You Are Not So Smart11 Maalis 2018

123 - Active Information Avoidance (rebroadcast)

Little did the champions of the Enlightenment know that once we had access to all the facts…well, reason and rationality wouldn’t just immediately wash across the land in a giant wave of enlightenment thinking. While that may be happening in some ways, the new media ecosystem has also unshackled some of our deepest psychological tendencies, things that enlightenment thinkers didn’t know about, weren’t worried about, or couldn’t have predicted. Many of which we’ve discussed in previous episodes like confirmation bias, selective skepticism, filter bubbles and so on. These things have always been with us, but modern technology has provided them with the perfect environment to flourish.

In this episode, we explore another such invasive psychological species called active information avoidance, the act of keeping our senses away from information that might be useful, that we know is out there, that would cost us nothing to obtain, but that we’d still rather not learn. From choosing not to open open bills, visit the doctor, check your bank account, or read the nutrition information on the back of that box of Girl Scout Cookies, we each choose to remain ignorant when we’d rather not feel the anguish of illumination, but that same tendency can also cause great harm both to individuals and whole cultures when it spreads through politics, science, markets, and medicine. In this show, you’ll learn how.

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Jaksot(336)

315 - May Contain Lies - Alex Edmans

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314 - Fluke - Brian Klaas (rebroadcast)

In this episode we sit down with Brian Klaas, author of Fluke, and get into the existential lessons and grander meaning for a life well-lived (once one finally accepts the power and influence of rando...

26 Touko 202554min

313 - The 3.5 Percent Rule - Erica Chenoweth

If you want to overthrow a dictator, resist an authoritarian regime, or create a movement that can change the national status quo, you don't need half the country, you only need 3.5 percent of the pop...

12 Touko 202559min

312 - Chaos and Complexity - Neil Theise (rebroadcast)

Professor Neil Theise, the author of Notes on Complexity, provides an introduction to the science of how complex systems behave – from cells to human beings, to ecosystems, the known universe, and be...

28 Huhti 202559min

311 - Cascades of Change - Greg Satell (rebroadcast)

In this episode we sit down with Greg Satell, a communication expert whose book, Cascades, details how rapid, widespread change can sweep across groups of people big and small, and how understanding t...

14 Huhti 20251h 6min

310 - Align Your Mind - Britt Frank

Therapist, teacher, speaker, and trauma specialist Britt Frank tells us all about her new book, Align Your Mind, an all-access pass to understanding, befriending, and leading the multiple voices withi...

31 Maalis 20251h 12min

309 - They Thought We Were Ridiculous - Andy Luttrell (rebroadcast)

In 1974, two psychologists, Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky, as the New Yorker once put it, "changed the way we think about the way we think." The prevailing wisdom, before their landmark research we...

17 Maalis 20251h 12min

308 - Magical Thinking - Matt Tompkins

In this episode, the story of Clever Hans, the horse who changed psychology for the better. We also sit down with psychologist and magician Matt Tompkins. Matt is the author of The Spectacle of Illusi...

3 Maalis 20251h 19min