Joe Rogan Experience #1643 - Jonathan Zimmerman

Jonathan Zimmerman is a professor of education and history at the University of Pennsylvania and author of "Free Speech and Why You Should Give a Damn".

Joe RoganhostJonathan Zimmermanguest

Jun 27, 20243h 6mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

150 min read · 30,040 words

0:00 – 1:34
Why free speech matters—and why censoring “bad people” is tempting
1. JRJoe Rogan
  (drumbeats) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out.
2. NANarrator
  The Joe Rogan Experience.
3. JRJoe Rogan
  Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day. (upbeat music) Free speech and why you should give a damn. Jonathan Zimmerman. Why should we give a damn?
4. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Well, we should give a damn because free speech has been at the heart of every movement for change in this country. Every great warrior against oppression was also a warrior for free speech.
5. JRJoe Rogan
  But wouldn't it be convenient if we just silenced people we disagree with? That seems a lot easier for me.
6. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  No. It's natural.
7. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
8. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  All right? Um-
9. JRJoe Rogan
  It is natural, right?
10. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right? And that's why we have to resist it.
11. JRJoe Rogan
  Yes.
12. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Like, I get it.
13. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
14. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Like, everyone's experienced that.
15. JRJoe Rogan
  Yes.
16. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Everyone's seen somebody or heard somebody they despise and say, "God, I just want that person to shut up."
17. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
18. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And that's why we have to resist it.
19. JRJoe Rogan
  Um, there's a lot of very intelligent people that disagree with you in this current political climate, unfortunately. I think that was exacerbated by the Trump administration and this desire to, like, stop a lot of the QAnon stuff and the Pizzagate stuff, and a lot of these conspiracy theories that people were frustrated that they were taking hold and they were like, "What do we ... How do we stop this? We gotta stop these people from talking."
20. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right.
21. JRJoe Rogan
  So that's the argument for censorship.
22. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  That's one of them, and the other argument has to do with race and ethnicity. I mean, the other-
23. JRJoe Rogan
  Yes.
24. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  ... argument is that it, you know, it harms minorities. And I think those are different arguments, but sometimes they're connected.
25. JRJoe Rogan
  The ... So-
26. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
27. JRJoe Rogan
  ... you mean censorship against racism, you-
28. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Correct.
29. JRJoe Rogan
  Is that what you're saying?
30. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Correct. Yeah.
1:34 – 5:07
Online discourse: short-form communication, incivility, and performative aggression
1. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah, yeah.
2. JRJoe Rogan
  ... any of those things, yeah. It's, um ... I think one of the problems that we're dealing with in today's climate is not just that everything's, like, hyper-politicized and people are really, uh, very passionate in debating things online, but just the nature of online discourse is so limited. It lends itself to, like, simple sentences, you know, one, you know, uh, 140 or 280 s- you know, s- symbols. It's just not enough. It's not enough characters to express yourself, and then also text.
3. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
4. JRJoe Rogan
  You know, unless you're writing a book, it's hard to get all your thoughts out.
5. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And, and also one of the things that people who study communications have taught us is that when we, uh, have exchanges online, they tend to be more uncivil.
6. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
7. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  We'll, we'll, we, we will type, um, things and text things, um, about somebody or to somebody that we would never, ever say to their face.
8. JRJoe Rogan
  Of course, yeah.
9. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah, yeah.
10. JRJoe Rogan
  I don't do that. I try really hard to not do that, and I stopped-
11. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
12. JRJoe Rogan
  I stopped even going back and forth with people on Twitter a few years ago.
13. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
14. JRJoe Rogan
  And now I take, like about a year and a half or so ago, I took it even further. I don't even read my mentions. I don't go in there. You know, I just ... And then I, I just, I t- open Twitter up, like, once a day to see if something crazy is happening.
15. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
16. JRJoe Rogan
  If there's any place on fire, is anybody doing something they shouldn't be doing. Like, what, what is happening? And then-
17. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Well, yeah, I'm an op-ed columnist and a couple years ago I stopped reading the commentary about the-
18. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
19. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  ... op-eds.
20. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
21. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  You know, 'cause it ... You know, generally it's, it's not that well-informed. I mean, there are exceptions to that, but generally it's just people shooting from the hip, and often in a, uh, just in a really nasty and derogatory way. It doesn't help.
22. JRJoe Rogan
  What do you think about social ... What is it about social media that lends itself to toxic exchanges? Because it seems to be ... I know people that are pretty friendly, positive people in person. When I meet them, they're friendly.
23. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
24. JRJoe Rogan
  They hug me. And then I see them online, I'm like, "You talk so much shit. Like, why are you doing this?"
25. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah, well, I mean, obviously the anonymity is part of it, right? I mean, it's, you know, they-
26. JRJoe Rogan
  But they're not even anonymous.
27. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  I, I know, but, but e- but you can trick yourself into thinking that, right?
28. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
29. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  It's just, it's you and your keyboard, right? And a bunch of symbols. Um, there is something that's weirdly dehumanizing about it, right?
30. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
5:07 – 8:03
Private platforms as the new “town square”: who gets to restrict speech?
1. JRJoe Rogan
  Well, um, free speech is not just the being able to express yourself now. Now it's being able to express yourself through these private companies-
2. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
3. JRJoe Rogan
  ... which is very strange. So now the arbiter of free speech is YouTube and Facebook-
4. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
5. JRJoe Rogan
  ... and Twitter, and it's like, wow. Like, those are the town squares of-
6. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right.
7. JRJoe Rogan
  ... our world now.
8. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah, and you know, when I discuss the free speech question with my students, I often say, "Look, anyone in this room is free to make a case for any kind of speech restriction they'd like, provided that they tell me who's gonna do the restricting."
9. JRJoe Rogan
  Yes.
10. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  All right? And often it comes down to Jack Dorsey.You know?
11. JRJoe Rogan
  Right. Well, it's not really-
12. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Um, or-
13. JRJoe Rogan
  ... Jack, it's really the other people that work with Jack.
14. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yes, right, his company.
15. JRJoe Rogan
  In, in defense of Jack, though-
16. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
17. JRJoe Rogan
  ... he, he honestly wants Twitter to be wild. He want-
18. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Ab- absolutely.
19. JRJoe Rogan
  He's even-
20. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  You know?
21. JRJoe Rogan
  He's even proposed a separate Twitter that is-
22. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
23. JRJoe Rogan
  ... completely uncensored. Or-
24. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
25. JRJoe Rogan
  ... you can have the moderated Twitter.
26. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  No, I think that, you know, in his public statements, I think he's been admirably ambivalent-
27. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
28. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  ... about this, you know? I mean, he doesn't like-
29. JRJoe Rogan
  I like him a lot.
30. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  He doesn't-
8:03 – 11:07
Bad speech vs. better speech: elections, time pressure, and the need for civic education
1. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right. And also, the other thing I'd add though is, although I agree with the dynamic you just described, in order to pull that off, you need a certain sort of education.
2. JRJoe Rogan
  Yes.
3. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right?
4. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
5. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And, and, and that's why I think ... I mean, you know, uh, uh, one of the things I study is education, and I think that's absolutely a critical part of this discussion, right? It ... To reason and deliberate in the way you were just describing, it ... that's not a natural act either.
6. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
7. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  We don't come out of the womb doing that, right? We need institutions to teach us how to do that, and they've not done a very good job of it.
8. JRJoe Rogan
  N- yeah. And, and, and teaching people how to think about things, and how to look at things and analyze things in an objective manner ... What's going on?
9. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Sorry about that.
10. JRJoe Rogan
  Is he leaning back? Is that the issue?
11. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
12. JRJoe Rogan
  Not enough volume. Um, te- teaching people how to think is not necessarily ... Critical thinking skills, it's not really highlighted in school, especially in high school. It's not something that you really spend a lot of time ...
13. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Well, unfortunately, I mean, we give rhetorical obessence to it, but we don't do it nearly enough. And when you interview kids about their high school experience, uh, and you ask them, you know, "Did you really engage in dialogue about substantive questions where there was real debate?" generally they say no.
14. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah. And the problem with debate is oftentimes you're just trying to win, right?
15. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right.
16. JRJoe Rogan
  So sometimes people are just very theatrical and very loud and dynamic, or they'll, they'll touch upon, like, certain things, like, you know, and that ... Certain things that they think, like whether or not it's, uh, valid to the conversation, they'll add those things to it because there's certain-
17. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right.
18. JRJoe Rogan
  ... social clout to those-
19. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Definitely.
20. JRJoe Rogan
  ... those subjects.
21. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Look, the hardest thing to do as a young person is to figure out what you really think.
22. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
23. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right? Not what the people around you are saying, your peers or your parents or your teachers, what you really think. And the problem is, we haven't actually created educational institutions that help people do that.
24. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
25. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  You know? I mean, what they do is they encourage people to mouth things they've heard from others.
26. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm.
27. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Rather than to come up with, like, "Okay, what do I actually think about this?"
28. JRJoe Rogan
  Right. 'Cause it also sounds good if you can mouth things that other people have said really well and you can kinda put it in your own words-
29. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Eh, sure.
30. JRJoe Rogan
  ... you sound smart.
11:07 – 15:35
Adolescence, conformity, and ‘we’re all teenagers now’ on social media
1. JRJoe Rogan
  I was really lucky when I was young, and we were talking about this earlier when you asked about my accent-
2. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
3. JRJoe Rogan
  ... that I moved around a lot.
4. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
5. JRJoe Rogan
  And, uh, I think that was really good. It sucked at the time, because, you know, I moved to San Francisco when I was seven, from New Jersey to San Francisco, and then Florida when I was 11, and then when I was 13 we moved to Boston. It was a lot of moving.
6. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
7. JRJoe Rogan
  And because of that, I didn't develop this like core group of friends that I grew up with. It was-... you know, it was a lot of, a little chaotic, but it forced me to formulate my own opinions about things.
8. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  You know, I had a very similar upbringing in different places. I actually grew up overseas because, uh, my parents were in the Peace Corps, uh, as I was subsequently. And so, as, as an elementary schooler, I lived in India and Iran. Um, uh, and then I lived in, uh, New York and in Washington. But, uh, like yourself, I mean, for me, except for meeting my wife, that was the formative experience of my life, I would say, living in all those different environments as a really little kid.
9. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm.
10. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Because also when you're little, you don't know how weird the shit you're doing is, you know? It's just 'cause you just do it. And so like in Bangalore, India, my parents sent me to a girls school, which took a couple boys in the younger grades because it was the Anglo school that was near where we lived. And it was actually a fabulous experience, uh, uh, you know, to be, uh, you know, like one of a couple boys in a whole room full of girls. But nobody told me that that was just bizarre.
11. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
12. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  I just did it. You know?
13. JRJoe Rogan
  You and that other boy must have been like-
14. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
15. JRJoe Rogan
  ... "What are we doing here, man?" (laughs)
16. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah, no, I, I, I ... But, you know, it's funny too, I don't even remember doing that. It's just, you know, like-
17. JRJoe Rogan
  It was just normal.
18. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  ... when you're young, you just do what's there.
19. JRJoe Rogan
  Right, right.
20. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah, yeah. Uh, and, you know, and, and, you know, I, I lived in Iran in the late '60s when, you know, Tehran was this hugely cosmopolitan place. I mean, you had-
21. JRJoe Rogan
  Completely different than it is now, right?
22. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Totally different, you know, and, and-
23. JRJoe Rogan
  What is that like for, to have those memories and to see what it's like now where they're ... I mean, they just executed an Olympic wrestler for-
24. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
25. JRJoe Rogan
  ... engaging in a, a political protest.
26. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  No, it's incredibly depressing. And in some ways, Iran was really an unlikely place for the Islamic revolution, you know? I mean, Iran is a really, uh, it's a pluralist place. I mean, it's, it's a crossroads and it has been for 10,000 years. Um, and it's interesting you mention Iran because, you know, when the Pew does these like pro and anti-American surveys where they take like a sample of people in different countries and say, "What do you think of America?" Except for Israel, the Iranians like us more than any country in the Middle East.
27. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah, I've heard that.
28. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And, and you would never get that from the saber-rattling that you see in the newspapers.
29. JRJoe Rogan
  What do you think that is?
30. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Well, I think it's because the history of the country is so pluralist, you know? I mean, Iran, everyone conquered it, right? It's a huge mishmash of ethnicities and historically of religions. You know, um, it, it obviously ha- it had, uh, big Jewish populations, Bahá'í populations. Obviously, most of those people have been exiled, right? But that's very recent history. And let's also remember, it's a country of about 80 million people and over half of them were born well after Khomeini.
15:35 – 18:11
Living under surveillance—then and now: Iran memories, Snowden, and self-censorship
1. JRJoe Rogan
  You know, when, um, Edward Snowden, uh, had to leave the country and, you know, and Glenn Greenwald, they published that story about the NSA's, uh, all the, you know, the shit that he leaked where there was this widespread surveillance on, uh, the American public.
2. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right.
3. JRJoe Rogan
  That, that's really disturbing.
4. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  It is disturbing. And again, the difference is thanks to democracy and free speech, you and I can critique that. We may- we may not be able to control it, we may not be able to end it. It's a complicated question, but-
5. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
6. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  ... nobody's gonna come in the night for my family or for yours because we're criticizing the NSA. Right?
7. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah. We can-
8. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  I mean-
9. JRJoe Rogan
  ... critique it, but it still, it still exists.
10. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yes, it does.
11. JRJoe Rogan
  It's, it's very strange.
12. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
13. JRJoe Rogan
  It's like, you know, "Hey, you can't do that. Uh, you shouldn't have done that. Oh, you're still doing it?"
14. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
15. JRJoe Rogan
  "Oh, are they still doing it? They are still doing it. Okay. Well, what do we do about that?" "Well, they're not doing anything with it."
16. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right.
17. JRJoe Rogan
  "Well, right now they're not doing anything with it. Jesus Christ."
18. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
19. JRJoe Rogan
  "This is crazy."
20. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Well, I forget which comedian made a joke o- out of, out of this when it c- it, it all started during Obama some of the leaks about this.
21. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm-hmm.
22. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And, you know, uh, uh, I forget who it was, but a comedian said, "Well, look, you know, I mean, Americans said that they wanted a president that listens to everyone."
23. JRJoe Rogan
  Ha.
24. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And here you go.
25. JRJoe Rogan
  That's funny.
26. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
27. JRJoe Rogan
  That's ... Whoever you are. Yeah. It's, um ... But that is, uh, in a sense, it's encouraging self-censorship. And that's one of the things about privacy that makes privacy so critical, is because-
28. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
29. JRJoe Rogan
  ... if you cannot express yourself without fear of other people listening, then there is a component of self-cen- self-censorship, which is critical to the North Koreans w- uh, the regime's way of keeping people in line, is they-
30. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Correct.
18:11 – 22:54
Campus speech chill and the ‘guilt-by-association’ fallacy (affirmative action example)
1. JRJoe Rogan
  Well, there's certainly rigid ideologies on college campuses, but do they get specific about saying what they really mean or think? Like, what is it... What are the key subjects?
2. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Well, look. I'll, I'll give you an example, and this was... This came up in another book that I wrote. There was a survey done of full-time faculty about ten years ago, and the question was, "Do you agree with the use of race and ethnicity in college admissions?" And it turned out that 40% of the respondents said no. Now, for the sake of transparency, I could tell you that I'm in the 60%. I think affirmative action has been a net gain for the university. It's a complicated question, um, but I think it's been a net win. Nevertheless, I was upset by the 40% figure. Not that there were people that disagreed with me. I was upset that I hadn't heard from them.
3. JRJoe Rogan
  Hmm.
4. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right?
5. JRJoe Rogan
  Hmm.
6. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  They are biting their tongues-
7. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
8. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  ... and that can't be good. It can't be even... It can't be good for affirmative action, right?
9. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
10. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Um, which could only benefit from people really... Affirmative action is a complicated question, right?
11. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
12. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And, you know, it cuts to a lot of different, really, really complex questions, and if we're biting our tongues about it, we won't get to good answers.
13. JRJoe Rogan
  Hmm.
14. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Um, and so obviously, the people that oppose affirmative action are afraid to do so publicly, uh, because they don't want to incur the social costs, and that's not good. Uh-
15. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah. That's unfortunate, and that is a part of what happens today, is the pile-on.
16. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Correct.
17. JRJoe Rogan
  When someone says something that is not on the list of things you're supposed to think or say, then you can get piled-
18. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yes.
19. JRJoe Rogan
  ... on.
20. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah, and then there's guilt by association, right? And it goes like this, right? You know, David Duke is an imperial wizard of the KKK. David Duke obviously opposes affirmative action. You oppose affirmative action, ergo, you're David Duke.
21. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
22. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And of course, there is no ergo, right? I mean, this-
23. JRJoe Rogan
  Of course.
24. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  ... th- this, this is, uh, like, a fallacy that a third-grader could see through, but it's all around us.
25. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah. That's a real problem with today, guilt by association. Yeah, it's, um... There's so many complicated questions that you oftentimes feel like you have the answer to, or you have your opinion on it, and then you'll hear a, a very nuanced perspective from someone who takes a, a different stance. And if you're open-minded, you go, "Oh, maybe I haven't considered that point of view." And that's one of the real-
26. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (clears throat)
27. JRJoe Rogan
  ... reasons why it's important that you have free speech and you have debate, because you don't wanna get pigeonholed into an idea that, maybe somewhere down the line, you might find foolish. But you weren't allowed to be exposed to some really good arguments to the contrary.
28. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right, and you know, um, I think at the end of the day, for me, this is really a question about learning. I mean, I'm a teacher. That's my vocation, right?
29. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm-hmm.
30. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  How do we learn from each other? And I think that the way we learn from each other is when we're examining as many different sides of a question as we possibly can. Right?
22:54 – 27:35
Escaping the filter bubble: news feeds, partisan TV toggling, and the clickbait economy
1. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  ... I think most of our media environment promotes the opposite, right? I mean, you know, um, uh, just think of what a news feed is, right?
2. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm-hmm.
3. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  A news feed is the events of the day curated according to your search history-
4. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
5. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  ... and your biases.
6. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
7. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Uh, and, and what an awful image, like, time for your two o'clock feed-
8. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
9. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  ... right, of, of all the stuff that we have curated in order to reinforce your biases. That's what it is.
10. JRJoe Rogan
  There is that.
11. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  That's where we live.
12. JRJoe Rogan
  But quite honestly, my news feed is, uh, is pretty... It's pretty innocuous.
13. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
14. JRJoe Rogan
  My news feed is all, like, new cars that are coming out-
15. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
16. JRJoe Rogan
  ... and this jujitsu match has been postponed, and you know, it's like-
17. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah, it's not all politics. Right, of course.
18. JRJoe Rogan
  Mine is not politics.
19. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right. Yeah.
20. JRJoe Rogan
  I don't care.
21. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
22. JRJoe Rogan
  Um, when I'm looking at... When I'm looking at things that are interesting to me, I am only looking at things that find, that... I'm looking for distractions-
23. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Mm-hmm.
24. JRJoe Rogan
  ... and things that are my hobbies. Like, I'll, I'll... My newsfeed has professional billiards on it.
25. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
26. JRJoe Rogan
  So I'll get, like, snooker scores, or snooker from the UK.
27. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
28. JRJoe Rogan
  And I... You know, I-... when something, like, deep and meaningful, if I'm looking for something, if I'm researching something, then I go look for that. You know? I don't like that stuff in my newsfeed 'cause I don't want... I'm... I figured out, like a year or two ago, like, I'm, I'm tired of getting freaked out.
29. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
30. JRJoe Rogan
  I don't, I don't wanna just pick up, like, "Jesus, what is he doing now?"
27:35 – 31:54
Print vs. screens: retention, eye-tracking, and ‘paper-like’ tech tools
1. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Well, I should tell you, I read two print newspapers at the, first thing every morning.
2. JRJoe Rogan
  Good for you.
3. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  But I'm like the, I'm like the last American to do that.
4. JRJoe Rogan
  Good for you.
5. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  In fact, the, The Onion ran a great headline a couple years ago that said, uh, I think it w- I believe it was "Last Print Subscriber to Boston Globe Dies." (laughs)
6. JRJoe Rogan
  I used to deliver the Boston Globe.
7. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs) There you go.
8. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
9. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
10. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah. I used to deliver The Boston Globe, Boston Herald, and The New York Times.
11. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah. (laughs)
12. JRJoe Rogan
  Um, that was, that was my job when I was, uh, a young man.
13. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah. I was a paper boy as well.
14. JRJoe Rogan
  Were you?
15. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Washington Post, yeah.
16. JRJoe Rogan
  It's a good job for discipline. Gets you up in the morning.
17. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
18. JRJoe Rogan
  Taught me a lot.
19. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah. Yeah, and now, I mean... Well, there are a whole bunch of reasons for this. But, you know, the, there's, uh, most of the circulation is done by adults in cars.
20. JRJoe Rogan
  That's what I did.
21. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah. Oh, you did?
22. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
23. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
24. JRJoe Rogan
  I did in c- oh, I had hundreds of houses that I would go to.
25. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
26. JRJoe Rogan
  I could make a good living.
27. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
28. JRJoe Rogan
  Like, not really, but I can make enough money in a couple hours a day where I didn't really have to have another job.
29. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right. I did the same thing in high school. You know, my friends worked at, you know, sporting goods stores and grocery stores, and I got up and delivered the paper, and I made more money than they did.
30. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
31:54 – 40:39
Multitasking is a myth: focus, self-bias, and judging yourself by the work
1. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  You know? And, uh, you know, there was, um ... Think about something like multitasking, right? So there was a guy at Stanford named Clifford Nass who died a co- uh, uh, a year or so ago. He was quite young, unfortunately. And Clifford Nass was the guru of multitasking. And what he demonstrated is that multitasking is a hoax, and that multitaskers have everyone snookered, including themselves.
2. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm.
3. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  So they're not liars. They honestly believe that they can do three or four things at the same time with equal efficiency. It's just they can't.
4. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
5. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  They believe it. And so much in the media environment is encouraging us both to multitask and also to believe in multitasking, right?
6. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
7. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  As an article of faith. It just turns out to be untrue. And he did it every which way with like, different sorts of sporting endeavors and card games and all kinds of different things. He said, you know, "Do these three things separately and do them together." Right? And if you do them one by one, um, you do them so much better. And this is another message I'm constantly giving to my students. Like, don't believe the multitasking hype. Um, it is a hype. It is not true. You know, turn off everything else and work on one thing, and then finish it and then go to the next. And it's hard, right?
8. JRJoe Rogan
  That's why it's such-
9. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Because it's hard.
10. JRJoe Rogan
  That's why it's such a flex when you see a chess master play 10 people at the same time-
11. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
12. JRJoe Rogan
  ... and walk around and like, "Mm-hmm. Fuck you."
13. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
14. JRJoe Rogan
  "Um, not today." (laughs)
15. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah, yeah. Well, there are exceptions to every rule, right?
16. JRJoe Rogan
  But that's-
17. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Those people can multitask.
18. JRJoe Rogan
  Yes.
19. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
20. JRJoe Rogan
  But are they even multitasking? 'Cause it's still the same-
21. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah, maybe not.
22. JRJoe Rogan
  ... endeavor.
23. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Correct.
24. JRJoe Rogan
  It's the same game.
25. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right. Yeah.
26. JRJoe Rogan
  But yeah.
27. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah, yeah, they're playing one game. Yeah.
28. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah, I think there's, there's some real truth to that, because, uh, I think most people that I know that multitask, they do several things, but they ... I don't think they do them quite as good as if they were only doing that one thing.
29. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Correct, correct. The interesting thing is they actually believe that they do, and I think-
30. JRJoe Rogan
  Hm.
40:39 – 58:10
Parenting and empathy: seeing adults as ‘grown-up babies’ and learning through challenge
1. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right, right. So I'm curious to know, since you were describing kind of all these moves growing up, how would you say, if somebody were to ask you, what have been the most important changes in the way you see the world since you were a younger person? Either the political world, the social world, the environment, whatever it is. Like, what would you... If you think... If you compare yourself to your younger self, what would you say have been the most important changes in how you think and how you see the world?
2. JRJoe Rogan
  I think the single biggest change that I can remember, single biggest shift that I ever had, was having children.
3. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Hmm.
4. JRJoe Rogan
  Because then I started thinking about everyone as grown-up babies.
5. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
6. JRJoe Rogan
  I used to think of people as being in a static state. Like if I met a guy and he was a 40-year-old guy, I'd be like, "Oh, there's Mike. He's 40."
7. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
8. JRJoe Rogan
  But then now I go, "Oh, Mike used to be a baby."
9. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right.
10. JRJoe Rogan
  And then all the weird shit that happened to Mike in his life, and the pros and cons, and the failures and successes, and-
11. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
12. JRJoe Rogan
  ... the lies and truths, and, and here he is.
13. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  That's what made Mike.
14. JRJoe Rogan
  Yes.
15. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  That's what's made Mike.
16. JRJoe Rogan
  I have a lot more-
17. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
18. JRJoe Rogan
  ... sympathy and empathy for people because of that.
19. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
20. JRJoe Rogan
  'Cause a, a lot of the people that I see now that are, you know, assholes... If I met an asshole before, I'd be like, "That guy's just an asshole."
21. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
22. JRJoe Rogan
  And then now I go, "Oh, you know, that's a baby that, like, came out a bad product. Like, what, what went wrong?"
23. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Well, well, you think like a historian. I mean, I'm a historian.
24. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
25. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And, you know, when, when, when my kids were younger, they would always get annoyed with me and they would say like, "Dad, when you meet somebody, why do you always say, 'Where are you from?' Like, that's so annoying." And the answer is, "I'm a historian. That's what interests me," is, you know, what, what are the communities and what are the experiences that, that made you who you are? And those things matter.Yeah.
26. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
27. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
28. JRJoe Rogan
  It, it-
29. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
30. JRJoe Rogan
  ... it's a lot. It's everything. You know?
58:10 – 1:03:44
Young adulthood then vs. now: anxiety, national confidence, and Cold War memories
1. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  I mean, something I love about teaching college students is that they're old enough to start understanding the world, but they have no idea what their role is gonna be in it.
2. JRJoe Rogan
  Hmm.
3. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And so, it's really a magical time. I think like, 19 and 20-year-old human beings are the most interesting people on the planet.
4. JRJoe Rogan
  Hmm. Yeah.
5. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Because they can see things, and they're often very aware of how the world is working. But they have no idea what their role is gonna be in it.
6. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
7. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And so they're much more interesting than you or me, or at least than me, right?
8. JRJoe Rogan
  Well, they're so...
9. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  'Cause you know, like, the game is sort of up for me.
10. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
11. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  I mean, you know, like-
12. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
13. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  ... I, I've made my choices. I've done the things that I do.
14. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
15. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And that's kinda it.
16. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
17. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
18. JRJoe Rogan
  That's a good point.
19. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
20. JRJoe Rogan
  There's so much potential, but also so much insecurity.
21. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Well, it's scary.
22. JRJoe Rogan
  Like, do you remember, do you remember being a young man and not knowing how it was all gonna turn out?
23. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Totally. And it is scary. And frankly, it's scarier now. I mean, and I think, you know, look, I, I went to college in the late '70s, and it was a different world.
24. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm-hmm.
25. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And I never once remember thinking, "Gee, am I gonna be like, a burden on my parents? Am I gonna be unable to get a job or sustain myself?" Right? Because the United States, I mean, it, it had like a, like a hegemonic role in the world that it does not have now. And you know, um, it, it was just a time of much more national confidence, I think.
26. JRJoe Rogan
  Hmm.
27. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  And you know, uh, I, I have a lot of empathy for people in my daughter's generation and in my students' generation, because they don't have that same kind of certitude, you know? So I do remember kind of wondering. But I guess I didn't feel the same sense of pressure or fear. Like, I think that because America still ruled the r- ruled the roost, um, it was easier to think, "Gee, it's gonna work out."
28. JRJoe Rogan
  But didn't, weren't you worried about Russia when you were young and in college?
29. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  You know-
30. JRJoe Rogan
  Didn't you worry about the Cold War and all that jazz?
1:03:44 – 1:09:19
Conspiracy theories: why they spread—and when governments earn the distrust
1. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah. Reagan was famous for that one speech that he made in front of the United Nations where he's talking about how quickly we would come together if we were faced with a threat from an alien world.
2. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah. (laughs)
3. JRJoe Rogan
  I remember that because I remember all the conspiracy theorists got so jazzed up.
4. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Oh, yeah. (laughs)
5. JRJoe Rogan
  They're like, "Finally, we're gonna know the truth! The aliens are coming!"
6. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  That was like crack for them. Yeah.
7. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
8. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah, yeah.
9. JRJoe Rogan
  It was ... That's the-
10. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah.
11. JRJoe Rogan
  ... best ... I mean, there is no better distraction for, like, a giant percentage of the population than telling them the aliens are coming.
12. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, um, uh, you know, H. L. Mencken 100 years ago, he had this great quote where he said something like, you know, "For every deep social and political problem, there's typically a solution that is simple, attractive, and wrong."
13. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
14. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Uh, and that's what conspiracy theories are, right? They're simple, attractive, and wrong. You know? Uh-
15. JRJoe Rogan
  Many of them are simple, attractive-
16. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah. (laughs)
17. JRJoe Rogan
  ... and wrong.
18. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Yeah. Yeah.
19. JRJoe Rogan
  Some of them are surprisingly accurate.
20. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
21. JRJoe Rogan
  That's what's scary.
22. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right. Well, I think, unfortunately, and this is where the history piece comes in, one reason that Americans tend to believe in conspiracy theories is that the government is engaged in conspiracies.
23. JRJoe Rogan
  Yes.
24. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Right?
25. JRJoe Rogan
  Exactly.
26. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  I mean, like, you know, if you're trying to put, like, LSD on Fidel Castro's, uh, uh, um, cigar-
27. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm-hmm.
28. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  ... which the United States did-
29. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
30. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  ... right? Um, uh, you know, it ... then, it, it, it, uh, let's just say there's a crying wolf problem. And, you know, it's ... it, it becomes easier for people to believe that the government is engaged in perfidious conspiracies after the government is engaged in a perfidious conspiracy.
1:09:19 – 1:12:11
The future of speech: Neuralink, wordless communication, and human-tech symbiosis
1. JRJoe Rogan
  When it comes to free speech, what- what we have now is just, we have words that we express, and these words convey intent and thought and the way we perceive the world. And- and, you know, we each take in the other person's words and the way they're saying them and try to go, "Okay, I see where you're going with this." One of the things that weirds me out most about the future is all of these sort of symbiotic human electronic things, gadgets that are being proposed, like Neuralink, like Elon Musk's thing.
2. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs)
3. JRJoe Rogan
  Where Elon told me, specifically said, "You're going to be able to talk without using your mouth."
4. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  (laughs) But wasn't Joe then in the interview where you shared a blunt with him?
5. JRJoe Rogan
  No, no, no.
6. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Okay. (laughs)
7. JRJoe Rogan
  That was two before.
8. JZJonathan Zimmerman
  Okay.
9. JRJoe Rogan
  Neuralink, I think, was the second interview I did with him, or the, maybe the third. I think it was the third.

