Joe Rogan Experience #1173 - Geoffrey Miller

Joe Rogan 0:00 ... for 4, 3, 2, 1. (gavel bangs) Jeffrey.

Geoffrey Miller 0:08 Hey. Joe.

Joe Rogan 0:09 Hey. Thanks for being here, man.

Geoffrey Miller 0:10 How you doing?

Joe Rogan 0:10 Appreciate it.

Geoffrey Miller 0:11 It's my pleasure, and honor.

Joe Rogan 0:12 And, uh, on the day where Bill Cosby goes to the pokey. (inhales deeply) Crazy.

Geoffrey Miller 0:16 Sad story, that.

Joe Rogan 0:18 Uh, sad for some people, happy for others. Sad that he's only going away for ... F- ... I wonder if that's a death sentence for a man at his age? Essentially it is, right? He's like 81 or something like that.

Geoffrey Miller 0:30 It would be weird if justice took into account, like, your health status in awarding sentences.

Joe Rogan 0:34 Right. I think they have done that, though. Didn't they do that with that guy who was Speaker ... Hassert? Who was Speaker of the House, who was convicted for molesting a large number of boys when he was a wrestling coach?

Geoffrey Miller 0:50 Oh, yeah.

Joe Rogan 0:50 Do you remember that man?

Geoffrey Miller 0:51 Yeah.

Jamie Vernon 0:52 He did 15 months.

Joe Rogan 0:53 15 months. Imagine. They mu- ... I mean, that's, that's pure insanity.

Jamie Vernon 0:59 He was in a wheelchair when he was 15.

Geoffrey Miller 1:00 Yeah.

Jamie Vernon 1:00 That could've been ...

Joe Rogan 1:01 Well, there's-

Jamie Vernon 1:02 ... darker.

Geoffrey Miller 1:02 Exactly.

Joe Rogan 1:02 There's no way, if he was a 25-year-old able-bodied man who had done the exact same thing, he would have gone to jail for 15 months for, uh, admitting to molest a large number of kids who were under his care, uh, when he was a wr- ... He was a wrestling coach, right?

Jamie Vernon 1:18 Uh, I think so. That sounds right.

Geoffrey Miller 1:19 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:19 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 1:20 Oh, he was the guy the movie-

Jamie Vernon 1:21 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 1:21 ... was made of. No.

Joe Rogan 1:23 No.

Geoffrey Miller 1:23 That was a different guy.

Joe Rogan 1:23 No. It was that- ... That was DuPont.

Geoffrey Miller 1:25 Okay.

Joe Rogan 1:25 DuPont was not a child molester. He was just a psychopath-

Geoffrey Miller 1:29 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:29 ... who, uh, hired, uh, wrestlers to come live with him and wrestle with him.

Geoffrey Miller 1:34 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:34 Remember that?

Geoffrey Miller 1:35 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:36 Yeah. I know one of them, the ... one of the m- ... the main guy in the movie. They, they, uh ... The, the, the two brothers, uh, Dave and Mark Schultes, fantastic, uh-

Geoffrey Miller 1:47 Mm.

Joe Rogan 1:47 ... wrestlers, who were completely misrepresented in the movie. They made him out to be, like, involved in this weird gay relationship with him and doing cocaine and all ... They, they added all sorts of shit to that movie.

Geoffrey Miller 1:59 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 2:00 Very weird how they do that.

Geoffrey Miller 2:01 Screenwriters, you gotta dramatize it.

Joe Rogan 2:03 I guess.

Jamie Vernon 2:04 His sentence wasn't for child abuse.

Geoffrey Miller 2:07 What?

Jamie Vernon 2:07 That's why it wasn't that. It said ... It says the judge said it would've been higher, he would have gotten more, if the, uh, statutes didn't run out. The limitation for acts in the 1960s and '70s ran out, so the judge noted, "The punishment for such a conviction would have been far worse." I think he actually got convicted for bank transactions, keeping stuff secret.

Joe Rogan 2:27 Oh, wow.

Jamie Vernon 2:27 Yeah. He had to pay fines.

Joe Rogan 2:29 Statutes of limitations.

Jamie Vernon 2:31 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:31 Mm. (smacks lips) And so, w- we were talking about B- Bill Cosby, that, uh, psychology professors and experts were obviously stating that he had some sort of problem.

Geoffrey Miller 2:44 (inhales deeply) Yeah, I mean, it's weird, 'cause the media will, um, have a certain narrative they wanna promote, and they'll sort of find a psychologist who will say the thing that fits that.

Joe Rogan 2:53 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 2:53 Right? So I think most clinical psychologists would say, "I've never talked to the guy. I'm not gonna try to diagnose him from a distance."

Joe Rogan 3:00 Right.

Geoffrey Miller 3:00 "I, I, I have no idea what his condition is or what his issue is." But then there's the handful who are willing to kinda stick their necks out and say something. And, man, it's embarrassing to be a psych professor for that reason, because you're, you're always kinda being represented publicly by the people who are kinda being least professional-

Joe Rogan 3:19 Yes.

Geoffrey Miller 3:19 ... about those kind of diagnoses.

Joe Rogan 3:21 That is a real problem today, isn't it? Like, in, in terms of, uh, identity politics and this, this inclination to draw conclusions and to lean towards one side or the other instead of just looking at the actual situation objectively.

Geoffrey Miller 3:37 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 3:37 And if you're not talking to him ... I mean, I'm assuming Bill Cosby's a terrible piece of shit as a human being. That's what I'm assuming by looking at all this, but I've never talked to the man. I, I don't know what kind of crazy shit he's got going on in his head. But if all these women are telling the truth, and it seems super unlikely that they're all lying-

Geoffrey Miller 3:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 3:55 I mean, was there ... Like, there's over 50 of them, right? With the same story. (inhales deeply) Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 3:59 Well, he's got a deep, dark streak. That's for sure.

Joe Rogan 4:04 Phew.

Geoffrey Miller 4:04 Um, I mean, the weird thing is, though, a lot of people who are successful have a little bit of that dark streak. They have a little bit of that sociopathy. Like-

Joe Rogan 4:11 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 4:11 ... they can kinda step back from normal human relations and they can either turn it into, you know, abuse and exploitation like Cosby did, or they can kind of civilize themselves-

Joe Rogan 4:22 Mm-hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 4:22 ... right? And they can harness that to, to do something that's g- good and- and where they're kinda using their ability to take a different viewpoint on things.

Joe Rogan 4:31 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 4:32 To, um, analyze human behavior, or invent things, or, or, you know, propose new policies or whatever. And, um, so I think that kind of dark streak, you know, if you have it, you have to recognize it and, and kind of tame it and work with it. And the people who do, I think can often do great things for a society. And the people who don't end up in jail.

Joe Rogan 5:01 Well, this is one of the reasons why I wanted to bring this up to you. As an evolutionary psych professor, l- looking at the human mind and looking at behavior patterns and what, what's clearly (smacks lips) some sort of ... I, I, I h- I hesitate to call crime an addiction, but it seems like an addictive pattern that he has, that there's a com- compulsion to doing this to people, that it's not as simple as he wants women to have sex with him, they don't wanna have sex with him, so he drugs them. I don't think it's that simple. I think there's some getting away with it thing. There's gotta be some he's better than everyone thing, because he's ... You know, he's royalty in the t- ... in terms of, like, Hollywood, in terms of show business, in terms of standup comedy. He's always been treated as royalty. I mean, he's been allowed to essentially criticize anyone he wants. He's, he's ... Rarely is there a rebuttal to the, the things that he says. And, you know, he's been criticizing the Black community for its use of bad words and for its use of sexually explicit, uh, language and, and depictions, and ...... meanwhile, though, the entire time, he's raping people. I mean, it's fucking amazing.

Geoffrey Miller 6:13 I think one thing that might happen is if you've got this public image as being, like, squeaky clean, family values, and you've got the burden of kind of being a moral exemplar like that. You know? Just like, um, televangelists, right-

Joe Rogan 6:26 Mm-hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 6:26 ... or anybody who, who has a big religious following. Like, the pressure to be good all the time, I think, can kinda tip people into this.

Joe Rogan 6:33 Right.

Geoffrey Miller 6:33 The thrill of transgression, uh, I imagine-

Joe Rogan 6:36 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 6:36 ... could be quite, quite kind of addictive. And I think that's a real danger, and I think that's ... that kinda hypocrisy is why we should be really careful about kind of idolizing anybody-

Joe Rogan 6:49 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 6:49 ... t- to that degree, kinda morally, and, and putting that burden on them.

Joe Rogan 6:53 Yeah, I mean, uh, I could only imagine, like, being an evangelist and being someone who, who preached about the word of God, but meanwhile, having this weird hooker thing. Like, uh, do you remember ... What was his name? Ted ... He r- ... Ugh. He ran a giant church in, I believe it was Colorado, and the entire time ... I used to have a bit about him. The entire time, he was smoking meth and having sex with gay prostitutes.

Geoffrey Miller 7:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 7:21 And all the while, he's going on about ... It's always the guys who go on about how awful gay people are that are secretly gay. It's so common.

Geoffrey Miller 7:29 There's a little research on that. (sighs) I mean, it's not d- definitive, but it looks like a lot of-

Joe Rogan 7:34 Ted Haggerty?

Geoffrey Miller 7:35 Like-

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 7:36 Haggerty.

Joe Rogan 7:36 Don't ... Haggard?

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 7:37 Yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 7:37 Haggard. Uh-

Geoffrey Miller 7:38 'Cause a lot of people ... A lot of guys who are pretty, like, outspokenly homophobic-

Joe Rogan 7:43 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 7:43 ... and then, like, you put them in a, a sex research situation and see what actually rouses them.

Joe Rogan 7:48 (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 7:48 Like, if you show them straight or gay porn, right? And you have a plethysmograph and you, you sense what-

Joe Rogan 7:53 What ... A ze- ... What's the graph? What is it?

Geoffrey Miller 7:55 Plethysmograph.

Joe Rogan 7:55 What is that?

Geoffrey Miller 7:56 It, it senses blood flow in the penis.

Joe Rogan 7:58 Oh, boy. I need one of those.

Geoffrey Miller 8:00 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 8:00 I need one of those. Just have it in the background of every podcast. P- when you come to do the podcast, you gotta put these electrodes on your penis.

Geoffrey Miller 8:06 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 8:06 And then, we're just gonna talk about Japanese vomit porn and (laughs) tentacles.

Geoffrey Miller 8:11 Well, the pletho- ... Plethysmographs don't lie, 'cause they do that-

Joe Rogan 8:15 Plethysmographs don't lie. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 8:17 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 8:17 Not the heart. The heart lies, not those plethysmographs. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 8:22 So yeah, the, the people who are often, you know, most hostile to something-

Joe Rogan 8:26 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 8:26 ... have some, some little issue inside that-

Joe Rogan 8:29 Right.

Geoffrey Miller 8:29 ... I guess, creating some conflict.

Joe Rogan 8:31 Yeah, I mean, it only makes sense. The, the, the conflicted thoughts of the human being who has this ideal of who they'd like to project and what they'd like people to think they are, who meanwhile has this thing below the surface that is literally everything they despise and everything they rally against, and that is their, their true nature.

Geoffrey Miller 8:49 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 8:50 God, it's gotta be the awefullest feeling. I mean, I've known several guys who are closeted gay men, and it's ... It's a f- awful existence.

Geoffrey Miller 9:00 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 9:00 They, they just live in this perpetual state of just angst and unease, and ... And meanwhile ... Oh, God, I just think for the most part, especially if you live in an urban environment, most part of the people don't give a shit anymore.

