Born to Lie: How Humans Deceive Ourselves & Others - Lionel Page

1. 0:00 – 5:13

   What Do We Use Reason For?

   1. CWChris Williamson0:00

      What do most people not understand when they think about human reasoning and how it works?

   2. LPLionel Page0:06

      Yeah. L- look, uh, reason is, uh, you know, the faculty to form judgments, solve problems, uh, be rigorous. We tend to think of it as, uh, that is ... I- it's here to help us solve actual problems with, you know, facts, with reality. Um, a- a good, a good, a good, a good image that you can have for reason, how, what it is, is you know the, the movie, the Stanley Kubrick movie, um, 2001: The Space Odyssey.

   3. CWChris Williamson0:33

      Mm-hmm.

   4. LPLionel Page0:33

      And you have this bunch of apes, and they're pretty useless, and then suddenly they wake up one morning and there is this, uh, monolith, this black monolith, and, and once they touch it, certainly kind of reason, uh, fall upon them. And then they discover that if they use it, a bone, they can use it as a tool and they can use it as a weapon. And then the movie, you know, s- say, use this, uh, as a starting point for what makes humans. Humans use reason to solve problems. And then you can think that reason help us, uh, do scientific things, uh, find the truth, send rockets in space, et cetera. But if you think about you and me, you know, normal humans, how do we use reasons? I mean, we, we rarely really solve actual problems, you know. How, when, when is the last time I kind of invented something or solved a practical problem? I mean, it happens, right? But, but it's not super frequent. But the, what we do most with reason is not really that, most often. Every day we use our reason to reason with other people. That is, we have ... Most of the problems we face in our lives, they are social problems.

   5. CWChris Williamson1:33

      Mm-hmm.

   6. LPLionel Page1:33

      They are problems when we interact with other people. Uh, it's not solving, you know, uh, that the computer doesn't work or that the dishwasher doesn't work. It's, you know, it's solving, uh, how do I get my friends to do what I want, how to get my friends to understand me, how to get my boss to give me a raise, et cetera. These are the problems we face. And we use reason. So we are reasoning, but we are not reasoning like scientists to solve problems. We're reasoning like lawyers, to convince other people. And then the key aspect, I think one of the interesting theories which came in the last 10 years about, you know, um, what is reason, is that reason is, is this. It's, it's this, uh, it's not here to solve problems. It's here for us to convince other people. And once you take this, this, um, uh, approach, it really explain a lot of, you know, people... You have a big literature on people being irrational, making lots of mistake, et cetera.

   7. CWChris Williamson2:19

      Mm-hmm.

   8. LPLionel Page2:20

      But then when you think, wait a minute, maybe we're not actually designed to be scientists, we're designed to be lawyers, and so some of the mistakes are by design. You know, uh, confirmation bias, uh, you look at the information which is convenient, you ignore the information which isn't inconvenient. Well, that's, that's what you do if you want to win your case, not if you want to find the truth.

   9. CWChris Williamson2:37

      Mm-hmm.

   10. LPLionel Page2:37

       So that's the way reason really works.

   11. CWChris Williamson2:40

       In that case, if human reasoning is more about persuasion than it is problem-solving, is our capacity for problem-solving just a byproduct of the fact that we're here and capable of convincing and persuading other people?

   12. LPLionel Page2:55

       Yeah, look, that's a good question. I mean-

   13. CWChris Williamson2:57

       (laughs)

   14. LPLionel Page2:58

       ... we have some ability, you know, we have some ability to sol- pro- problem-solve. But the, um, the, the anthropologists and psychologists, um, um, who looked at that, th- they found that, you know, we're pretty useless, uh, about... Lots of the f- solutions we have now are solutions that we are given that are social solutions, that we know how to do things because we've been taught how to do. You know? You, you might remember in Australia there were kind of, uh, uh, British sig- British, uh, people, like, uh, traveling in Australia, and the- and, and they lost themselves. And, uh, a- and they were kind of... You know, the locals, who had their customs, et cetera, they were able to survive with the land. And these guys had just died because, you know, they didn't know. They don't know where to find water. They don't know how to find food, et cetera. And we... Individually, we really rarely find and solve problems. We kind of inherit the problems which have been accumulated, the solution which have been accumulated by past generations. So, um, we solve problems, but really not frequently. What we do most often is just we use all the solutions that we inherit. We're told how it works and we do it.

   15. CWChris Williamson4:01

       Mm-hmm. So is it right to say that our reasoning is self-serving in that way?

   16. LPLionel Page4:07

       Yeah. Yeah. Uh, you know, that's, I think that's one of the biggest insight we get, is that when we think about, when we talk about Reason with a big R, we tend to think of philosophers or mathematician, you know. That's a kind of iconic, uh, picture of re- uh, reasoning, et cetera. But really when we... what we do, you know, if you think about it from an evolutionary point of view, that's not being hyper-rational like that, and, and very rigorous. It's not the best way of winning arguments. You know, y- i- if you, if you go in debating, you know that debating you have tricks. You know, you, uh, y- you're not here to find the truth. You're here just to win your case. And that's the way our mind works, you know. So when you debate with other people, when you try to convince other people, you're going to, you know, uh, just put a nice angle, a nice spin to what you say. You're going to avoid going into the areas where you think that you may be in trouble, et cetera. And we do it naturally, right? We don't n- need to, to generally, to necessarily strategize. We do it naturally. Often we are convinced that that's the right way, uh, that what we say is right, right? Uh, and that's the way our reason works, is, is to, you know, take... completely being self-serving to f- for us to find the best way of convincing other people.

2. 5:13 – 15:10

   Why Do We Deceive Ourselves?

   1. LPLionel Page5:13

   2. CWChris Williamson5:13

      Mm-hmm. But we also need to convince ourselves, right? This is where self-deception comes in too.

   3. LPLionel Page5:19

      Yeah. Yeah. Y- yeah. So, I think, th- this idea that we self-deceive, uh, and that it's a strategic, uh, um ... uh, it, it works strategically to convince others is an idea put forward by, uh, Robert Trivers in, in the '70s, the biologist Robert Trivers. And the, the problem he describes is, okay, you know, why do we self-deceive? And we know that we self-deceive, we know that we over-confident people tend to think that they are smarter, uh, more handsome, uh, nicer than, you know, than they are, than, than other people, et cetera. You have a lot of data. When you ask people, you know, "Are you a good driver?" Like, I think that 90% of people say they are better driver than average.

   4. CWChris Williamson5:54

      Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

   5. LPLionel Page5:56

      So that's ... That's just not possible, right?

   6. CWChris Williamson5:57

      Yeah.

   7. LPLionel Page5:57

      I mean ... And it's everybody. If you ask college professors-... you know, I think 90% will say they are b- better professors than their colleagues, right?

   8. CWChris Williamson6:05

      (laughs)

   9. LPLionel Page6:05

      So-

   10. CWChris Williamson6:05

       (laughs)

   11. LPLionel Page6:06

       ... you see, it's like, it's at every, every levels, you know, you have this, this kind of thing.

   12. CWChris Williamson6:09

       Yeah.

