The Hidden Motives in Everyday Life | Robin Hanson

1. 0:00 – 15:00

   (wind blowing) Hello, friends. We…

   1. CWChris Williamson0:00

      (wind blowing) Hello, friends. We are talking today about hidden motives in everyday life. Robin Hanson is the author of The Elephant in The Brain. This book is an evolutionary look at why we do the things we do, what are the reasons that our brain is encouraging us to perform particular actions, and how are we deceived by the monkey inside of our own mind? If you've never dabbled in the world of evolutionary psychology before, this is a fantastic introduction to it and it- I found it super interesting. We break down why competition is such an important driving factor for humans, how collectively established rules and norms came about in hunter-gatherer societies and why they're important. We also talk about the dark side of those rules and norms, about lying and cheating and how evolutionarily it's a very effective way to move forward. We look at laughter from an evolutionary perspective, conversations, body language, gossip, and why there is a justification for gossip actually being useful in hunter-gatherer societies and in the modern day, how consumer behavior is influenced by hidden motives, healthcare, altruism and being charitable, and an awful lot more. What's super interesting and I think very liberating about this discussion is the fact that it reminds us just how at the mercy of our primitive brains we really are. Now, our environment has progressed an awful lot over the last 5,000 years, but our brains haven't (laughs) changed all that much and it's nice and important to be reminded of the fact that we're basically just hairless apes that have managed to harness a little bit of electricity. So, let's find the elephant in our brains. (upbeat music) Robin Hanson, welcome to Modern Wisdom. How are you today?

   2. RHRobin Hanson2:11

      I'm very happy to be here.

   3. CWChris Williamson2:13

      (laughs) Fantastic. So you are-

   4. RHRobin Hanson2:14

      We're gonna talk about interesting stuff, aren't we?

   5. CWChris Williamson2:16

      We are gonna talk about interesting stuff, yeah. We're gonna blow some minds today, I think. Uh, so-

   6. RHRobin Hanson2:21

      Let's go.

   7. CWChris Williamson2:21

      ... you are an associate professor of economics at George Mason University, and a research associate at the Future of Humanity Institute of Oxford, u- amongst other titles.

   8. RHRobin Hanson2:32

      I am indeed.

   9. CWChris Williamson2:33

      (laughs) So reading your website, the bio is a lot like being hosed down with a bit of a pressure washer. You've got over 3,890 citations and have been published nearly 100 times across a very, very wide range of fields. Why- why is your work so eclectic? Why is it so varied?

   10. RHRobin Hanson2:55

       Well, um, most academics, uh, basically look for a secure place, a place where they are in authority and where they can contribute and where they've been rewarded, and then they stay there. (laughs)

   11. CWChris Williamson3:09

       Mm-hmm.

   12. RHRobin Hanson3:09

       And I've been much more of a wanderer looking for the most interesting topics and especially looking for anything more interesting than what I've been working on lately. Uh-

   13. CWChris Williamson3:18

       Okay, so is it a short attention span? (laughs)

   14. RHRobin Hanson3:20

       ... and that makes you wire. (laughs) To some extent, but, uh ...

   15. CWChris Williamson3:23

       Yeah.

   16. RHRobin Hanson3:23

       So, at least in the past I held myself to the standard of if I was gonna go into a new area, I should produce a publication there-

   17. CWChris Williamson3:30

       Mm-hmm.

   18. RHRobin Hanson3:31

       ... that would be published by the experts in that area and that would acknowledge that I had made a contribution and that would justify the fact that I had, uh, distracted myself from other things and-

   19. CWChris Williamson3:40

       (laughs)

   20. RHRobin Hanson3:40

       ... done something in that area.

   21. CWChris Williamson3:41

       Yeah. (laughs) I get that completely. So that's a bit of, uh, of signaling I suppose straight away, which is what we're gonna- we're gonna get stuck into in a little bit. So, your book, Elephant in the Brain: Hidden Motives in Everyday Life, it came out at the start of the year. Can you tell us why you wrote this book?

   22. RHRobin Hanson4:00

       S- so this is, uh, the answer to a puzzle that's been bothering me all my life.