Geoffrey Miller 9:16 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 9:16 Y- y- ... This is almost a self-imposed prison, and the people that do give a shit, they're the real problem. You know, the, the, the people who are not gay who really care if someone's gay, u- unless they're trying to do a Cosby on you, like, why do you care?

Geoffrey Miller 9:30 Yeah, I ... Look, if somebody wants to be in the closet about their h- their sexuality, like they wanna be discreet for-

Joe Rogan 9:36 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 9:36 ... professional reasons or because investors would panic or whatever-

Joe Rogan 9:40 Mm-hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 9:40 ... like, that's totally cool. But I think it is so hard to be authentic to yourself. Like, it's okay to sort of acknowledge, "I have this sexuality or these predilections, and, and it's up to me to kinda harness them and deal with them and, and manage them." And if you wanna do that privately, that's, that's cool. We should have that freedom.

Joe Rogan 10:00 Yes.

Geoffrey Miller 10:01 Um, but if you don't work out those little demons, and if you can't acknowledge what's authentic, I think that's where you get these problems like the Cosby case.

Joe Rogan 10:09 Yeah, and I b- ... I believe there's a difference between discretion and not wanting to discuss your sexuality and o- out-and-out hypocrisy.

Geoffrey Miller 10:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 10:17 Ye- th- these are completely different thing ... It's one thing, like you said, say if a guy's a CEO of some major corporation and he happens to be gay, and he's just not interested in all the political nonsense and all the social nonsense that goes along with discussing that.

Geoffrey Miller 10:29 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 10:29 He's like, "I'm just gonna keep it discreet." That makes sense.

Geoffrey Miller 10:32 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 10:32 Like, why should he have to? But if he lies to his friends, you know? Like-

Geoffrey Miller 10:36 Or if, or if he goes on-

Joe Rogan 10:37 He ... Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 10:37 ... the attack in media-

Joe Rogan 10:38 Yes.

Geoffrey Miller 10:39 ... like, that is-

Joe Rogan 10:39 Yes.

Geoffrey Miller 10:40 That is hell.

Joe Rogan 10:41 Damnation, hellfire.

Geoffrey Miller 10:42 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 10:43 We are so strange, um, as, as a race. Uh, and I, I, I have talked many times about how bizarre it is that we've become really comfortable with seeing people have sex, like on phones and in, you know, iPads and laptops. I mean, it is such a massive part of internet consumption-

Geoffrey Miller 11:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 11:06 ... but yet, so dirty and so forbidden. And if someone comes in the room, and you're watching-

Geoffrey Miller 11:10 (slams table)

Joe Rogan 11:11 ... you slam the laptop shut in, in, in disgust. I- t- total embarrassment.

Geoffrey Miller 11:17 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 11:17 It's we- really weird.

Geoffrey Miller 11:19 Yeah. Well, (sighs) it's weird on so many levels. Like, I don't do research on whatever, the psychology of porn, but I know people who do. And the fact that you can study it and everyone watches it, but you can't even show clips at a scientific conference-

Joe Rogan 11:36 Wow.

Geoffrey Miller 11:36 ... of what people are watching is kind of bizarre. A second thing that's bizarre is if you'd ask people 70 years ago w- w- ... you know, in the '50s or whatever, "What do you think will happen if there's unlimited free online pornography that is every possible genre of humans of all sexes interacting with each other, in- including cartoon dragons and whatever?"

Joe Rogan 12:02 (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 12:02 They would go, "Civilization will have fallen." Like, it would be chaos. It, it ... That sounds post-apocalyptic. And, and yet, we're living in that era.... and people are still driving their kids to school.

Joe Rogan 12:16 They seem fine.

Geoffrey Miller 12:16 ... and being, like, morally judgmental about politics and our ability to car- compartmentalize is kind of awe-inspiring, actually.

Joe Rogan 12:27 Yeah, it really is. Um, but it's also, uh, our ability to adjust to the times-

Geoffrey Miller 12:34 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 12:34 ... is kind of awe-inspiring too.

Geoffrey Miller 12:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 12:36 I mean, think about the different... Like, I've often talked about, uh, when I was in high school is wh- I was in high school in 1981. It was my freshman year in high school. And that was literally around the time the VH1 tape was introduced into modern America. What- what was the- what was the exact year VH1 tapes were invented? We got them in my house, I think, in '82. Like, maybe I was a sophomore, which is right when you're about the horniest.

Geoffrey Miller 13:02 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:02 And, uh, (laughs) that's- that's when porn made it into people's houses and you had to go through those beads in the video store-

Geoffrey Miller 13:09 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 13:09 ... to get to the porn section. And everybody was like, everybody had blinders on and nobody looked at anybody else, and it was just terrifying. And, you know, you saw your neighbor there.

Geoffrey Miller 13:17 They'd be, like, rental- rental late fees, like, "Should I bring it back today? Oh, man."

Joe Rogan 13:19 Just keep it.

Geoffrey Miller 13:19 "It's late. I'll just keep it as a three bucks."

Joe Rogan 13:21 Just keep it. Another three bucks.

Geoffrey Miller 13:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:22 If you just stole it, it cost 30.

Geoffrey Miller 13:24 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:24 Steal it just so you don't have to, like, look the guy in the face.

Geoffrey Miller 13:27 (laughs)

Jamie Vernon 13:28 They had it in the '70s.

Joe Rogan 13:29 '70s?

Jamie Vernon 13:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:30 Really?

Jamie Vernon 13:31 It said internet home use in the '70s on the wiki, it says. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:34 Huh.

Jamie Vernon 13:34 Early '70s and early '80s.

Joe Rogan 13:35 Oh, okay. Well, maybe it was late '70s or something like that. My house, we got it around 1982, uh, yeah, I wanna say '82-ish. But it- it changed the world and it changed it in a real sneaky way-

Geoffrey Miller 13:46 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:46 ... where nobody saw it coming, but the difference between the access to sex, to w- to looking at sex from 1960 to 1980, 20 years, which is, you know, in terms of historically, is a very short period of time at any other time other than today. Today, it's a massive change. Uh, if you had to anticipate what it would be like in 2038, you'd be like, "Oh, God." You know?

Geoffrey Miller 14:09 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 14:10 All of Elon Musk's inventions will have come to fruition. We'll be living in tunnels underground, and-

Geoffrey Miller 14:15 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 14:15 ... the- the surface of the Earth will be 190 degrees, and there'll be no more water, and...

Geoffrey Miller 14:21 Yeah, people always overestimate how much is gonna change in the next 20 years compared to the last 20.

Joe Rogan 14:26 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 14:26 Um, but, you know, if you'd asked a bunch of, let's say psychology researchers who study, like, marriages and long-term relationships, ask them in 1980, "What's gonna happen when you have unlimited VHS porn?" Some of them might have said, "That'll save American marriages."

Joe Rogan 14:45 How many do you think would go with that? All the hippies?

Geoffrey Miller 14:49 I think a lot of folks would have said, "Well, that's a way you can get your sexual variety needs met."

Joe Rogan 14:54 Mm-hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 14:54 "In a kind of virtual fake way, and so that'll reduce the pressure for, like, infidelities." And other folks would have said, "Oh, my God, it'll remind people what they're missing, and so it'll- it'll nuke marriages. The divorce rate will go to 80%."

Joe Rogan 15:07 But then there's the third option, which is the, sort of the Cosby-esque thing, is that the addiction, that there's- there's... And maybe I can ask you about this. Like, what is it about things, whether it is gambling or, you know, whatever, video games, there are things that people get obsessed with, and those things become almost a part of who they are? It- it takes over their minds so much. Like, if you had a pie chart of the human brain-

Geoffrey Miller 15:34 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 15:34 ... with some folks, there's a giant chunk that's just porn. It's, like, 40% of the brain, just porn.

Geoffrey Miller 15:42 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 15:42 Like, what happens? What is- what is it about the mind that makes one obsessed, whether it's with gambling or whatever- whatever the vice, whatever the- the thing that makes you addicted?

Geoffrey Miller 15:55 Well, I mean, one thi- one issue is people differ in their- their conscientiousness, right? Their degree of self-control and their ability to kind of resist temptations and keep their- their eyes on the target, like career, family, kids, you know, do the right stuff. Um, other people are like, "I just can't control myself in any domain of life," whatever it is. Video games, porn, um, doing my homework, whatever. But I think we also have to cut people some slack, because remember, you know, if you're a teenager and you're really into video games, um, Call of Duty, whatever it is, there are literally thousands of people designing that game to be as addictive as possible and beta testing it and refining it and- and, you know, doing the level design so it gives you just the right reinforcers at the right pace. And of course we're not gonna be very good at resisting that, because the power of capitalism and tech and- and innovation to kind of, um, exploit our brains is- is pretty awesome.

Joe Rogan 17:03 Am I being naive or are they just trying to be entertaining? I mean-

Geoffrey Miller 17:07 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 17:07 ... are they just trying to make an amazing game that's totally immersive and sucks you in, or are they really thinking, "Hey, this Geoffrey Miller guy, I wanna get him fucked up on Battlefield Earth"? No, that was the John Travolta movie, right? (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 17:19 Yeah. That- that did not succeed.

Joe Rogan 17:21 Okay, okay. Let's just say Unreal Tournament.

Geoffrey Miller 17:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 17:23 "I wanna get him fucked up on Unreal Tournament and get him completely addicted to this."

Geoffrey Miller 17:28 Uh, th- they're just maximizing sales and profit and, you know

Guest (single-word interjection) 17:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 17:30 But are they doing it consciously or are they just trying to make the best possible game that's so entertaining, and then it just, as a side effect, it becomes, uh, addictive?

Geoffrey Miller 17:39 I think it's a s- well ... Okay, if you're running a video game company, the- the folks actually doing the programming, right? Character design, level design, whatever, they want it to be awesome. They want it to just be-

Joe Rogan 17:54 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 17:54 ... the best game ever that is just so fun to play. But the management knows, "We have to sell it. We have to make it compelling. We have to make people excited about the next version and- and, you know, the add-ons." So I think the- there's kind of like a-... a super ego and id issue going on, even within companies. Where the, the designers just want it to be cool.

Joe Rogan 18:21 Right.

Geoffrey Miller 18:21 And management just wants a viable commercial product.

Joe Rogan 18:26 But doesn't that just come with something that's cool? I mean, I'm, I'm just playing devil's advocate here, 'cause I'm not exactly sure how... I'm friends with a few guys who, who make video games. Uh, CliffyB, who, uh, worked for Epic Games, who makes, uh ... He showed us Unreal, way back in the day, even before Jaime worked here. We got to see, uh, them making Unreal Tournament, like as it was being made. And, uh, I went to the id offices when they were working on Quake III, which were just these amazing games. And it seemed to me -- and again, I could be naive -- but it seemed to me that all they were doing was just trying to make awesome shit that they like.

Geoffrey Miller 19:00 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 19:01 And then, it became addictive just 'cause it was so good.

Geoffrey Miller 19:04 I think that's most of it. Um, yeah, I mean, this summer, like, my girlfriend and I were each doing, working on our next book proposals. And we each got a little bit addicted to Age of Empires HD-

Joe Rogan 19:15 (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 19:15 ... which was like back in the day, 20 years ago. And it's really fun 'cause we learned a lot about each other just watching each other play. Like, we had such different strategies, and- in terms of like what you build, what you prioritize, how you deal with enemies. Like, it, it's an amazing kind of personality test-

Joe Rogan 19:33 Mm.