   13. LPLionel Page6:10

       So, okay, so why, why do we, why do we self-deceive and why do we have all these kind of flattering views about ourselves? So one, one possibility is that we just like it, you know? I mean, you know, I like thinking I'm good, so, uh, I, I choose to, uh, shape my beliefs and to form beliefs that I'm, I'm better than I am because I just, I just enjoy this feeling. The problem with this explanation is that there are costs of being, uh, over-confident, of having wrong beliefs. So, you know, if I think I'm stronger than I am, maybe I'm going to go into fights I shouldn't go into. If I, if I think I'm a better climber, I'm going to climb a mountain which I, I shouldn't climb. You know, if I think I'm a better diver, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm a better, um, swimmer, I'm going to dive into this river I shouldn't swim into.

   14. CWChris Williamson6:51

       Mm-hmm.

   15. LPLionel Page6:52

       So there are real risks. But, so, you know, from an evolution point of view, if we are all over-confident, there must be a reason. And it can't be in our mind, because evolution doesn't select our minds to be happy, you know? That, it, it selects us to be successful. So if we all turned out to be a bit over-confident, there must be, because there are costs, there must be benefits. And the benefit, as Robert Trudeau says, that because we all try to convince each other, you know, um, there is always a risk that if I kind of lie, if I, if I, if I, if I blatantly lie when I try to talk to you, you'll find out and there are costs, you know, uh, like I'm losing reputation, et cetera, et cetera. And maybe, you know, also you find, you find out that I'm, I'm, I'm not being, uh, honest. So one way of limiting this cost, or one way of not being found out is actually to believe my own stories. Um, you know, like, you know poker players, when they play poker, they have their, their sunglasses. Why do they have sunglasses? Because they don't want to leak cues of their emotions and feeling. So maybe instead of having sunglasses, you could, you, one way to play poker if you want to bluff and be convincing is to really believe that when your, your game is not great, actually it's a great game.

   16. CWChris Williamson8:01

       Mm-hmm.

   17. LPLionel Page8:01

       Okay? So it's not possible in poker because it's just very obvious, you see the game. But in the game of life, you know, your cards is not that clear. And so if you start believing that your, th- the hands that you have is stronger than it is, you might actually be, be able to bluff, in a way. Y- you bluff but you believe your own bluff, and that's convincing 'cause you don't leak cues that you're bluffing.

   18. CWChris Williamson8:22

       What are some of the other ways that self-deception creeps in that people might not notice? Some of the more subtle ways.

   19. LPLionel Page8:31

       Some of the most subtle ways. Um, I think... You know, I remember when I... Because I worked on self-deception and I've written papers on, on self-deception, and I talked to a journalist and, and the journalist says, "Oh, yes, some people self-deceive." And-

   20. CWChris Williamson8:46

       (laughs)

   21. LPLionel Page8:46

       ... I was like, "No." (laughs)

   22. CWChris Williamson8:49

       (laughs)

   23. LPLionel Page8:49

       "No, no. This is not..."

   24. CWChris Williamson8:50

       (laughs)

   25. LPLionel Page8:50

       "This is not it. It's we all self-deceive." So, so you know, it's a, the design, by design we are all doing that, is that you forget the truth-

   26. CWChris Williamson9:00

       Yeah.

   27. LPLionel Page9:00

       ... forget the, you know, we have the view that we view the world and, and we reason with the world. No, we have to think that, uh, just, you know, being, being a, um, always a bit self-serving, if it works, if you can get a small advantage by believing your own stuff and you can push, you know, convince other that, you know, you deserve a bigger share, uh, you know, you're not guilty of this or that, et cetera-

   28. CWChris Williamson9:24

       Mm-hmm.

   29. LPLionel Page9:24

       ... uh, it's going to be beneficial. So I think the key insight is that we really see the world with, uh, rose-tinted glasses. Uh, and you know, that explains, explains a lot of things. You have a lot of conflict in social situations where you, you hear, "Well, there's always two sides of the story." Well, why is there two sides of the story? Well, there's two sides of the story because everybody is seeing the story trying, you know, like a lawyer trying to, uh-

   30. CWChris Williamson9:50

       Mm-hmm.
3. 15:10 – 24:33

   Lionel’s View Lying Damaging Our Reputation

   1. CWChris Williamson15:10

      Um, okay. How much is the fear of losing your reputation the thing that keeps people trustworthy, then? You just mentioned there that our-

   2. LPLionel Page15:20

      Yeah.

   3. CWChris Williamson15:20

      ... um, recursive judgment of others, uh, this sense... Well, how reliable is Lionel when he's talk ... Like, d- he got that thing wrong about that s- that thing being white previously.

   4. LPLionel Page15:33

      Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

   5. CWChris Williamson15:34

      Um, uh, so is I know that- that you know, and you know that I am gonna keep track of you.

   6. LPLionel Page15:41

      Yep. Yeah, yeah.

   7. CWChris Williamson15:41

      How ... Is that, is that the thing that keeps us trustworthy for the most part, and it almost hems in how much deception and self-deception we deploy?

   8. LPLionel Page15:51

      I think it is, yeah. Uh, you know, if you look at the kind of ... You look at the fundamentals of cooperation between humans. So human ... You know, I think you have to- to set out what characterize humans is that we're not, we're not like, uh, birds, like robins, where we have no interest in interacting with each other. So robins, you know, they- they do their own stuff, they don't talk to any other robin, and they find a mate once and that's it.

   9. CWChris Williamson16:15

      Okay.

   10. LPLionel Page16:16

       And we're not like ants. Ants, they live, you know, they kind of ... almost clones because they share 75% of their, uh, genetic material. So they are between siblings and clones. So they kind of always agree naturally on what to do. We are in this kind of in between which is complex, where we share, we have a lot of interests in common, but we're also- also always a kind of part of conflict. And so we have to negotiate this, uh, with each other. And so, um, when you see that, the, uh, the key is how do agents like us who have somewhat aligned incentives, somewhat aligned interests, but not fully aligned interests cooperate? And what we can see is that, um, there's this, uh, game... One of the most insightful thing from game theory we get is that once you repeat interactions, then you can really use the fut- the- the- the possibility of gaining from, because we have some shared interests, the possibilities from gaining in the future to police the interaction in the present. So in, in the present, you could always have a kind of an incentives not to be cooperative because, you know, you can take benefits. So, you know, I could lie today because, yeah, if you trust me, you know, I'm get- going to get an advantage. But what you can see that if we have the prospect of interac- interacting a lot, and then, uh, then you ... If tomorrow, if we- we say that we agree to cooperate all the time, but if I lie, and if you find out I lied, you stop believing me in the future, so there is a cost now. The cost is that I lose this opportunity to cooperate with you in the future. And so, and when you extend this, uh, insight to a population where you have a lot of people, then the thing which police us is this record track, this, uh, this record that we have, this reputation. So the reputation is really this, uh, record that we have that other people can check to see whether I did abide by the rules which ensure that cooperation is sustained.

   11. CWChris Williamson18:04

       Mm.

   12. LPLionel Page18:04

       And I think it's key. You know, you say, is it a key- key thing? I think this is the thing. That is, this- this is the way it works. That is, reputation is what makes, is co- ... what makes us, uh-... com- comply with the rules of cooperating now, because if we don't then our record is tainted.

   13. CWChris Williamson18:20

       Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

   14. LPLionel Page18:21

       And then all those people will know that. And as a consequence, they will not cooperate and then we have a cost. We have the shadow of the future, which, uh, applies some pressure in the present.

   15. CWChris Williamson18:30

       Yep. So good. Okay, so, uh, all of this, it presumably is what makes human communication so complex. That it's not... It's not a simple task to try and do.

