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Psychology, Aliens & Averting The Apocalypse - Robert Wright | Modern Wisdom Podcast 338

Robert Wright is President of the Nonzero Foundation, an author and Visiting Professor of Science and Religion at Union Theological Seminary in New York. Bob's book The Moral Animal has changed my thinking more than pretty much any other over the last few years, so naturally I wanted to bring him on to discuss whether aliens are real and how we can avoid existential risks. For real though, expect to learn the role that evolutionary psychology plays in mindfulness practice, why Bob thinks that aliens are probably enlightened, how global coordination can be improved by everyone meditating, whether we're doomed for civilisational collapse and much more... Sponsors: Get a Free Sample Pack of all LMNT Flavours at https://www.drinklmnt.com/modernwisdom (discount automatically applied) Get 83% discount & 3 months free from Surfshark VPN at https://surfshark.deals/MODERNWISDOM (use code MODERNWISDOM) Extra Stuff: Follow Robert on Substack - https://nonzero.substack.com/ Follow Robert on Twitter - https://twitter.com/robertwrighter Get my free Ultimate Life Hacks List to 10x your daily productivity → https://chriswillx.com/lifehacks/ To support me on Patreon (thank you): https://www.patreon.com/modernwisdom #evolutionarypsychology #aliens #existentialrisk - Listen to all episodes online. Search "Modern Wisdom" on any Podcast App or click here: Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/2MNqIgw Spotify: https://spoti.fi/2LSimPn Stitcher: https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/modern-wisdom - Get in touch in the comments below or head to... Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx Email: https://chriswillx.com/contact/

Robert WrightguestChris Williamsonhost
Jun 24, 20211h 11mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

  1. 0:00 – 0:34

    Intro

    1. RW

      The quest to be respected is the most natural thing in the world for human beings. We are designed by natural selection to want people to think highly of us, but we weren't designed to live in this (laughs) environment where we are, every day, seeing how much affirmation we're getting from all of these people who don't actually even know us. (wind blows)

    2. CW

      How do you go from working on evolutionary psychology, to mindfulness, to politics and the end of the world?

  2. 0:34 – 3:07

    Mindfulness and evolutionary psychology

    1. CW

    2. RW

      (laughs) I don't know, they seem closely interconnected in my mind, at least. Uh, well, as for evolutionary psychology and mindfulness, uh, that's actually kind of straightforward, I think. I mean, it, you know, I, I ... My view of Buddhism, or at least of kind of Buddhist meditative practice, and kind of the Buddhist prescription for dealing with a human predicament is that it's actually a pretty smart response to the problem posed by human nature, to the way we naturally view things, process information, feel things. And human nature is a product of evolution. I mean, evolutionary psychology is about human nature. So, um, you know, for example, uh, mindfulness can deal with anxiety, and, and, and so the question arises, is why is there anxiety to begin with? And the answer seems to be, uh, we're engineered by natural selection to feel it under certain circumstances, uh, but that doesn't mean that it's always good for us. Uh, and mindfulness gives us a way of dealing with anxiety, and a number of other kind of problems with being human. Um, the end of the world stuff, I mean, you're right. My, like, my latest obsession is this thing I call the Apocalypse Aversion Project. Um, that's long been a concern of mine. It's certainly related to human nature, uh, in the, in the sense that I think, uh, our evolved psychology is, uh, uh, in some ways an obstacle to forming the kind of global community I think we need to form to solve the world's problems, uh, before they get out of hand. And I'm specifically thinking of what is sometimes called the Psychology of Tribalism. That is, those parts of our evolved psychology that can lead us into, uh, pointless and counterproductive arguments and hostilities. Uh, these, uh, this psychology tends to involve cognitive biases, and, and you might say a kind of warped perception of the world. Uh, and so, you know, if, if, if that indeed, uh, if, if this psychology is one thing standing in the way of, um, solving the world's problems, then you can see how mindfulness comes back into the picture. It might help us get our minds in a position where we're, we're, we're better equipped to, uh, to help the civilization

  3. 3:07 – 6:23

    Avoiding the apocalypse

    1. RW

      survive.

    2. CW

      So avoiding the apocalypse, is that a global coordination problem? Is that an individual responsibility?

    3. RW

      I would say it's both. I mean, you know, the, uh ... I, uh, wrote a book a while ago called Nonzero. Uh, that was a reference to game theory. A nonzero sum problem is a, is a problem where ... Or a game, a nonzero sum game is a game where there can be a win-win or a lose-lose outcome. Doesn't have to be a win-lose, uh, uh, outcome. And one thing I said near the end of that is that the world, you know, more and more, uh, nations face nonzero sum challenges. That is to say, uh, problems where they can both come out ahead, or many nations can together come out ahead, like avoiding nuclear war. That's a good example. Nuclear weapons create a radically nonzero sum situation. Nuclear war would be bad for everybody, uh, and avoiding it is good for everybody. And I was just saying there are more and more problems like this. Climate change is one. Uh, various environmental problems like overfishing the seas, uh, various arms control problems, uh, bio-weapons. Uh, so on the one hand, yes, it's a political challenge that nations, uh, could cooperate to address, but on the other hand, uh, there is a, a dimension of individual psychology, because if you ask, "Well, why aren't nations, uh, in some cases getting along well enough to cooperate?" Uh, sometimes at least I think the answer is, you know, the human psychology, uh, it, it ... I wouldn't say it's necessarily kind of the fault of a bunch of individual, uh, Americans, say, that they're not on better terms with various nations, but it is true that, that individual psychology makes us susceptible to politicians who want to manipulate us and make us, uh, feel more fear of another nation than maybe is warranted, and, and things like that. So yeah, I see, I see it as, as both in answer to that question. It's a, it's a grassroots problem of individual psychology, and, and I- I'd like to think of ways to get people more mobilized, uh, to address the problem at the individual level, with an eye to the, the global goal. Uh, a- and one, one asset in that regard, I mean, one, one way to get people interested in this, is that I do think that, uh, addressing the psychological obstacles to global cooperation, uh, is also a way to become a happier person. Uh, I, I think, you know, these are ... I- i- we're not-... uh, I, I, you know, I don't think we're made happy when we are, um, you know, whipped up into a state of like tribalistic, uh, frenzy, you know, and, and, and, and go on social media and find people to hate. I mean, uh, there is a sense in which that must be gratifying, or we wouldn't do it y- maybe. But, uh, I think in the long run, um, you know, we can be happier and more deeply happy if we avoid some of these pitfalls.

  4. 6:23 – 7:36

    What is good for humanity

    1. RW

    2. CW

      So what is good for humanity and the civilization-wide potential of us as a species, is also enjoyable in the process of getting to it for the individual agents as well?

    3. RW

      I re- I really think so. I mean, I, I, I really think that, that if you just, uh, you know, follow, uh, mindfulness, uh, for the purpose of kind of therapy, to become a little less anxious, maybe a little more stable, a little more appreciative of th- of the beauty in the world and of other people, I think you will wind up becoming a better citizen. And, uh, you know, without even trying necessarily. I just think, uh, it'll be harder for politicians to whip you up into a state of hatred. Uh, you'll be a little less inclined to fall for bait on social media and, uh, and contribute to, uh, kind of the tribalism problem by sharing things, retweeting things, without really examining, uh, the consequences of that. So yeah, I, I do think that's the good news, that, uh, you know, self-help and kind of helping the world can coincide.

  5. 7:36 – 9:52

    Mindfulness

    1. RW

      Yeah.