Episode duration: 3:06:07

Install uListen for AI-powered chat & search across the full episode — Get Full Transcript

Transcript of episode _lJJhjfreb4

Get more out of YouTube videos.

High quality summaries for YouTube videos. Accurate transcripts to search & find moments. Powered by ChatGPT & Claude AI.

iOS

Android

Claude

Chrome

Why free speech matters—and why censoring “bad people” is tempting

Online discourse: short-form communication, incivility, and performative aggression

Private platforms as the new “town square”: who gets to restrict speech?

Bad speech vs. better speech: elections, time pressure, and the need for civic education

Adolescence, conformity, and ‘we’re all teenagers now’ on social media

Living under surveillance—then and now: Iran memories, Snowden, and self-censorship

Campus speech chill and the ‘guilt-by-association’ fallacy (affirmative action example)

Escaping the filter bubble: news feeds, partisan TV toggling, and the clickbait economy

Print vs. screens: retention, eye-tracking, and ‘paper-like’ tech tools

Multitasking is a myth: focus, self-bias, and judging yourself by the work

Parenting and empathy: seeing adults as ‘grown-up babies’ and learning through challenge

Young adulthood then vs. now: anxiety, national confidence, and Cold War memories

Conspiracy theories: why they spread—and when governments earn the distrust

The future of speech: Neuralink, wordless communication, and human-tech symbiosis

Get more out of YouTube videos.