Geoffrey Miller 19:34 ... in its own right. Um, and we each got a little bit addicted temporarily in a- in our own way. And I don't think that's an intention of the designers. It's just, if you make anything awesome, whether it's music, whether it's standup comedy-

Joe Rogan 19:51 Or sex.

Geoffrey Miller 19:52 Whether it's sex, whether it's long form TV drama, um, like Ozark-

Joe Rogan 19:57 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 19:57 ... then people want that. You know? It, it works. It's, it's brain candy.

Joe Rogan 20:04 Yeah, I saw you quote ... Uh, you, you posted about Ozark after I posted about how amazing it is. I'm completely wrapped up in this second season. It's so incredible. But you were saying how they always make the kids bratty.

Geoffrey Miller 20:15 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 20:15 You don't have kids, do you?

Geoffrey Miller 20:16 No, I have a daughter.

Joe Rogan 20:17 You do?

Geoffrey Miller 20:18 22, yeah.

Joe Rogan 20:18 Oh, okay. I, I didn't think she was bratty at all. I think she kept it remarkably together for a teenager whose parents are murderers and drug dealers.

Geoffrey Miller 20:26 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 20:26 Spoiler alert. (laughs) I thought it was ... I think she's-

Geoffrey Miller 20:29 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 20:29 ... she, I mean, she needs some time alone where they need to talk to her. I mean, you can't just let her go through life hanging out with some kid who lives in a trailer, smoking weed and stealing books. I mean, you gotta-

Geoffrey Miller 20:38 Yeah, it ... I, I kinda warmed up to it after like ... Uh, I'd watched the first couple episodes, and she seemed kind of bratty, the daughter, in, in-

Joe Rogan 20:45 Really?

Geoffrey Miller 20:45 ... in that. And then, and then, I thought-

Joe Rogan 20:47 Your kid must be amazing. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 20:49 My kid's awesome, and, and I don't know why all kids are like her. So, um ... But I think screenwriters get lazy about this stuff.

Joe Rogan 20:58 Mm.

Geoffrey Miller 20:59 They think, well, if there's a family, you need marital conflict-

Joe Rogan 21:03 Right.

Geoffrey Miller 21:03 ... and you need parent-offspring conflict, and you need secrets and lies, and, and-

Joe Rogan 21:09 But I think the way they're handling it is amazing because the kid doesn't have that kind of conflict. The kid has, like, in my opinion, a, a, a typical sort of, uh, relationship with his father, where he admires his father and his father's abilities. And, you know, and he seems to be ... It's- ... I just think that show's fucking great. It's just so well-read. Uh, written, rather. It's just so- it's so twisted and there's so much going on, so many different levels.

Geoffrey Miller 21:35 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 21:35 It's like I get anxiety. I start sweating. You know, I feel like I'm burying bodies. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 21:40 (laughs) Well, I love that you, you don't really know what's gonna happen.

Joe Rogan 21:43 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 21:43 And-

Joe Rogan 21:44 Legitimately.

Geoffrey Miller 21:45 It, it's ... You know, Game of Thrones, you had that thing where any character could die at any time.

Joe Rogan 21:52 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 21:52 And that's what- That was one of the major things that kept-

Joe Rogan 21:55 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 21:56 ... people watching. Um, and I think with really good TV drama, you, you get that kind of engagement, where it's, it's like real life. Like, you know the series will continue, but you don't know any particular character will.

Joe Rogan 22:09 But we didn't have that for most of culture. That's-

Geoffrey Miller 22:12 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 22:12 ... what's really interesting. It was through most of mass media fiction that you saw, on television and in the movies, that a good guy won.

Geoffrey Miller 22:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 22:23 You know? And it was real predictable. And there was always like a little bit of drama, like, "He might lose! He might lose! Oh, he wins!" Occasionally, you had something crazy, like Thelma & Louise driving off the cliff, and you're like, "Whoa!"

Geoffrey Miller 22:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 22:36 "Whoa, they just off themselves. That's the end of the movie?" And you leave the movie theater like, "Holy shit! What a gangster move!"

Geoffrey Miller 22:44 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 22:44 You know, there was a few movies like that. But for the most part ...

Geoffrey Miller 22:47 Yeah. Well, starting in like the Golden Age of Cinema in the '70s, the counterculture cinema, you sometimes got those really profound surprise endings. But one thing that makes-

Joe Rogan 22:56 Like, an example, The Hustler.

Geoffrey Miller 22:58 Vanishing Point. (sighs)

Joe Rogan 23:00 Oh, okay. That was the one with the Challenger. The guy had the Challenger, yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 23:03 Yeah. It's like-

Joe Rogan 23:05 I forget that movie.

Geoffrey Miller 23:05 Suicide by car.

Joe Rogan 23:06 I just re- ... I remember the car, awesome car.

Geoffrey Miller 23:09 But, I mean, one thing that makes me optimistic about America is that the same adults who are being completely insane to each other about politics on Twitter, whatever-

Joe Rogan 23:20 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 23:21 ... are watching this really sophisticated, you know, emotionally insightful Netflix stuff.

Joe Rogan 23:28 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 23:29 And I, I can't connect those, those two things. It's like when people aren't talking about certain issues, they're capable of, you know, really in- appreciating really insightful drama that's about the subtleties of human relationships and, and morally ambiguous situations. And then, they go into the voting booth or get on Twitter, and, and it's like, there's black and there's white, and, and that's it. And, and I hate those people, and I love these people. And I can't connect the dots between, you know, the entertainment media that we appreciate versus the kind of ideologies that, that we, um, oversimplify.

Joe Rogan 24:11 Yeah, I think Twitter and I think- ... Well, Twitter in particular, but blogs as well. I think it is a horrible way to communicate when you are saying something that's in dispute.... you know, because you're not challenged. And I think there's also, whether it's 140 characters or 280 characters, I just think this limited way of writing in text without talking to someone, without being in front of them and communicating with them, and the subtleties of human interaction and social cues, and recognizing people's feelings, and it just ... It's a piss-poor way of getting your thoughts out, and it's very non-human.

Geoffrey Miller 24:50 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 24:50 You know, it's, it's very, um, uh, it's, it, it tends to gravitate towards cruelty, because there's no consequences for saying cruel things. It's almost like you're, you're throwing a bomb over a wall and you don't know who's over there, you know?

Geoffrey Miller 25:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 25:05 Like, you don't, you're, you're not there seeing it. You're not ... There's something about that, that I just think is alien to the human condition, and I think it's f- it's having a real effect on our civilization and our culture and how we communicate with each other. And I think it's galvanizing the, the polar opposites and it's making people w- go towards these extreme lefts and extreme rights, especially people that are easily led or, uh, n- maybe n- not so thoughtful about, you know, the, uh, objective way that they're interpreting these events and not, not being introspective, not looking at themselves c- with a critical eye, and just engaging in this sort of back and forth tribal shit with people that I just think is, uh, it's so strange to watch. And particularly with ... when you read something and it's really well-written, like you could tell this is an intelligent person that's written a bunch of nonsense-

Geoffrey Miller 26:00 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 26:00 ... and called people alt-right and Nazis, and what's the most recent one? Um-

Geoffrey Miller 26:06 That Vox, Vox piece-

Joe Rogan 26:07 Yes.

Geoffrey Miller 26:07 ... about the, the-

Joe Rogan 26:08 Was it radical? What is it? There's, there's a new ... The radical right?

Geoffrey Miller 26:12 The reactionary.

Joe Rogan 26:13 The reactionary right?

Geoffrey Miller 26:13 The reactionary right.

Joe Rogan 26:13 Oh, yes, that's it. The reactionary right. This is the new one. We have a new one now. It's new. It's only like a couple weeks old, the reactionary right. It's a baby.

Geoffrey Miller 26:21 Yeah. And-

Joe Rogan 26:22 Isn't that time to ...

Geoffrey Miller 26:24 I mean, the weird thing is, people do have a hunger for this more primal, engaged kind of long-form discussion, which is-

Joe Rogan 26:33 Yes.

Geoffrey Miller 26:33 ... why podcasts like this are really popular and why people are willing to listen to, you know, two reasonably smart people talking for an hour or three-

Joe Rogan 26:42 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 26:43 ... about cool topics, because that's a natural condition. You know, imagine our ancestors 100,000 years ago around the campfire having a discussion about some fraught issue. Well, they would talk it through until it was more or less resolved, or unless they at least identified, "Here's the things we can agree on and here's the things we can agree to disagree on." But with Twitter, it's, it's just the exact opposite. It's not sitting around the campfire.

Joe Rogan 27:09 Right.

Geoffrey Miller 27:09 It's, it's lobbing these hand grenades over the ...

Joe Rogan 27:13 And it's an infinite number of hand grenades. Like say if you have 30,000 followers or something, God, that's 30,000 people that might be lobbing hand grenades.

Geoffrey Miller 27:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:21 And then they might retweet to a bunch of other people, and oh Jesus, then here comes some p- you know, especially if it's on some hot button topic that they would like to chime in on, you know?

Geoffrey Miller 27:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:32 It's ... Ugh. It's just, it's strange.

Geoffrey Miller 27:34 Yeah. Well, I think, you know, the human social psychology is, it's very hard to reach any agreement without a certain amount of back and forth, preferably face-to-face, in person, with as much time as you need.

Joe Rogan 27:49 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 27:50 And this is why things like, um, these sort of time-limited presidential debates drive me nuts. I would love to just have 50, 60 hours of candidates-

Joe Rogan 28:02 Sure.

Geoffrey Miller 28:03 ... talking it through, and people can tune in and just hear, "Okay, l- here, here's six hours about foreign policy. Let's see what they really ..." And then voters could have an informed choice. Imagine candidates actually learning something from each other.

Joe Rogan 28:20 Right, and being open and honest about that. Instead, they have to pretend that their, their ideas are rock solid and completely well thought out and rigid and-

Geoffrey Miller 28:28 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 28:29 ... impossible to evolve, that this is it, they've got it, and you're wrong. "And what, what my opponent wants is some- s- something terrible for America." And God, we've, when we seen this hustle so many times, and yet it's the same hustle every four years.

Geoffrey Miller 28:45 Yeah, I, I hope we get to a future where people are allowed to be epistemically humble, like, "Here's what I don't know, and I don't know a lot about most things."

Joe Rogan 28:54 Mm.

Geoffrey Miller 28:54 And even if politicians or scientists or media figures were able to take that attitude.

Joe Rogan 29:00 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 29:01 And just ... It kinda gets back to the hypocrisy point, right? Everybody inwardly knows, "Man, about most topics I know virtually nothing, or I've heard a f- few things thirdhand that I can kind of regurgitate at a party."

Joe Rogan 29:16 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 29:16 But we're all kind of expected to have an informed view about everything. And this is something I try to model for my students. Like, if they ask a question and I, I, I really don't know the answer, I try to make a point of saying, "I don't know. Let's look it up. Let's find out."

Joe Rogan 29:33 That's awesome. That's so important. The idea that you should know everything about everything is preposterous.

Geoffrey Miller 29:40 Yeah. And, you know, if you're a 20-year-old undergrad, you don't know what the typical 50-year-old knows. You might think, "Oh, they've probably mastered most of the wisdom in the world already."