    2. CW

      I mean, stepping into that mindfulness gap, if you've spent a bit of time doing meditation, one of the coolest things is observing an emotion arise inside of you. And sometimes they're negative emotions, right? And sometimes they're triggered by some in- idiot on the other side of the internet. And sometimes the idiot is you for watching something that you know that you shouldn't have watched, or reading something you know-

    3. RW

      (laughs)

    4. CW

      ... you shouldn't have read. Um, but yeah, it's, it's everything can be a meditative exercise in that regard.

    5. RW

      Yeah, absolutely. Um, and I encourage people. You know, people think of mindfulness, some people do, as, as, you know, something that, uh, happens during meditation, or at least that you have to meditate, uh, rigorously to cultivate. And I do encourage people to try meditation, um, and to keep meditating. But you can also just try to be mindful even if you've never meditated, uh, in various ways. Uh, you can, for example, if you're feeling sad and would rather not feel sad, um, uh, or at least would not, rather not suffer from sadness, uh, just sit down, close your eyes and examine the feeling. Just ask yourself, like, "Where exactly in my head and body is the feeling of sadness?" And just examine the contours, and you'll probably find that some of the suffering has gone out of it in, in the process of your examining it. And I would also encourage people to experiment on social media, even if they've never meditated. Just next time you, you're, you're about to retweet something, or about to reply to somebody who annoys you, or about to do anything on social media, just like stop and close your eyes and examine the feeling you're feeling that is motivating you to do that, you know. Eh- we do things because of feelings. Feelings are the great motivators. Thoughts are involved in the process, but generally speaking, when w- when we are motivated to do something, there is a feeling, however subtle, driving us to do that. And, um, I'd encourage people, yeah, on social media, just e- at any point in life, just stop, close your eyes, examine the feeling. It's just kind of interesting. Uh, whatever feeling, good, bad, uh, whatever, it's just good practice, and sometimes it can keep you out of trouble.

  6. 9:52 – 10:50

    Emotionality

    1. RW

    2. CW

      One of the things I've been thinking about a lot recently is whether or not another alien civilization could be any more emotional than we are, or quick to emotion?

    3. RW

      Yeah.

    4. CW

      And one of the things that I've come to believe is they couldn't be. Because if you were to turn up our emotionality by 10 or 20%-

    5. RW

      Right.

    6. CW

      ... I think that coordination would be so difficult that you wouldn't actually be able to achieve very much. So given the fact that we're trying to avert an apocalypse, we're hopefully going to fulfill our civilizational potential and become multi-planetary space-faring, you know, type three Kardashev civilizations, is there a potential that our emotional set point is a glass ceiling which it's a Sisyphean task to try and get past with regards to mindfulness? You would need everybody to be dedicating 10,000 hours of their life simply to be able to get to the point where we could coordinate sufficiently well to reach our potential. Are we too emotional to be the civilization that we want to be?

  7. 10:50 – 14:01

    UFOs

    1. CW

    2. RW

      Well, it's a great opportunity to plug my newsletter, uh, (laughs) the Nonzero Newsletter, because the, the issue I sent out last night-

    3. CW

      Link in show notes below. Link in show notes below.

    4. RW

      ... th- th- the issue I sent out last night, uh, I think this one went out only to, only to paid subscribers. But, uh, the, uh, was about UFOs. And, and, and, uh, because, you know, they've gotten a lot of attention lately. The US government's gonna publish its big report on UFOs within a few weeks apparently, and there was a big 60 Minutes on them. And I made the argument that, uh, you shouldn't worry, uh, that they, they may be extraterrestrial. I mean, I have no idea if they are or not. I'm, I'm not like a UFO guy, but, uh, but, uh, you shouldn't worry that, "Oh no, maybe they're extraterrestrials." Uh, in fact, in a certain sense, you should hope that they are. And, and the, the reasoning I gave is, is, is, I think, pretty aligned, if I understand you correctly, with what you're saying. I mean, I, I, I said, uh ... Well, th- this, this w- could use a little background maybe. You, you may have heard of the Fermi p- paradox. The idea that, you know, wait a second, in principle there are so many planets out there that could have life. If you ask just in our galaxy, the Milky Way galaxy-... which is one of a gillion galaxies. How many planets are there that seem to be in the Goldilocks zone, that is neither too hot nor too cold for life? The current estimate is like 20 billion or something, okay? Or more, probably more. And, and so if you assume that, well, on some of... you know, the, the, so probably a lot of them, you know, a fair number of those probably have water. And so if, if life is the kind of thing that arises when circumstances are conducive given long enough, and by the way, a lot of these planets are way older than ours, so there's been a lot of time. If you assume that life kind of tends to start, and that evolution has a decent chance, at least, of producing intelligent life, and that intelligent life tends to launch technological evolution, you know, pretty soon you find yourself asking, "Well, why haven't we been contacted by aliens?" 'Cause you'd think there would be some out there that are like millennia ahead of us in terms of technological evolution. And so challenging as it is to communicate from another solar system, uh, or even travel from another solar system, you'd think there would be some that have solved the problem and so on. So, so that's the Fermi paradox, and you know, i- if there's so many opportunities, uh, for an advanced civilization to develop I- in our galaxy, and, and the universe more broadly, why haven't we heard from them? That's the paradox, and one answer you get is, "Well, maybe when, uh, civilizations get to our level, that is, they have the technology that they could use to bind themselves into a, into a, into a planetary community, solve any problems they need to solve, or they could blow the whole thing up. Maybe they blow the whole thing up." That's a, that's a common answer to the question, uh, posed by the Fermi paradox, and so I said two things. First of all, uh, you might hope that there are extraterrestrials showing up

  8. 14:01 – 15:31

    The Great Filter

    1. RW

      just so that you'll know, like, it's doable. I mean, uh, th-

    2. CW

      They've got past the great filter, therefore, so can us.

    3. RW

      They got, yeah. It's possible to get past this, this so-called, uh, this one variant of the so-called great filter. The other, the other thing I said is, "I would guess that if they did get past the great filter, they're probably morally enlightened enough that they're not gonna just, like, torture us or eat us, right?" (laughs) I mean, like, like, uh, because, you know, again, my view is that if planet Earth is going to get past, uh, the current crossroads, then people broadly are gonna have to really make, in a certain sense, more moral progress. They're gonna have to overcome some of their, uh, tendency to be just gr- gratuitously and harshly judgmental of other people, and kind of come up with reasons to hate other groups and stuff, and, uh, so, you know, I- I- I think, um, I- I- I think if there's a, if there's a civilization that's gotten beyond this threshold that we are maybe stuck at, uh, and surmounted the challenge, uh, I would suspect that they're probably, um, you know, closer to moral enlightenment than we are, and not inclined to gratuitously inflict, uh, suffering on other sentient beings. That would be my guess.

  9. 15:31 – 16:06

    Global Coordination

    1. RW

      (laughs)

    2. CW

      Well, that actually rolls forward from my proposal. My proposal is that most civilizations couldn't be more emotional than us because they would struggle with global coordination. If-

    3. RW

      Right.

    4. CW

      ... I'm saying that I think we're somewhere near the ceiling of that, you have to presume that, well, I don't know if less emotionality would be akin to more enlightenment. I'm not really too sure about that. I don't know how those two map onto each other, but th- they, they shouldn't be at least more tribal than us, or else how the-

    5. RW

      Right.

    6. CW

      ... fuck have they managed to colonize the galaxy, and get the, or get over here

  10. 16:06 – 18:10

    Tribalism

    1. CW

      at the very least?

