Joe Rogan Experience #1437 - Stephen Dubner

1. 0:00 – 2:45

   Hearing loss, noise-canceling tech, and why some people crave background noise

   1. JRJoe Rogan0:00

      ... ready, young Jamie.

   2. NANarrator0:00

      Three, two-

   3. JRJoe Rogan0:02

      Here we go. (slaps desk) How are you, sir?

   4. SDStephen Dubner0:04

      I'm great, thanks.

   5. JRJoe Rogan0:05

      (laughs) Good. Nice to meet you.

   6. SDStephen Dubner0:07

      Nice to meet you.

   7. JRJoe Rogan0:07

      Um, we were talking before, uh, about Adam Curry, who was just here, who has these crazy ear enhancements that are these, uh, software-based, so he can tweak it and change levels and stuff like that. And you were saying that you also have h- hearing, but you get it from rock and roll.

   8. SDStephen Dubner0:22

      Yeah, I, I mean, honestly, I've never been tested. I just know that when I'm out eating with my family or friends, that everybody can hear everything, and I can't hear anything. (laughs)

   9. JRJoe Rogan0:31

      Yeah.

   10. SDStephen Dubner0:31

       So, uh, but no, I, yeah, I played r- loud rock music for, mm, six, seven, eight, nine years. And, uh, yeah, it- it- it- it does what they say it does. (laughs)

   11. JRJoe Rogan0:41

       Yeah, they- they know what they're doing-

   12. SDStephen Dubner0:43

       (laughs)

   13. JRJoe Rogan0:44

       ... those, those people that tell you not to do that.

   14. SDStephen Dubner0:45

       But look, I like the technology. Like, I have older relatives who have a hearing aid, or whatever they're called now, hearing enhancement devices that are, like, lightyears better than they used to be.

   15. JRJoe Rogan0:55

       Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

   16. SDStephen Dubner0:56

       So I figure if I can hold out a couple more years, mine are gonna, like, be so good they'll take out the garbage too.

   17. JRJoe Rogan1:00

       Well, the ones that Adam has sound pretty fucking amazing. Um, he said it, it just sounds incredible and that he can actually tune into people that are 50 feet away, 50 feet away having a conversation, he can hear them.

   18. SDStephen Dubner1:10

       And can you tune out people you don't like?

   19. JRJoe Rogan1:11

       That's a good question. I bet there is a way. I bet he ... Well, he has various settings, but I bet there's, like, a tone the world out setting.

   20. SDStephen Dubner1:19

       (laughs) I don't need to tone the world, there are just some people-

   21. JRJoe Rogan1:21

       Sometimes.

   22. SDStephen Dubner1:22

       ... you know?

   23. JRJoe Rogan1:22

       Yeah. Have you used any of those AirPods that have the noise-canceling technology?

   24. SDStephen Dubner1:27

       Oh, uh, not AirPods, but I wear Bose noise-cancelers-

   25. JRJoe Rogan1:30

       The head- headphones?

   26. SDStephen Dubner1:31

       ... almost-

   27. JRJoe Rogan1:31

       Yeah.

   28. SDStephen Dubner1:31

       ... every day. Um, I wear them a lot. Oh, you know, when I started, uh, as a journalist in newsrooms, uh, this was, whatever, early, late 80s, early 90s, um, I didn't ... Like, a- a newsroom is an open place, and a lot of people back then were on the phone doing your reporting. It was pre-internet reporting, right? And, uh, I didn't ... You're a writer, you're writing and you're editing, and I, I didn't understand how people could think with all this din going on. I c- I couldn't do it.

   29. JRJoe Rogan1:59

       Yeah.

   30. SDStephen Dubner1:59

       So I started wearing just the good foam earplugs. They're made by, uh, Flance, I think is the brand that I use. They're kinda non-tapered, and they're very thick. And if you compress them and put them in, it'll block out, like, you know, 70, 80%. So I've been shutting out the world for, like, 25 years now.
2. 2:45 – 4:29

   Misophonia, ASMR, and the idea of sound as “assault”

   1. SDStephen Dubner2:45

      It's like pollution. If you have a big factory, your pollution goes up, it blows over to someone else, that's an externality on them. So noise is that. But what's really interesting is that there's a huge variance in how different people receive and perceive noise, as you just said. So some people really need it and want it. For some, it's a burden. And then there's all these rather (laughs) weird intricacies of noise, like have you heard of misophonia? Do you know what that is?