   16. LPLionel Page18:43

       Yeah, you know what? It's- it's fascinating to... You know, communication comes to us very easily. You know, we chit chat and we talk about things, et cetera. Like, it seems normal. But think about it, uh, computers were able to beat Grandmasters like, you know, 30 years ago. Right? Uh, Big Blue was, uh, uh, in 1995 in beating Kasparov. Uh, but it's only- only in the last two, three years that we get computers eventually able to speak like you and me. You know, before when you were talking to a computer, you felt it was artificial. You felt that, you know, it was not very deep, it was predictable, et cetera. A- and now only with the new language models, it, you feel like you're able to speak... M- you can still re- um, perceive the artificial nature of it sometimes, but it's- it looks very natural. So you, you needed 30 years of computer, uh, programming progress to reach this level. It tells you how difficult communicating, talking like we- you and me what we're doing now, it's actually very complex. Much more complex for a computer than, you know, playing chess at the level of Kasparov. And- and what... The complexity is at several levels. One thing you- you have to think about, when... What is communicating? Communicating is when I say something, I am providing information, and information is me giving you something which is going to change your beliefs. If I say something and it doesn't change in any way your beliefs, it's- it's- it's useless. It's- it's kind of, uh, boring. So it's only if you have your beliefs, and I provide something which is novel, change your beliefs, that it is useful to you. Uh, it could be, I could tell you, "Oh, Chris, you know, I've met this guy, he's very nice," it's information. Or I could tell you, you know, what I tell you now about what I know. I could talk to you about the weather or whatever. But I'm giving you something which is information. Th- then that's the basics. Then if you want to look at how communication works, uh, there would be plenty of way we could do that. They- there's plenty of things I could tell you. I could give you information about, you know... I could talk to you about the dictionary, but I'm not talking to you about the dictionary now. So, what we do, there's a, um, a linguist and- and- and psychologist who

   17. NANarrator20:50

       (whistles)

   18. LPLionel Page20:50

       ... a cognitive scientist who has written a book about it, um, is that we try to be relevant. And relevant, they define relevance as, we try to provide the most information which is changing your beliefs in the most useful way to you, with the minimal cost for you to treat it. So when I talk to you, I'm going to try to give you the most useful information to you that is w- which are going to change your beliefs in a way that you find useful, while at the same time giving a message which is the least hard for you to process. And- and you can see what is relevance when you violate it. So what is violation of relevance? Well, first I could talk to you and give you information which is useless, so that, you know, I could talk to you about things you are not interested in. You'd find me boring. Or I could be, uh, talking in a way which is not easy for you to process. I could speak very longly and very technically, and that would be, you know... And even if what I say is right and- and- and- and useful too, but, you know, I would not make it easy for you to access. So this is a violation of relevance. And what we do, we try to do that all the time. Th- this is amazing, you know, this principle of relevance, it's not just when we talk about something technical, it's every situations in our daily lives when we communicate, we very quickly communicate a lot of information in the minimal amount of words. So I'll give you an example, for instance. Uh, suppose that, you know, John and- and Jane, they are, um, thinking about what to do in the weekend, and John says, "Oh, what about, uh, going, uh, to play tennis?" And Jane says, "I'm tired." So now, if you think about it, Jane's answer seems like if you're a robot, if you're a computer-

   19. CWChris Williamson22:26

       Mm-hmm.

   20. LPLionel Page22:26

       ... you'd say, you'd- you'd be like, "Wait a minute. Like, Jane didn't say sh- whether she wanted to or not to play tennis. She said she's tired, so she- she seems like she's not answering the question."

   21. CWChris Williamson22:33

       I'm sorry that you're tired, but can we get back to talking about tennis?

   22. LPLionel Page22:37

       Yes (laughs) . Yes, exactly. And so, how does this work? So obviously, John is going to understand what she means, right? But- but that she d- she doesn't want to play tennis. But so, how does John understand? Well, John ha- John has to under... First, Jane is going to give the minimal amount of information, which is, "I'm tired." Uh, John will say, "Okay." They will back... We have an understanding that's what Jane is doing, so John will think, "Okay, if s- if Jane say that she's tired, it's- it has to be relevant to what I was saying about tennis." So it has to be relevant. So why this is relevant? Well, people being tired usually don't want to play tennis, so sh- she is indicating she doesn't want to play tennis with me. That's why she said that. But then if you think about it, Jane has to anticipate that this is the way John is going to interpret her. So she's, she- she understand that John is going to expect her to say that, well, because she thinks that he's going to understand. So you have this kind of recursive mind reading, "I know that you're going to think that that's what I want to say." Okay? And when you start understanding that, that we're doing this rec- you know, you're putting your shoes in the other person putting his- his shoes into yours, you realize, okay, that's really, really complex. That's why computers are really, uh, sound silly relative to us, because they don't do that, so they sound, you know... They sound a bit off. Until the large language models which- which are better now, but before they were sounding artificial, they were unable to do this kind of-

   23. CWChris Williamson24:00

       Mm-hmm.

   24. LPLionel Page24:01

       ... easy interactions when w- what is understanding each other is doing this kind of recursive mind reading.

   25. CWChris Williamson24:07

       Yeah, and I suppose the fact that it's taken so long and it, you know, the entire corpus of every written word, and now even synthetic data...... that AI is having to create fake new source data to retrain themselves on 35 or 30 years after we were able to be beaten at chess. It kind of explains...

4. 24:33 – 34:05

   Why Social Games are Hard to Navigate

   1. CWChris Williamson24:33

      So, one question on that, um, I keep on learning about the importance of coalition building, of communication, of solving-

   2. LPLionel Page24:43

      Yeah.

   3. CWChris Williamson24:43

      ... social problems, of theory of mind. I need to be able to work out what John means when he asks Jane, and what Jane meant with that, and John and Jane were friends last week but not this week, and s- you scale that up to a Dunbar number of 150.

   4. LPLionel Page24:58

      Yep.

   5. CWChris Williamson24:59

      How likely do you think it is that human consciousness, like the sense, the phenomena of being a me, of having a sense that I am here, of being able to model your mind, reflect on my own- my own motivations, that kind of metacognitive process, how much of that do you think is just a byproduct of us having to be able to navigate our way through complex social games and communication?

   6. LPLionel Page25:27

      Well, I think... You know, there is this, uh, social brain hypothesis, which is like, why, wh- you know, why do we- why do we become so intelligent? And that is n- dealing with, uh, social interactions. And I think, I think that's the key to understand all of the- the- why we are as intelligent as we are and why we think the way we do. It's because of the fact that we have to deal with social interactions. When you compare- when you compare us to other apes, et cetera, well the big difference is the complexity of our social networks. So if you look at apes like, uh, chimpanzees, for instance, they have some coalitions, like two, three. But, you know, we have very large coalitions. We have, like, you look at your Facebook, you have like hundreds of people. At work you may have like, you know, dozens of people, et cetera. And so navigating this is really, really complex. I mean, you know, I think every- one thing that everybody will understand is that when you play video games, you make a big- you see a big difference between playing versus a computer ver- versus playing with versus players. You know, when you play with just a computer, usually quickly you learn that the computer has this kind of predictable way of doing. So when you play Super Mario and you arrive at the boss, you know, first time you get smashed, but then after it's s- ah, when it throws a fireball, you hide yourself in the corner and then after you jump on it again.