Joe Rogan 29:50 (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 29:51 Or you might think, "No, uh, there, there's like gigabytes of stuff and they can't possibly know it all," and-

Joe Rogan 29:57 Well, there's such a spectrum too. The, the average person that has a, like a very intensive job, like say if you're involved in something, uh, computer coding, electronics, something that's 10, 12 hours a day, you're im- engrossed. You don't have a lot of time to focus on other areas. I mean, you don't really have a lot of time to expand your understanding of whether it's biology or mathematics. Whatever it is that doesn't apply to what you do for a living-

Geoffrey Miller 30:23 You have-

Joe Rogan 30:23 ... really have very little time.... so this, this notion that you... Like, people are embarrassed about things they don't know, and I think that's really unfortunate. It's- it's- it- it's one of the main stumbling points when it comes to, like, open and honest discourse. There's not... You're not dumb if you don't know some things, you know? You just don't know some things, and you... There's no way you know everything.

Geoffrey Miller 30:49 Yeah, I- I think it's a great point. A lot of people have these cognitively demanding jobs, and that's not just white-collar workers. I mean, a lot of manual trades, um, you've got to think about what you're doing and it- it's hard mental labor. And then you get home and you have dinner and you have the kids and their homework and your family life, and what are you gonna do by the time you finally have some alone time at, whatever, 9:00 p.m.? Are you gonna, you know, turn on the Nature Channel and watch a really hardcore David Attenborough-

Joe Rogan 31:20 (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 31:20 ... you know, animal behavior documentary?

Joe Rogan 31:22 Right, right.

Geoffrey Miller 31:23 Or are you gonna be like, "I'll just rewatch," you know, um-

Joe Rogan 31:28 Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 31:29 ... Vanity Fair or Vanity Point or whatever, yeah.

Joe Rogan 31:31 Yeah, I mean, people wanna escape at that point, yeah. It's... There's not enough time in the day. One of the most beautiful things about podcasts that was completely unexpected for me is that it gives me this very unusual opportunity to sit down and talk to somebody without any interruptions for three hours, which I could never ask someone to do in real life.

Geoffrey Miller 31:48 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 31:48 And it never came up before. Like, if we have dinner, if you and I went out to dinner, we'd be talking, you know, maybe someone else would be with us, different conversations, we'd be eating. "Oh, this is amazing. Did you try that? Oh, that's good. What are you up to? Blah, blah, blah." Those are, like, little simple conversations, it's fun and everything, but it's not completely locked in like this with, uh, the headphones on-

Geoffrey Miller 32:09 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 32:09 ... through a microphone, the knowledge that other people are listening, and that these- these subjects that you're discussing, you're allowing these ideas to play themselves out, and you're- you're sort of moving them around and- and asking questions and looking at them from different angles. And- and to have that liberty and freedom to do that is- is a very rare thing, and for people that get to listen, and I- I enjoy Sam Harris's podcast, in particular, at Radiolabs, one of my favorites. But one of the... Th- there's so many good ones out there, but what's really good about them is that you get a- an- a chance to listen to discourse uninterrupted, un- s- uh, uncensored, undirected.

Geoffrey Miller 32:50 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 32:50 And this is something that I think is sorely missing from the rest of our culture, and it's one of the reasons why these things have caught on so well.

Geoffrey Miller 32:59 Yeah, I mean, if you respect the ideas that you're talking about, you should be willing to give time-

Joe Rogan 33:03 Yes.

Geoffrey Miller 33:03 ... and attention-

Joe Rogan 33:04 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 33:05 ... and let them kind of breathe, like opening a bottle of wine and just letting it do the aeration thing-

Joe Rogan 33:11 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 33:11 ... before you pour it. And y- it's funny how much of a thirst there is for that. I mean, if you'd asked me 10 years ago, "Would anybody ever spend three hours listening o- to a podcast?" I would have said, "No, there's just this- this one-way acceleration of culture that's gonna be faster and faster. Nobody will watch more than a 90-second clip on YouTube, that'll be it."

Joe Rogan 33:34 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 33:35 And instead, it's the opposite way. I think people have a yearning for a more relaxed pace of dialogue that is actually a break from the- the- the frenetic pace of their work life, right?

Joe Rogan 33:50 Yeah. Um, m- I think even, like, leaning towards things that are, like, tech reviews, things along those lines. Those are getting longer and longer, when people are dis-... I mean, there was never a television show where someone would discuss cellphones in depth with no interruption for over an hour. That's very common now, where- where someone will go over all the different details of a phone and let you know, like, "Here's- here's what's new about the Galaxy Note9," and- and they get fucking hundreds of thousands of views. Like, clearly, someone's missed something.

Geoffrey Miller 34:26 Yeah, I mean, even on YouTube, like, you can get 25-minute reviews of, like, an AR-15 accessory.

Joe Rogan 34:32 Yeah. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 34:33 Not ju- not just the, like, the rifle, but, like, the red dot scope or whatever.

Joe Rogan 34:37 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 34:37 And, um, or you... I'm sure there are long bow hunting reviews or whatever.

Joe Rogan 34:42 Oh, yeah, there's a lot. Yeah, I've seen 'em all. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 34:47 And I- I mean, I think that's just a more natural pace of, uh, human- human discourse-

Joe Rogan 34:51 Mm-hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 34:52 ... because, you know, bear in mind, like, 100,000 years ago, sitting around the fire with a bunch of people, no smartphones, no video, no TV, no movies, no recorded music. The entertainment is each other. And it's not rushed, it's like, "The sun- the sun went down. None of us are gonna sleep for four hours. Um, what do we do? Talk- entertain each other with jokes?"

Joe Rogan 35:18 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 35:18 I mean-

Joe Rogan 35:19 Break out the ukulele.

Geoffrey Miller 35:20 They wouldn't have done standup comedy, but they would've-

Joe Rogan 35:22 (coughs)

Geoffrey Miller 35:22 ... done sit-down comedy.

Joe Rogan 35:24 Well, somebody probably stood up.

Geoffrey Miller 35:25 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 35:26 You know, held court, told some good stories, you know? I mean, a good story is always valued, a good storyteller.

Geoffrey Miller 35:34 This is what my anthropologist colleagues tell me is, you know, your status, if you're in a tribal society, a small-scale society, is heavily dependent on not just how good a hunter you are or how many kids you have. It's how entertaining are you in the evenings.

Joe Rogan 35:50 Sure.

Geoffrey Miller 35:51 And the people who are... Who just break the monotony are just gold. They're- they're treasured.

Joe Rogan 35:57 Yeah, they give you fuel, they give you energy. Like, y- when you're around someone who's really hilarious, is telling great stories, you're like-

Geoffrey Miller 36:04 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:04 ... everyone around is like, " (laughs) "

Geoffrey Miller 36:05 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:06 You get fired up by it.

Geoffrey Miller 36:07 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:08 Yeah, um, it's... I don't... (sighs) I mean, I- I- I have a- a rosy view of the future. I'm very optimistic, and I think that all the chaos that we're going through right now, politically and socially, in particular, this is... I feel like this is just an adolescent-... period of communication, that we are experiencing this, this open flood, like we've opened up the, the barriers for communication. Anybody can communicate now, and it's just ch- And it's gonna take a while before the discourse m- uh, levels out, and you've got a lot of loud noises on, on all sides. And there's a lot of people fighting for power, and fighting, fighting for virtue, fighting for, uh, you know, whatever social brownie points they get by pointing out their position being correct, and your position being foolish and silly, and this is the future, and this is done. And, and it's ... There's a ... There's this cruel aspect to it, which is interesting. Like, when... If someone missteps, and someone says something that they regret, and then they delete it, p- there's this cancel culture. "Get rid of them! Off with his head!" Because, uh, people realize the immediacy of all this, and they're terrified of it happening to them. So, it's like they're just throwing rocks at whoever might be the accused. It's fascinating to watch-

Geoffrey Miller 37:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 37:30 ... you know?

Geoffrey Miller 37:30 I mean, we're gonna need a whole new set of social norms where people just calm the fuck down about this stuff.

Joe Rogan 37:36 (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 37:36 And I think it's kind of analogous. Like, one of my favorite books about kind of social history is called, uh, The Bourgeois Virtues by Deirdre McCloskey, an economic historian. She points out when you switch from, like, the Middle Ages where everyone's a peasant, to this urbanized commercial culture where people are mostly, um, traders, and they have little shops and whatever, they needed to learn how to interact with strangers to provide value for money. And they needed a whole new set of virtues that had to do with reliability, and thinking, "What am I making? Or what goods or services am I providing that actually are useful?" And it took, you know, a couple generations for people to enter that kind of capitalist mode of, "What can I do that's helpful to others, that can support my family?" And I think now we have a cultural shift, where we realize, given social media, how do we cope with the fact that everybody virtue signals, everybody sometimes says things that are, that are mean and stupid, and everyone's fallible, and anything you say will be on a permanent record basically? Um, how do we cope with that? You know, we're, we're used to a sort of public culture where everything is very polished and edited and curated. And, and that time is gone.

Joe Rogan 39:02 Mm-hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 39:03 So we need a new set of kind of social and moral norms that cut each other a lot more slack, I think.

Joe Rogan 39:11 Yeah. I would agree with you, and I would, I would say that the inclination towards kindness and communication and understanding should be rewarded, and that we, we, we need to reward that and ... I don't wanna say ostracize people that are inclined to go towards this cancel culture idea. But we need to let people be aware of it. You know, we were talking before the podcast that, uh, I have, like, all these emails that I can't catch up on 'cause I was gone. I was in the mountains for six days with no cellphone service at all. I felt better when I was there. I just did. I feel like there's a certain amount of anxiety that comes with being connected to all these people all the time, and constantly checking your mentions, and constantly looking at Google News to find out what chaos is coming our way. And, uh, it's just ... I, I just don't think that that's healthy, and I, I don't think ... I think I do my very best to mitigate the negative effects of it, but my very best is not good. (laughs) I just don't think I'm doing a great job. Because when it's taken away from me, and I've had this happen twice over the last few months. Um, I was in Lanai, the small island off of Hawaii, one of the Hawaiian islands, and I broke my phone, and it took a few days for them to send me a new one. And I was like, "God, why do I feel so good?" (laughs) "I feel so present, and I feel so healthy." And then this, this past week the same thing. No cellphone service for all these days, and so I just felt better.

Geoffrey Miller 40:42 I think there's a funny thing even that happened with Burning Man culture, where, like, when it got started in the early '90s it was, "Let's all come together and have this excitement of interacting more." And now, since Burning Man's one of the few places where you don't get cellphone service, and you can't really be online, it's like, "Oh man, this is such a relief, because we literally can't stay connected." And the community we're in is only 70,000 people-

Joe Rogan 41:09 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 41:09 ... instead of 330 million or whatever.

Joe Rogan 41:11 Which is almost Boulder.

Geoffrey Miller 41:13 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 41:13 That's almost Boulder, Colorado. I think Boulder's a little bit over 100, so 70,000 is ... That's a fucking big city (laughs) of freaks.

Geoffrey Miller 41:23 (laughs) It's a big city, but it feels intimate compared to Twitter.

Joe Rogan 41:27 Ooh.

Geoffrey Miller 41:27 Right?

Joe Rogan 41:28 Yeah, for sure. Yeah. I, I, I'm fascinated by Burning Man. I can't go because hippies will drive me crazy, and there's too much dust.

Geoffrey Miller 41:39 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 41:39 But I love the idea and I'm a- fully support. If there was, like, a fund that you could write a check, like, to support Burning Man, (laughs) I would support it as a project, as an idea. I don't necessarily wanna go there until they got it really polished and worked out, but I think what ... The idea behind it is fascinating. So people saying, "I don't like this. I don't like where this is going. I think there's a lot of people that would like to do something different. Let's just try it out for a week. Let's just ... Everybody let's agree. We'll get together through these days, and let's, let's just fucking dance, and we'll have glow sticks, and wear pasties, and get fucking crazy and do ecstasy." And a lot of people are like, "Fuck yeah, let's do it!" And then this thing happens, and this thing is only a few years old. I mean, it really is what? A decade and a half? How many years have they been doing it?