   2. JRJoe Rogan3:14

      I have heard of it, but I don't remember what it means.

   3. SDStephen Dubner3:15

      It is, um, a- a- an intensely negative reaction when you hear other people chewing or their mouths making any sound.

   4. JRJoe Rogan3:23

      (laughs)

   5. SDStephen Dubner3:24

      And it can be debilitating for people who have it. But and then there's something called ... I'm gonna get it wrong. AMSR, ASMR?

   6. JRJoe Rogan3:29

      Yes.

   7. SDStephen Dubner3:29

      You know that? Like ... Okay.

   8. JRJoe Rogan3:30

      Yeah, there's all these videos online with that.

   9. SDStephen Dubner3:32

      Right, right, right. Yeah, so that's-

   10. JRJoe Rogan3:34

       Yeah.

   11. SDStephen Dubner3:34

       So noise is a s-

   12. JRJoe Rogan3:34

       What does that stand for though?

   13. SDStephen Dubner3:35

       Uh, I- I- I can, I, I'd have to look it up. Um ...

   14. NANarrator3:39

       S-

   15. JRJoe Rogan3:39

       He knows.

   16. NANarrator3:40

       Automated sense something.

   17. JRJoe Rogan3:41

       (laughs)

   18. SDStephen Dubner3:41

       Or someone would have to look it up.

   19. JRJoe Rogan3:43

       Someone, yeah, but-

   20. NANarrator3:44

       Response.

   21. JRJoe Rogan3:45

       ... w- if someone screams in your ear unexpectedly, and it hurts your ear, that is a form of assault.

   22. SDStephen Dubner3:51

       (laughs)

   23. JRJoe Rogan3:52

       Right? You don't think of it that way, but if some- if like, if you saw a girl, and she was standing there, and a guy ran up to her and just, "Waah!" in her ear, and she's like, "Aah!" And she f- she like falls down 'cause her ear hurts.

   24. SDStephen Dubner4:03

       I agree.

   25. JRJoe Rogan4:04

       You can do that with sound.

   26. SDStephen Dubner4:05

       What about when airports play CNN at blast volume?

   27. JRJoe Rogan4:09

       Yeah, that's another one.

   28. SDStephen Dubner4:09

       I mean, is that a form of assault? Borderline?

   29. JRJoe Rogan4:11

       What kind of sweet deal does CNN have with airports, right?

   30. SDStephen Dubner4:14

       Mm.
3. 4:29 – 7:50

   Getting high on planes: fear, creativity, and ‘caveman mode’ paranoia

   1. SDStephen Dubner4:29

      (laughs) You, you have a flying, y- you, uh, you have to self-medicate pretty heavily before flying, I understand?

   2. JRJoe Rogan4:33

      No, I don't have to.

   3. SDStephen Dubner4:36

      You enjoy it.

   4. JRJoe Rogan4:36

      I enjoy it.

   5. SDStephen Dubner4:37

      You enjoy it more.

   6. JRJoe Rogan4:37

      Yeah. Well, this is what I, the way I think of it. Um, on a plane, one of two things gets ... Either I get some work done or I get some entertainment. I watch a movie on the laptop, or I'll get some writing in.

   7. SDStephen Dubner4:48

      Right.

   8. JRJoe Rogan4:48

      Or I can get really, really high, and then get on that ... and just freak the fuck out-

   9. SDStephen Dubner4:55

      (laughs)

   10. JRJoe Rogan4:55

       ... and, and make it, but go through a roller coaster ride of thoughts and, and a lot of times, I'll wind up writing too, you know, if I-

   11. SDStephen Dubner5:02

       Wait, when you get high, you have a, uh, a worse experience on the plane, though, you're saying?

   12. JRJoe Rogan5:06

       No, no, no, it's not worse. It's just scary. It's not worse.

   13. SDStephen Dubner5:09

       And that- and scary is not worse.

   14. JRJoe Rogan5:11

       No, because there's benefits to it.

   15. SDStephen Dubner5:13

       Huh.

   16. JRJoe Rogan5:13

       There's benefits in terms of, like, creativity, and then insight. And, like, just a not- I- I have a whole bit about it. But it is based on the truth. Like, I oftentimes take a heavy dose of edibles and then get on a plane.

   17. SDStephen Dubner5:23

       In order to intentionally put yourself in a state-

   18. JRJoe Rogan5:27

       Yeah, yeah, yeah.

   19. SDStephen Dubner5:27

       ... that can be somewhat negative, but also creativity? But also ...

