09:19 - Most people don't find God because they don't search low enough. There's an ideal to reach for in everyday life.   1:09:48 - Daily practice is a version of God in the everyday and mundane. Gratefulness journal. Figure out what things make you feel better. Your emotional response. Dopamine and serotonin.   1:13:42 - Rule 5: Do Not Let Your Children Do Anything that Makes You Dislike Them.   1:13:55 - Positive reinforcement training. Attention as a currency of reward - effective reinforcement in humans. If you ignore people, they'll quickly understand that they shouldn't repeat whatever it was that made you ignore them. Beware of conversational one-upmanship.   1:16:43 - If someone does something you don't like, just tell them.   1:19:28 - People tie ideas to their identity and get offended. Some can't hold two competing ideas in their head at once. If you get emotional about an idea, that's generally a bad sign.   1:20:37 - Crony Beliefs. If you react to information with disgust or outrage that’s a sign that there's some belief you hold which is not based on logic and reasoning. In-group acceptance, virtue signalling, desire to be accepted.   1:24:18 - Trojan Horse strategy. A lot of hyper-feminist young men do it as a way to get in with women. Weasely.   1:25:05 - Rule 6: Set Your House in Perfect Order Before You Criticize the World. Columbine killers said the world is so bad, it shouldn't exist, they want to burn it all down and take everyone with them. All of us, on some level, have these impulses when things don't go right.   1:27:04 - Make your bed, create order and not chaos. Take ten minutes and get back to inbox zero. Part of your brain is latently working on it, so work on it yourself. Set aside times for worrying and forget it the rest of the time.   1:30:13 - Extreme ownership, don't worry about what anybody else did wrong or what other people could be doing, focus on what you can do. Don't rail against society. You have to recognise the monster within you in order to really be a good person.   1:32:14 - Floods are going to come, it's your fault for being unprepared. Just because something is unlikely doesn't mean you shouldn't have a plan in place.   1:34:08 - Rule 7: Pursue What is Meaningful (Not What is Expedient). The role of sacrifice in ancient societies.   1:35:09 - Preparing for the future. Giving up greater comfort now for something further down the line. Ceremonies as reminders.   1:36:14 - Kids who were able to hold off eating a marshmallow as they would get two later did better in future life. Delayed gratification. Sacrificing impulses leads to richer life.   1:38:42 - Cain and Abel. Sometimes sacrifices are rejected and we don’t know why. There’s wisdom in fairy tales. “Religion is the opiate of the masses”. Do what’s meaningful and not expedient.   1:42:14 - Rule 8: Tell the Truth, or at least Don’t Lie. Lean towards truth instead of trying to tell a story. Acknowledge the problem. Problems are often improved by simply talking.   1:43:39 - Dalio: An honest interpretation of the world is necessary. Robert Greene: Interpret the world honestly. We run from scary truths but knowing the truth is almost always better. If there’s a problem you’re not acknowledging, your brain interprets it as the sum of all the possible problems. Dragons or squirrels.   1:45:14- You can’t just tell the truth to other people, you also have to tell it to yourself. Entropy: things tend towards chaos. Things will go wrong if you don’t do anything about them. One state of order, infinite states of chaos. Do the dishes.   1:51:33 - Rule 9: Assume that the Person You Are Listening to Might Know Something You Don't. 3 categories of conversations: exchanging information; one-upmanship; mutual meditation. Figuring out what the map looks like.   1:54:36 - Most people can be interesting if prompted the right way and if you’re actually listening. Try saying something controversial. If you don’t talk about it, that encourages people not to talk about it. The tyranny of the minority. Be willing to offend people.   1:58:37 - Differences in interests between men and women. We have to be honest before we can talk about the implications of things. How we as conscious beings can recognize negative urges under the surface and still function in society.   2:00:46 - Part of the job of comedy is to be on the edge of order and chaos. They’ve found the line and they know how to walk it. They say what everyone is thinking! Playing with boundaries as Infinite players.   2:03:09 - Rule 10: Be Precise in Your Speech. Don’t mold your opinions to try to get approval from those around you. Be honest. Deal with that as it comes. Be open to being corrected.   2:04:28 - Rule 11: Do Not Bother Children when they are Skateboarding. Initially confusing. Danger has a value in teaching kids. Adult efforts to make children safer are often misguided. Let people fail.   2:06:15 - There will always be a dominance hierarchy. This danger and experimentation is how we find our place in it. How we expand in it. The hierarchy is a natural result of us testing ourselves. You can’t have equality and freedom. There are many different hierarchies.   2:06:54 - The pursuit of goals is what makes life meaningful. There is no reason to have goals if there’s nothing to win at. You can’t create meaning if you can’t strive for anything.   2:09:04 - Controversial topics that shouldn’t be. Use of personality as an excuse from taking care of yourself. Be healthy and make yourself more desirable. Removing danger is dangerous.   2:11:14 - We use our middle school years to figure out the rules of society. Two year-olds aren’t malicious, they’re just testing the limits.   2:12:28 - It’s important for men to be men. Women will find 85% of men below average in terms of attractiveness. To be attractive, be the best version of yourself you can be.   2:14:11- Life competence matters. There should be true rewards for success, and true consequences for failure. People need to be able to fail. Pain is useful.   