    2. RW

      Right. They would have to be less tribal, I think. I mean, you can imagine scenarios where they, they, uh, they, they consolidate planetary order without becoming less tribal. It seems to me unlikely-

    3. CW

      Like totalitarianism, perhaps, or some sort of-

    4. RW

      Yeah, yeah, yeah.

    5. CW

      ... techn- technocracy overlord, yeah.

    6. RW

      Th- that tends to be an unstable thing. The, um, I- I think, I- I mean, as for whether you're talking about kind of level of emotionality, uh, in a certain sense, I would agree. I mean, I- I would s- I would say when you become mindful, yes, there's a sense in which you're becoming less emotional, but, you know, people, mindfulness practitioners and teachers want to be very careful with language here. It's not like your feelings are going away. It's that you are less slavishly obedient to them.

    7. CW

      Don't identify with them, no.

    8. RW

      Right. You're- you're- you're- you're- you're better at not identifying with them when it's not in your interest to do that, and, um, so I- I- I think, yeah, yeah, I- I would-

    9. CW

      If you presume that the, if you presume that the emotionality being higher made not identifying with them more difficult, though, that should end up a- a similar sort of outcome.

    10. RW

      Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You could imagine just subduing the emotions, uh, and- and that having somewhat the same effect. I'm- I'm just saying it's not exactly, I think-

    11. CW

      I understand.

    12. RW

      It's not exactly the same as, uh, mindfulness. Um, you know, i- it's, uh, of course, there, th- the, you know, the- the- the whole thing I just said about the Fermi paradox and my take on it, there are all kinds of a- assumptions underlying my analysis, and some of them are- are hard to- to kind of get a grip on. Um, like, you know, well, would any spec- and it would any technologically advanced species be prone to tribalism in the first place? In other words, would that be something it had to overcome? I think you could argue th- th- there are reasons to think maybe so, given, given the way natural selection works. I think there are reasons to think maybe so, but- but I would just acknowledge that that's an example of something I'm kind of assuming without really examining.

  11. 18:10 – 23:41

    Underwater station

    1. RW

    2. CW

      Hmm. Yeah, I think... I'm not sure. O- obviously the next couple of months are potentially going to be...... some of the most revelatory in human history, er, depending on what gets released from these files. But to me, it seems unlikely that they're living beings, uh, unless they've got some underwater station, perhaps. But what would make most sense would probably be, I mean, what do you do when you've got in the Antarctic, and you're just doing observations? Observation posts tend to have some sort of technological component that's able to do the observation on your behalf. You have cameras, you have sensors, you have so on and so forth. You know, why not just make a base down at the bottom of the, the seabed? It's far less likely the fish aren't going to bother you. Perhaps you're able to capture some sort of geothermal energy that can keep you ticking over, or based on what these Tic Tac videos are showing, it looks like you probably don't even need that. You can just bend space time around you, so who needs energy? Um, yeah, it's an interesting one. It's, it's gonna be a, a fascinating period, but I mean, God, this kind of... If it's not something from Earth, there's so many fields that get upended a little bit.

    3. RW

      Y- yeah, it'd be pretty freaky. Uh, I, I mean, the... You know, the report has been leaked to the New York Times , or at least selectively. Uh, the, the officials who leaked it wanted to get some messages out. And what, and what, what the New York Times said is, they don't find strong evidence that these are extraterrestrials. On the other hand, they are puzzled, uh, by the properties that some of these apparent, if these are indeed flying objects, uh, th- they are, uh, they seem to possess capabilities that we don't have. And, uh, you know, I, I, I honestly don't know. I, I'll be curious to look at the report itself. But, uh, uh, you know, as for the question you ask, I mean, there's a couple of things. First of all, you might say, well, given the fact that a civilization would presumably develop the capacity to communicate, uh, with us from a distance before it would develop the capacity to actually get here, which isn't an easy thing to do from, like, 10,000 light years away, um, then, uh... Although some, some solar systems are much closer than that. Uh, but, uh, uh, wouldn't you expect that that would be the first sign? Th- that you'd, you'd be getting these radio waves. That's one question. You know, the other question may be more closely related to the one you asked, is, uh, you know, these... There's kind of a couple of, of pretty interesting, uh, sightings that I'm aware of. The, the most interesting seem to be the, on the one hand, the eyewitness testimony of this David Fravor guy, the pilot off of San Diego, because there were three eyewitnesses in two planes, right? I mean, there was, uh, uh, one of his, uh... Uh, the, uh, there was a, a woman who was a fi- who was flying the plane above him, and she... So she watched what he did from a s- from a distance. He, meanwhile, went down and engaged what he says was a- an aircraft. And so... And you've got two people in each plane, and, and for the first time I'm aware of, we actually heard from this woman on 60 Minutes the other day. So, so that seems to be intrinsically interesting when you listen to their, uh, testimony. Um, and there are, mm, kind of remote kinds of corroboration of that. I mean, there was a... They were originally dispatched there by a, uh, a cruiser. Uh, I think it was a cruiser. Navy ship, uh, that, uh, had seen these things on its radar that wanted to investigate and then, uh... But they did not get anything on camera from their plane during that sighting. A plane came th- later that day. I think a plane went out and saw something that might be something, and that's the, the FLIR video, uh, uh, you know, infrared video. The, the other interesting sighting is, is v- apparent- apparently, these things just persisted for months in, like, uh... The one I just described is 2004. These other ones were, like, I think, around 2014 and, uh, they were off the East Coast of the United States. And, um, uh, they're, they're... Those are the videos where it's like people are going, "Whoa." You know? And, uh, the, uh, th- those are two other videos. And, um, so I've asked myself, looking at those, like, "Okay, so suppose these are extraterrestrials." I've asked myself the question you've asked. Like, "Well, first of all, why are they exposing themselves like this?" And I guess one thought could be, like, they didn't realize they were that visible 'cause the Navy never released the (laughs) videos, you know? I do- I don't know. I mean, uh, but it is, it is puzzling, and it may be reason, uh, to think there's less here than meets the eye. I don't know. But, um, I don't... Uh, I mean, maybe that's a better answer to the San Diego one, 'cause there was only one sighting. That, that, that, that craft seemed to have the ability to maybe even submerge in the, in the ocean. Uh, at a minimum, hover above it. Uh, and, uh, and that's the only sighting of that kind. So, maybe that's a case where, like, okay, it got seen once and then it's like, then they changed their program, right? (laughs) Like, I don't know. It's, it's, it's fun to speculate about this stuff, but I don't know. Have you, have you gotten very deeply

  12. 23:41 – 25:01

    Joe Rogan

    1. RW

      into this stuff?

    2. CW

      I've watched the Joe Rogan episodes with Commander David Fravor, and I've-

    3. RW

      Right.

    4. CW

      ... seen a bunch of other videos on the internet, and I'm in awe. Balls deep in this stuff, so he's a, actually a pretty good sort-

    5. RW

      Mm-hmm.

    6. CW

      ... of one-stop shop in terms of a resource for it. But yeah, you're right. It's a very unceremonial... If this is aliens, it's like the least ceremonial way, that you'd... No, no landing on the White House lawn, just-

    7. RW

      Right.

    8. CW

      ... dicking about in the Pacific and the Atlantic Ocean.