   20. JRJoe Rogan5:31

       I don't, as I see, I don't use that word negative.

   21. SDStephen Dubner5:32

       Interesting.

   22. JRJoe Rogan5:33

       I don't think of it as negative. Even when I'm freaking out. Like, if I'm sitting in the chair, and I'm like, "Whoo!" And with- uh, you know, I'm looking out the window, we're flying, and I'm realizing we're 30,000 feet in the air. And I'm, you know, really fucking high.

   23. SDStephen Dubner5:43

       Is this ... Uh, so I'm not a, like a roller coaster person. But is this a s-

   24. JRJoe Rogan5:48

       I don't like roller coasters.

   25. SDStephen Dubner5:48

       But is this a similar kind of ... Like, you put your, intentionally put yourself in a scenario where you're gonna heighten some senses? Is that the idea?

   26. JRJoe Rogan5:54

       No, because I think a roller coaster is just fun. Right? It's just goofs. This is a- an essential thing you're doing. You're traveling to a place where you're going to. And as you're doing it, you're- you're incredibly vulnerable. Right? You're immobilized in a chair while you're going 500 miles an hour in the sky. Right? And you're like, "Whoa." Already, you're like a little weirded out if you look out the window. But now, when you're really, really, really high, it puts you in this very strange state. And you start thinking about your life, and you start thinking about how you talk to people.

   27. SDStephen Dubner6:23

       Hmm.

   28. JRJoe Rogan6:23

       And you start thinking about things that you've learned and h- uh, m-... documentaries that you find fascinating, you start dwelling on weird things. And then, you know, oftentimes, I'll either watch something or I'll start writing. So I get something very productive out of what would be dead time. It makes me, it fires up my, whatever it is that creates creativity for me, whatever the, the source of it. For me, for some reason, it gets enhanced oftentimes by being on a plane on edibles.

   29. SDStephen Dubner6:51

       How, uh, predictable though, is the experience?

   30. JRJoe Rogan6:54

       Unpredictable.
4. 7:50 – 13:01

   Drug-free altered states, whiskey as a ‘predictable’ vice, and longevity claims

   1. SDStephen Dubner7:50

      All right. Here's a question. Um, let's say, for people who don't use drugs-

   2. JRJoe Rogan7:54

      Yeah.

   3. SDStephen Dubner7:55

      ... right? But they hear you say this and like, they say, "Wow, that is..." I recognize the value of putting yourself in a place emotionally, cognitively, kinda unleashing yourself or maybe putting yourself in a new place where you're gonna have thoughts, big thoughts, maybe scary thoughts. Is there a way to do that, that you know of? Uh, without drugs?

   4. JRJoe Rogan8:15

      Yeah, we were just talking about that with Adam, in fact. Uh, we were talking about holotropic breathing, and he has had some experiences with holotropic breathing. It's a, like a meditation-based breathing routine that, uh, i- if, for whatever reason, it activates psychedelic chemicals in your brain and you can really trip out. And he was talking about how he's flying for like a half an hour. And I've had various friends do it. I've yet to experience it. Various-

   5. SDStephen Dubner8:37

      You've tried it?

   6. JRJoe Rogan8:38

      No, yet. I've yet to experience it. But I've had various friends who've done it, who have had spectacular experiences, like, like full-blown mushroom experiences for several minutes.

   7. SDStephen Dubner8:48

      And is it guaranteed? Like if you do the breathing-

   8. JRJoe Rogan8:50

      I don't think it's a-

   9. SDStephen Dubner8:50

      ... is it guaranteed to get you to that state or no?

   10. JRJoe Rogan8:52

       No. I think you have to learn how to get there.

   11. SDStephen Dubner8:54

       Not as reliable as drugs then?

   12. JRJoe Rogan8:55

       Right. And also physically demanding. Like, I think it takes a long time. I think you have to work yourself up into this state where the stuff starts to happen, and you also have to probably follow some routine that's tried and true. I don't-

   13. SDStephen Dubner9:08

       Right.

   14. JRJoe Rogan9:08

       ... I don't know what that routine is.

   15. SDStephen Dubner9:09

       Hmm.

   16. JRJoe Rogan9:09

       But I do know that people that I trust, including people like Adam, s- super smart guys, will, will tell you that for them, it gave them the same experience as, uh, like taking a drug.

   17. SDStephen Dubner9:20

       All right. I'm gonna look it up.