Geoffrey Miller 42:29 Uh ...

Joe Rogan 42:30 ... the '90s.

Geoffrey Miller 42:30 The first, the first Burning Man was, like, the late '80s-

Joe Rogan 42:32 Oh, was it really?

Geoffrey Miller 42:32 ... but it was just, like, a couple dozen people.

Joe Rogan 42:34 Oh.

Geoffrey Miller 42:34 And then it just, it gradually grew, and it, it really became a pretty solidified subculture by probably the late '90s.

Joe Rogan 42:42 And no leadership.

Geoffrey Miller 42:44 Well, there is kind of behind the-

Joe Rogan 42:47 Guidance.

Geoffrey Miller 42:47 There's behind-the-scenes leadership, of course. And I mean, that's another fascinating thing, is depending on the, the political lenses that you wear when you go there, it's either, like, a libertarian paradise or it's a communist paradise.

Joe Rogan 43:01 Mm.

Geoffrey Miller 43:03 Or it's spontaneous self-organization of some sort. Um, but there, there certainly are people who are kinda coordinating it. It's just they're not-

Joe Rogan 43:12 Well, there's tickets now.

Geoffrey Miller 43:13 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 43:13 You have to get tickets. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 43:14 There's ... It's hard to get. It's hard to get tickets.

Joe Rogan 43:17 That's fucking hilarious.

Geoffrey Miller 43:18 It's even hard to get a parking pass.

Joe Rogan 43:19 But this is my point. Like, why would they wanna limit this thing? Like, who, who, are ... It's like a Bitcoin thing. Like, you're arbitrarily limiting the amount of Bitcoin, or deciding there's only a certain number. And they're doing this with humans. They're just saying, "Oh-

Geoffrey Miller 43:32 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 43:33 ... can't really go over 70,000. It's just, it's not gonna work." But what if they did? What if they just opened up the floodgates and said, "Anybody who wants to come to Burning Man and, and, and get, get fucking crazy, just come on down"? How many you think, how many you think would come?

Geoffrey Miller 43:47 Um, half a million.

Joe Rogan 43:49 Ooh, boy.

Geoffrey Miller 43:51 But it would be chaos, right? 'Cause it would-

Joe Rogan 43:53 Let's-

Geoffrey Miller 43:53 Like, who supplies-

Joe Rogan 43:56 Extracurriculars.

Geoffrey Miller 43:56 ... the Porta-Potties and ... Right?

Joe Rogan 43:59 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 43:59 And the emergency medical services-

Joe Rogan 44:01 (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 44:02 ... and the-

Joe Rogan 44:02 Right.

Geoffrey Miller 44:02 ... therapists for people having bad trips, and ...

Joe Rogan 44:04 Mm.

Geoffrey Miller 44:05 Um, like, you need some infrastructure. And then, you know, Nevada State Police have to kinda make sure there's not, like, murders and stuff. But-

Joe Rogan 44:14 Do they come around?

Geoffrey Miller 44:16 Oh, yeah. Like-

Joe Rogan 44:16 They wander around?

Geoffrey Miller 44:17 They, they police how fast you drive and-

Joe Rogan 44:21 They must be so annoyed. Like, what have they been dealing with up until Burning Man? Fucking nothing. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 44:27 No, just someone-

Joe Rogan 44:27 A little bit of a mess here and there.

Geoffrey Miller 44:29 Someone's cow got loose, or-

Joe Rogan 44:30 Yeah, someone blew up a trailer-

Geoffrey Miller 44:31 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 44:31 ... because they got their mixture wrong.

Geoffrey Miller 44:33 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 44:35 (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 44:35 But yeah, it's, it's fascinating in terms of, um, how quickly it went from not being a thing at all to being its own subculture, with its own little-

Joe Rogan 44:44 Huge.

Geoffrey Miller 44:45 ... little moral norms and dress styles and systems of virtue signaling, and, um, sort of political expectations about what beliefs are the right ones to have, even though it didn't start out political at all.

Joe Rogan 45:05 Well, whenever you get freaky, you go left wing. Like, if you get freedom and freaky and drugs, it's left wing. Period, right? I mean, there's no real ... I mean, unless it's some Eyes Wide Shut-type shit, where you're wearing masks and everybody's got a ...

Geoffrey Miller 45:20 Right. Uh, yeah, you don't typically hear people like, "Well, I went to Burning Man and I dropped acid and, and I realized, like, Mormon monogamy is really the proper way to live."

Joe Rogan 45:34 (laughs) Yeah. They're nice people, though. They might be right.

Geoffrey Miller 45:38 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 45:39 Mormons are the nicest cult of all time. They're, they are some of the nicest folks. I know, uh, if I had to say, if, like, there's one religion, were I to say, like, what are, what are the, what are your expectations of friendliness and niceness? Like, where, where's, where's the highest expectation? For me, it's Mormons.

Geoffrey Miller 45:58 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 45:58 That's one religion. Like, I think it's nonsense. I think Joseph Smith was a little con man in 1820 when he found golden tablets that contained the lost work of Jesus, and only he could read 'em 'cause he had a magic rock, and all that crazy shit. It is absolutely ridiculous. But the end result is a bunch of really nice folks. Like, they have a wonderful community. They're really nice to each other. Once they got rid of all that polygamy shit, you know, once they got rid of the 90 wives and, you know, dressing up like a pilgrim, they, they became, like, a really nice community of people. They're, like, generally really friendly.

Geoffrey Miller 46:34 So my granddad, who was a, a business school professor, um, back in the '40s he moved his, his little family to Salt Lake City, and they lived there for a while. And he was really inspired by the kind of family values. And I think that's one reason he sort of went on to have 12 kids of his own.

Joe Rogan 46:49 Oh.

Geoffrey Miller 46:49 And not that he turned Mormon, but he thought, "They're onto something in terms of how seriously they take, um, the future, both on Earth and, and in the afterlife, they believe in."

Joe Rogan 47:02 Well, in the afterlife, don't they get a planet of their own when they die?

Geoffrey Miller 47:05 Right. Uh, well, this is something I loved about the TV series The Expanse. I don't know if you've seen it.

Joe Rogan 47:09 I keep hearing about it, and I haven't gotten into it yet. It's just too many damn shows that are awesome to watch these days. But as soon as I'm done with Ozark, I'm gonna jump in.

Geoffrey Miller 47:18 What I loved about it is it's set maybe a couple hundred years in the future. And so, we've colonized Mars and the asteroid belt, and there's one group of people who are building the first ship to colonize a distant star system. And who's doing it? The Mormons.

Joe Rogan 47:35 Of course.

Geoffrey Miller 47:35 And I thought, of course, of course it's gonna be a religion that has a far-sighted approach, and that's kind of pro-natalist, and that's all about family values, and, and, like, increasing their numbers, and, and ... Yeah, of course it's gonna be them. Not, what, so- uh, uh, social justice warriors putting together a starship?

Joe Rogan 47:58 (laughs) Yeah. Did you ever see the, um, um, the Osmond Family photograph from one of their albums, their early albums, where they all got their own planet? 'Cause they think that when you die, you get your own planet. And so, the album was based on that concept. And, like, if you, you open up the album, it's like, "Oh, here's f- Planet Donny." Lookit.

Geoffrey Miller 48:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 48:21 He's got her own little asteroid belt. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 48:24 Yeah, they're, they're totally locked and loaded to do the, uh, the interstellar colonization.

Joe Rogan 48:29 It's strange, though. I mean, it's stra- It's strange the blinders that people go on, that people put on, and that they would put those blinders on. Like ...... it's almost like, if you just can go, "Hey, look, let's just all admit Joseph Smith was full of shit. But we got a good thing going on here, folks. We're all real nice to each other, and there seems to be some real positive energy involved in believing in this higher power and this greater good and this overwhelming sense of community that we all have."

Geoffrey Miller 48:58 And they have a sense of humor about it.

Joe Rogan 48:59 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 48:59 Like, the way they reacted to the South Park guys doing Book of Mormon-

Joe Rogan 49:02 It's fantastic.

Geoffrey Miller 49:03 ... was like, fair enough. Pretty hilarious.

Joe Rogan 49:05 They took out a full-page ad-

Geoffrey Miller 49:07 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 49:07 ... in the playbook. I mean, that, tha- th- and that is a brutal musical, in terms of, like, the way they're depicted. Buffoons, believing in nonsense, trying to recruit these indigenous people. It's kind of ... I mean, it's ruthless and hilarious at the same time. And they're like, "Wonderful."

Geoffrey Miller 49:25 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 49:25 "If you wanna find out more about being a Mormon, here."

Geoffrey Miller 49:28 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 49:28 "Come, come to our website and come check it out. Thank you."

Geoffrey Miller 49:31 I, I think having that, that humility and that sense of humor about what you're doing, I wish we saw more of that in, like, academia, 'cause there's a lot of fields that are very bad and, and don't do good work, but that are terribly, terribly serious about it.

Joe Rogan 49:50 Like what?

Geoffrey Miller 49:53 Gender studies or-

Joe Rogan 49:54 (gasps) How dare you.

Geoffrey Miller 49:57 ... social psychology.

Joe Rogan 49:58 Gender studies.

Geoffrey Miller 49:59 Or-

Joe Rogan 49:59 I, I posted something on Instagram yesterday. Um, I was at a bookstore and there was a feminist baby, uh, book. It says Feminist Baby Finds Her Voice, and it's a baby screaming into a bullhorn. Look at this picture. Baby screaming into a bullhorn. And, and I said that the lines between parody and reality have never been blurrier. And some people laughed, but a lot of people called me a piece of shit. And (laughs) I ... This is one of the rare times I dove into the comments just to take a little look-see into the gates of hell.

Geoffrey Miller 50:32 (clears throat)

Joe Rogan 50:32 But, uh, look, that's fucking parody, folks. Why is the baby screaming into a bullhorn? What voice does she have? D- What, what oppression is she rallying against at three months old? Is she screaming about the patriarchy when she can't even fucking talk yet? And h- here's more parody. Why is she fat and ugly? What kind of baby is that? That baby looks like a thumb. She doesn't even have a chin. This is chaos. It's not even a real baby.

Geoffrey Miller 50:58 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 50:58 It's like an M&M with legs. It's crazy. Look, she's got fucked-up hair, and they've already gendered her. They put a, a bow on her, which is really fucked up to do to a baby. You've decided that she's a girl? How dare you, you piece of shit. You transphobic asshole.

Geoffrey Miller 51:14 And the rouge is, is a little bit over-applied there.

Joe Rogan 51:16 Yeah. She's got whore makeup on.

Geoffrey Miller 51:18 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 51:18 She's dressed up like a fuck-clown already, as a baby. Fucked-up hair.

Geoffrey Miller 51:24 Child abuse.

Joe Rogan 51:24 Big nutty eyes. It's crazy. Finds her voice. She found her voice. Fantastic. She can't talk yet.

Geoffrey Miller 51:32 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 51:32 That's a baby. What, we should all listen to the baby? Give the baby a bullhorn. Let's all gather round. "I got poop."

Geoffrey Miller 51:40 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 51:40 (laughs) What is the baby ... (laughs) What is the baby saying? "She finds her voice." Look, it's parody. Even if the ... The book is wonderful. I don't know that it's not. Maybe it's a great book. Maybe it's fun. Maybe it's a silly book. That's parody. That ... Fuck, that would be a goddamn character on South Park, a baby feminist with a bow that screams at the top of her lungs. What is this? Free the nipple? Hmm. Oh, like, right now, I'm hungry.