   23. CWChris Williamson4:07

       Okay. (laughs)

   24. RHRobin Hanson4:07

       And so I've been noticing that in many areas, uh, there's just a lot of things that don't make sense, a lot of the things that are strange, and that's been bugging me for a long time. Why are all these strange things? They're like, "Why doesn't the world make sense?" And I decided, well, this was an answer to a lot of puzzles, a lot of reasons why, uh, things don't make sense is that we've been just making the wrong assumption, a key wrong assumption about motives. Uh, in most areas, people have a standard motive, they'll tell you about why they do it, and we usually just take them at their word and think about the details and I realized that in an awful lot of areas, they're just wrong about their basic motive. The- the most fundamental thing they're saying about why they're doing it is, in an important sense, wrong.

   25. CWChris Williamson4:53

       Do you think that's consciously wrong or a combination of deceptive and, uh, unconscious motivations?

   26. RHRobin Hanson5:01

       It varies. Uh, it's com- that part is complicated. (laughs)

   27. CWChris Williamson5:04

       Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

   28. RHRobin Hanson5:05

       Uh, because we each vary in, uh, ourselves and- and what's important to us, et cetera. So each one of us tends to have something in our lives that we consider the most sacred and important.

   29. CWChris Williamson5:16

       Mm-hmm.

   30. RHRobin Hanson5:17

       And in that area we insist on idealism about our motives. We ins- so if- if you are a researcher, say, and that's the thing that's your sacred thing, then you are really- uh, it's really important to you that you see your motive in research as high and important, uh, to justify-
2. 15:00 – 30:00

   (laughs) …

   1. RHRobin Hanson15:00

      kind of hard because, uh, you know, only a couple of you can really get close to them and you could throw the first punch when he wasn't looking but, uh, that's not gonna help very much.

   2. CWChris Williamson15:07

      (laughs)

   3. RHRobin Hanson15:08

      (laughs) And so it's actually pretty hard for any large group to, uh, to actually counter the big guy.

   4. CWChris Williamson15:15

      Mm-hmm.

   5. RHRobin Hanson15:15

      But in a group of humans, uh, with weapons, you could all stand kind of far away and then 20 of you could stand far away and all pelt him with rocks (laughs) and, uh, that would be much more effective.

   6. CWChris Williamson15:26

      Job done.

   7. RHRobin Hanson15:28

      And so, uh, human weapons and language, uh, uh, allowed social norm enforcement much more than for other animals. So language is necessary in order to be able to say, "I have to tell you what this other person did wrong-"

   8. CWChris Williamson15:39

      Mm-hmm.

   9. RHRobin Hanson15:40

      ... "and then you have to tell me that, yeah, that's, you agree that that was a real violation and then we have to talk about what to do about it." And all of those things are just much harder to do without language.

   10. CWChris Williamson15:48

       I get that. I've got a, a question from George McGill, who is one of our listeners, and he's a massive fan of the book. He asked a couple of questions that I think are pertinent here and he asked: why do we gossip, what percentage of human conversation is gossip, and does Robin think people are aware of how much they gossip?

   11. RHRobin Hanson16:09

       (laughs) Um, gossip doesn't tend to have a good reputation. So people like to downplay their tendency to gossip. We mostly discuss it when we talk about it.

   12. CWChris Williamson16:20

       (laughs)

   13. RHRobin Hanson16:21

       Uh, so a highbrow people are supposedly gossiping less, although that's not been my experience.

   14. CWChris Williamson16:27

       But no one-

   15. RHRobin Hanson16:27

       Whenever I've seen highbrow people, they're gossiping a lot.

   16. CWChris Williamson16:29

       All, all the time. No one ever talks about how much they love watching TMZ, do they? (laughs)

   17. RHRobin Hanson16:34

       Well, some people do, so over time people are more willing, but, but basically, uh, it's striking how much people do gossip given how much they seem to disapprove of gossip.

   18. CWChris Williamson16:43

       Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

   19. RHRobin Hanson16:44

       Uh, but gossip is, um, an obvious useful thing for species like humans to be doing. Uh, first of all, we just, we need to be talking about something 'cause we're just hanging out with each other trying to show how much we like each other and we're also trying to impress each other, and we're looking for something to talk about that could be useful and gossip is, is pretty useful 'cause gossip is how we find out who's been doing what and who we approve and disapprove of and who we're gonna coordinate against. (laughs) And so, you know, being such complicated political creatures, we're always trying to form coalitions that have us on the inside and our rivals on the outside-

   20. CWChris Williamson17:18

       Mm-hmm.