    9. RW

      Yeah, and you would think if they're advanced enough to get here. I mean, we, we're talking about advanced technology. If they could get here from another solar system, (laughs) you, you would think, you would think...... that it wouldn't take them terribly long to decode our communication and be able to communicate with us. And at that point, like, why wouldn't they? I guess if they think of us as this interesting experiment, um, they just want to watch. I don't know. But, uh, you know, it, it's, it's ... Uh, you know, I've walked, watched debunking videos, and, and I am totally agnostic on the question of whether there's any- anything here at all. I just, I just don't know. It's just that it's fun to speculate. Uh, and when you hear some of these people, like Fravor and that other pilot talk together, you think, "Hm,

  13. 25:01 – 28:44

    Mark Petrie

    1. RW

      pretty weird."

    2. CW

      And it's so- it's compelling because you have these multiple viewpoints, right? Yeah, it's an interesting one, man. Going back to what you were talking about at the beginning, which is this relationship between evolutionary psychology and mindfulness or Buddhism, is ... how much of a place is there for an evolutionary psychology insight from the individual, if they are a mindfulness practitioner, or just if they want to live a peaceful life? 'Cause I have my biases with regards to this particular worldview, but what are your thoughts?

    3. RW

      You mean, you mean the worldview of evolutionary psychology, or-

    4. CW

      The fact that, in my opinion, mindfulness without an insight into evolutionary psychology, at least a shallow one, and a little bit of an understanding of how cognitive biases work, I don't think that you're getting the full picture. Because for me, I want to ask the question, "Why?"

    5. RW

      Right.

    6. CW

      Why is it like that? Why does this affect me in this way? And that's when you need the adaptive explanation.

    7. RW

      Right. Um, uh, you know, obviously, uh, for centuries and centuries and centuries, uh, meditators have gotten something out of meditation, including mindfulness meditation, um, without having evolutionary psychology. Since it- you know, we've only known about natural selection for, uh, about a century and a half. Um, the, uh ... So, so it can have benefits, and, and it can have profound ones. There, there are people who, uh, I'm sure have gotten to great, great depths, greater depths than I've gotten to, uh, who lived centuries ago, uh, and got there via mindfulness meditation. Um, at the same time, I have found since writing my book about, uh, Buddhism, Why Buddhism is True, that a, a number of people respond, uh, by saying it is helpful to their practice to understand where these feelings come from in the first place. Like, why they're here. Why do humans, uh, have anxiety? Why, why, uh ... To, to look at a more generic problem that's, that's confronted head-on by Buddhism, why are we so hard to satisfy? Why is it that, you know, you have that one donut, you wait a while, you want another one. You know? It's like whatever it is, that next promotion, the, the, the, the latest material acquisition, your new gimmick that brings you gratification for a few days, sex, whatever, gratification tends to be fleeting. And this is, you know, this is just the fundamental problem that Buddhism, uh, confronted from the get-go. Uh, the fact that we seem to be driven by these thirsts. They, they, uh, can never be satisfied for very long. In fact, you know, um, the, uh, the term Dukkha, you know, the, the famous phrase, "Life is suffering," which actually the Buddha never quite exactly said in so many words, but anyway, he did say life is, uh, pretty full of suffering. Uh, a- and the word that's translated as suffering is Dukkha. And some people think you could also translate that as unsatisfactoriness. That, or that in any event, it has, it would have had that connotation in, in the Buddha's day, that the problem with life is that we keep wanting more, right? We, we, there's always this restless feeling, uh, of more. And I don't plan to ever, uh, completely prevail over that. I don't even really want to.

  14. 28:44 – 30:14

    The desire for more

    1. RW

      I mean, you know, i- it's not, it's not a h-

    2. CW

      You need a motivating force, right?

    3. RW

      Yeah, yeah. It's not a horrible affliction in itself, but it really does, uh, get out of control more often than I'd like, and you know, you're just, you're, you're better off, uh ... I mean, even, you know, if you have this motivator of wanting more in, uh, just in the sense of more influence. I mean, say you're in like kind of my line of work or yours, you're a podcaster, you're a writer, whatever, you would like to have more influence on people. You like to think that you're trying to influence them in a positive way, uh, and you'd like to do more of that. Okay, so fine, um, but even, uh, that goal I think you can pursue more effectively if, in a lot of realms, you'll let go of the desire for more. I, I mean, just to, just to take a, a very simple example, like, uh, I have, you know, uh, what I think is fair to call attention deficit disorder. I have a lot of t- trouble focusing. And if you examine what's going on there in a kind of a mindful way, you realize that it's a quest for pleasure, right? It's like I'm, I'm trying to write an email or write something, I get a little stuck, I don't know what to write next, and that causes an unpleasant feeling. It's like an, "Er, I don't know what to do." And then you think, like, "Wouldn't it

  15. 30:14 – 31:44

    Discipline yourself

    1. RW

      be fun to research, like, your next smartphone purchase or something?"

    2. CW

      (laughs)

    3. RW

      Yeah, that would be a lot more fun. I enjoy doing that.And that's just a click away, right? And, and when I examine what keeps me from being able to focus on things, it is this constant desire to be, uh, to get a little more pleasure and, and have a little less discomfort. And that leads you to not confront things that need confronting. And if you can discipline yourself, this isn't easy, but if you can get yourself, when you feel that desire to like go open another tab or go downstairs and watch TV, watch sports or something, uh, if, if you can just close your eyes and examine the feeling that's making you want to do that, uh, you know, you can, you can get better at, uh... Well, some people would complain if I say resisting it, uh, some mindfulness aficionados, but in any event, not being, uh, kind of governed by it. Um, so I, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, you know, looking for an all-out assault on our quest for pleasure or achievement or accomplishment or anything. Uh, I'm, I'm just, at least in my own case, trying to pursue my goals more effectively, uh, in a way... A- and as it happens, I think pursuing them more effectively makes you happier as well.

  16. 31:44 – 35:09

    The duka bias

    1. RW

    2. CW

      I think this point about the dukkha bias, uh, comes to one of the most central questions that most people in the 21st century are asking because we are objective metrics of success, we are a meritocracy, materialist, reductionist, utilitarian. And when you combine all of that together with the status hierarchies that are built in and, "Where am I?" and, "What do I want next?" and hedonic treadmill and all this sort of stuff, the inevitable unsatisfactoriness of most of the experiences in life can cause you to continue to chase things in a desperate attempt to try and fill that hole, coming from a scarcity mindset that you're running away from insufficiency as opposed to running toward abundance.

    3. RW

      Mm-hmm.

    4. CW

      And that is... Uh, the number of conversations that I've had about that map of experience i- is huge because for most people, for many people, especially with social media now which is an objective, quantifiable metric of your social status, might be a rough or shitty one, but um-

    5. RW

      Yeah.

    6. CW

      ... with all of this combined and weaponized and utilized and monetized, it's a difficult situation to be in, to be a happy, peaceful, balanced human.

    7. RW

      Yeah. Now that's a good example of, I think, how, how evolutionary psychology figures into this. I mean, you know, the quest for esteem, the quest to be respected is the most natural thing in the world for human beings. We are designed by natural selection to want people to think highly of us. But we weren't designed to live in this (laughs) environment where, uh, you know, we are every day, uh, seeing how, uh, how much affirmation we're getting from all of these people who don't actually even know us, right? I mean, uh, you know, you, you... It's like it- it is genuinely painful to tweet something that leads a bunch of people to judge you negatively. And, and they're, like, in no position to judge you, you know? It's crazy when you think about it. And yet, uh, and yet here we are. And it's a- it's another case where if you can just pause and examine the, the actual feeling of pain, like, "This is hurting me," just reflect on the feeling, I think the feeling will be a little less, uh, painful. And, but at the same time, the- the- the desire, the, the, uh, you know, when you tweet something and you're like, "Ah, let's check every five seconds to see how many likes I have or retweets," you know, that feeling too I think warrants, um, reflecting on because it can become pathological. It- it's, it's... And, and, and you know, this is, to get back to psychology of tribalism, this is a big problem for our society at large because Twitter, you know, social media tends to reward tribalistic behavior. The easiest way in the world to build up your Twitter following is to find a, a, a, a pretty big group, Trump supporters, Trump haters, whatever,

  17. 35:09 – 36:21

    Trump haters

    1. RW

      and just reinforce their prejudices, right? Just like, oh, like whoever it was, this genius thing the other day claiming that Trump had his pants on backwards, which turns out not to be true.