   7. CWChris Williamson26:42

      Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

   8. LPLionel Page26:43

      And this works all the time, right? But when you play against other players, no, because if you- if it works once, the other players learn-

   9. CWChris Williamson26:50

      Mm-hmm.

   10. LPLionel Page26:50

       ... and then you have to expect that, you know, you have to anticipate their next move, knowing that themselves, they try to anticipate your next move. So what you have is that the complexity of playing with other people is way, way more difficult, uh, to- to- st- to solve as a problem than the complexity of playing with, you know, s- uh, either objects or even low, uh, low awareness animals, right?

   11. CWChris Williamson27:14

       Mm-hmm.

   12. LPLionel Page27:15

       So this challenge that we face, uh, I think it has put- it has likely put a tremendous pressure on our cognition to be- for us to be smarter. A- and all what we- most of what we do kind of resolves a- a- around solving and being successful at- at these social problems.

   13. CWChris Williamson27:31

       Yeah. Okay. So what's the difference in strategies that we use when we're being cooperative than when we're being in conflict? Because yeah, sure, self-deception, we're gonna believe most of the things that we say, that makes it easier to lie. But we can't do that all the time. We have to be more, uh, collaborative and more sort of honest and aligned with certain people, and more adversarial and more in conflict with others.

   14. LPLionel Page28:03

       Yeah.

   15. CWChris Williamson28:03

       So how does cooperation and conflict, how do those two things change? How does the way-

   16. LPLionel Page28:08

       Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

   17. CWChris Williamson28:08

       ... that we show up change?

   18. LPLionel Page28:09

       I think, you know, I think I tend to talk a lot about here, you know, in- about self-deception and conflict, because often we kind of minimize it or don't talk about it as much. But I think we should emphasize that in our social interactions, cooperation, I mean, we should appreciate how much cooperation there is. Most of what we do in life, in society, right, is we abide by a lot of social rules about conventions, about how to do things. You know, you- you- you go out and you drive, you're in the US so you drive on the right side of the road, right? I'm in Australia, so I drive on the left. And I mean, you're going to do that 100% of the time, right? I mean, at least in the US. Some- some other countries it's completely r- random. But if you do that and everybody does that, so- so there's this regularity, and this is cooperative. This isn't... it benefits every- everybody. I mean, sometimes, you know, you could benefit from breaking a few rules, and some people do, but if you go on the road, most people respect the rules. And you can extend these insights to all the areas of your life. You go at work and people do work. They don't, you know, uh, most people don't embezzle the company and- and run away in- in another country with the money, et cetera. So cooperation is really, uh, well, we have to appreciate how much cooperation there is, and we comply with rules most of the time. And I think maybe one, um, image that you could have is that if you think about a football or soccer match, or whatever sport you- you- you prefer, there are rules. And the rules are applied, that is, people follow most of the time the rules. Whereas at the same time, it would be- it would be wrong to say that people really follow fully the rules. And you know, because if you think about football, for instance, you know, people pull at your shirt, peop- they are kind of try to go over the line without being, you know, just enough for- for the, uh, referee not to, uh, to blow the whistle, et cetera. So that's what we do in life. So there are rules, and mostly we follow them. But, you know, if we can get some advantage, uh, by not following exactly or by going just close to the line, then we will have a tendency to do that. And self-deception here is going to help us because we can do that...... while convincing ourselves that we're not, okay? So if we are called up and says, "Oh, I, I, I didn't do anything wrong. I didn't know I was doing anything wrong," okay? So we are mostly cooperative-

   19. CWChris Williamson30:28

       Mm-hmm.

   20. LPLionel Page30:28

       ... but there is always a potential element of conflict which often we try to rationalize our behavior with self-deception, trying to get some advantages.

   21. CWChris Williamson30:36

       It seems to me that communication would, would never really be fully cooperative, that even the most cooperative team, two people team, would always be ever so slightly in conflict.

   22. LPLionel Page30:48

       Oh, totally. Yeah, yeah. No, you're totally right. I mean, I... once, once again, I, I really stress the aspect of cooperation, so I think w- we need to appreciate how much cooperation w- there is in communication. But at the same time, so you're totally right, that there was... you know, we are not ants, but there was always an element of conflict. Conflict is a big word, but it just mean that we don't want the same thing. It could be as much as, you know, somebody wants to talk a long time and somebody w- else wants to talk s- less, right? And that there's, there's a, a negotiation you have. Like if you are with your uncle who talks to you at a wedding forever and then you want to do, to do something else, there's kind of a conflict here.

   23. CWChris Williamson31:25

       (laughs)

   24. LPLionel Page31:25

       And, (laughs) and so y- conflict is everywhere, and I think it explains... once you appreciate that, it explains a lot of the kind of thing which is... seems weird or, or mysterious in communication. For instance, in his book, um, uh, um... yeah, he write about it in several books, uh, but, but I don't remember the, uh, um... maybe the, um... I think the... it's a book on language in '94. Steven Pinker talks about why, uh, we use, um... and if... I think there is the, the, The Food for or Foot, uh, book. It's a more recent book. Why we use indirect speech, which is, we use ambiguous statements or innuendos. For instance, when you are with date, at the end of a date, you might say, you know, "Do you want to go up have a drink?" Right? You don't want to say something more explicit.

   25. CWChris Williamson32:11

       Mm-hmm.

   26. LPLionel Page32:11

       So the question is, why do you do that? Because when you said you want to go up to have a drink, it's pretty, you know, it's pretty clear what's, w- what's involved, but you're not going to say s- you know, to be more explicit. So, um... or he, he gives an example about, um, uh, you know, somebody trying to bribe a policeman and say, "Oh, you know, I would like for us to find a way to solve it here." And he give his wallet and there's a, a bill sticking out of the wallet. So he's not saying, "Do you want $50 and, you know, uh, let me go?" It, it, it says something ambigu. So... and ambiguity is everywhere. So for instance, um, you know when, when there's conflict in the office, usually it's not open. People are going to drop hints that they're not happy with you, right?

   27. CWChris Williamson32:52

       Mm-hmm.

   28. LPLionel Page32:52

       They do... they can be passive-aggressive. Uh, they're not going to say, you know, "I'm not happy because of that." So why do we not say things clearly and explicitly? Well, it's because of this conflict element. Uh, because if there is a conflict, by not saying something, I can, in a way, uh, convey the message without, uh... with keeping plausible deniability if things go wrong. Okay, so if I say, for instance, "Do you want to go up have a drink?" And, and my date says no, I can pretend that I was just going to, you know, invite for a drink so we can play the game where we pretend that, uh, uh, nothing more was involved. If I tell the policeman I would like... "Could we solve this here?" and I don't offer a clear bribe, the policeman may not be able to have a case to put me in jail, you know, as, um, an attempt of bribery. And in, in the office, if there is a, a conflict and I ma- I get angry and says, you know, uh, "What are you implying?" And say, "I'm not implying anything," right?

   29. CWChris Williamson33:50

       Mm-hmm.

   30. LPLionel Page33:50

       So, so you keep plausible deniability. And so this is, this is why our communication is so rich because... and it's so... well, often, we don't say what we mean, but we convey it indirectly.

5. 34:05 – 39:37

   The Sydney Sweeney Controversy

   1. CWChris Williamson34:05

      I was listening to Rob Henderson talk to Louise Perry about the Sydney Sweeney advert. So Sydney Sweeney did this-

   2. LPLionel Page34:12

      Oh, yeah. About the jeans?