2:15:36 - Peterson’s comments are tailor made to get taken out of context. Example of “women can find meaning in childbirth” and “the pay gap”.   2:17:29 - The game that we’re measuring when we measure income is just one game, and is not meaning for life. There are other places to find meaning. Women express alternative places they can derive meaning. Reverse societal pressure to say that some women are “too good” to want to raise a family.   2:21:36 - Sponsor. Perfect Keto pizza!.   2:22:08 - Women can win in men’s arenas. Men can’t win in what are typically considered women’s arenas. Men get flak for being in traditionally female roles (e.g. nurse, school teacher).   2:23:48 - Rule 12: Pet a Cat When You Encounter One on the Street. There are going to be a lot of horrible times in your life so when you get the opportunity to experience something good you should take it.   2:25:09 - Cats are the most perfect metaphor for nature, for being. They interact with humans but are not as fully domesticated as dogs are. If you pet a cat you’re getting an opportunity to appreciate being and nature. The dog will always run up to you and be happy to see you but that is not how reality is. Mutually assured non-destruction.   2:27:30 - Gratefulness. Appreciate a good cup of coffee or time with your family. Times are great right now but they won’t always be. Enjoy not being in chaos. Don’t be a turkey.   2:30:16 - Returning to chaos and order. We rise to the level of our training. Get into improving habits while the world is still in order.   2:32:13 - Don’t just sit at home watching YouTube, go and do something damnit! Is Peterson a heretic? He’s figured out how to monetize haters.   2:51:30 - Sponsors. Drink Mushroom Coffee from Four Sigmatic with cordyceps and chaga for evening working out. Go to Perfect Keto for your keto needs. Check Perfect Keto’s new liquid MCT oil good for pre-workout. Kettle on Fire’s Bone Broth is excellent to get back in your diet. Buy Jordan Peterson’s book and everything else using our Amazon link. Leave a review on iTunes. Subscribe to the email list for bonus materials and more tangents. Tell people. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

 “I had, of course, heard people say the sky was beautiful, especially those who were as far away as Fuchü and Furuichi. But it was now, for the first time, that I could picture the cloud, sharply defined against a clear blue August sky. It was at the moment of the birth of this cloud, with its ever-changing color, that Hiroshima was wiped out. It was at this moment that Hiroshima City, the culmination of many years’ work, disappeared with her good citizens into the beautiful sky.” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and I discuss Hiroshima Diary: The Journal of a Japanese Physician, by Michihiko Hachiya. In this book, Michihiko registered his own life’s experiences following the atomic bomb’s blast, as a doctor in a Hiroshima hospital. “For acres and acres, the city was like a desert, except for scattered piles of brick and roof tile. I had to revise my meaning of the word ‘destruction’ or choose some other word to describe what I saw. ‘Devastation’ may be a better word, but really I know of no word or words to describe the view from my twisted iron bed in the fire-gutted ward of the communications hospital.” We cover a wide range of topics, including: The accounts of survivors of the atomic blast. The uncertainty and confusion that surrounded the mysterious illness befalling the hospital patients and their families. War propaganda and its effects on soldiers. Japan’s cultural attitude and perceptions surrounding WWII. Where did survivors find food and water? And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Hiroshima Diary: The Journal of a Japanese Physician, by Michihiko Hachiya!   You can also listen on Google Play Music, SoundCloud, YouTube, or in any other podcasting app by searching "Made You Think." If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on The Denial of Death by Ernest Becker, for another look into death’s effect on humankind, and our episode on Letters from a Stoic by Seneca, that delves into philosophy and stoicism and how humans can adapt in the most adverse situations. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show: Zapier [34:00] Men Against Fire - Black Mirror episode [38:41] Hardcore History Podcast by Dan Carlin [44:32] Tesla [1:12:26] Satoshi Nakamoto [1:14:59] Nick Szabo [1:15:15] DARPA [1:15:54] CoinBase [1:16:57] Books mentioned: The Denial of Death by Ernest Becker [10:10] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Letters from a Stoic by Lucius Seneca [16:45] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Last Lion by William Manchester – Churchill’s 3 Parts Biography [31:35] The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II [38:09] Catch-22 [40:37] Emergency: This Book Will Save Your Life [13:10] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage [49:01] Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson [1:11:14] Elon Musk by Ashlee Vance [1:11:15] The Snowball [1:11:49] People mentioned: Michihiko Hachiya Emperor Hirohito [4:08] Hideki Tojo [4:12] George W. Bush [30:20] Winston Churchill [31:35] Thomas Jefferson [34:10] Steve Jobs [34:53] Jeff Bezos [34:57] Donald Trump [39:12] Taylor Pearson [1:11:39] Warren Buffet [1:11:49] Show Topics 1:08 — The book’s backstory: a physician’s diary from the days following the Hiroshima’s atomic bomb, and its long path into being translated into English. The US Senate’s approving of a resolution condemning the Smithsonian for failing to portray the atomic bombs as mercifully ending the war in 95. 