   18. JRJoe Rogan9:21

       Yeah.

   19. SDStephen Dubner9:21

       'Cause I'm not big on drugs. I don't know why, just not.

   20. JRJoe Rogan9:23

       'Cause you're smart.

   21. SDStephen Dubner9:24

       No, I'm, uh, I'm not. I'm also not judgmental about it. I've, I've, I've-

   22. JRJoe Rogan9:28

       I f- I know, but no issue.

   23. SDStephen Dubner9:29

       ... I'm not saying that y- you would be dumb to do 'em, but I say you're a smart guy. So if you're a smart guy and you see drugs, you see a lot of people have problems with drugs and you're fine with reality. Yeah.

   24. JRJoe Rogan9:37

       You don't need 'em.

   25. SDStephen Dubner9:37

       I mean, I smoked dope in college and it just-

   26. JRJoe Rogan9:40

       It's not like you're a cop.

   27. SDStephen Dubner9:40

       I mean, also the dope was... (laughs)

   28. JRJoe Rogan9:42

       (laughs)

   29. SDStephen Dubner9:43

       "Believe me, son, I smoked dope."

   30. JRJoe Rogan9:45

       (laughs)
5. 13:01 – 20:35

   Walking, silence, and screen time: what constant stimulation may be costing us

   1. SDStephen Dubner13:01

      ... it's an interesting ... But I'm always looking for ways ... I'm always trying to isolate the places or the circumstances where I get good ideas. And the problem is, it's very ... it's unpredictable. Walking is the one thing that I found ... A- and the fact is, is that writers throughout history, a lot of creative people throughout history have, have embraced walking.

   2. JRJoe Rogan13:22

      Yeah.

   3. SDStephen Dubner13:22

      Now, in the old days, it was one of the few things that you kinda could do.

   4. JRJoe Rogan13:26

      Mm-hmm.

   5. SDStephen Dubner13:26

      You know, you c- you weren't gonna go out and ... Well, I guess you coulda played golf, or whatever. But people have been walking for a long time, and they say that there's something about what the brain and body do in concert with each other on a walk, which is you're kinda mapping, you're kinda decoding, you're kinda figuring, but you're also getting some physiolog- physiological stimulation. And I find that's one that's pretty good. But I wish there was a, a thing I could do to make the good ideas flow-

   6. JRJoe Rogan13:52

      Yeah.

   7. SDStephen Dubner13:52

      ... because that's the hard part.

   8. JRJoe Rogan13:53

      I don't ... I think if there was a thing, other than show up and start riding, if there really was a thing, it would cheapen whatever the fuck it is (clicking sound) that makes you have those weird thoughts that come across. Like, where'd that come from?

   9. SDStephen Dubner14:03

      Yeah.

   10. JRJoe Rogan14:03

       A gift from the heavens.

   11. SDStephen Dubner14:05

       Yeah. No, the mystery is beautiful.

   12. JRJoe Rogan14:07

       Yeah.

   13. SDStephen Dubner14:07

       Yeah.

   14. JRJoe Rogan14:08

       Yeah. Uh, but walking, to me, I didn't really walk until really recently. I didn't go on hikes or anything till really recently. I usually would run. And running, a lot of times, you know, you're just so tired, you're not having any good ideas. You're just thinking like, "I gotta get to the top of this hill."

   15. SDStephen Dubner14:23

       How long you lived in LA?

   16. JRJoe Rogan14:25

       Since '94.

   17. SDStephen Dubner14:26

       And before that?

   18. JRJoe Rogan14:27

       Uh, I lived in ... This is my whole thing. Sa- New Jersey until I was seven, San Francisco from seven to 11, Florida from 11 to 13, Boston from 13 to 24, New York from 24 to 26-ish, 27 maybe. Um, before 27, I'm, I'm on the West Coast.

   19. SDStephen Dubner14:46

       Okay. So did you find that in Boston and New York, which are easily the best walking places of all those places you just said, did you walk a lot more there? And did it change anything for you?

   20. JRJoe Rogan14:54

       No, I was busy. (laughs)

   21. SDStephen Dubner14:57

       (laughs)

   22. JRJoe Rogan14:57

       There was no time to be ... Well, I was 20 ... You know, in my early 20s.

   23. SDStephen Dubner15:00

       You were working in clubs in New York at that age?

   24. JRJoe Rogan15:02

       Yeah.

   25. SDStephen Dubner15:02

       Or right, right.