   3. CWChris Williamson34:13

      Yeah, did this ad for American Eagle and everybody got upset about it. And what was interesting was the way that women sort of criticized Sydney Sweeney was not the way that if you were a robot you would probably predict. It wasn't, "She is being, um, sexually overt and, and has big boobs, and is a potential intrasexual rival for some other high-value partner that I would like to get with, and she is going to set an unrealistic standard of beauty that is going to be difficult for us all." No, no, no, no. It was none of that. It was all couched in moral terms. It was, "She's pushing eugenics. She once attended a, uh, Trump rally. Her family is, like, st- central Southern American, flag-waving, truck-driving, country music listening-

   4. LPLionel Page35:16

      Mm-hmm.

   5. CWChris Williamson35:17

      ... hicks."

   6. LPLionel Page35:17

      Mm-hmm.

   7. CWChris Williamson35:17

      And it was... at no point was the actual thing that was the issue being pointed at. It was all, "She's a bad person." And I said that, uh... me and Rob were at dinner last night, uh, singing your praises. By the way, we've managed to get 35 minutes in and I haven't plugged your Substack. Can everyone go and subscribe to Optimally Irrational on Substack, please? Because it is one of the best things and it is criminally undersubscribed. It is Bitcoin at $1. So everyone can go and subscribe to that now. And it's... and you can get, you can get most of this stuff for free. Um, uh, the interesting thing, women have a failure of a theory of mind, cross-sex mind reading failure here, I think. They think that by derogating Sydney Sweeney's morality, other men will think, "Well, that's a beauty standard that is unreasonable. She's a bad person."

   8. LPLionel Page36:12

      Hm.

   9. CWChris Williamson36:12

      "Given that she's a bad person, I should not find her attractive." Now, maybe it's some intrasexual competition that they think if, if men see that lots of other women do not consider Sydney Sweeney to be a good person, they might not be attracted to them.... I'm going to just lay it out for the women-

   10. LPLionel Page36:31

       Yeah.

   11. CWChris Williamson36:32

       ... that are, that are listening. That's not true. Men are not going to not find Sydney Sweeney attractive just because other women don't find her a good person. However, if you are, um, Leonardo DiCaprio and lots of other similarly valued men. If, uh, Keanu Reeves and Hugh Grant and Jared Leto and a bunch of other Hollywood A-listers were to say, "I know that you fancy Leonardo DiCaprio, but he's a bad man. He's morally unjust," I do think that, that would impact women's assessment of this. It's sort of male competition-

   12. LPLionel Page37:11

       Mm-hmm.

   13. CWChris Williamson37:11

       ... theory that, uh, men's judgment of other men is kind of a big mediator of how women find that man to be attractive. This is David Putz's, uh, um... I just thought it was really interesting. You know, when you're talking about ambiguity, deniability, you have this first level, which is, it's not about her looks, it's about eugenics, it's about being right of center, it's about not caring about normal people, et cetera, et cetera-

   14. LPLionel Page37:36

       Yeah, yeah.

   15. CWChris Williamson37:37

       ... and then the, the reverse wouldn't be true. I just thought that was a really interesting setup, but I might be totally wrong. I'm, I'm... This is a, this is a fresh-

   16. LPLionel Page37:43

       No, no, I mean, I mean, uh-

   17. CWChris Williamson37:43

       It's a fresh theory, okay?

   18. LPLionel Page37:45

       (laughs) No, I get, I get the idea of intrasexual competition. Like, and, and there is a v- you know, there are psychological research showing that, uh... I don't remember the details, but I've seen papers where, you know, when you put a beautiful woman in, in, uh... sh- she's more likely to get criticized or to be the, the target of gossip, et cetera.

   19. CWChris Williamson38:04

       Mm-hmm.

   20. LPLionel Page38:05

       And, and that kind of, kind of makes sense. I mean, not because... I want to be clear that it's not because women are bad. It's like, you know, men have other problems and other type of competitions.

   21. CWChris Williamson38:14

       Mm-hmm.

   22. LPLionel Page38:14

       It's, it's just, uh, intrasexual competitions in, on both sides. In the case of Sweeney, I, I could definitely see how this kind of plays a role, because... Yeah. I think also because of what you said. Like, uh, I think also in the case of the ad which I, I saw, I guess it breaks a bit of the codes, the political codes. And in the US at the moment, you know, over the last years was very big-

   23. CWChris Williamson38:39

       Mm.

   24. LPLionel Page38:40

       ... about, you know, gender roles, et cetera. It's kind of, uh... it says... Well, there's two things. First, it's overtly kind of sexualizing the body of a woman-

   25. CWChris Williamson38:50

       Mm-hmm.

   26. LPLionel Page38:51

       ... and two, it's talking about genes, which is about biology. And I think these two things is kind of, you know, hurts the kind of political, uh, ideological setup, uh, on, on, on part of the, the US, in particular on the left. So I, I can see how that could trigger this kind of reaction. I, I don't know anything about Sydney Sweeney, um, whether political allegiance or whatever-

   27. CWChris Williamson39:12

       Mm.

   28. LPLionel Page39:12

       ... but I could see how people would try to, you know, would react like a, as you said, a coalition... If, if you perceive is that being from the out group, from, you know, against your group and then people get very mean, uh, and that can also blend, as you say, with intrasexual competition-

   29. CWChris Williamson39:28

       Mm.

   30. LPLionel Page39:28

       ... but I could see how they were trying to dig something on her, on the family, whatever.
6. 39:37 – 46:41

   How Venting Masks Judgement

   1. LPLionel Page39:37

   2. CWChris Williamson39:37

      The other, um, ambiguity, innuendo, plausible deniability thing, like the, the perfect example of this I think is venting. So some of the great research done around venting... Again, this isn't for me to lay it at the feet of women. Guys have... and, like, intersexual competition between men and women. Uh, but women are a bit more interesting around this. They're just more complex when it comes to the sort of-

   3. LPLionel Page40:03

      Oh, they're more complex, yeah.

   4. CWChris Williamson40:04

      ... in- intrasexual competition games, in the way that they communicate, and so on and so forth. But venting is so fucking fascinating, dude. Like, I, I, I just find it, it's maybe the most interesting style of, of human communication. Um-

   5. LPLionel Page40:17

      Yeah.

   6. CWChris Williamson40:17

      ... I'm talking to you. I'm Christine, you're Lisa, and we're talking about our friend Roberta. And I say, "I'm so worried about Roberta, Lisa. She's just sleeping with all of these guys, and I'm really worried that she's gonna get-"

   7. LPLionel Page40:29

      Right.

   8. CWChris Williamson40:29

      "... her heart broken. And I, you know, I keep trying to warn her about it, but she, she just doesn't, she doesn't seem to listen to me, and..." Okay, like, on the surface, I'm being a good person, I'm being cooperative, I'm caring, I'm being compassionate for my friend. But under the surface, what I'm doing is talking totally openly about Roberta's sexual exploits. I'm implicitly-

   9. LPLionel Page40:50

      Right.

   10. CWChris Williamson40:50

       ... putting myself on a high moral pedestal by saying, "I would never. That is not part of me." And it's all couched in, "If Roberta ever finds out that I told you." I'm like-

   11. LPLionel Page41:01

       Yeah.