Geoffrey Miller 52:07 I get it.

Joe Rogan 52:08 I get it. Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 52:09 Oh, is that from the book?

Joe Rogan 52:10 That's from the book, I guess.

Geoffrey Miller 52:11 Okay.

Joe Rogan 52:11 Feminist Baby. Maybe it's a great book.

Geoffrey Miller 52:12 I think it's satire. But, uh, but-

Joe Rogan 52:14 I don't think so.

Geoffrey Miller 52:15 ... here, I mean, here's the thing, like, if you're in a field where-

Joe Rogan 52:17 (sniffs)

Geoffrey Miller 52:17 ... you can't tell whether something is from it or it's satirical-

Joe Rogan 52:21 Right.

Geoffrey Miller 52:21 ... then you need to lighten up up, about your field.

Joe Rogan 52:23 Yes.

Geoffrey Miller 52:25 And just, like-

Joe Rogan 52:25 Gender studies, you're saying?

Geoffrey Miller 52:27 You ... In particular. Well, yeah.

Joe Rogan 52:29 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 52:29 In, in particular. But, um-

Joe Rogan 52:31 But what is it about it that leans itself towards foolishness?

Geoffrey Miller 52:39 (sighs) I think it's very hard to do good work in a field where you have to, every day, systematically deny common sense. And, and deny the evidence of your own eyes and ears about what's right in front of you, like how sex differences work. Uh, I think that creates a habit of interacting with the world in a way that says, "What I study is gonna be completely divorced from every aspect of day-to-day life, and everybody else I encounter who's not in my field." Because if, if you allow any crosstalk between, like, (sighs) your sort of blank slate gender ideology and the real world, the ideology crumbles. So you, you can only maintain it behind this wall of, of insulation. And, and that's a terrible position to be in. I don't envy the people who, who live their lives that way.

Joe Rogan 53:42 And it, it all grows inside the walled gardens of academia. And outside of that, it's these ... You know, you get internet groups from people that sort of-

Geoffrey Miller 53:54 (clears throat)

Joe Rogan 53:54 ... were indoctrinated into these ideas in, in college or ... And there's also, uh, I think in some ways, there's a leveling of the playing field that a lot of these ideologies present to some people-

Geoffrey Miller 54:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:06 ... where they, they go, "No, you're not a freak. You're okay." You know, there's ... (sighs) There was some silly article on fat acceptance the other day, and it was talking ... And they, then they got pre- ... Which is fine. Just, um, I, I accept people who drink. I accept, I accept all kinds of unhealthy choices. But let's ... Don't lie to me. Just don't lie about the physical reality of what you've done to your body if you reach 400 pounds. That's not, that's not healthy. You're saying it's healthy. You're saying it's okay. No, you're just not dead yet. If you lost 200 pounds, you would feel wonderful. That would be healthier.... like if you smoke every day and you're like, "Look, no cancer. Smoking's healthy." No, no. You're just- you're just- yo- your body is dealing with it. Your body's processing it. It won't be able to forever. That is exactly what's going on if you're m- morbidly obese. And for you to pretend any differently, and to- to just go on about this fat acceptance movement, and, you know, the big beautiful this and that. And like, no, you're obese. You've eaten too much food. If you see a fat guy, how come he doesn't get the same sort of treatment? If you see a morbidly obese man in his underwear, no one's saying he's beautiful, 'cause he's disgusting and he's fat and he's lazy and he's- he's addicted to food. We all know it. But if it's a woman, we're so inclined to, like, acce- just, like, yeah, let her go. She's fine. You're wonderful. You're beautiful. You're amazing. Like, gi- gi- give her her space. We treat them as if they're incapable of recognizing the a- the absolute reality of their physical being.

Geoffrey Miller 55:45 I think it's important, you know, to address both the kinda individual choice level and also the kinda systemic level, like the food industry and what is being promoted-

Joe Rogan 55:58 Sure.

Geoffrey Miller 55:58 ... and what the federal government promoted for ages. And, um, i- i- i- it was this terrible situation where you could've followed exactly what the FDA recommended and it would've been bad for you for decades. And because of lobbying and because of the powers that be and- and influence and- and I think that's the level to criticize, right? I- if you have a systemic problem, like promotion of tobacco products, and you want a safer alternative, um, then yeah, you gotta address the tobacco industry. Th- we have this p- bizarre situation, for example, um, where, like a lot of people in my department work on alcoholism treatment research, how do you get people to drink less, or they work on how do you get people to stop taking opiates, how do you deal with opiate addiction. And if you make a suggestion like, "Oh, here's some awesome new research showing that if people switch from opiates to cannabis, it, like, dramatically lowers their risk of death, or if they switch from alcohol to cannabis, it- it has all these health benefits relatively to, like, being an alcoholic." But it's kind of considered taboo to raise that-

Joe Rogan 57:18 Mm-hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 57:19 ... in a lot of (sighs) medicine and psychology and so forth.

Joe Rogan 57:23 How so?

Geoffrey Miller 57:23 Well, it's like, oh, you're- you're giving into people being self-indulgent if you say they s- they should switch from one thing to another in a kinda harm reduction mode, right?

Joe Rogan 57:33 Almost like a methadone type solution.

Geoffrey Miller 57:36 Yeah. And i- a lot of them come out of a kinda 12-step program mentality where it's like you have a disease, if you ever do anything that is bad for you then you've relapsed and- and that's feeding your disease.

Joe Rogan 57:51 Mm-hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 57:51 And I think that's idiotic-

Joe Rogan 57:53 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 57:53 ... and that's not ... Th- the evidence shows that's not the way to treat any of these physical addictions. But, um, something like cannabis as an alternative is, it's totally marginalized in academia. Like you really can't talk about it as a valid alternative where people could come home and they can drink or they could come home and they could get high, and maybe getting high for a lot of people might be better. It's-

Joe Rogan 58:25 Is that changing though?

Geoffrey Miller 58:27 I haven't seen any evidence that it's changing, at least within academia.

Joe Rogan 58:31 Really? I would think that that would be one of the first places where it does change because the influence of the pharmaceutical industry isn't so, uh, deeply entwined in the system itself. It's not like pharmaceutical industry people are dropping off pamphlets on talking points when you're giving lectures.

Geoffrey Miller 58:48 Well, here's the problem, who gives you the research funding to look into this?

Joe Rogan 58:52 Ah.

Geoffrey Miller 58:52 Right?

Joe Rogan 58:53 Okay.

Geoffrey Miller 58:54 National Institute of Alcohol and Alcoholism or National Institute of Drug Abuse. If you do a grant proposal that says, "Here's an alternative that might work," they will shut it down 'cause the federal government does not ... Th- those agencies don't want the blowback of some senator saying, "How dare you fund this research that says this is a valid alternative."

Joe Rogan 59:17 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 59:18 So everyone who works in these areas is kind of locked into a system of- of grant funding that's subject to kind of, um, political censorship-

Joe Rogan 59:29 Mm-hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 59:29 ... by the funding agencies.

Joe Rogan 59:31 Do you remember those, uh, talking dog commercials of about 10 years ago, where there was a girl, she comes home from school and the dog's like, "Lindsey, I really wish you wouldn't smoke pot. You're not the same when you do and I miss my friend." And the girl's sitting there stoned out of her mind, her dog's talking to her, dog runs away. It turns out that the organization that funded those commercials was funded by tobacco, alcohol, and pharmaceutical companies.

Geoffrey Miller 1:00:01 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:02 Like they're drug dealers who are against drugs. It's literally like hookers doing a commercial against strippers. That's literally what it's like. And we just accepted this and it- it was all over television, it was everywhere you look. It became parody. I mean, it became preposterous. It was like, this is your brain on drugs, you remember the eggs?

Geoffrey Miller 1:00:23 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:00:23 And everybody's like, "I'm hungry." I mean, a mi- million comedians had jokes on that. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 1:00:27 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:27 You've given me the munchies, man. This is, uh, just insanity that this is allowed to take place, is that drugs that kill enormous numbers of people are allowed to demonize drugs that kill no one any-... ever in the history of use. If you looked at that rationally, if you were something from some other planet that was studying the human race, and y- you saw the way we program people and the way we spend enormous sums of money to project a certain idea and get it into people's heads through these very influential short memorable videos, you'd be like, "This is a culture and a civilization, a c- uh, uh, an organ- an organism that is mad."

Geoffrey Miller 1:01:16 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:01:16 "This is madness."

Geoffrey Miller 1:01:18 Yeah, I, I often ask, like, myself, w- how is this gonna look in 50 or 100 years to whatever my, my great-grandkids or future people who stumble upon my books or this podcast or whatever? And I think i- if this would make zero sense and would be totally embarrassing, both, um, intellectually and ethically, then don't take it seriously. Uh, in this particular issue, I think it's really important for citizens to understand how much of science is constrained by what can be funded by the federal government, and that we are not actually supported to do certain kinds of research that might be really helpful to people. It's the same thing with sex research, right? It is virtually impossible to get federal funding to do any kind of sex research in America these days. So what do you do? You write a grant to do something else, and then you kind of do the sex research on the side using, like, some of the resources. Um, I don't do this, but everybody I know who does sex research does it.

Joe Rogan 1:02:25 Is it because they're concerned that the image of funding sex research versus funding w- whether it's obesity or hunger or, you know, p- poverty, whatever it is, like, th- these are... there's not enough resources to go around. Why would you spend any money studying this? You must be a pervert.

Geoffrey Miller 1:02:46 It's partly that, but it's, it's partly, you know, the individuals in Washington who administer these grants don't want the political flack if some politician discovers, "Oh, you're, you're doing funding on, on, like, how women can have more orgasms. Outrageous."

Joe Rogan 1:03:07 Right.

Geoffrey Miller 1:03:08 And it's like, that sounds like one of the most cost-effective ways to increase human happiness-

Joe Rogan 1:03:13 (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 1:03:14 ... I've ever heard of, right? Um-

Joe Rogan 1:03:16 Right, but people are embarrassed of orgasms.

Geoffrey Miller 1:03:18 People are embarrassed about it and...

Joe Rogan 1:03:19 They're embarrassed of all sex.

Geoffrey Miller 1:03:21 Yeah. Um, marital therapy research, you can do. Like, if you wanna research, how do you make a monogamous relationship less full of stress and argument, y- you can get some money to do that. But even there, l- like, the kind of suggestions you could make are quite restricted, um, in terms of what, what kind of therapy you're allowed to, to research or talk about. So, uh, yeah, I wish citizens understood this, because their tax dollars are not being allocated in the best way to, to deliver the benefits in their real lives to their families and their relationships th- that they, that they could do.

Joe Rogan 1:04:06 So to bring it all back to obesity, what, what I would like, and I bet I could say the same about you, is w- we'd like to take some of these sort of influential videos that we've seen done that demonize innocuous drugs, like marijuana, and put those on sugar, put those on how p- uh, pe- people are addicted to sugar. People are addicted to so many things that are causing obesity, so many things that are causing us to have this epidemic of... you know, I mean, if you go to Disneyland, it's one of the saddest things in the world to see how many people are on scooters 'cause they've eaten themselves out of their ability to be mobile on their own. They're just overflowing off the, off the side of these scooters. It's, it's very depressing. And then you see them, what they eat. They're drinking slushies and, you know, eating fucking nonsense. And this, this is a r- a- and, and again, it's another addiction and then the availability of it is so... I mean, imagine if you were a heroin addict and everywhere you went has heroin. That's what it's like to be a sugar addict. If you're a sugar addict, every store you go into is filled with your drug. Every 7-Eleven, right when you go to pay for your gas or whatever you're doing, it's filled with your drug right there in front of you. Your drug's everywhere.