    2. CW

      (laughs) I didn't see this.

    3. RW

      But somebody had, you know-

    4. CW

      (laughs)

    5. RW

      ... whoever, whoever the person is who came up with that picture seeming to show that, "Hey, my hat's off to you. You really know how to play the Twitter game, man. Just come up with total bullshit that is deeply gratifying to everyone who hates Donald Trump, and there's a lot of those, and get it out there," you know? And, and then of course, the effect of that is for Trump supporters to say, "See? They do nothing but lie about us," right? "The, the, the Trump, the Trump haters do nothing but lie about us and about Trump. That's all the more reason not to t- trust the media. So if the media tells you the election wasn't stolen, don't believe them." And, and it's just, uh, you know, it's a, it's a, it's a really deep problem. I mean, I, I think somebody needs to find a way to make it be considered cool to not be an asshole on Twitter. (laughs)

    6. CW

      (laughs)

  18. 36:21 – 38:45

    Political polarization

    1. CW

    2. RW

      You know, like

    3. CW

      But the problem is-

    4. RW

      Like-

    5. CW

      ... no one, no one knows... No one notices you when you're being silent.... right?

    6. RW

      Right, right.

    7. CW

      Reasonable people very rarely make the headlines. No one says, "Look at this incredibly well-balanced, nuanced, centrist point that was just made here." No one gives a shit. And also, a point that I realized about Sam Harris toward the back end of last year, by being in the middle, you can guarantee disagreement from both sides. At least when you're out on the extremes, you get agreement from one of them. But by sitting in the middle... And the stupid thing is that your view on gun control should in no way be influenced by your view on abortion, or your view on the federal tax level, or your view on immigration, or anything else. But because of the way that people have become tribalized and because of how politics works, that you tend to have this two-party system, at least in America, you get that. So people get bunched together in groups. But very- th- there's no reason... If I know one of your views, and from it, I can accurately predict everything else that you believe, I can probably safely assume that you're not a serious thinker.

    8. RW

      Right. But, but what the, what political polarization does is make it more and more true that that's the case. Because people choose their policy preferences by whatever the other side doesn't like. I mean, a, a kind- a, a, a, a version of this kind of is that while so many Democrats in America are suddenly these anti-Russia cold warriors, it used to be kind of reversed, you know? And then the, the idea developed that Russia had helped Trump win the election, and I, I personally think it turned out to be a little, a little less there than met the eye. I mean, the, the Mullergate investigation didn't really turn up all that much. I mean, Russia did try to intervene and, and help them where they could. And actually, the email hack I think was genuinely consequential. But the idea floating around in the resistance for a while was like, "Oh, he's their, he's their, uh, you know, their Manchurian candidate, that he did a deal with him, and, and he's in bed with Putin and, and blah, blah, blah." And that, that led all these Democrats to suddenly, uh, be like the cold warriors that Republicans used to be. And, and there was just a complete flip on that, and, and then Republicans started saying, "Hey Russia, what's so bad with Russia?" It's, uh, it's, it's not a rational, uh, process. Political polarization.

  19. 38:45 – 40:02

    Free speech absolutism

    1. RW

    2. CW

      Well, look at the positions on free speech now. That the people who were-

    3. RW

      Yeah.

    4. CW

      ... calling for restrictions in free speech traditionally would have been the ones that were calling for free speech absolutism.

    5. RW

      Right. Uh, no that's, that's absolutely true. The, uh, you know, when, when Trump is thought to be the problem, then a lot of liberals are, are in favor of him and his, uh, people like him being shut down by social media companies. Uh, and I gotta say, life is a lot easier without him on (laughs) Twitter. But, but, you know, I would have been very interested to see if we could have mustered the discipline... I think if he hadn't been kicked off Twitter, there would've been a movement, I certainly would've supported it. I think you would've e- eh, heard, it would've made, uh, some noise to just ignore him, to just, like, start e- he's no longer president, don't do him the favor of retweeting anything he does. Just ignore him. I would've been curious to see if we could muster that much, uh, self-discipline. I'm, I'm sure it wouldn't have been a complete success, but I, I, I, I'd like to know. And, and I guess we won't know, 'cause I think he's banned, uh,

  20. 40:02 – 41:19

    Twitter

    1. RW

      from Twitter for more or less

    2. CW

      Two years on Facebook, I think, it just came out.

    3. RW

      It's at least, it's at least January 2023 on Facebook. But I think Twitter sounds like they have no plans to ever reinstate him. I don't know.

    4. CW

      Yeah. Well, I mean, the news is a lot more boring without him being around.

    5. RW

      Hey, I'm okay with boring news. Yeah, no, I, I'm not... I mean, I'm very ambivalent about, uh, the social media companies, uh, shutting him down. A- and in general, I mean, like, well, just they're, uh, you know... I, I don't think they're doing a great job of, of handling, uh, the challenge. And, and I think they should err on the side of openness and have clearer rules. Uh, but it's a weird... I, I, I kind of feel their pain. I mean, if I were running Twitter or Facebook and saw how, you know, untrue and dangerous things can spread, uh, rapidly, and, and, and saw that we had a president who, you know, was inclined to say things that weren't exactly thoroughly corroborated, uh, and get them spread widely, I, I, I, I understand their temptation to do something. It's a tough... I- it's

  21. 41:19 – 42:08

    Left vs Right

    1. RW

      not easy.

    2. CW

      I think the problem that people have is that it appears like the rules are being applied discriminately, right? Between the, the picking particular actors or particular viewpoints or particular political positions. Uh, and both sides of the aisle consider it to be their side which is the one that's being maligned, right?

    3. RW

      Right.

    4. CW

      It's the, if you have someone that is in their left echo chamber, they will only be served people on the left who have been canceled or had their channels removed, and everyone's up in arms about it. But if you're on the right-hand side of the aisle, you're, you don't see that at all. You just see your side of people that-

    5. RW

      Right.

    6. CW

      ... have been canceled and have been removed. Yeah, I mean, here's another thing. Do you remember when the first big Facebook, uh, Con- was it in front of Congress, where he had to give a statement, where Zuckerberg had to give a statement, and there was that photo of him and everyone accused him of being an android? Remember

  22. 42:08 – 44:50

    Jack Dorsey

    1. CW

      this? It was maybe about three or four years ago. (laughs) And-

    2. RW

      He is an amazing looking guy, I gotta say. But, uh-

    3. CW

      He's a very androidy-looking human. Um, but think about that. Or look at Jack Dorsey now. I mean, Jack Dorsey just looks like a man that's done far too many psychedelics, which very well may be the truth. But these are people, especially Zuck, right? He was just a kid that started a thing, and now he's strapped to this nuclear warhead rocket going at a million miles an hour, and you just look at him and you think, "You just wanted..."You, you just wanted to do, like, a cool thing on the internet. And as people progress on, we go through life, we leave our old epochs behind, we find our new ones. But God, I, I don't know. I, I really do wonder, in his darker moments or his more mindful moments, whether he thinks, "Would life have just been easier if I'd started a Shopify store or something and was just doing e-com?"