   26. JRJoe Rogan15:02

       I was working in clubs in New York, and I was doing a lot of road gigs. And, uh, was playing a lot of pool. And I was, uh, hanging around with a bunch of comedians. And I wasn't going on any hikes.

   27. SDStephen Dubner15:11

       Right.

   28. JRJoe Rogan15:11

       We were, we were in a ... You know, I would go to the gym occasionally and work out, but we were, we were doing comedy, you know? But as a grownup ... And, uh, I usually run with my dog, he loves to run. And I haven't been able to, uh, run recently because of a little injury. (clears throat) So like for the last two months, I'd just been walking with him and then hiking on the trails, and he runs around and ... When I was doing it, I was realizing, like, I can listen to podcasts or I g- I can listen to music, or I could just do it silent. And when I do it silent, it's, like, really interesting. There's, there's, there's inner dialogue that starts playing out. And it's like you're having a conversation with yourself, that it's a little ther- therapeutic. So I go on these hour walks with my dog. And at the end of it, you know, I feel like I've got some, a b- better handle on stuff.

   29. SDStephen Dubner15:55

       I wonder, what you're saying makes me think, and I hope it's not too late for our episode on noise, 'cause this is actually a component that'd be good to get at, is-

   30. JRJoe Rogan16:02

       Mm-hmm.
6. 20:35 – 33:48

   Tribal mindsets and belief enforcement—plus Dubner’s family conversion story

   1. JRJoe Rogan20:35

      You know, that's an e- an ep- another episode that I was listening to of yours recently about how hard it is to get people to change their mind on things. And, uh, I forget who the expert was who was talking, but it was a really interesting point that he had about the mind. Like, people say, "Change your mind." You don't really have a mind. You have the mind of the community, and if you step outside the beliefs of the community, it can be very bad for you in terms of, like, your personal connections with people, and I really l- enjoyed that episode.

   2. SDStephen Dubner21:01

      It's funny, it's, thanks. It's a, it's a paradox though, 'cause w- the way you just said it, like, if you are in your tribe-

   3. JRJoe Rogan21:07

      Yes.

   4. SDStephen Dubner21:07

      ... then even though it can be healthier for you and for presumably many other people for you to change your mind or at least think differently about things, right, you, you risk losing credibility or whatever.

   5. JRJoe Rogan21:19

      Yeah.

   6. SDStephen Dubner21:20

      Yeah.

   7. JRJoe Rogan21:20

      Well, I mean, th- s- some religions, I mean, that's how they keep you, right? You get ostracized. There's, there's religions we, that we know of where you, if you decide to leave, you don't just get ostracized, you're, you're literally, you have a death sentence. Like, now you've, you've escaped our group. You are, you're a, you're an outsider now.

   8. SDStephen Dubner21:37

      My father, who con- m- both my parents converted from Judaism to Catholicism-

   9. JRJoe Rogan21:42

      Wow.

   10. SDStephen Dubner21:42

       ... before they met each other.

   11. JRJoe Rogan21:43

       Whoa.

   12. SDStephen Dubner21:44

       Yeah, it was, it was very unusual story.

   13. JRJoe Rogan21:46

       How did that happen?

   14. SDStephen Dubner21:47

       Ah, it's a long story. I'll tell you if you really wanna know, but anyway, I'll, I'll, I'll do the short-

   15. JRJoe Rogan21:51

       That sounds great.

   16. SDStephen Dubner21:51

       ... what I'm getting to. Th- and this was during the, uh, during the Second World War. They were both in New York, both first generation, uh-

   17. JRJoe Rogan21:58

       Oh, okay.

   18. SDStephen Dubner21:58

       ... American Jews.

   19. JRJoe Rogan22:00

       That makes sense.

   20. SDStephen Dubner22:00

       They converted for different reasons from each other, and then they met. My father's family was, m- Orthodox, um, and his father, a guy named Shepsil Dubner, uh, who'd come here when he was in his maybe late 20s from Poland, he still lived his everyday in Brooklyn as if he were still in Poland. He didn't change at all. When my father converted and his father found out, my father was, uh, in the war, he was overseas, he was home on leave, and his father was cleaning up, and from my father's pants that he'd left over a chair, uh, rosary beads slipped out and fell on the floor. That's how his Jewish father, Shepsil Dubner, found out that his son had become a Catholic.

   21. JRJoe Rogan22:40

       Whoa.