3:44 — A view of the Japanese people as a monolith, and the diary’s portrayal of internal struggles and resentment against the Japanese military. A divide between the Emperor’s authority, which was generally loved by the people, and the military authority, seen as responsible for the war. 6:16 — The author’s background. A doctor working at Hiroshima, for the military, whose diary starts with the bomb dropping and injuring him. A work that was meant only for himself. 8:24 — They didn’t know what the bomb was when it first dropped, nor how radiation lead to all the following illness. The many effects and injuries an atomic bomb can cause. 9:11 — Hachiya’s injuries and survival following the bomb’s blast. His recovery at the hospital and awareness that he could have been dead. 10:58 — The terrifying descriptions of the bomb survivors. The survivor’s confusion and helplessness, as no one had been prepared for so much damage, and there was little information. 13:40 — Following the blast, there were no resources or time to research the causes of all the death and illness. One of Hachiya’s first assumptions were biological agents or poison gas. 16:40 — The desensitization to death that came with all the horror that Hachiya experienced. His guilt as well as his numbness to it. 17:50 — Where did Hachiya’s hospital found water and food, which isn’t addressed in the book. There had to have been water, as it was housing so many patients and their families. It was one of the few structures to survive the blast. 19:45 — “For acres and acres, the city was like a desert, except for scattered piles of brick and roof tile. I had to revise my meaning of the word ‘destruction’ or choose some other word to describe what I saw. ‘Devastation’ may be a better word, but really I know of no word or words to describe the view from my twisted iron bed in the fire-gutted ward of the communications hospital.” 20:06 — The destruction to buildings caused by the atomic blast. One building has been preserved in its destroyed estate near to the bomb’s epicenter. 21:35 — Hachiya’s use of the diary part as a tool for his medical work, in trying to decipher the effects of the bomb. His descriptions on symptoms and their progression. 22:10 — The flash of light caused by the bomb’s blast. Its physical effects, like its sound or lack of it: some people heard the boom (pika don), but other people didn’t, depending on their distance from the bomb. 24:44 — Rumors started arising on whether Hiroshima will be habitable following the blast. Are the people becoming sicker by staying in the hospital? What were the long-term consequences? Many other rumours began to appear. 26:12 — The patient’s reactions to rumors that Japan had retaliated the Hiroshima bomb. Human’s need for agency, to feel like there’s something they can do about their situation, especially in the face of such an awful event like the bomb. 28:54 — Japan’s decision to surrender was also connected to the Russian’s declaration of war, not necessarily the bombs by themselves. Japan’s culture of “surrendering is failing”. 31:35 — Tangent. Churchill and his attempts to participate in the front lines on D-Day. Leaders who declare war, but do not participate themselves in the actual fighting; “leaders” who don’t have ‘skin in the game’. 35:42 — The Japanese people’s expectations to the arrival of American troops in Japan. Differences between the military and civilian perceptions, its relation to war propaganda. Parallels to USA’s propaganda. 39:52 — The rate of participation in killing in the military, who has been going up and up. Conscription, and soldier’s unwillingness to kill other people, how propaganda and a sense of patriotic duty influences the willingness to fight. 45:20 — Other descriptions of horror following the Hiroshima bomb: citizens who tried to save themselves by taking shelter in pools and in rivers, who still didn’t survive. 48:31 — The communications were all down following the bomb: Hachiya’s reflects positively on being without modern ways of communication. Humankind’s adaptability to new circumstances, even the worst of them (hedonistic adaptation). 48:36 — “Besides, we had no radio. For me, this was something of a blessing, for being without the so-called advantages of civilization gave me a freedom of spirit and action others could not enjoy with their telephones, radios, and newspapers. Having lost everything in the fire and being now empty-handed was not entirely without advantage. I experienced a certain light-heartedness I had not known for a long time.” 54:18 — There were many incredible accounts of people who survived the blast, and of people who thought they’d lost loved ones, who had in fact survived. 56:03 — Media downplaying what happened in Hiroshima. Cigarettes becoming currency in disaster situations. 1:00:53 — What happened when Americans showed up. Reconstruction of buildings and reconstruction of minds. Japanese blind loyalty to the country. 1:09:29 — Tangent. Feeling of accomplishment reading books of the to-read list. Biographies of living public figures and… bitcoins! 1:16:52 — Sponsors Time. Perfect Keto will give you 20% off everything you need to maintain, sustain, entertain, get into a keto diet. Kettle & Fire bone broth 20% off on excellent supplements for getting some of your ancestral dietary needs, collagens, bone marrow. Good for cooking and good for drinking. Four Sigmatic for all your mushroom needs. Must to try the Hot Cocoa, it’s delicious with butter or heavy cream. It’s keto-friendly, there no sugar in the cocoa, it’s an amazing dessert. If you buy anything on Amazon, use our affiliate link to help sustain the show. 1:20:45 — If you want to start your own podcast, check Nat’s article on how to start a podcast and buy stuff on Amazon. Also, don’t forget to give us a review on iTunes. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com  