   12. CWChris Williamson41:01

       ... "Look, Roberta, I, I'm just so worried about you. I didn't m- You know what? This is l- I care."

   13. LPLionel Page41:07

       So-

   14. CWChris Williamson41:07

       So good.

   15. LPLionel Page41:08

       ... I can... So I, I think I can give you the, the reason why you have this, uh, difference between men and women. Uh, and, and basically the key difference is our network of friends. How our network of friends work. Uh, mens have large networks of friends, or it's a large coalition, uh, and they have loose, loose ties, weak ties. You know, you have a lot of friends. You don't... A- and one friend, you can not talk to him for two years, and when you see him back, you say, "Hey, mate, you know, how's it going?"

   16. CWChris Williamson41:37

       Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

   17. LPLionel Page41:38

       It's fine. Um, and that's because... Well, that's one man. I'll tell you maybe because why afterwards. And women, they have tighter networks. Small networks, a few friends, and with a lot of investment, you know. Uh, they talk a lot. They, uh, they invest a lot. And so there is also gossiping because, which you are talking about, because you manage reputation. You, you want to learn about reputation, you manage your own reputation. So friendship, um, uh, friendship in, in, for women is much more intense in terms of, you know, the investment in each particular, uh, uh, friendship, uh, partnership. And I think the reason for that is, uh, that men and women had to solve different problems in our anteced- ancestral times. So when you read a fascinating book by, um, evolutionary psychologist Sarah Hrdy on, you know, mothers in ancestral times-

   18. CWChris Williamson42:28

       Mm.

   19. LPLionel Page42:28

       ... one thing that appears is that it's very hard to raise kids. You know, now you've got... You get a kid at the hospital, and then-... you've got the nurse, and then after, you go to the kindergarten, you know, and drop the kid at the kindergarten. Super easy. But okay, our ancestors, they didn't have that. And you know, you need to collect food, y- there is no supermarket to find the food. And you have, y- you need to collect food with this, uh, stuff, which is just sucking the energy out of you. And so the survival of children, likely was much higher when you got help. So there is a lot of what we call alloparenting. That is, a mother gets help from her family, partly from her mother, but also from other mothers. Sometimes even, you know, other mothers helping to breastfeed your kid when you can't. And so, you know, for that you need, if you want to give your kid to other woman, you need a lot of trust. 'Cause a kid is a huge stake, right?

   20. CWChris Williamson43:16

       Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Hmm.

   21. LPLionel Page43:16

       So you want very strong bonds with a few people who give you a lot of help. So that i- you know, you can't ask somebody would, who you barely know to take your kid and breastfeed your kid, right? So, so this is small network, tight bonds. Men's, on the contrary, most likely, you know, they, they obviously didn't have, uh, this, uh, problem. Uh, th- they, they were engaged more in kind of occasional collective work, occasional warfare, occasional hunting, which is in big groups. And in this case, the defection of one person is bad, but not as dramatic. You know, if, if this woman drops your kid on the ground, that's terrible. If this guy doesn't show for the hunt, he's a bad guy, but, you know, you're not going to die for that. And so I think that's why we have these kind of men friendships are much lower, uh, maintenance, right, than, uh, female friendship. But I, I think it's natural. It's kind of a reflection of the kind of different social problems we had to solve, our ancestors had to solve.

   22. CWChris Williamson44:11

       Mm. Well, I think the way that men, the way that men and women compete, you know, overt versus covert, um, the, I think the blast radius as well, of, of male success versus female success. It, it, people would assume, I think, that guys are more, more competitive in a way because the status games are more, uh, overt. You can see how this works. But, uh, I use this example of Lionel Messi. So if you are the reserve gold goalkeeper on the team that Lionel Messi plays for-

   23. LPLionel Page44:54

       Mm-hmm.

   24. CWChris Williamson44:56

       ... you might think, "Wow, I mean, I am so far in the shadow of the m- I'm not even the guy that is in the goal-"

   25. LPLionel Page45:04

       Yeah. (laughs)

   26. CWChris Williamson45:04

       "... while the other guy that's the superstar is at the other end scoring in the opp- opposition's goal." But the, the sort of blast radius of goodwill of you being attached to Lionel Messi is so great, in the same way as here's a hunting party of eight, me, you, and six of our friends that go, and you're the one that's really fast, and R- Robert's the one that's really strong, and another one's the one that's really great at sh- Yeah. ... creating a spear. And I'm like, I'm the, the second-best carrier or something. And I'm like, "Well, I'm not exactly the top guy, but the fact that I'm associated with this coalition of men kind of raises me up in the standing-"

   27. LPLionel Page45:45

       Sure.

   28. CWChris Williamson45:46

       "... overall. The blast radius seems to, to be wide." I'm not convinced that the same thing is true for women. I'm not convinced that a single successful woman who is in your, uh, coalition has the same kind of, uh, blast radius.

   29. LPLionel Page46:02

       So, look, yeah, I, I, I don't know, okay, I don't know work about that, but if you think at the kind of anecdotal level, it seems to me, uh, and I think there is research on that, but, uh, I- I don't know any specific. But you know that, um, you see that in movies, that you have these girl, the groups of the cute girls who hang together, you know, they are like-

   30. CWChris Williamson46:26

       Mm-hmm.
7. 46:41 – 1:01:33

   Communicating is More Complicated Than a Chess Game

   1. CWChris Williamson46:41

      Okay, so that's why ambiguity and innuendo is useful, because plausible deniability? Uh, because...

   2. LPLionel Page46:50

      Plausible deniability, in particular, plausible deniability, uh, uh, a thing that Pinker says is when you negotiate the relationships, you know, like for instance, when you're dating, you negotiate the relationship, whether you want to turn from friendship to more than friendship. And so you want to keep your options open in case it doesn't work out. When you are with a policeman, you negotiate a relationship whether you're i- in the law or outside of the law, right? So you want to keep your, your options open. So when you negotiate relationships in particular, you want to keep, uh, plausible deniability.

   3. CWChris Williamson47:19

      Right.

   4. LPLionel Page47:19

      There is a, you know, one thing in, in Steven Pinker, uh, uh, uh, book I love is, is he reference the, the movie Harry, When Harry Met Sally. So for the, your young listeners, it's an old movie from the, I think '90s. And, and Harry basically, he, he meets, meets Sally and she's a, a friend of his current girlfriend, and he hits on her. I think he says, "You're very attractive." And she calls him out. She said, "How could you hit on me while you, you're with my friend?" And he say, "Oh, I didn't, I didn't hit on you." He says, "Oh, well, maybe I did. And so what? You know, I take it back." And she said, "You can't take it back. It's out there." And, and it's out there because now the difference that, if it's not ambiguous, once he ad- her knowledge that he has done it, once he admits that he has done it, then it's in the open. He can't anymore pretend he has not done it because now everybody knows. She knows that he did it. He knows that she, she knows, et cetera. So, you know, this is common knowledge. And so you wi- you want typically to avoid this. This is risky common knowledge, you know, a, a, an open overture is risky. So being ambiguous helps prevent this kind of thing.

   5. CWChris Williamson48:22

      Mm. Okay, so it, could we look at ambiguity as sort of a, a communication style, a, a type of deception that we've sort of normalized?

   6. LPLionel Page48:36

      I'm not sure if it's a kind of deception. It's a kind of, you know, it's, it's one of these rich aspects of communication.

   7. CWChris Williamson48:41

      Mm-hmm.