    4. RW

      Yeah. I, I don't have a very clear sense for what the answer to that is because he's so hard to figure. I think-

    5. CW

      It's 'cause he's an android, Bob.

    6. RW

      ... it, it... Well, honestly, I mean... No, I don't think he's an android.

    7. CW

      (laughs)

    8. RW

      But, but, I mean, he, he does seem not, uh, constrained by certain basic human feelings, the way... (laughs) I mean-

    9. CW

      (laughs)

    10. RW

      ... like, you know, when he went to, uh, like, when he went to Harvard, you know, he started that site, Hot... It was the Hot or Not site. You know the one? Where, uh, so they'd show-

    11. CW

      Comparing two different people. Yeah.

    12. RW

      ... pictures of, of people who, I guess, were in the freshman book or whatever at Harvard. And people would vote on how attractive they were. Now, if I had that idea, I'd think, "Ugh." Like, I don't want to cause pain to these people who are going to get down-voted. It's like, this isn't cool. He's, he doesn't have feelings like that, and he has treated Facebook that way. He's just like... I do think he kind of sees us as laboratory rats. I mean, they've literally done experiments, uh, on, you know, where they, uh... I forget the details, but where they just, uh, they're like, "Let's throw this out here, uh, and, uh, and see how people respond." And I for- I forget the details, but there are some really controversial examples of that. Um, so I don't know. I don't want to get off on Mark Zuckerberg, but... Uh, I'm trying to think. Are there any of these companies that are in the hands of people who seem, like, deeply conscientious? Hard to say. Uh, but there is a lot of power in, in a small number of hands now because of the way these companies, you know, Google, Facebook, Twitter, just blow up and dominate just by virtue of their internal dynamics. You don't, you don't have to be a ruthless monopolist to make that happen. There... Just the positive network externalities make these platforms dominant. And then you're right. Suddenly, you're running a dominant

  23. 44:50 – 48:29

    Feature vs Bug

    1. RW

      platform.

    2. CW

      (laughs) The Matthew Principle's a hell of a drug man.

    3. RW

      Yeah.

    4. CW

      Yeah, he really is. Um, just finishing off that dukkha bias thing that we were talking about. So, there's another side of the coin, I think, that when people achieve something that they thought was going to give them pleasure... Uh, my favorite example is talking about a holiday. So, you're planning a holiday for ages. You're all excited. You know the restaurant. You know the table. You might even have looked at the menu and know what you're going to order. And then you sit down, but then you notice that there's sand between your toes, and maybe it should have been iced instead of shaken, and, "Oh, I wish I'd gone for medium well instead of medium rare." Um, that is a feature, not a bug, right? That's, that's part of the source code. It's inbuilt into the substrate of our existence that everything's just going to be a little bit more tarnished than you probably thought, or if it isn't, it's going to be briefer. Um, what practices have you found to allow yourself to be able to relish those sort of good moments a little bit more?

    5. RW

      Well, first of all, as for the feature bug thing, before I answer your actual question... I mean, that, that, I think, is interesting to delve into a little, because I think you're right that the, uh, the constant evaluation of these things, like, "Couldn't this be a little bit better? It's not quite as good as I had expected." Uh, that is... It is built in, and the reason it's built in is because it's a feature by the lights of natural selection. Okay. That, that is to say that apparently, in our species, uh, and I think this would be true of a lot of species, but, uh, animals, uh, that had that, uh, did a better job of getting, uh, their genes into the next generation, uh, than other animals. But that doesn't mean it was ever a feature in terms of, uh, the happiness of the individuals, 'cause, 'cause natural selection doesn't care about our happiness to begin with. So, it could be a feature from natural selection's point of view and a bug from the point of view of, of human psychology and human happiness from the beginning. And then there's the second sense in which things can become bugs, and, and that's by virtue of how different the environment we're in is from, uh, the environment we were designed for. So, for example, um, the desire to feel a little better. Well, in an environment where there's cocaine, that can become a huge bug, right? You know, and, and, and, and cocaine wasn't part of the natural environment. So, so it wasn't, it wasn't a bug of that kind, um, in, uh, in the environment of our evolution. So anyway, that's just a little... Just wanted to be clear on, on kind of the feature bug thing. I mean, as for... So, you're asking now about, like, uh, the, uh... (laughs) . Um, I mean, I'm, first of all, a little blessed... Well, there's senses in which I'm very fuzz- fussy and senses in which I'm not. And I'm not, like, a foodie, you know. It's like, my wife's family, they're foodies. And, and they're, they're... You know? So, we'll, we'll be eating, and they'll be commenting on whether something is, you know, uh, above or below their expectations. And I'm like, "Oh, grub. Good. Put in mouth. Chew. Swallow. Go do something else." Uh, fine. Um, so, but, uh, but, but I definitely, uh, ha- have the problem at some level. And certainly,

  24. 48:29 – 53:54

    Dukas

    1. RW

      one way to get it-

    2. CW

      What's... What, what do you have a weakness for? If it's not food, what are some of the things where your dukkha bias rears its head?

    3. RW

      Oh. Well...I mean, first of all, I'm very fussy about, like, writing and stuff. That can be productive. Uh, like, "Couldn't this be a little better? Couldn't this sentence be a little better?" That can make your writing better. Um, I, uh, but I'm just... I mean, th- this will seem at odds with what I just said. I'm very aware of, uh... I- I'm very self-conscious in the sense of being a- a- aware of how, how I'm feeling at the time. And, and I think that's, uh... Well, I mean, the, the, the, the, the worst form of that is, is something I already alluded to, is just making it hard to concentrate because I do find myself thinking, uh, um, you know, "Wouldn't I feel better if I had a little more coffee, or a little more chocolate, or something of this?" I mean, that may seem at odds with what I just said about food (laughs) , but my point is, I'm not, like, a connoisseur. It's like, I, I, it's like, what I naturally do is just think about the psychological effect of food. So, like, I'm aware that, uh, carbohydrates will sedate me. So, I will, I will, I will eat them for that purpose, you know? Um, and I could probably stand to be a little less conscious at that level of how everything is, is influencing me. Um, but, uh, I don't know. I mean, I mean, things I'm, things that I find... Temptations I find it very easy to succumb to are, like, watching sports on TV. That's not a horrible thing, but carried too far, it can lead you to never accomplish anything again for the rest of your life. Uh, y- wha- what, um... I don't know. I, I, you know, chocolate, or-

    4. CW

      So, just think about, what about reveling in things, end states, events, achievements? Just allowing those to linger a little bit longer. It feels like that's something that I think a lot of people wish that... The holiday that they're planning to go on, the new house that they're planning to buy, even someone that's taken the hedonic treadmill red pill and knows that, "Look, this isn't going to be an inherent source of happiness, but it's still something-"

    5. RW

      Mm-hmm.

    6. CW

      "... that I can be proud of in what it symbolically represents, that I have worked for this, that it is a new stage, a new level that I've reached within my life," whatever it might be. Um, yeah, just not looking for that next thing. It seems like that balance, again, delivered by culture, delivered by evolutionary psychology, both kind of colliding and combining and, uh, increasing. Um, that just seems to be one of the challenges that people have, and I think one of the reasons they get into mindfulness, to avoid negative emotions and to further allow themselves to enjoy positive ones.