  In reality, the way animals, including humans, react to danger occurs in the following order: freeze, flight, fight. If the reaction really were fight or flight, most of us would be bruised, battered, and exhausted much of the time. In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and I dissect What Every Body Is Saying by Joe Navarro. In this book Joe shares his 25+ years experience conducting interrogations as an FBI agent, and reveals behaviors and reactions we can’t control under stress. He gives very actionable tips to understand if someone is lying, if someone is happy to chat with us, if we should close that business deal, or how to improve our public speaking skills. We cover a wide range of topics, including: Heuristics for understanding when others are uncomfortable or under stress. When we can confidently suspect on someone, and when not. How our body reacts when threatened. The human body reactions, explained part by part. Rips and warning when trying to unmask deception. And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of What Every Body Is Saying by Joe Navarro You can also listen on Google Play Music, SoundCloud, YouTube, or in any other podcasting app by searching "Made You Think." If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennet, as many reactions to stress are innate and a byproduct of evolution, as well as our episode on Elon Musk, an article that analyzes how the man behind Tesla and SpaceX thinks on principles. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more.    Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show: Lie To Me TV Show [5:57] Tinder [58:11] Bumble [58:11] Peterson’s Podcast series on Abraham story [57:54] 27, 28, 30, Nat’s article on Easy Keto [37:57] Books mentioned: What every Body is saying by Joe Navarro Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennet [3:36] (book episode) Godel Escher Bach [3:36] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Elon Musk [7:21] (on this podcast) The Way of Zen [15:59] (Nat’s Notes) (Neil’s Notes) (book episode) The Gift of Fear [18:13] Principles [56:45] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Antifragile [57:00] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Amusing Ourselves to Death [57:00] (book episode) (Nat’s Notes) Defining Decade by Meg Jay [58:59] The Denial of Death [1:03:27] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Origin of the Species [1:03:38] Mastery [1:03:38] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Why We Love by Helen Fisher [1:15:06] People mentioned: Joe Navarro Tai Lopez [0:33] Elon Musk [7:21] (on this podcast) Pepper the Poochon [43:17] Charlie Munger [1:03:38] Jeff Bezos [1:20:12] Show Topics 0:00 – “In order to ensure our survival, the brain’s very elegant response to distress or threats, has taken three forms: freeze, flight, and fight. Like other animal species whose limbic brains protected them in this manner, humans possessing these limbic reactions survived to propagate because these behaviors were already hardwired into our nervous system.” 1:13 – Looking at how the human body reacts to stress and using that to figure out if somebody is lying or better understand emotional and mental state of somebody. 1:38 – Why Nat read this book at college. How Nat, improved his public speaking abilities after reading this book, following a suggestion he received during college. 2:04 – About Joe Navarro’s background as an FBI agent for 25 years. How he was able to include all his experience interrogating and what was suspicious or not in the many cases presented in the book. Example of Joe trying to figure out accomplices of a suspect, that was betrayed by his pupils when put under stress. 3:54 – Reference to Darwin: evolution is the foundation for body unconscious reactions. Behaviors are involuntary because they drive from the limbic system instead than from the frontal cortex. Joe stresses that nobody can really detect lies, but what you can detect is discomfort, and discomfort  may lead you to find a lie or information that not being shared. 6:56 – The key to body reading is to look for behavioral changes, rather than specific behaviors. 7:56 – The book is organized in chapters: 1. Commandments (guidelines for body reading), 2. How to pacify ourselves, 3. Reading each part of the body, 4. Deception. 8:40 – First Commandment: Look at behavior in context. Example: we feel cold when we are uncomfortable. 9:32 – Second Commandment: The idiosyncratic behaviors. Body contradicting what one is saying. Example of nodding while saying no. Example where the suspect said went right while moving the left hand. 10:22 – Fifth Commandment: Establishing baseline behaviors. Nat rolling his eye example. Neil's example running hands on his head when sleepy. 12:45 – Sixth Commandment: Always try to watch people for multiple tells, clustering of different behaviors. A single tell is not determinant. Why body language is much more communicative than spoken language. 15:27 – Limits of spoken language. We can pick someone's emotional state even if we don't have words for that. 18:25 – Gut feelings when you meet someone. Neil's example of a guy being elusive about payment. Having negative intuitions just because the other is “tribally” different. How to handle intuition’s contradictions and why we should to prefer the negative one. 23:03 – Cues. Watching people's shoulders will reveal feet excitement. Core of the behaviours. Describing each part of the body’s possible reactions. Each reaction comes in the flavour of some interaction of: freeze, flight, or fight. Freeze is the first reaction. Flight examples: turtle effect, pulling shoulders up to try to protect your neck, smaller neck in fighting poses. 31:20 – Pacifying behaviors: we do a lot of things to comfort ourselves, to distress, to feel more calm. There’s no intentionality in these reactions. Why dating advice can go bad: shoulder touching example. Why we don’t pics of ourselves smiling. Examples of forcing these reactions and trying to make them pass as natural. 