   8. LPLionel Page48:41

      That is-

   9. CWChris Williamson48:41

      Mm-hmm.

   10. LPLionel Page48:42

       ... I can say something... You know, I, I talked before about recursive mind reading. You can think of recursive mind reading as we have different levels of beliefs. So one belief is, you know, you might believe, uh, I might believe what y- that you, you s- something, then you might believe that I have this belief. So for instance, like, maybe, let's say, um, uh, we are talking about where to go on holiday. And I want to go in Brazil. And so that's a fact. You might think, "Oh, Lionel wants to go to Brazil," so you have a belief on me. And then I can say, "Oh, Chris believe that I want to go to Brazil." I have a belief on your belief, right?

   11. CWChris Williamson49:17

       Mm-hmm.

   12. LPLionel Page49:17

       And you can climb this chain of beliefs, right? And it gets obviously very easily complec- complicated. And then now, what you can do is, when you say ambiguous thing, is that you can say something which are going to change the first order beliefs, but keeps ambiguity at the higher levels. So if I, if I'm passive-aggressive, for instance, I might lead you to think that I'm annoyed at you, but you're not sure that I know that you know, et cetera.

   13. CWChris Williamson49:40

       (laughs)

   14. LPLionel Page49:41

       So we keep the ambiguity on the top. But I can still manage to let you know I'm not happy, but then now, uh, do you know that I know that you know that I'm not happy? Maybe not.

   15. CWChris Williamson49:51

       (laughs)

   16. LPLionel Page49:51

       You see? And so- so when you tell me, "Are you unhappy?" I can say, "No, I can c- no, you thought I was unhappy? No, I was not unhappy."

   17. CWChris Williamson50:00

       Mm. Mm.

   18. LPLionel Page50:00

       See?

   19. CWChris Williamson50:01

       What's paltering? I'd never heard of that term before.

   20. LPLionel Page50:06

       Yeah, paltering is another interesting concept. There was a paper, uh, published about a few years ago on this. Uh, it's, you know, one aspect of this rich aspect of communication, because, because we, we, we, we work with this tr- um, uh, communication works with, uh, us trying to be always relevant, you can actually manipulate that to say something and use the fact that people are going to interpret it. So you can say something you expect is going to be interpreted in your favor, but actually you're inducing people in error. So I g- I'll give you an example which I wrote in the book. Suppose Jane and Jack are, uh, you know, a couple, and Jane says, "I'm going to do, um, uh, a cake for your birthday," and then at the last minute, she doesn't have enough time, so she go to the bakery and she brings a cake. And j- and Jack says, "Oh, what a great cake!" And she say, "Oh, thank you." Okay. Well, what does she say when she says thank you? She must know that Jack before, because of his information, assumes she did it. So when she says thank you, she just, uh, say, imply that she did the cake. Okay? But- so this is paltering, because saying "Thank you for what a great cake" is not a lie, right? But it- paltering is saying something true. Thank you, as you know, she's, uh, she's not lying in saying thank you.

   21. CWChris Williamson51:22

       Mm-hmm.

   22. LPLionel Page51:22

       But which is inducing the other person in mistake, right? In, in error, right?

   23. CWChris Williamson51:26

       Mm-hmm.

   24. LPLionel Page51:27

       Now you see, she's leading Jack to believe that she did the cake by saying thank you. Right? So paltering is this, you can actually deceive people by saying the truth.

   25. CWChris Williamson51:36

       That's interesting. Yeah, I, I, uh... It's so funny, man, when you think about the complexity and how it's not the first order thing, it's not the second order thing, it's five levels down, it kind of becomes easier to work out why chess is actually a simpler game than just having a conversation and fully understanding what it is that a human means.

   26. LPLionel Page51:59

       Yeah, exactly. This is exactly that. Because, you know, a computer... You are playing chess in a kind of much larger, much complex, much more complex, like, tragic, uh, uh, uh, space. You have to- a computer would have to form a belief about, uh, you know, the world, form a belief about your beliefs, and, and now, now having a model of you running the same stuff. So it needs to have a model, and then a model of you running the same model-

   27. CWChris Williamson52:26

       Yes. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

   28. LPLionel Page52:27

       ... and potentially another one.

   29. CWChris Williamson52:28

       Yes. Yeah. Well, that's what, that's what I clunkily tried to explain about my consciousness theory of mind thing, that in order for me to be able to understand what you're thinking, we both need to have a theory of mind.

   30. LPLionel Page52:41

       Yeah.
8. 1:01:33 – 1:13:49

   Why We Feel the Need to Belong

   1. CWChris Williamson1:01:33

      what does, what does coalition psychology tell us about our anxiety to belong, then? We need... W- we can't bear to be left out. If we feel like the group is pulling away from us... Uh, how does coalitional psychology sort of tie in with that, that need to belong?

   2. LPLionel Page1:01:55

      Well, I think it's e- it explains why we have this need to be... So, so I said, you know, I gave you the kind of extreme version about why we need s- w- why we need coalition. It... not to be picked up and not to be at risk in, uh, in ancient times. But really, coalitions are useful for plenty of things. In the case, for instance, mothers, you know, being with a tight group of other mothers, it helps provide support and insurance. Uh, if you are in a big group, you can do things that you could not do, like for instance, like moving house, you move sofas, et cetera. You couldn't do it on your own. So, coalitions are useful for plenty of things. And, and I think our coalitional, coalitional psychology is that we always care about being in a group. We, we care about two things. We care about being in a group, uh, and our standing in the group. Our standing is how other people, um, see us in the group. And you know, when you unpack a group, there's always an internal hierarchy. So it's not like, uh... Uh, it's, it's like a fractal. If you think of a fractal, you know, it's a kind of, um... Or Russian dolls. You know, you open a Russian doll, there is another Russian doll. Okay? So coalition is like that. So you have a group of friend, and from the outside you say, "Oh, these are the group of friends." Okay, but you go inside, and actually in the group of friend, there is kind of an in- inner circle, an outer circle. Um, one, one thing you can see very easily, quickly, uh, very nice, nicely, very, uh, interestingly, I think, is, uh, the game show Survivor. So you watch the game show Survivor. Officially, it's a game show on surviving in the jungle.

   3. CWChris Williamson1:03:20

      Yeah.

   4. LPLionel Page1:03:20

      But actually, most of it is not. Most of it is a coalitional game, because you have a group and they tell you at the end of the day, you'll have to eliminate one of you, okay? And so all, all... It kind of, uh, run on the anxiety of being excluded, uh, massively. So you know, they are in a group and they know that at the end of the day, one of them is going to be out. And s- and right away, what, what's very interesting in this show is that right away you see that there is an inner hierarchy. People says, "Oh, I'm safe. I'm in the, I'm in the top three." There's a top three in the group? How, how do you know what's the top three, right? And so there is a top three, and there is a, the loose two, and there's the bottom two, for instance, right? And so the bottom two, they say, they know that they are, they're on the chopping block. So y- you know, we have this psychology. We, we quickly go in a group and we feel, oh, in this inner group, there is this guy, they are tight bond, they are respected by others. They're unmovable, you know. They, they are part of the group. But me, I'm kind of... I'm in between. I'm not sure. Maybe they could, they could live their life without me, right? And so if you are like that, you're stressed, et cetera. So this is, this is the way we... O- our psychology is shaped. We really care about these things, and that drives a lot of what we do.