    7. RW

      Mm-hmm. And, uh, yeah. I mean, I, I think the, the trick is partly not to have too much of a grasping kind of attitude toward the feeling of success. Uh, I don't know. I sometimes wonder, you know, these, uh... Like, right now, I'm wondering, like, how is Phil Mickelson feeling? Like, I don't know if you follow golf. But he just became the, uh, oldest person ever to win a major golf tournament. He, uh, he was a month away from 51. This was, uh, a couple of weeks ago. And he had been working just incredibly hard to get back in the, in the game, even though he's past, way past his prime. And, uh, I wondered, how long does the thrill, uh, last? And, and, and how, you know, uh, for him. Uh, I mean, I, I, I don't know. I think it's certainly true that a lot of people who have accomplished great things are not very happy, precisely because the feeling always evaporates, and, a- and, and that's what keeps them motivated. Uh, but I know, in my case, I am confident that, uh, I could, by becoming more mindful, and I think I've already made some progress in that regard, um, actually become more productive. Uh, you know, because, uh... You know, I, I think there is some level of, uh, mindfulness you could get to where you were, uh, you know, you were less ambitious. That, that can happen. You know, people... It's a common question. People say, uh, "If I, w- what if I meditate so much that, um, I just no longer have the desire to succeed?" Or whatever. Uh, and I say, "Well, first of all, by definition, you'll probably be happy." That's why, you know, (laughs) you'll, you'll let go of it. But also, it's almost certainly not gonna happen. I mean, uh, it, it... I think for most of us, uh, you know, just getting, uh, to a, to a, mindful enough to pursue the goals we most care about more effectively is enough of a, a challenge. And the chances of getting so far beyond that point that we just sit around and meditate all day is pretty slim.

  25. 53:54 – 55:42

    Motivation

    1. RW

    2. CW

      It's the same argument that I give to girls who are worried that lifting weights in the gym is going to make them too muscly, that, "Do you know how long and how hard I've worked in the gym in a desperate attempt to become muscly? And you're concerned (laughs) that by lifting the sixes instead of the fours, that you're gonna-"

    3. RW

      Right.

    4. CW

      "... walk out of there jacked out of your mind?" So, this isn't going to happen. Overshooting with things like this, especially where people dedicate a lot of time to it, is just so unlikely, and there's so much work to be done to get to that point, that... Uh, it's not as if it's gonna come out-

    5. RW

      Yeah.

    6. CW

      ... of nowhere. You're not just gonna wake up-

    7. RW

      Yeah.

    8. CW

      ... one day and your default mode networks just completely shut off-

    9. RW

      Right.

    10. CW

      ... or you've got 23-inch arms.

    11. RW

      Right. It's like, get back to me if this becomes a problem. Like-

    12. CW

      (laughs)

    13. RW

      If, if you're just sitting around in a state of bliss all day, I'll have two questions. Is it really a problem if you're in a state of bliss all day, A? And B, did this really happen? 'Cause I don't think it's gonna happen. Um, but, uh, so you're, you're like a s- you're, like, a serious fitness guy, right?

    14. CW

      ... I, I train a lot, yes.

    15. RW

      And, and is this, uh... Do you have trouble staying motivated?

    16. CW

      Sometimes. Sometimes.

    17. RW

      Yeah.

    18. CW

      Yeah.

    19. RW

      And it's like what? Weightlifting and what is it? Uh...

    20. CW

      It's a combination, so sometimes it's CrossFit, sometimes it's bodybuilding. Um, the reason that motivation sometimes ebbs and flows is that one training methodology often gets boring, but you can easily change that up. Going to Muay Thai, so I went out to Thailand, and I'm gonna go to more functional fitness, or I'm gonna start- start doing yoga for a while, and now I'm back into bodybuilding again, so on and so forth.

    21. RW

      Yeah. No, that makes sense. Uh, I kind of feel that way about different meditation techniques. Sometimes, you know, you start, uh, seeming to get diminishing returns, and there are different things you can try, different techniques.

  26. 55:42 – 57:55

    Pivots

    1. RW

      Um-

    2. CW

      I've really found that recently. I was with, uh, Shinzen Young's Five Ways to Know Yourself, so I was following that-

    3. RW

      Yeah.

    4. CW

      ... for the longest time. And, um, it just, after a while, it just felt like banging your head off a wall. And-

    5. RW

      Mm-hmm.

    6. CW

      ... I can't remember where I heard it. Someone s- used this analogy. They said, "Don't expect the boat that carried you across the river to take you across land to the next river."

    7. RW

      Mm-hmm.

    8. CW

      And that was a really nice insight. Like, look, you, you've made some gains, leave it there.

    9. RW

      Right.

    10. CW

      Let's look forward. What can there be? What have been some of the major pivots that you've made that have helped your mindfulness practice?

    11. RW

      Uh, well, you know, it goes up and down. Um, a thing I'm trying now, because I have hit, uh, you know, kind of a, a wall, um, is just meditating a second time a day. Um, the, uh, you know, because I do meditate every morning, and that's, that's good, uh, but, you know, I- later in the day, you'll have a, there's, there's, uh, there's different stuff to meditate on. Like, you, you may, by, by 5:00 PM, um, your mind is just in a different place. There, there's probably a little more restlessness, uh, some aggravations. And, uh, what I've just started doing, like, yesterday is realizing that, look, as long as you're wearing a fitness watch, you can just set it to go off every day at 6:30 PM. And, uh, it's a reminder to meditate. Because all other, uh, reminders in my life don't work, because like, the, you know, the, the, the... Because my appointment calendar always signals 15 minutes before an appointment. You just, you just get in the habit of dismissing that without even thinking about it. So, I finally had this epiphany yesterday, like, "Set your watch, and you'll only get one alarm." You know, I- I meditate in the morning and then... So, uh, yesterday was the first day doing that. I like it.

  27. 57:55 – 58:47

    Meditation

    1. RW

      (laughs)

    2. CW

      You're definitely right in saying that morning is, I wouldn't say easy mode, but it's less hard mode than later on in the, in the day.

    3. RW

      Yeah.

    4. CW

      If you're committing yourself to, "I have to meditate every day," and you miss your morning session, the anxiety that you know it's going to be like, "I'm going to sit down for 15 minutes, and I'm going to have that song that I heard in the car on the way to the gym in my head-"

    5. RW

      Right.

    6. CW

      "... and that conversation I've just had with my business partner," and so on and so forth.

    7. RW

      Yeah. Yeah. I mean, in a way, later in the day, sometimes it's easier in the sense that there is something to meditate on, right? Uh, like, there is a specific, uh, frustration, or you're mad at somebody, or just at that moment, you're feeling some sharp emotion that's a result of what happened that day. Sometimes that's, that's good to have a, to have, uh, something in your body to focus on, as- aside from just the breath.

  28. 58:47 – 1:11:09

    The Creator Economy

    1. RW

    2. CW

      As a new or fairly recent Substack convert yourself, what do you think we've learned over the last sort of 12 months? We've seen people like Matthew Yglesias decide to just leave his position at Vox, which was super prestigious, probably incredibly well paid, and maybe now making m- even more money there. We've seen Scott Alexander do the same, go from probably one of the biggest, if not the biggest, rationalist blogs in the world to start Astral Codex 10. What's your experience been coming at the creator economy from this side?