37:57 – Sponsor time. Sip a Mushroom Coffee together with Neil. The mushroom coffee from Four Sigmatic energizes you with less caffeine. Neil is drinking the Chaga and Lion’s Mane mush stimulants that give a really soft caffeine bump. It feels much more clear than coffee. If you want to keep the taste of coffee without the caffeine, mushroom coffee is you perfect ally.  If you want something else to taste like coffee, try some Perfect Keto coffee flavored exogenous ketones. Check Nat’s article about a easy ketogenic diet. Ketones make it a lot easier to get into ketosis, and is perfect for weight loss or its cognitive benefits. Don’t forget to shop through our Amazon affiliate link to help sustain the show. Lots of people get sick in this season, Kettle & Fire bone broth helps you warm in this winter. It’s nice, it’s warm, it’s tasty. Listen Neil’s and Nat’s recipes and variations. There’s one that’s better than Chipotle’s! Finally, subscribe to the Mailing List to receive bonuses, giveaways, and more. Most of our tangents and goofing off are going there now. 44:15 – Looping back on the baseline commandment, we should recognize reactions beyond the baseline, and understand the reason behind. Different pacifying behaviors can indicate different mental states. Pacifiers scale with the intensity of the discomfort. 49:34 – Heuristics: “weighting” different parts of the body: facial cues are the least reliable, the face is the most likely to lie. The feet are the most honest ones. Gravity defined behaviors. Colloquial phrases tied with actual behaviors: walking with a bit of a bounce on your step, walking on air, turning your back on someone. 52:17 – Tangent. Reactions of protection inherited by evolution and survival from predators. Evolution is a great first principle heuristic for understanding a large span of topics. 57:54 – Tangent. Optionality trap in dating. Sex in our generation. Optionality trap in jobs. Youthful tendency to sit around and wait for the best option. 1:04:17 – Details of different situations for legs, chest and arms. Leg crossing, nodding up or down, tilting our heads to the side, feet pointing, turning away our chest, crossing arms, etc. When it is easy to force subconscious behaviors. Importance of arms for protection. Problems of helmets in American football. 1:11:46 – Face. Fake smile. “Keep your chin up”. Keeping good posture to feel more confident. The nasal flaring. People that lose sense of smell have a hard time establishing deep relationships. 1:16:09 – Deception. Most people including FBI agents are not better than chance detecting deception. But we have some clues to be suspicious. Synchrony, if what a suspect speaks jives his body language. And emphasis: “I have never seen or heard a person who is lying yell affirmatively, “I didn’t do it,” while pounding his fist on the table”. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and I discuss  Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennett (a guy with an amazing beard). In this book Daniel remind us we are not so special as we think, but just an ordered set of material refined by evolution. We cover a wide range of topics, including: Evolution as an amazing and super-simple algorithm for refinement Why we are not special but just a random result of a process Bottom-up “cranes” theories vs “skyhook” theories How memes are the cultural equivalent of genes Why it’s very unlikely that we will talk with aliens one day And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennett! You can also listen on Google Play Music, SoundCloud, YouTube, or in any other podcasting app by searching "Made You Think." If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Godel Escher Bach by Douglas Hofstadter, a book that inspired several pages of Darwin’s Dangerous Idea, as well as our episode on Denial of Death by Ernest Becker, another book that reshapes the importance of our existence. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show: Count in Binary with Your Fingers [11:22] Invisible Hand [21:08] Islam: A Religion of Violence Or Peace? [24:30] Street Food History [33:45] Kennin-ji – Oldest Temple in Kyoto [36:00] VCR [40:42] How Coffee Influenced the Course of History [43:40] Testosterone levels in the womb may determine how masculine your face is as an adult [51:47] 23andMe [53:11] Promethese [53:11] Rhonda Patrick – Found My Fitness Genetics [54:11] Perfect Keto [54:21] Fermi Paradox [1:17:01] Books mentioned: Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel Dennet Godel Escher Bach [0:51] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Denial of Death [3:20] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Way of Zen [7:34] (Nat’s Notes) (Neil’s Notes) The Selfish Gene [22:26] Sapiens [38:40] (Nat’s Notes) Letters from a Stoic [38:45] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Newton’s Principia [1:12:15] Rare Earth [01:16:23] Emergency [1:21:55] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene [1:27:16] The Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene [1:27:16] Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil deGrasse Tyson [1:27:21] Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand [1:31:29] The Sovereign Individual [1:33:29] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Goal [1:44:02] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) What every Body is saying by Joe Navarro [1:46:13] People mentioned: Charles Darwin Daniel Dennett [0:32] Nassim Nicholas Taleb [0:51] (Antifragile episode) Douglas Hofstadter [0:51] Elon Musk [6:15] (on this podcast) Flatgeologists – Flat Earth Society [6:15] Pepper the Poochon [12:09] Adam Smith [21:08] Maajid Nawaz [24:30] Christopher Columbus [36:26] Lucius Annaeus Seneca [38:45] Rhonda Patrick [54:11] Nassim Nicholas Taleb [59:25] (Antifragile episode) Nicolaus Copernicus [1:08:03] Isaac Newton [1:12:15] Albert Einstein [1:12:40] Jeff Bezos [1:39:57] Show Topics 0:00 – “When you ask functional questions about anything –organism or artifact– you must remember that it has to come into its current or  final form by a process that has its own requirements, and these are exactly as amenable to functional analysis as any features of the end state.” 