Geoffrey Miller 1:05:27 And, you know, if, if you wanna do something alternative, like, I've been involved in the paleo movement for a few years and, and, like, my girlfriend's vegan, and if you wanna find good paleo or vegan food, it's, like, getting a little easier, but it's not mainstream enough that there's, like, a whole aisle in Walmart devoted to it.

Joe Rogan 1:05:45 Right.

Geoffrey Miller 1:05:47 And-

Joe Rogan 1:05:47 Just a shitty aisle. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 1:05:49 (laughs) Yeah. Uh, so, I don't know. The, the, the food system is a pretty hard nut to crack because there's an awful lot of money at stake and the-

Joe Rogan 1:06:01 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 1:06:01 ... profit margins on junk food are very, very high.

Joe Rogan 1:06:04 And it's also, it's very difficult to keep things on the shelf. Things go... I mean, if you have real fresh food, it goes bad very quickly.

Geoffrey Miller 1:06:11 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:11 And it's natural.

Geoffrey Miller 1:06:12 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:12 That's what, what it's supposed to do, and good luck keeping a supermarket open if you can only keep your vegetables for a couple of days. So-

Geoffrey Miller 1:06:20 Now, if there was, like, long life kale, I'd be pretty sad about that.

Joe Rogan 1:06:23 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 1:06:24 But-

Joe Rogan 1:06:24 That would be sad.

Geoffrey Miller 1:06:25 Um-

Joe Rogan 1:06:26 Like some sort of a artificial turf type kale. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 1:06:31 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:31 That stuff goes bad quick, you know? It gets funky.

Geoffrey Miller 1:06:34 Yeah. Um, but I, I'm kind of excited about new developments, like clean meat-

Joe Rogan 1:06:40 Mm-hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 1:06:40 ... lab-grown meat.

Joe Rogan 1:06:40 I am too, 'cause I think-

Geoffrey Miller 1:06:41 I think, like, ethically, that'll be awesome.

Joe Rogan 1:06:43 I wanna see what kind of monsters they make outta that.

Geoffrey Miller 1:06:46 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:47 It's gonna be strange to see, like, headless meat slabs-... if no central nervous system, just grow- and, and trying to figure out how, how do they get it to have like a muscle consistency, like a filet mignon or something? I mean, you gotta realize, an animal, like different cuts of meat have a different texture to them because there's different muscle density, 'cause the animals use their body.

Geoffrey Miller 1:07:11 I think you have to electrically stimulate the muscle tissue.

Joe Rogan 1:07:14 Oh.

Geoffrey Miller 1:07:14 So it kinda has to twitch and, and allow-

Joe Rogan 1:07:16 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 1:07:16 ... a little ... It's weird.

Joe Rogan 1:07:18 You'd have to.

Geoffrey Miller 1:07:18 But ... And people go, "Oh, God, that's-

Joe Rogan 1:07:21 But would it have nerves then?

Geoffrey Miller 1:07:21 That's disgusting."

Joe Rogan 1:07:23 People would make the argument then that it could feel somehow or another in some neighboring dimension. (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 1:07:29 It'll have like fake, fake nerves.

Joe Rogan 1:07:31 (gasps) (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 1:07:31 But, I mean, what I'm excited about is you could potentially have meat that's not just from like the top three species, you know-

Joe Rogan 1:07:37 You could eat meat from people?

Geoffrey Miller 1:07:38 ... cows, pigs, and chicken.

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:07:40 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 1:07:40 Well, you could-

Joe Rogan 1:07:40 You want to eat people, Jeffrey? Is that what you're saying?

Geoffrey Miller 1:07:42 S- So, well, one of my edgier tweets was like-

Joe Rogan 1:07:44 (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 1:07:46 ... celebrities will start selling-

Joe Rogan 1:07:49 Pieces of themselves.

Geoffrey Miller 1:07:50 ... themselves that can turn into like a Ryan Gosling steak. (whooshing sound)

Joe Rogan 1:07:53 You don't wanna encourage that, bro. Trust me, Ryan, don't go down that road.

Geoffrey Miller 1:07:58 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:07:58 You're too delicious. (laughs) Yeah, man, I don't know about all that. I don't think we should encourage, 'cause what if people are delicious? That could be a real problem.

Geoffrey Miller 1:08:08 I, I think the lab-grown people will always be cheaper than like-

Joe Rogan 1:08:13 I don't know about that.

Geoffrey Miller 1:08:14 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:08:14 I bet you could buy someone real cheap in some-

Geoffrey Miller 1:08:16 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:08:17 ... sort of third-world country.

Geoffrey Miller 1:08:18 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:08:19 For food. You know, there was a terrible ... Not terrible in a bad way, but in terms of its revelations, uh, there's a documentary piece, uh, from Vice on Liberia. And one of the things about it was that they were selling human meat, and that, uh, this guy recognized it because he had eaten humans before. And so when there was a stand that was selling meat on the side of the road and he turned them in for selling human meat, and the reason why he knew is 'cause he had eaten people. I'm like, "Okay, when's the next flight outta here?" (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 1:08:50 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:08:51 What the fuck? (laughs) Can you imagine? I mean, if you gave me a piece of lamb and you didn't tell me what it was, I'd be like, "Hmm. Not sure." Do you know how many people you have to eat before you absolutely know that something's people? Like, fuck, man.

Geoffrey Miller 1:09:05 So American.

Joe Rogan 1:09:05 I've had a lot of lamb chops-

Geoffrey Miller 1:09:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:09:06 ... and would not bet 100% on my ability to distinguish a lamb chop from, say, a, a veal chop, or a, uh, a v- venison chop.

Geoffrey Miller 1:09:18 But all this stuff is gonna create some real moral quandaries.

Joe Rogan 1:09:24 Mm-hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 1:09:25 Like there'll be this, uh, what Jonathan Haidt calls moral dumbfounding, where you go-

Joe Rogan 1:09:28 Yes.

Geoffrey Miller 1:09:28 ... "Yuck, that is disgusting."

Joe Rogan 1:09:30 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 1:09:30 Why? I don't know, it just is.

Joe Rogan 1:09:33 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 1:09:34 Like, I can't give you a reason.

Joe Rogan 1:09:35 Well, robot brothels, this is one of the more recent discussions, the ethical implications of robot brothels.

Geoffrey Miller 1:09:42 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:09:42 And there's a robot brothel that's scheduled to be open. Where is that, in Germany? Is that where it is, I believe? I believe it is. And there's ... All these people are up and on-

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:09:51 Texas.

Joe Rogan 1:09:51 Texas?

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:09:51 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:09:51 Holla. (laughs) Powerful Texas. (laughs) Of course it's Texas. Texas, you could probably fuck a tiger if you got enough money. Country's first robot sex brothel set to open in Texas prompts backlash. See, I wonder if that's real, or wonder if they just like, uh, "Hey, put out a fucking press conference. Tell them we're gonna open up a robot brothel. Let's let them go crazy." It's Ron White, he did it. Ron White, r- (laughs) Ron White from his, from his ... Uh, from the desk of Ron White at Austin, Texas he sent this email.

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:10:22 60 bucks for a half hour.

Joe Rogan 1:10:23 Oh, that's cheap. How long does it take to get off with a robot? What if you lose your concentration?

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:10:27 10 locations by 2020.

Joe Rogan 1:10:29 Is there a snooze button?

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:10:31 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:10:31 2020?

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:10:32 It's only a few months.

Geoffrey Miller 1:10:34 Holy shit.

Joe Rogan 1:10:34 Yeah, but see, what ... You don't wanna show up late, right? You don't wanna be there at the end of the day, bunch of unmotivated people cleaning out those fuck holes.

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:10:43 Oh.

Geoffrey Miller 1:10:43 Well, Texas was actually at the forefront of the lap dance club revolution in the late '80s.

Joe Rogan 1:10:47 The revolution? There was a revolution? (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 1:10:49 Well, yeah. From, from old stripper-style clubs to lap dancing.

Joe Rogan 1:10:52 Oh, where they actually touched you.

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:10:54 (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 1:10:54 And that actually started in the ... In Texas.

Joe Rogan 1:10:56 Look at this. There's a showroom where customers can test and rent dolls before deciding to purchase one.

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:11:03 Oh, wow.

Joe Rogan 1:11:05 (gasps) Can you imagine? You know how like, uh, they have certain cars that have been on, you know, on the lot for a while and like, "You thinking about buying an M4, Mike? Come on, take this sucker for a spin." (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 1:11:16 Well, y'all should, uh, read the essay my girlfriend Diana Fleischman wrote about sex bots, which got her a little bit of notoriety a few months ago.

Joe Rogan 1:11:24 What was her take on it?

Geoffrey Miller 1:11:26 That it would be really good on balance, because there's a lot of guys who, um, need like a sexual release.

Joe Rogan 1:11:36 Mm-hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 1:11:36 And if it kind of takes them away from doing some, like, exploitative Bill Cosby-style behavior into just doing something like this, which is kind of weird and gross, but innocuous, like it's not hurting anybody-

Joe Rogan 1:11:51 Right.

Geoffrey Miller 1:11:52 ... um, that that would be a net win.

Joe Rogan 1:11:54 Do you make that connection? 'Cause th- that's a, that's a tricky connection, right, because most people who think of rape, they don't think of it as an act of arousal, or sex, or, you know, intimacy. Rather, it's a thing of power, and it's some sort of a creepy sociopathic, psychopathic behavior trait.

Geoffrey Miller 1:12:15 I know that's the standard view in gender feminism.

Joe Rogan 1:12:17 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 1:12:17 But I, I don't think it's well-supported by the evidence. Um, for example, there's a big problem with rape in India, right?

Joe Rogan 1:12:25 Mm-hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 1:12:25 And porn, as far as I understand, is illegal in India. Now-

Joe Rogan 1:12:29 Is it accessible though? Or is it just-

Geoffrey Miller 1:12:31 I don't, I don't think it's even ... Like, I think it's pretty hard to access porn websites from India. But I think if you legalized porn there, I predict the rate of sexual abuse would drop.

Joe Rogan 1:12:44 Really?

Geoffrey Miller 1:12:44 Yeah, I really do.

Joe Rogan 1:12:46 Boy, that would be a weird s- sort of experiment. But the thing about robots and sex is ... (sighs) ... they're gonna get so good that it's gonna be like a person, and then we're gonna be in this weird Ex Machina sort of situation, where, um, how would you feel? Like, what if you were dancing around with that, uh, really hot Japanese girl-

Geoffrey Miller 1:13:13 (clears throat)

Joe Rogan 1:13:13 ... and Ex Machina, she starts taking off your clothes. Like, "What do we do here?" Like, she feels warm.

Geoffrey Miller 1:13:18 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:13:18 She's beautiful. She smells good. Like, this... My, all my senses are telling me this is a person.

Geoffrey Miller 1:13:23 And she's a good listener.

Joe Rogan 1:13:24 Yeah. She's great.

Geoffrey Miller 1:13:25 And she doesn't nag you.

Joe Rogan 1:13:26 She doesn't give you... Ooh, nag you. Oh, you ma- are you mansplaining?

Geoffrey Miller 1:13:29 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:13:29 No, not yet.

Geoffrey Miller 1:13:30 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:13:31 That's my favorite.

Geoffrey Miller 1:13:33 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:13:33 If you're correct and you have a penis, you're a mansplainer.