   22. SDStephen Dubner22:41

       So what he did is he proceeded to, uh, sit shiva for him, the Jewish mourning ritual where for seven days, you mourn the dead. He, he declared that he would never again speak to his son, and he forbade everyone in his family from speaking to his son. So I, by the time I was born, I was the youngest of eight kids in this family because they'd become very Catholic. I didn't know... Th- this whole family of my father's was unknown to me entirely. So they did exactly what you're saying now.

   23. JRJoe Rogan23:13

       Holy shit.

   24. SDStephen Dubner23:15

       Yeah. Yeah, that was what I thought too when I... (laughs)

   25. JRJoe Rogan23:17

       Holy shit.

   26. SDStephen Dubner23:19

       Mm-hmm. And my mothers did the same thing, but it was less dramatic 'cause her family was less religious, so they still didn't like it all that she had converted, um, but, uh, yeah.

   27. JRJoe Rogan23:31

       Do you have any children?

   28. SDStephen Dubner23:32

       Uh, yeah, I got a couple.

   29. JRJoe Rogan23:33

       Good.

   30. SDStephen Dubner23:33

       I'm Jewish again, though. I- it's a long st- uh, my first, the first book I wrote, long before Freakonomics, was called Turbulent Souls, although it got then republished under a different title called Choosing My Religion, and it tells this, this story of my, uh, my two parents-
7. 33:48 – 42:23

   New York vs. California: intensity, cities’ ‘voltage,’ and why urbanization keeps rising

   1. JRJoe Rogan33:48

      I have some thoughts on that. I feel like there's that heirloom f- civilization that still, uh, like-

   2. SDStephen Dubner33:55

      (laughs)

   3. JRJoe Rogan33:55

      ... it landed there from boats-

   4. SDStephen Dubner33:58

      (laughs)

   5. JRJoe Rogan33:58

      ... just a couple of decades ago. I mean, my grandparents came over, um-

   6. SDStephen Dubner34:01

      Mm-hmm.

   7. JRJoe Rogan34:02

      ... in the... I think they were here in the, the '20s-

   8. SDStephen Dubner34:05

      From where?

   9. JRJoe Rogan34:05

      ... or the '30s, from Italy-

   10. SDStephen Dubner34:07

       Mm-hmm.

   11. JRJoe Rogan34:07

       ... and Ireland.

   12. SDStephen Dubner34:07

       Mm-hmm.

   13. JRJoe Rogan34:07

       Everybody came from somewhere, right? There's mostly, most of them, three of 'em came from Italy, one of 'em came from Ireland, so I'm three quarters Italian. But it's... The, the families of those people were risk-taking savages. They didn't even have a video to watch, right? They just jumped in a fucking boat-

   14. SDStephen Dubner34:24

       (laughs)

   15. JRJoe Rogan34:24

       ... and hoped America was better. And then when they got there, they got checked in at Ellis Island. They, and then they started working in factories, and scratching and clawing. And there's just a lot of struggle that's still in that part of the world that you... When you come to California, one of the first things you feel is like a lighter, a lighter sense of discourse than the East Coast. It's... The East Coast, I always felt like people had their guard up a little bit more, a little bit more tense, a little bit more like, "What the fuck did you say?" There was a little bit more of that, a little bit more sketchy people. Just the, the echoes of the savage past is still in the soil, you know?

   16. SDStephen Dubner35:01

       I, I hear you, but there's also... So the thing that I like about New York, I don't mean to, n- m- trash California. I like California a lot.

   17. JRJoe Rogan35:11

       Oh, I love New York, but don't get me wrong.

   18. SDStephen Dubner35:12

       But man, when I'm in California, first of all, it feels much more like a foreign country to me than a- any other place in America. Maybe l- uh, well, that's not quite-

   19. JRJoe Rogan35:22

       What, what makes it seem like a foreign country?

   20. SDStephen Dubner35:23

       Um, it feels, uh, because I feel people have, uh, a manner and a style that is totally divorced from this intensity (laughs) that I'm used to, right?

   21. JRJoe Rogan35:39

       (laughs)

   22. SDStephen Dubner35:39

       F- in New York. Now, I grew up on a farm in Upstate New York, so I grew up not in the hurly-burly. New York City was scar-

   23. JRJoe Rogan35:46

       (laughs)

   24. SDStephen Dubner35:46

       'Cause my parents, once they converted and they became Catholic, they needed to have some place where you could have tons of kids, so we grew up in the middle of nowhere.