0:51 – Connections of Darwin’s Dangerous Idea with Godel Escher Bach book. Talebian writing style of the author. The author focuses one part of the book to refute other people’s ideas. 3:20 – Problems derived by bad wording and God directed evolution. Mind-first theories depending on a “sky hook” vs “cranes” bottom-up theories. Concept of things that can grow and organize spontaneously, without the need of an external influence. Application in markets. 10:02 – Numerals vs Quantity. Why humans prefer base-10 to count. Use of different numbering bases, like the Mayan base-20 numeral system. 12:14 – Darwin’s main idea. Evolution as a simple algorithm based on natural selection: random things happen, some of those things make the more fit to the environment, therefore those thing last. Explaining genes using energy harvesting and autonomous robots. 14:23 – What’s the point of sleeping? Sleeping is energy efficient. Being awake is the weird thing. An hypothesis on why our brain developed so much is because being awake we have to deal more often with threatening situations. Humans prefer to sleep by night because we are sight animals. 16:29 – About the danger of Darwin’s idea. We are not special, we are just another result of this algorithm, we have no meaning. Against "our mind is special" argument. Winning in evolution. Domesticated animals winning evolution over wild versions: "They are selected to be OK with us". 20:44 – About unfortunate naming and wording. “Knowledge”, “Natural Selection” and “Invisible Hand” example. Random-process-that-results-in-a-refinement concept. 22:26 – Memes genes analogy. Ideas spreading in cultures is like genes spreading in populations. There's nothing special with ideas, there are memes that caught on and last, natural selection applies to them too. Sacred texts interpretation in religions: texts are brutal, core ideas are valuable. 26:25 – Tribal doctors analogy. Nat's experience in the Amazon Jungle. 28:17 – Losing valuable bottom-up knowledge. Paleo diet as going back to this knowledge. How fetishizing technology made as loose knowledge. Golden Rule: the older something is the longer probably will be around because there is a reason that it lasted. 30:31 – Tangent. Why the Greeks seem to have invented so many concepts. Japan preserved as Galapagos. Asian cultures compared to the US . Why in Tokyo they don't have trash cans. Street food culture in Asian countries. 36:40 – Spreading of ideas and knowledge in animals. Whales teaching others to create bubble nets. Lions teaching cubs how to hunt. 38:40 – Myths. Writing as a better way to preserve ideas. Enhanced understanding and being able to abstract and comprehend relativity. 41:28 – Different types of understandings: design level, technical understanding, physical, intentional. Function of bones, appendix and pinky toes. 42:59 – Tangent. About raw water, beer and coffee. How coffee may have caused Renaissance. 45:53 – Aquatic ape hypothesis. The reason we differentiate from chimps is because at one point of our history we were at half way of being dolphins. Inclination to live near water bodies. 50:30 – Epigenetics. Why the author overlooked this topic. Genes and phenotypes. How modifying our diets and behaviors can bias our evolution in few generations. Keto diet reaction for different regions. Effect of testosterone on facial traits. 59:25 – Tangent. Food labeling. Labeling in beer as a marketing strategy . Sugar allowance and lobbies. Super high carb diet and avoiding mixing carbs and fat diets. Against Mediterranean diet. 1:03:55 – Concept of of speciation. We can analyze evolution going backwards but can’t predict it. Problems with too much forward planning. "Strong goals loosely held" (instead of opinions). Humans won because we cooperate, or, we survived some event. Traffic jam example. 1:08:03 – Retrograde motion. Geocentric orbit model. "God hides in the gaps." 1:12:15 – Intentional and unintentional creations. Scientific discoveries vs art creation. Library of Babel thought experiment: infinite library that has every possible human creation but there is only one random variation expressed, as an analogy for genetic expression. Example of horned birds. “Evolution can explain how whe are here, but can’t explain why”. 01:16:23 – Darwin's warm pool idea of how life could have formed. The chances that we find human-like life in other planets are very low. Possible branches of evolution and comfortable homeostasis. “If the astro hadn't hit, would we have stayed a dinosaurs' planet?” 1:18:46 – Misinterpretations of seeing humans as the end of evolution. Coin flipping contest example. "Winning" evolution. 1:22:37 – Connection with Godel Escher Bach. Our consciousness and our minds are not special. Parallel with ants. Evolutionary algorithms in Computer Science and AI. Against the “all of this constants are right for us to exist” argument. Relativity and clocks in space example. 1:28:53 – The Ethics problem and why we should stop trying solving it problems. Where we draw the line for human "soul"?. 1:34:40 – Subscribe to the Mailing List to receive bonuses, giveaways, and more. People that make this show happen: Perfect Keto is the one-stop shop for all your ketogenic diet needs. The ketogenic diet is really effective for weight loss. Perfect Keto’s exogenous ketones helps you get into ketosis. Use the 20% coupon mentioned in the episode or use this link! The mushroom coffee from Four Sigmatic energizes you with less caffeine. Chaga Elixir and Lion's Mane mush's are stimulants and give a really nice buzz, and the Cordyceps Elixir is a caffeine-free stimulant. They hot cocoas instead, are relaxing and work as a delicious night dessert. Kettle & Fire bone broth helps you warm in this winter. Theory says we were scavengers and sucked up the bone colagens. K&F bone broth is excellent to get all those nutrients we don’t get anymore. Also it helps combat modern diseases like small intestine bacterial overgrowth. Finally, you help the show for free shopping on Amazon through our affiliate link. 1:40:06 – Crypto tangent. Ethereum rise is not really a rise. Buying other coins. Opportunity cost and parallel with business: investing in client acquisition vs client retention. Invest in the bottleneck. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com