   21. RHRobin Hanson17:19

       ... and gossip helps us do that.

   22. CWChris Williamson17:21

       So that's part of enforcing, enforcing the rules and norms, right? If I do something wrong and-

   23. RHRobin Hanson17:28

       Sure.

   24. CWChris Williamson17:29

       ... a, a bunch of... I, I know that there is this external accountability that's going to come back and get me because if Suzy sees me doing it, she's gonna tell Brian and Brian's gonna tell and da, da, da, and-

   25. RHRobin Hanson17:39

       Right.

   26. CWChris Williamson17:39

       ... it goes around.

   27. RHRobin Hanson17:40

       Right. So when it's working well- (laughs)

   28. CWChris Williamson17:43

       Yeah. Okay. (laughs)

   29. RHRobin Hanson17:43

       ... that's what's supposed to happen.

   30. CWChris Williamson17:44

       That's when Suzy's not a lying bitch, yeah.
3. 30:00 – 45:00

   I totally get that.…

   1. RHRobin Hanson30:00

      point of our book is just to make you understand the basics about everybody, not so much just yourself.

   2. CWChris Williamson30:06

      I totally get that. I think it's- it's nice the distinction that you've drawn between the analysis and commentary, so to speak, that you guys have made in the book and the prescriptive nature of- of how you would get around it. Like the- the 10-step... It's not called The 10-Step Process To Control The Elephant In Your Brain (laughs) . Do you know what I mean?

   3. RHRobin Hanson30:26

      Right. Well, like, first of all, we have to decide whether we like it or not. I mean (laughs) -You know, just because we've been pretending to be these angels doesn't mean it would actually be a good idea if, if we tried to become these angels we pretend we are. We, we have to think it through. Um, and so, you know, first of all it's just, it's not gonna be feasible to change us that much from what we are. We, we have a lot of inertia in what we are and we were built for who we are, and we can't really change ourselves that much, so, uh, the first order of business is just to figure out what we are and, and get oriented to that, uh, under the assumption that it probably won't be that different from what it is.

   4. CWChris Williamson31:02

      I get it.

   5. RHRobin Hanson31:02

      Uh, then, it might be better to, to, uh, change ourselves somewhat, but probably the biggest things is, is just to be honest (laughs) with what we really are. So like we say, you know, there are these huge engines of waste in our society where because we've been pretending one thing and really doing another thing, we're wasting enormous amounts of resources And maybe we're gonna have to keep wasting a lot of resources in those areas, but we should at least be aware of that (laughs) and ask ourselves, "Could we waste a little less resources there somehow?"

   6. CWChris Williamson31:32

      Mm-hmm.

   7. RHRobin Hanson31:33

      Uh, and that may not be the, uh, rising to our ideals. It might be through some other, uh, channel, or some other... So, in general when there's a conflict between what you are and what you say you are or what you want to be, there's, you know, three, at least three possible strategies. One is to raise what you are up to the ideals you pretend.

   8. CWChris Williamson31:53

      Yep.

   9. RHRobin Hanson31:53

      Another is to lower your standards down to where you are.

   10. CWChris Williamson31:57

       (laughs) Yep.

   11. RHRobin Hanson31:58

       And a third one is just, uh, ooh, look, a plane.

   12. CWChris Williamson32:01

       Yeah. Okay. (laughs) Distraction. (laughs) Okay.

   13. RHRobin Hanson32:03

       Just distract yourself. Just talk about something else, right?

   14. CWChris Williamson32:05

       Yeah.

   15. RHRobin Hanson32:06

       And those are all live options here.

   16. CWChris Williamson32:09

       Okay. Well, um, so I want to get back into some of the meat and veg, so to speak, of the book itself. I want to talk about pretexts, lying, and cheating. Can you take us through how you summarized that, please?

   17. RHRobin Hanson32:24

       All right. So there's this idea that we have these norms, uh, there's these rules that, of things you're not supposed to do-

   18. CWChris Williamson32:29

       Yeah.