   25. JRJoe Rogan35:53

       Oh, jeez.

   26. SDStephen Dubner35:53

       So I grew up... Uh, I was a farm kid and, um, so the intensity of a city scared me until ultimately I moved to New York, um, for a variety of reasons, and then I, then I caught the bug, and now I love cities. So I love California, but when I come here, I feel like it's, uh, running on a different voltage, you know?

   27. JRJoe Rogan36:14

       Yeah.

   28. SDStephen Dubner36:14

       And I am envious of people's ability to run like that. Like they seem, right? Like their shoulders... Like you look at me, I'm sitting here, my shoulders are always up to my ears. Like, kinda just a built-in tension.

   29. JRJoe Rogan36:28

       Mmm.

   30. SDStephen Dubner36:28

       And I feel like I thrive on it, and maybe I do. I mean, things have worked out okay. But, uh, like I said, when I look at, look at the way people are sort of congenitally relaxed, I envy it. On the other hand, I think that that intensity produces some things that I, I like a lot. Like I like... I also like the environment of a, uh, you know, of university campus. The... To me, the tricky part is, uh, there's that fine line between intensity and competition that treats it like a zero-sum game. So I don't like to be around environments where people are trying to...... win so that they can beat somebody else, except in sports. That's why sports are awesome. Sports are a good proxy for life. People can be very competitive. You win or lose.
8. 42:23 – 54:54

   Comedy mechanics: bombing, contagious laughter, and politicians as performers

   1. JRJoe Rogan42:23

      Like when you watch a comedian bomb on stage and you're in the audience, you're feeling agony.

   2. SDStephen Dubner42:27

      Oh, boy.

   3. JRJoe Rogan42:27

      Like you're mad at this person for putting you through this, like, "Oh my God, get off the stage."

   4. SDStephen Dubner42:30

      No, you can't be mad at them though, don't you f-

   5. JRJoe Rogan42:32

      No.

   6. SDStephen Dubner42:32

      Isn't it more empathy than anger?

   7. JRJoe Rogan42:33

      Oh, for sure.

   8. SDStephen Dubner42:34

      Yeah.

   9. JRJoe Rogan42:34

      But sure, but y- there's a lot of anger too.

   10. SDStephen Dubner42:37

       (laughs)

   11. JRJoe Rogan42:37

       Like 'cause you are, you are being tortured. Like imagine if... And it's not really physical pain, but there is a certain level of emotional pain that you experience when someone's bombing. When someone's in front of you and you're like, "Oh, God." Especially me, 'cause I've done standup for so many years, like I know what it's like to bomb. I've bombed. So I see someone bombing, I'm like, "Yikes, I gotta get outta here. I can't take it." It's almost like my guts are on fire.

   12. SDStephen Dubner42:58

       The thing I always wondered about comics is why they don't cheat more because laughter is plainly very contagious.

   13. JRJoe Rogan43:06

       Yeah.

   14. SDStephen Dubner43:06

       ... right?

   15. JRJoe Rogan43:07

       Yeah.

   16. SDStephen Dubner43:08

       So every time I've seen someone bomb, I always felt like if one or two people had g- started going with it, laughing, responding-

   17. JRJoe Rogan43:16

       You mean cheat more by f- packing the audience and people laughing?

   18. SDStephen Dubner43:19

       Something, something. Or just-

   19. JRJoe Rogan43:20

       That's hilarious.

   20. SDStephen Dubner43:20

       ... putting your iPhone in the audience and having it start laughing. I don't know how to ch- There's a lot of ways to cheat.

   21. JRJoe Rogan43:25

       That's hilarious.

   22. SDStephen Dubner43:25

       Because I've always thought that it's such a, uh, it's such an obvious dynamic that laughter really is very, very contagious. But even like y- you see, like, kids in school, when they're supposed to not be laughing and one kid laughs, they, they all can't stop. It's this incredibly contagious behavior. So-

   23. JRJoe Rogan43:41

       I think if you did pipe in laughter, first of all-

   24. SDStephen Dubner43:44

       No, I'm not saying... Well, maybe I am saying that. Yeah. (laughs)

   25. JRJoe Rogan43:47

       (laughs) You might, you could kinda say with a phone in the audience. Okay, that's most drastic. Let's say you plant people in the audience.

   26. SDStephen Dubner43:54

       Right.

   27. JRJoe Rogan43:55

       You could probably swing things in a way from a really bad set to maybe an okay set, but you're never gonna make it funny. See, all... The best way to do that is to just make it funny.