    3. RW

      Um, I had actually been on Substack a while, uh, and I only went paid, uh, a few months ago. So, I built up a pretty substantial email list of people who are getting it for free. And so now, I'm in the process of doing, you know, uh, you know, certain amount of paid content, some free content, and you try to convert people from the free list to the paid list. That's the basic, um, strategy. And I'm finding it, uh, you know, reasonably gratifying. Uh, I, uh, I, it's not... It, it, it hasn't made me, uh, wealthy beyond my wildest dreams by any means. I don't, you know, I don't have the optimal, uh, kind of shtick for it, you know? I mean, i- it's kind of like building up a big following on Twitter. You're best off, uh, if you can, like, make, like, kind of incendiary arguments and get a bunch of people mad and make a bunch of other people happy. Matt, by the way, Matt Yglesias, uh, is, is an interesting kind of exception to that. I mean, he does make some people angry, but he consistently puts out pretty cerebral, well, well thought out, uh, stuff, and he's not especially tribal. I actually had him-

    4. CW

      He's a pretty mild-mannered dude. I had him on the show, and he seemed like an-

    5. RW

      Well-

    6. CW

      ... incredibly mild-mannered dude. Although his internet persona may be different, I haven't seen enough to be able to comment on that.

    7. RW

      Well, he will tell you, uh...... that he has a temper, and he actually does. I know him a little. Uh, but- but it doesn't come out that often, um, and he's- he's pretty good at rising above. Uh, so I don't know. I don't... I think there's going to be a limited number of huge success stories like him, Glenn Greenwald, Matt Taibbi, um, because partly, I think people are getting subscriber fatigue. I mean, you know, it's like, you can only subscribe to so many newsletters, actually pay for them before you start thinking, "Wait a second, (laughs) like, how much money can I spend on this?" Uh, so I don't know. Um, I don't have a clear sense for the landscape in terms of how many people are- are making a huge success of it, uh, and- and, um, how many aren't. Uh-

    8. CW

      Are you gonna see more creators paywall their content, hide behind stuff? Because people do this for different reasons. Some people do it, Steven Crowder is a good example of this. The reason that Steven Crowder paywalls some of his content is that he doesn't want that to be the trending news story. He wants to say things within a- a walled community that he doesn't want seen by the wider world, or at least shared to the wider world.

    9. RW

      Right.

    10. CW

      Uh, other people want to do it to assist them financially, other people want to do it for a whole litany of reasons. Um, is that the, at least for now?

    11. RW

      No, that makes... I- I- I can see the logic. In fact, I'm doing kind of a version of that myself. I mean, the way I'm... So the newsletter is called the Nonzero Newsletter. The thing, the Apocalypse Aversion project is something that I think of as being kind of the part that's behind the paywall for the most part. And certainly one thing that's, uh, behind the paywall, uh, is, you know, I'm- I'm kind of trying to put together a conception of a book on the subject of the Apocalypse Aversion project, whether it'd be called that or not, I don't know. But when I've, uh, when I've most explicitly dealt with that, like, here's a draft of an introduction to the book, or here's the overall argument of the book, I've done that behind the paywall. And- and I do, uh, I do feel more comfortable doing that in front of a, uh, smaller and less judgmental audience, right? I mean, these are... You would think if they're paying for my newsletter, these are people who don't hate me, so they're probably not going to just kind of tear into me, and yet, uh, they will... Uh, you know, I ask for, uh, constructive feedback and- and they give it in the comment section, and that's useful. Sometimes they email me. Um, and so that- that is working for me, thinking of this not just as a revenue generation thing, uh, but also as a place where you can cultivate a particular project in an environment that's conducive to that.

    12. CW

      So you are able to use the paywall as a selection effect to find-

    13. RW

      Mm-hmm.

    14. CW

      ... a particular group of people who are bought in at a particular level, and then-

    15. RW

      Mm-hmm.

    16. CW

      ... you're building in public and permitting that particular group of more bought in, probably deeper understanding of your work, uh, that community to then give you feedback on it. Jack Butcher from Visualize Value, uh, is doing something incredibly similar, but on the graphics side. He has this-

    17. RW

      Mm.

    18. CW

      ... big community, and then other people. He's got a huge, um, Slack thing where all different people show their work and then they all comment on each other's. So he's almost got this iterative process for the people that are doing what he's doing within his community as well. So I think that's a, that's quite a cool thing that you, that you have going on there. I mean, you see this with, uh, Locals. Locals, which is Dave Rubin's equivalent of Patreon, uh, some center and center-right people have kind of taken to that platform because it's like a Facebook. So you- you all, you have friends and you can have conversations with other people, which means that the creator actually passively creates content just by having a group of followers that all communicate with themselves. So yeah, I think it's a liberating time. It's just interesting to see what's happening, especially someone... Um, Scott Alexander and Matt were two examples I thought of, because Matt was in such a prestigious position, I thought that would be the sort of person that would maybe never leave. And Scott was in a position that was so, uh, obvi- he was obviously doing his site and Drummonder and he was kind of abstracted away from it a little bit and wasn't a public-facing guy.

    19. RW

      Mm-hmm.

    20. CW

      And for him to then turn on a dime, I know the New York Times article had something to do with that, but for him to switch that strategy, I just thought those were two really, like, "Okay, there's something, there's really something to this."

    21. RW

      Yeah. Well, I think Matt, for one thing, wanted to feel a little more liberated to write what he wanted. Uh, the, um... He was, when he was on my show, on my, uh, The Wright Show, he explained, this was a few months ago, he- he explained, uh, why he left, uh, in a way that's more subtle than- than how I would characterize it. But I do think at least part of the, uh, part of the dynamic was that Vox, uh, was getting pretty woke, uh, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but in some cases maybe made him feel constrained. So you know, he had signed the, um, so-called Harper's letter, which is kind of an anti- anti-cancel culture letter. It was mostly conservatives, but some progressives like him and Michelle Goldberg signed it. And he- he got into some trouble for that from some, uh, from I think a trans Vox staffer who said that because the letter had also been signed by somebody that this person considered anti-trans, uh, you know-

    22. CW

      Guilt by association.

    23. RW

      ... it was an issue or... What's that? E- e- yeah, whatever. Uh, so, and this was before he left Fox. Um, I don't know how much that had to do with it, but, uh...You know, it's certainly, a number of people have said, uh, they go to, um, Substack for the freedom. Um, you know, there are various places you can go. You can start a podcast, uh, for the freedom. Uh, a- and it's true that if you... You know, i- I've worked in olden times for, you know, a number of actual publications, and it's true, there's always some kind of constraint, and there always was. I, I mean, it wasn't always like it is now, uh, but there were always things that, you know, when you thought about it, if you wrote them, they would not be welcome at that publication, you know? Um, there, there's no, there's no freedom like having your own platform.

    24. CW

      Yeah.

    25. RW

      Uh...

    26. CW

      Yeah, it's interesting, especially Apple are rolling out, you may have seen, a paid-only internal thing now, so you can paywall content within the Apple Podcast app itself. Spotify, if they haven't already rolled out, in beta, will almost certainly be doing it. That's the reason for getting Rogan and the Obamas on and so on and so forth, because they want to build up the listener base, so that they can then say-

    27. RW

      Mm-hmm.

    28. CW

      "Look, we'll monetize, we'll host through..." I think they've got Anchor FM or Radio FM or something. "Uh, and we'll then be able to let you do audience capture in terms of this." So, yeah, I mean, for the people that have things to say and an audience to say it to, it's a, it's a good time. But look-

    29. RW

      Although, although Spotify, you know, I, I think, uh, they got some staff blowback on Rogan, and I think they, didn't they even remove some things from the archives or something? Um-

    30. CW

      They didn't transfer across a bunch of episodes, and-

Episode duration: 1:11:14

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