   19. RHRobin Hanson32:29

       ... and then you're supposed to enforce the norms. And so, uh, but we're actually trying to get away with not following the rules. (laughs) 'Cause the rules are usually a bit in our way. And so while you might think it would be hard to avoid these rules when everybody else is watching out for deviations in the rules and ready to enforce them, but it turns out not to be (laughs) quite as hard as you might think. 'Cause what everybody really wants to do is to look like they're trying to enforce the rules. (laughs)

   20. CWChris Williamson32:54

       (laughs)

   21. RHRobin Hanson32:55

       They're not trying so hard to actually enforce the rules as to avoid the accusation that, "Look, you did not enforce the rule when you were supposed to."

   22. CWChris Williamson33:01

       Mm-hmm.

   23. RHRobin Hanson33:01

       So we're all really weakly motivated to enforce these rules, which lets us get away with avoiding the rules as long as we have any sort of weak pretext, just a little excuse. (laughs) That's all everybody's looking for. (laughs) If you're gonna be really obvious about breaking the rules, well, they're gonna have to come down on you because otherwise they're gonna look bad, but if you give them any little excuse to pretend that they didn't see it or that it wasn't what they saw, or whatever, they're just, they're happy to have those excuses 'cause it's not like they really care whether you follow the rule themselves. They just care to look like they were enforcing the rule when they were supposed to.

   24. CWChris Williamson33:32

       I guess, I guess that not only do the rules make li- people's lives more difficult, but enforcing the rules also make people's lives more difficult.

   25. RHRobin Hanson33:40

       That's a big, that's absolutely a big pain. So, an example we give, uh, is the example of drinking alcohol in public. In, in many places, most places in the United States, it's against the rules to drink alcohol in public. Now... And the police are supposed to enforce that rule, but they don't really want to. They think they have more important things to do. I don't think it, they don't actually think it's that harmful typically, but they think that if you really put it in their face, waving a big bottle of wine around, say, that you're-

   26. CWChris Williamson34:05

       Yeah.

   27. RHRobin Hanson34:05

       ... guzzling off of-

   28. CWChris Williamson34:06

       Yeah.

   29. RHRobin Hanson34:06

       ... then they have to do something 'cause you were, you were forcing them. But they don't really want to, and so they'll take any little excuse so that, a standard, classic, you know, solution is you put your alcohol bottle in a paper bag and then you drink out of the paper bag. (laughs)

   30. CWChris Williamson34:20

       Yeah.
4. 45:00 – 1:00:00

   Well, um, but you…

   1. CWChris Williamson45:00

   2. RHRobin Hanson45:00

      Well, um, but you and I want to talk about it.

   3. CWChris Williamson45:03

      (laughs)

   4. RHRobin Hanson45:03

      Well, if we laugh and joke about talking about it, we might find out from each other the other guy doesn't really mind if we talk about it (laughs) and then we can, like, just actually start talking about it in private and know that the other guy's not gonna tell on us 'cause they don't really mind. So we- we can actually figure out which rules anybody wants to enforce. And so like there's this old saying, I guess Mel Brooks, I think, said, you know, um, "Tragedy is when I hurt my little finger- finger. La- Uh, comedy is when you walk into an open sewer and die."

   5. CWChris Williamson45:31

      (laughs)

   6. RHRobin Hanson45:35

      Which is that a lot of humor is- is about the distinction between us not caring much about things far away from us that don't actually impact us much. And so we use laughter and often to probe those things to figure out which rules and things people care enough about that they would enforce the rules and which they don't.

   7. CWChris Williamson45:55

      It's like a safe space, so to speak.

   8. RHRobin Hanson45:58

      It's supposed to be. I mean, it's not actually.

   9. CWChris Williamson46:00

      (laughs)

   10. RHRobin Hanson46:00

       But that's the pretense. You're- when you're pretending to play, you're pretending to be in a safe space and so, uh, unless you want to, you know, acknowledge that you're not really safe, um, y- y- you kind of have to keep going on and pretending.

   11. CWChris Williamson46:12

       Well, everyone will know the situation in which everyone's been laughing and someone deems that they've taken it too far and the laughter is broken and the sa- (laughs) the safe space is now gone and you are very much back in the real world-

   12. RHRobin Hanson46:26

       Right.