   5. CWChris Williamson1:04:28

      Well, surely you can't have a flimsy coalition. One of, one of the things that you need is, uh, commitment. So what are the ways-

   6. LPLionel Page1:04:37

      Totally.

   7. CWChris Williamson1:04:38

      ... that, what are the ways that coalitions test loyalty?

   8. LPLionel Page1:04:41

      So I mean, y- y- you're dead right. When... You know, a key challenge for coalitions is the... You need loyalty, and you need the commitment that people are going to work for the coalition. You know, if you're on a football team, you need the confidence that everybody's going to put, you know, to work their best to try to win the match. If you're in a, in a i- in an army platoon, you need your confidence that, you know, people will have your back when you run toward m- l- th- the front line, et cetera. So what you have is that here we have a, a problem in, in game theory. It's a problem of, uh, that y- you have two potenti- potential situations. One situation where people trust each other and all go i- and work for the group. Okay, so the football team gives his 100% and the, the army platoon all run in the same direction at the same time.

   9. CWChris Williamson1:05:29

      Mm.

   10. LPLionel Page1:05:29

       And you have the other s- situations where if I don't trust that you and others will do that, why would I do that? So maybe I don't. I don't run and you don't believe, you don't trust that people will run, so we are ineffective.

   11. CWChris Williamson1:05:40

       Mm.

   12. LPLionel Page1:05:40

       So it's also a possibility. And to move us from the situation where an ineffective group to the situation wh- w- we run as a unit, we need the confidence each other, the shared confidence that we believe that we think we're a unit and we work as a unit. And how do you get that? You get that with social identity. So the groups who work, like they have this kind of bond. So, you know, this feeling that we, we are a team and I know we are a team. I know you know we are a team. We share the team's logo. We share the team hats, you know, the team T-shirt. We share the team song before the match, you know, et cetera. And so, and that explained a l- a lot of, again, a- about the human psychology. We think things which are described as irrational. Like you got the football supporters, uh, spend a lot of money on the signs for their football team, they sing dur- during the match. Sometimes they sing during the match, they don't even watch the match. And y- you think that's a, that's a bit surprising, but that's because our psychology gives a lot of weight on, uh, caring about signs of loyalty, displaying signs of loyalty. Because being seen as a good group member, being trusted as a good group member-... you n- want to signal, to b- you want to tell everybody, "Hey, look, I- I'm a part of your team, and- and, you know, I- I'm clearly ... I'm not going to defect any time."

   13. CWChris Williamson1:06:57

       Mm.

   14. LPLionel Page1:06:58

       And so this explains a lot of what we do. We always want to show, and we're worried about signs that people could think, "Oh, maybe they will think I'm disloyal."

   15. CWChris Williamson1:07:06

       Mm.

   16. LPLionel Page1:07:06

       You know, "I'm not go-..." et cetera. So we are, we care about that a lot.

   17. CWChris Williamson1:07:10

       Yeah. I- I had it in my head, this idea around ... especially during sort of 2020 when the purest beliefs, you needed to adopt your entire ideology wholesale, that what people were doing with some of the more extreme political beliefs that people were being asked to raise a- a- a hand in support of, was that it was less about, "We think that this particular new policy is something which is really effective," and more, "This is a- a test of fealty."

   18. LPLionel Page1:07:46

       Oh, t- yeah.

   19. CWChris Williamson1:07:46

       It's like, "Are you prepared to put reason to the side?" I- and a- actually in that way, the more ridiculous the political belief, the stronger the show of your loyalty to the group, because you've had to suspend even more of your reason and your rationality in order to

   20. NANarrator1:08:07

       Yeah.

   21. CWChris Williamson1:08:07

       Hold ... Does that, does that make sense?

   22. LPLionel Page1:08:09

       No, that totally makes sense actually. It more than makes sense. There- there are people writing on this. Uh, you can think that beliefs, or if ... be- beliefs is what's in your head. So it's, uh, you know, whether beliefs ... I- I believe yes, but- but at least signs of, or claims that you hold the beliefs, uh, of the group-

   23. CWChris Williamson1:08:27

       Mm. Mm-hmm.

   24. LPLionel Page1:08:28

       ... uh-

   25. CWChris Williamson1:08:28

       Mm-hmm.

   26. LPLionel Page1:08:28

       ... they are important to signal loyalty. And I think you're totally right, that, you know, within the group there's a competition to ... there's, there's also kind of competition to look good within the group. So one- one thing that you could have, in particular in political group, and you can see that, you know, it's not just on the left. It's on the left, it's on the right, it's ... you can ... you see it in different ways, is that if I want a claim which is a bit more extreme, which is a border of, you know ... I- I- I may trade off a bit of credibility. That is, I say something which is extreme, or maybe the factual evidence is not super strong, okay? But I show to my group that I care so much about, you know, the- the message of my world that I am willing to say something which is i- which is that, instead of if- if on the contrary I'm- I'm like, "Oh, you know, I'm not sure on one hand." On the other hand-

   27. CWChris Williamson1:09:15

       Mm-hmm.

   28. LPLionel Page1:09:15

       ... people think like, "Lionel is not a reliable man of the group."

   29. CWChris Williamson1:09:17

       Yes.

   30. LPLionel Page1:09:18

       He has some doubts. Right?
9. 1:13:49 – 1:26:39

   Using Coalition Psychology to Understand Politics

   1. CWChris Williamson1:13:49

      So this sounds a lot like politics, right? I'm aware that we're talking about coalitions, but even the process of politics, not just the coalitions of the groups of people, the sports teams, the religious groups, whatever, uh, is it- is it better, do you think, to understand democracy as a coalition game than a- a truth-seeking exercise?

   2. LPLionel Page1:14:13

      Yeah, totally. So I wrote about it, and I think it's key to understand what democracy is. So, uh, I'm not sure, you know, I- I- maybe people have different views of democracy, but when I s- you know, heard or l- looked at democracy initially, uh, when I was younger, you know, you- you hear a lot about the ideal of democracy, Greece. The Greeks, um, they had the agora, which is this public space. People meet and discuss and make collective decisions. And in a way, this is often used as an ideal, and you judge the modern democracy relative to it.

   3. CWChris Williamson1:14:50

      Mm.

   4. LPLionel Page1:14:50

      So for instance, like, we think, oh, uh, that was direct democracy, so the real democracy is direct democracy. You have an assembly and they decide together. Now, we have in- what we have in- in modern democracy, we have representative democracy, so you vote for people, and in the parliament, or in the presidencies, they decide, right? So often, this is- this is seen as a kind of compromise which is, uh, an imperfect compromise, right? Because the real ideal democratic stuff is- is- is- is, um, the thing, the agora. And then what we think that people do in this public sphere, the agora, is that they try to find the right solution for the city, the right solution for the- for the society. But I think that that is mistaken, because, you know, once you understand that your- what we have is that we have people with imperfectly aligned incentives. They are in groups, groups who have- who have gathered these people who have similar incentives and similar interests and with opposite interests. What- the key of politics is not finding the truth, for most often, it's finding ways to, um, h- how- finding compromise between the different coalitions, how you split the gains from cooperation. So we cooperate in society, we create wealth because there's no crime, because there is no war, because there's laws and, you know, companies work, et cetera. How do you split the gains, uh, from huge taxation and very limited inequality for us to, uh, very limited taxation and large inequalities, you could

Episode duration: 1:40:23