“We live at a time when man believes himself fabulously capable of creation, but he does not know what to create. Lord of all things, he is not lord of himself. He feels lost amid his own abundance. With more means at his disposal, more knowledge, more technique than ever, it turns out that the world today goes the same way as the worst of worlds that have been: it simply drifts”. In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and I discuss Revolt of the Masses by José Ortega y Gasset. In this pre-WWII collection of essays Ortega y Gasset critiques and predicts the rise and predominance of the "Mass-man" class and instigates us to be accountable of our destiny. “The select man is not the petulant person who thinks himself superior to the rest, but the man who demands more of himself than the rest, even though he may not fulfill in his person those higher exigencies”. We cover a wide range of topics, including: The profile of a Mass-man, its differences with the Noble-man, and how to avoid being mediocre. Liberalism concepts today and in the past. When to listen to others opinions and when not. Behaviour within and between groups. About being responsible of our destiny and having the will to build our self future. Perceptions and regulation viewed by different sides and generations. And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Revolt of the Masses!  You can also listen on Google Play Music, SoundCloud, YouTube, or in any other podcasting app by searching "Made You Think." If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on the Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson, to learn how modern technologies can help you be in control of your own future, as well as our episode on Finite and Infinite Games by James P. Carse, to improve your life with new perspectives. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show: Slack [22:45] Jordan Petersen Podcast [26:05] Violence and the Sacred: College as an incubator of Girardian terror – article by Dan Wang [33:51] Game of Thrones [34:37] The meaning of life in a world without work  – article by Yuval Noah Harari [37:59] Zeecash [44:22] Tylenol [45:20] Coinbase [46:24] Binance [46:37] Tron Whitepaper [48:35] A Crash Course In Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Cryptocurrency [48:57] Blockfolio [48:57] Recap Time! Our Favorite Lessons from Episodes 1-20 [51:13] How to Think Like Elon Musk [56:23] Level 3 Thinking: A Unified Theory of Self-Improvement [56:35] Nat’s tweet on 4 levels of thinking [56:35] LifeHacker.com [59:15] Huffington Post [59:15] The Age of Unreason – The Economist (not The Atlantic) [1:02:27] Amazon [1:10:57] Books mentioned: Revolt of the Masses [0:00] The Sovereign Individual [1:11] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Finite and Infinite Games [1:16] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Mastery [3:35] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Antifragile [3:43] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Emergency [9:03] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Rational Optimist by Matt Ridley [23:21] Darwin's Dangerous Idea [23:25] The Selfish Gene [30:16] The Denial of Death [30:16] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) The Psychology of Human Misjudgments [30:16] (book episode) I Will Teach You To Be Rich [59:38] (Nat’s Notes) The 4-Hour Workweek [59:38] (Nat’s Notes) Principles [59:38] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Letters from a Stoic [59:38] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode) Influence [1:00:44] (book episode) People mentioned: Pepper the Poochon [0:26] Nassim Nicholas Taleb [1:55] (Antifragile episode) Karl Marx [8:11] Socialists of New York City [9:11] Jordan Peterson [9:36] Adolf Hitler [11:10] Milton Friedman [14:55] Hillary Clinton [15:14] Gary Johnson [15:28] Tim Ferriss [17:17] John D. Rockefeller [22:12] Elon Musk [25:27] (on this podcast) Charlie Munger [30:16] Dan Wang [33:51] Yuval Noah Harari [37:59] Barack Obama [53:47] Ashton Kutcher [1:01:00] Channing Tatum [1:01:13] Ray Dalio [1:03:16] (on this podcast) Winston Churchill [1:18:08] Show Topics 0:00 – “We live at a time when man believes himself fabulously capable of creation, but he does not know what to create. Lord of all things, he is not lord of himself. He feels lost amid his own abundance. With more means at his disposal, more knowledge, more technique than ever, it turns out that the world today goes the same way as the worst of worlds that have been: it simply drifts.” 0:26 – Welcome to Pepper, the third show host! 0:59 – Intro to Revolt of the Masses (Spanish: La rebelión de las masas), a book written by José Ortega y Gasset. 1:05 – Similarities of Revolt of the Masses with The Sovereign Individual and Finite and Infinite Games. Mention of "Horizonal Thinking" in one of the essays. Introduction of terms used by Ortega, the Mass Man, one who thinks deserve things, vs the Elite/Noble Man, one who thinks about improving himself. 3:16 – Organization of the book in unordered essays instead of chapters. 