   28. SDStephen Dubner44:07

       Actually, to be-

   29. JRJoe Rogan44:08

       Because... Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because-

   30. SDStephen Dubner44:09

       To bother to be good.
9. 54:54 – 1:12:12

   Two-party ‘duopoly,’ single-issue sorting, and why prosperity still feels miserable

   1. JRJoe Rogan54:54

      The, the real problem that we're having is this tribal battle of left versus right. And the, the strongest voices on the left, the loudest voices, and the most extreme oftentimes are the worst representations, and the same with the right. The loudest, most extreme team members, they're the people at the front of the line, "Fuck yeah, we're gonna kick their ass." And like, "Is that guy with me?"

   2. SDStephen Dubner55:16

      (laughs)

   3. JRJoe Rogan55:16

      "Am I on his team? Fuck. Are we in a war now? We're in a war with the left."

   4. SDStephen Dubner55:20

      (laughs)

   5. JRJoe Rogan55:20

      Like, that's what it is, you know? And, um, and there's also these ideas that we have that are cemented in stone, that, you know, if you're a, a left wing person, you believe in X, Y, and Z, this is your doctrine.

   6. SDStephen Dubner55:31

      Yeah.

   7. JRJoe Rogan55:31

      If you're a right wing person-

   8. SDStephen Dubner55:31

      Yeah.

   9. JRJoe Rogan55:32

      Where most of us have, like, a little bit of this-

   10. SDStephen Dubner55:33

       Yeah.

   11. JRJoe Rogan55:34

       ... and maybe you believe in the Second Amendment, maybe you believe in the First Amendment, maybe you think that maybe, you know, uh, maybe we should, uh, incorporate a lot of the things we do with the fire department and, uh, you know, and, but, but do that to schools, and do that to housing, and do that to m- make sure that all the, the stuff's covered. Make housing, like, a, a, an important part of w- the, a civilization.

   12. SDStephen Dubner55:53

       Mm-hmm.

   13. JRJoe Rogan55:53

       Like, for everybody.

   14. SDStephen Dubner55:54

       We did a piece, a Freakanomics Radio piece a year or two ago called America's Hidden Duopoly, and it was about the Democratic and Republican Party basically-

   15. JRJoe Rogan56:02

       Yeah.

   16. SDStephen Dubner56:03

       ... acting like Pep- Pepsi and Coke, right? They kinda divide and conquer the market, and they've built an industry that is incredibly valuable.

   17. JRJoe Rogan56:10

       Yeah.

   18. SDStephen Dubner56:11

       The thing that's amazing to me is this, uh, Trump won the presidency as the Republican that the RNC most wanted to get rid of. Bernie, last time around, was the Democrat that the DNC wanted to get rid of. They lost by getting their candidate, Hillary, in. This time, Bernie, who may very well become the candidate, is again the party that the DNC is out to get. So, what does it say that you've got a duopoly, literally the machines running the system that we kind of let ourselves get manipulated into buying? Like you said, I've never understood. My mom, my mom and dad were Democrats for a long, long time, typical Catholic f- okay, maybe not so typical 'cause they were former Jewish Catholics.

   19. JRJoe Rogan56:54

       (laughs)

   20. SDStephen Dubner56:54

       But typical Catholic, working class, big family, meat and potatoes issues, no-brainer that they're Democrats, okay? And then, but my mom is a devout Catholic. She started the local Right to Life chapter in Upstate New York where we lived. New York State had legalized abortion before Roe v. Wade, so she was fighting that fight early. When that happened and the Democrats lined up against, uh, i- in favor of, uh, in favor of legalized abortion, she switched parties. Everything else about her was still mostly Democratic.

   21. JRJoe Rogan57:26

       Mm.

   22. SDStephen Dubner57:26

       But she had to become a Republican.

   23. JRJoe Rogan57:28

       Because of life. And that's a, that's another powerful one that-

   24. SDStephen Dubner57:31

       But-

   25. JRJoe Rogan57:31

       ... gets integrated into the right.

   26. SDStephen Dubner57:33

       And it happens to all of us though.

   27. JRJoe Rogan57:34

       Yeah.

   28. SDStephen Dubner57:34

       We take ... There's one issue that kinda sets people off, and then they have to join the team-

   29. JRJoe Rogan57:39

       Mm-hmm.

   30. SDStephen Dubner57:39

       ... that they may, uh-

Episode duration: 2:46:24