   13. CWChris Williamson46:27

       ... with a- a sense of guilt and a pang in your stomach 'cause you've said something that's upset someone or you've-

   14. RHRobin Hanson46:31

       Right.

   15. CWChris Williamson46:32

       ... watched someone say something that they totally shouldn't have done and the person on the other side of the room's face has just gone back to death stare.

   16. RHRobin Hanson46:40

       Right, and- and it's a hard choice to even trigger that because, say, you know, somebody makes a joke and everybody's laughing and now you are hurt, but if you admit you're hurt, you take everybody out of play mode and you kind of admit, "Well, I was weak enough that I had to take everybody out of play mode 'cause I actually got hurt." If you're trying to show that you're strong and tough and- and it didn't bother you, then you often, like, pretend like it didn't hurt you so that you can pretend that you're strong and tough.

   17. CWChris Williamson47:06

       I guess that would be a m- modern manifestation, that kind of sucking it up or keeping yourself quiet. Had that have been 50,000 years ago, that would be what you wanted to signal. Outwardly, you would want to signal that you were tough enough to be able to take the play because if you weren't, that would identify you as a weaker member of the group.

   18. RHRobin Hanson47:25

       Well, you- you'd want to be making the right strategy choice in the right context. So, um, (laughs) like if this is a rival who's insulting you-

   19. CWChris Williamson47:33

       Yes.

   20. RHRobin Hanson47:33

       ... in this play mode, uh, you have a choice between pretending that it- it's beneath you to even respond because they're- they're not really a challenger to you and you don't really care about anything they have to say. Or on the other hand, deciding that they've made a provocation and you're going to show that you don't take these things lying down. Say you could pretend it's really an insult about your friend and not about you (laughs) and then you could take the stance if you're defending your friend.

   21. CWChris Williamson47:55

       Yeah. Okay, so you're-

   22. RHRobin Hanson47:56

       And you're gonna- you're gonna- you're gonna make a fight out of it. You're gonna make a conflict out of it. But often, like, we make a conflict out of something, it's a choice. We can decide to ignore it or let it slip by or we can decide to make it a conflict and we're supposed to be, you know, evolution point of view, deciding when it's in our interest to do one versus the other.

   23. CWChris Williamson48:10

       Exactly, yeah. You can... In play mode, you can use it... You can kind of downplay whatever's occurring and use it as a cushion or you can actually use it as an excuse to magnify whatever's occurred and escalate the- the issue depending on what your preferred outcome is.

   24. RHRobin Hanson48:26

       Right. You... I mean, often what- what you might do is show that you're so clever and strong by not just letting it slide, but by making, like, a quip that's- that jumps on that one, but turns it around on somebody, them or one of their allies-

   25. CWChris Williamson48:38

       Yes.

   26. RHRobin Hanson48:39

       ... and shows that you're, uh...... not al- you're not hurt, you're, you're not hurt enough that you're, you have all your wherewithal to make such a clever retort.

   27. CWChris Williamson48:46

       Yeah, yeah. I totally get that, I tot- it's, it's interesting that, um, laughter is so, uh, it's so related to being relaxed and that, that signaling, I mean, everyone will know the guy or girl who manages to always get somewhat a- a very sexually attractive partner because they're funny. You know, especially in men that capacity to be funny is one, you know, good sense of humor is probably one of the- the highest virtues that girls would look for in a- a potential mate. And it's interesting that that's so closely tied with being relaxed, which is a- an indicator of someone being at ease within their normal environment that they've got worldly experience because they don't often get ruffled-

   28. RHRobin Hanson49:35

       Right.

   29. CWChris Williamson49:35

       ... et cetera, et cetera.

   30. RHRobin Hanson49:36

       So it's a combination of social skill and confidence (laughs) and sort of innate likeability, uh, that can get everybody to laugh along with you. So I mean the important thing to notice is most laughing isn't about jokes, so it's not actually that you have a skill at being funny.
5. 1:00:00 – 1:14:38

   (laughs) …

   1. RHRobin Hanson1:00:00

      is (laughs) to do these things that would make you popular because the more transparently you are doing them to people like you who can see these things-

   2. CWChris Williamson1:00:07

      (laughs)

   3. RHRobin Hanson1:00:07

      ... but of course most people don't see these things, right? So that's certainly an age effect is often teenagers and young people are doing these things, and from their point of view, they think they have plausible deniability.