3:50 – Why Ortega got many predictions right, but may have missed many others by publishing this book before WWII and the Cold War. For example, he didn't expect the US to become a super-power. "The US had the seeds to be great". 5:04 – Tangent. About the difficulty to translate from romance languages to English. Translators vs interpreters. Socially acceptable traits in some countries and not others. 7:06 – Details on the situation of Europe at the time of publishing the book. Europeans worry about spreading of Russian Communism. Socialism in China. 9:11 – Tangent. Socialists of NYC. Perceptions: Nazism vs Socialism as counter-culture; fraud and violence vs crimes of omission and neglect. "It wouldn't be that bad if other people were in charge" argument. Vegans about killing lionfishes example. Jainism (indian religion). 14:14 – Political views of Ortega. Liberalism concepts today and in the past, interpretations and misinterpretations. Free markets and protectionism example. 16:31 – Tangent. New tax to "punish" liberal states. Moving to Texas for tax purposes. Buying an apartment may be cheaper than paying taxes in NY. Zero income tax. San Francisco diaspora. 20:24 – Essay. Distinguishing the Mass man vs the "Select"/Aspirational man. "The select man is not the petulant person who thinks himself superior to the rest, but the man who demands more of himself than the rest, even though he may not fulfil in his person those higher exigencies". Being elite as mindset vs being rich. Access to resources today compared to the past. 25:15 – Tangent. The rise of general quality of life in the last century was due to fossil fuel driven. Humans as the cancer of this planet. Broad philosophy vs personal action. 27:37 – Conformity. Groups of people against others. Fear of strangers. Nature preserve in Costa Rica for dogs. 31:55 – Essay. Masses have more than they ever had, and appreciate less and less. Upward mobility viewed by different people. "Poor people are lazy" argument. Girardian Terror concept. Selection bias and Game of Thrones. Conflicts within casts vs between casts, in India. 37:13 – "The sovereignty of the unqualified individual, of the generic human being as such, generically, has now passed from being a juridical idea or ideal to be a psychological state inherent in the average man. And note this, that when what was before an ideal becomes an ingredient of reality it inevitably ceases to be an ideal". Critique of the Mass person as a human that is not striving. The "Useless" Class. 38:34 – Tangent. Going back to the serves-and-lord state. 39:10 – The meaning of life in a world without work. Living in Virtual Reality, and Religion as VR. Artificial Intelligence and the need of Basic Universal Income. 41:15 – City states as the economic hubs of the future. Singapore and Hong Kong, San Francisco and New York. Importing beer in Hong Kong and in the US. Moving away from regulation because "nobody cares" and generational approaches to law. 45:41 – How regulation scares bitcoin price. About bitcoin wallets reporting to the IRS. How bitcoin relates to some many other topics: nation-states, business, currencies, politics, finance, politics, geography, cryptography, computer science, philosophy, etc. 51:45 – "The Mass-man is he whose life lacks projects and just drifts along. As a result, though his possibilities and his powers be enormous, he constructs nothing". Having the ability and motivation to improve thanks to today's technology. How today's responsibility falls on the individual. Parents wanting their kids to be better off. Sending kids to private school while criticizing public school. Minorities. 55:33 – Essay. Why the masses intervene in everything and why their intervention is solely by violence. Why people are wrong when they believe they can have an opinion now. Level 3 thinking. 58:30 – Tangent. Blog posts with Top X types titles. 1:00:07 – Celebrities endorsing political candidates and the liking fallacy. When to listen to others opinions. Steps to the Revolt. How people think they are entitled to be listened to. Syndicalism and Fascism. "Under the species of Syndicalism and Fascism there appears for the first time in Europe a type of man who does not want to give reasons or to be right, but simply shows himself resolved to impose his opinions. This is the new thing: the right not to be reasonable, the "reason of unreason"." 1:04:14 – How the majority does not eliminate the minority. When to respect others’ beliefs. The cake neglected to the gay couple example. Problems that may better be solved by the market. 1:09:15 – Essay. The age of the self-satisfied Dandy. On having rewards that we haven't necessarily gained. Anxiety from feeling entitled to move upward. 1:12:50 – Essay. The Barbarism of Specialization. Problems of overspecialization. Link with Antifragile. 1:14:06 – Essay. The Greatest Danger: The State. How the state could be used to make people conform. Support of regulation and support of police. 1:15:47 – Essay. Who Actually Commands. How governments rule with the compliance of the masses. Why elections should reflect the opinion of the masses, and why the gerrymandering is fragile. The problem with Democracy. About the quality of the legislative chambers. 1:20:29 – Closing thoughts. Be a vital person, be involved with the world, try to do projects, don't get sucked into the masses. 1:20:46 – People that makes this show happen: Kettle and Fire (their bone broth is good for dogs too!), Perfect Keto (reach ketosis effortless), Four Sygmatic Coffee (delicious mushroom coffee, pre-workout hot cocoa mixes). You can support us too, as most have done prepping for the NY snow storm through the Amazon affiliate link. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com “The select man is not the petulant person who thinks himself superior to the rest, but the man who demands more of himself than the rest, even though he may not fulfill in his person those higher exigencies”.