Geoffrey Miller 1:13:36 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:13:36 Gotta be real careful about your information, the way you distribute it to, to the ladies these days.

Geoffrey Miller 1:13:40 It used to be-

Joe Rogan 1:13:40 We have all sorts of words.

Geoffrey Miller 1:13:41 ... also being patronizing anybody who could do it.

Joe Rogan 1:13:44 Yes. Well, it also sh- could be called being correct.

Geoffrey Miller 1:13:47 Yeah. It... Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:13:48 Sometimes you're correct. You just happen to be a man.

Geoffrey Miller 1:13:50 It's explaining, explaining true things-

Joe Rogan 1:13:52 Hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 1:13:52 ... is a crime.

Joe Rogan 1:13:53 Well, when it comes to gender studies, we circle back to this. This, um, denial of reality, and we know that there's, there's a... this sort of really broad spectrum of sexuality, in terms of, uh, male/female, in terms of... you know, in terms of the, the, the obvious, you know, uh, The Rock on one side and Kate Upton on the other, right?

Geoffrey Miller 1:14:17 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:14:17 You know, these super, uber female, uber males. And then there's all these... Like, who's the guy who was in The Hobbit?

Geoffrey Miller 1:14:26 Elijah Woods.

Joe Rogan 1:14:26 Elijah Woods, that guy. He's sort of in this sort of weird space in between the two of those people, right?

Geoffrey Miller 1:14:31 Androgynous hobbit.

Joe Rogan 1:14:32 Yeah. Well, he's not really androgynous, but in, in terms of like you compare him to, you know, fill in the blank, Herschel Walker.

Geoffrey Miller 1:14:40 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:14:40 He's not that manly, you know? And then there's, there's women that don't feel represented by these-

Geoffrey Miller 1:14:46 (clears throat)

Joe Rogan 1:14:46 ... standard views of female sexuality as well. But this just speaks to the variability of the human genome and just, uh, just DNA in general. There's different people that breed with different people and different shapes come out. Until we figure out how to manipulate those shapes, which seems to be right around the corner with the robot fuck dolls. It seems like they're both gonna arrive probably at the same time, where you're gonna be able to choose from, you know, having sex with a robot or having sex with The Hulk. Like, there's gonna be real possibilities that everyone's gonna look like Thor. I mean, this seems like it's not too far away, one, two, three generations, maybe possibly inside of our lifetime-

Geoffrey Miller 1:15:24 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:15:24 ... we'll have mastered the human form to the point where we're... the world's gonna be preposterous. I mean, it's gonna be like the Star Wars cantina scene everywhere you go.

Geoffrey Miller 1:15:32 Oh, yeah. Well, this is what happens whenever you have a, a biological innovation that opens up new possibilities in terms of the evolution of bodies or behaviors, is you get this adaptive radiation, this explosion of possibilities, like the Cambrian explosion-

Joe Rogan 1:15:47 Hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 1:15:48 ... right? 530 million years ago, animals finally figured out how do you program a multicellular body with a nervous system. And as soon as they got that, boom, you've got all these, these bizarre new forms and then you get, you know, dinosaurs and mammals and us. I think once we can program the human genome and you have parents who are like, "I wanna... I wanna select for kids who are, like, really tall and really religious," right? And other parents are like, "I want cute little hobbit babies who are, like, hardcore atheists."

Joe Rogan 1:16:27 With furry feet.

Geoffrey Miller 1:16:28 And then you'll, you'll get a divergence.

Joe Rogan 1:16:30 Imagine if your parents decided to make you a hobbit. Like, they coulda done anything they want. I mean, but, like, the first early adopters, I imagine, it's gonna be about fetal transformation-

Geoffrey Miller 1:16:41 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:16:41 ... about taking something that's in the womb and d- uh, manipulating it, and then as it emerges and then evolve- and grows, then you're gonna see what it is. If your fucking parents were just gigantic JRR Tolkien fans and you have f- furry feet and you're two feet tall, you're like, "What the fuck, Mom?" Like, "You asshole."

Geoffrey Miller 1:17:00 "I just wanted a hobbit. I didn't want a baby." Like, uh, well, it was either a hobbit or a cave troll, so you should count your blessings.

Joe Rogan 1:17:06 Yeah. That's entirely possible that-

Geoffrey Miller 1:17:10 I think-

Joe Rogan 1:17:10 ... we-

Geoffrey Miller 1:17:10 ... that I think the sex bots will come a lot earlier.

Joe Rogan 1:17:12 Quicker? Yeah?

Geoffrey Miller 1:17:14 I think within-

Joe Rogan 1:17:14 How close are we? What do we look like? What do we look like right now in terms of sex bots? What are we looking at? Let's see. State of the art. Type Google state of the art sex robot.

Geoffrey Miller 1:17:24 (laughs)

Jamie Vernon 1:17:24 Start talking and I'll see what they have there at... in Texas.

Geoffrey Miller 1:17:27 I think they look pretty good, but they're not-

Joe Rogan 1:17:29 They're not good at moving?

Geoffrey Miller 1:17:30 ... that good at, like, language or conversation-

Joe Rogan 1:17:32 Right.

Geoffrey Miller 1:17:32 ... or eye contact or-

Joe Rogan 1:17:34 Hand jobs.

Geoffrey Miller 1:17:34 ... or movement or whatever.

Joe Rogan 1:17:36 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 1:17:36 But I think there will be this tipping point where they can do conversation that's good enough, right? It doesn't have to be quite as smart as an actual lover, but it can be a hell of a lot nicer.

Joe Rogan 1:17:51 Than an actual lover?

Geoffrey Miller 1:17:52 It can have better memory for all your preferences-

Joe Rogan 1:17:54 Hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 1:17:55 ... and your desires and your... And, like, it'll also be more trainable in terms of it'll kind of register, "Oh, the last time I asked this question, like, you didn't respond much, but this other question, you talked for five minutes, so I'll ask more of that."

Joe Rogan 1:18:11 Hmm.

Geoffrey Miller 1:18:12 Right?

Joe Rogan 1:18:13 This is all very problematic behavior you're discussing here, Jeffrey.

Geoffrey Miller 1:18:17 Well-

Joe Rogan 1:18:17 I don't like your tone.

Geoffrey Miller 1:18:19 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:18:20 Trainable?

Geoffrey Miller 1:18:22 Well, my girlfriend's working on her-

Joe Rogan 1:18:22 Nicer?

Geoffrey Miller 1:18:23 ... on her-

Joe Rogan 1:18:23 Sometimes people are nice when you're nice to them, Jeffrey. How about you be nice first instead of expecting this fucking robot to just take care of your dick and balls and just be nice to you all the time and remember all the stuff you like? What about it? You... We would develop into total narcissist sociopaths with robots that we could just get to do whatever we want and we'd bring them to the mall on a leash.

Geoffrey Miller 1:18:45 Well, so there are two different ways that could go, right?

Joe Rogan 1:18:48 Right.

Geoffrey Miller 1:18:48 On the one hand, like, if there's a woman I'm interested in, let's say, and she has access to a male sex bot-

Joe Rogan 1:18:56 (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 1:18:56 ... who's, like, really funny 'cause it's, like, its little neural network has learned, like, all of your standup routines or, um-... how to, how to riff on today's news. And, and it's a great listener, and it remembers everything about her backstory. I can either be like... God, like, I can't compete with that, I'll have to diss it. I'll have to say, "You, you're not allowed to see him anymore."

Joe Rogan 1:19:24 Mm-hmm. Oof.

Geoffrey Miller 1:19:25 Or I'll have to level up and be better.

Joe Rogan 1:19:28 Yes. Like, like humans.

Geoffrey Miller 1:19:33 And I, I hope people will level up and-

Joe Rogan 1:19:37 Some will.

Geoffrey Miller 1:19:38 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:19:38 And we'll get to see, we'll learn from the people who don't level up, like how they fall apart. I'll present you with an even more disturbing scenario. Some people will be like, "You know that Geoffrey Miller's a handsome guy? I'd like to fuck him all the time." And they're gonna make a version of you and bring it around the mall with a leash on. And you're gonna be going to the Apple Store and a version of you is gonna be caked in cum with a dog collar on- (laughs)

Geoffrey Miller 1:20:06 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:20:06 ... standing right next to you while you're buying a new MacBook, and you're like, "What the fuck?" And it's gonna be totally legit 'cause you don't... Oh, look at... Oh, whoa. That's what they look like? Swappable face. What? Let me see what it looks like, though. This is just i- This is, this is like- Oh, that's good. ... when you're looking at one of them digital renderings of a house they haven't built yet.

Geoffrey Miller 1:20:26 (sniffs)

Joe Rogan 1:20:26 Let's see what we got here. (singing) Are they warm? Whoa. They're, th- all these close-ups are creeping me out.

Geoffrey Miller 1:20:35 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:20:35 Come on. It's got AI in it.

Geoffrey Miller 1:20:36 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:20:37 (laughs) It's got AI. It's Howard Stern. Hey. Look at this. Oh, that's creepy. They haven't passed the uncanny valley, clearly.

Geoffrey Miller 1:20:44 No, they-

Joe Rogan 1:20:45 Yeah. What was it, hairy chests? What the fuck? Oh, it's a- I don't know, I think it's a long, long video.

Geoffrey Miller 1:20:48 ... a guy robot.

Joe Rogan 1:20:49 (laughs) A long video, yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 1:20:51 Yeah, so, I mean, people do, like, celebrity deepfake sex bots, and there will be-

Joe Rogan 1:20:56 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 1:20:56 ... people wandering around with their Jordan Peterson sex bot on a leash in the store.

Joe Rogan 1:21:00 Well, have you seen the porn where they do face swaps? That's, that's getting really good. They're really good at that now.

Geoffrey Miller 1:21:07 This is another social revolution we're gonna have to brace for, is an era when you can do a credible porn fake of any celebrity or any citizen.

Joe Rogan 1:21:16 Yeah.

Geoffrey Miller 1:21:17 Just based on, like, sampling their Facebook photos or...

Joe Rogan 1:21:20 Do you know who Kyle Dunnigan is?

Geoffrey Miller 1:21:22 Mm-mm.

Joe Rogan 1:21:22 Hilarious standup comedian who has the funniest Instagram page of all time, and his Instagram page is about 80% of him doing face swap videos of the Kardashians and President Trump and Kanye West. (laughs) And they're just so fucking ridiculous because you know that they're fake, 'cause it's real obvious that they're fake, but it's essentially like a new art form. If you think of, like, sketch comedy and... Here, play one for 'em. See what we got here. I haven't seen this one.

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:21:50 Big drama. Yeah, big drama.

Guest (brief comedic bit / third voice) 1:21:52 What'd I do now?

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:21:53 When I was at your tiny white house, I put a recorder in the chair. Yeah. Yeah, she recorded you. Yeah. Yeah.

Guest (brief comedic bit / third voice) 1:21:59 Holy shit, another tape?

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:22:01 Yeah. Yeah, so bad. So bad. So bad. Yeah.

Guest (brief comedic bit / third voice) 1:22:04 (laughs)

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:22:06 Where's the bathroom?

Guest (brief comedic bit / third voice) 1:22:07 Right down the hall, sweetheart. Oh my God, she's got the weirdest ass, but also sort of terrific. So terrific. I'm gonna go smell her chair.

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:22:17 Ew. You're rough. Whoa.

Guest (brief comedic bit / third voice) 1:22:19 Getting some information here.

Guest (unidentified, brief participant) 1:22:21 (laughs)

Guest (brief comedic bit / third voice) 1:22:21 Okay, she had a bowel