   4. CWChris Williamson1:00:17

      Yes.

   5. RHRobin Hanson1:00:18

      And any 50-year-old who's looking at them going, saying, "No, you don't." (laughs)

   6. CWChris Williamson1:00:22

      (laughs)

   7. RHRobin Hanson1:00:22

      "No, this is just dumb."

   8. CWChris Williamson1:00:23

      Get real, kid.

   9. RHRobin Hanson1:00:24

      "I can see why you're doing this," but still, among your peers, you have plausible deniability, and, and that's what counts.

   10. CWChris Williamson1:00:30

       I totally get that. So, um, moving on to charity. Altruism and being charitable seem like quite modern concepts. We don't... uh, well, I personally don't think about hunter-gatherer societies giving some lonely outcast a portion of their recent kill out of pity or whatever, but there's a, an established background for this sort of phenomenon. Is that right?

   11. RHRobin Hanson1:00:52

       Yeah, I think you're just wrong about what hunter-gatherers were like. So (laughs) , in fact, foragers or hunter-gatherers were extremely egalitarian.

   12. CWChris Williamson1:01:00

       Okay.

   13. RHRobin Hanson1:01:00

       Uh, they lived in groups of say, 20 to 50 and they had very little physical property and they shared most food and other things and they made collective decisions and so they did help each other a lot. Um, they raised children together. The, you know, the whole group would raise children, uh, teach them things like that and so in fact, in the typical forager hunter-gatherer group, it was a very high degree of sharing and help.

   14. CWChris Williamson1:01:26

       If you were a weak member of that group, why would you be helped along by the rest? Why would they want to share resources with you?

   15. RHRobin Hanson1:01:33

       Well certainly if you're temporarily weak-

   16. CWChris Williamson1:01:35

       Yeah.

   17. RHRobin Hanson1:01:36

       ... they want to show that they are loyal to you and each other and that's how they help each other and that, you know, they are a loyal member of the group and they are showing anybody that they help you that, uh, somebody else would be in that need, they'd help them too.

   18. CWChris Williamson1:01:48

       And if they are in that need at some point in the future?

   19. RHRobin Hanson1:01:52

       Uh, right. And so they'll, and they'll be, as long as you seem to be trying as hard as you can, they may even have a fair bit of tolerance for your not being quite as productive as others.

   20. CWChris Williamson1:01:59

       Mm-hmm.

   21. RHRobin Hanson1:02:00

       Uh, certainly if you're young, you may not be pulling your weight yet, but later on you, they hope that you eventually will get strong enough to pull your weight.

   22. CWChris Williamson1:02:07

       Good analogy. Yeah.

   23. RHRobin Hanson1:02:08

       And they have a fair bit of slack. They have a fair bit of extra resources usually and, um, you know, sometimes there's times of famine, et cetera, but, but usually there's enough extra resources that they can carry a few slackers as long as those slackers don't, you know, look like they're trying to slack.

   24. CWChris Williamson1:02:23

       (laughs) Yeah, if they're only limping when you see them, but they're running around-

   25. RHRobin Hanson1:02:28

       Right. Yeah, yeah.

   26. CWChris Williamson1:02:28

       ... you hear something about them running around totally fine when you t- when your back's turned.

   27. RHRobin Hanson1:02:33

       So actually most human work groups all through history have been like this. Um, I mean we can look at, you know, literature on, on work group- people in a, in a factory shop or things like that and often the, the people just form this strong norm of we together are going to help each other and support each other and we don't want to let management say take us apart by figuring out who, which one of us are more productive and, and, you know, or making us all work harder. And so, uh, there was a whole era when management was trying hard to (laughs) incentivize factory workers to work harder and to work better and the, and the factory workers would be coordinating to stop them because they were trying more to, to protect this one f- one for all and all for one sort of work group where they, uh, they just took care of each other.

   28. CWChris Williamson1:03:18

       Is that unionizing?

   29. RHRobin Hanson1:03:20

       Uh, unions wou- would be a way to express that more formally, but it-

   30. CWChris Williamson1:03:22

       Yeah.

Episode duration: 1:15:49