Tyler Cowen: On Being Conversation Partner that Draws out the Best

76:48
oh just interesting first of all how do
you manage to to have discussions with
both jordan peterson and at the same
time people like automated which are
totally of the different size of the map
and still be a look of the interview or
a discussion that partner by both sides
of the equation with some alienating one
of the sites you know a lot of people in
your position just like enough being
either clone of the right totally
election they can’t have discussions
that’s a very good question I’m not sure
I know the answer I mean my audience
probably has a better sense of that than
I do but you know I’ve had like
published dialogues with Paul Krugman
Jeffrey Sachs Dani Rodrik Larry Summers
there is basically all like the leading
left-leaning
economists and I just asked them like
would you do it and they all said yes
and none of them have been paid yet
either it’s not like oh we had to shell
out you know the box to get Paul Krugman
just asked him I guess I think he
thought he would get a fair treatment
and then when you do a bunch of these if
people feel the others have gotten a
fair treatment they’re willing to do it
too
but I’m genuinely mystified because you
know I never thought any of those people
would say yes so like through some way
in which I’m still miss perceiving the
world people
meet printed in the same newspaper as
some of the other people that you like I
think a lot of them see Jordan Pearson
is a really yeah you know I think I
approach those conversations trying to
learn from those people and not trying
to refute them so I try to refute myself
in a sense and that changes the demeanor
and the tone and I guess it’s working
for attracting the people like sometimes
readers will write to me and they’ll say
Oh Krugman said this Jeff Sachs said
that like how could you just let that
slide they want me to like fight combat
with them on every point but somehow
that’s not what I think it should be
like if their arguments have weaknesses
maybe those weaknesses will come out
more if I’m encouraging and drawing out
the argument rather than in just
refuting it and that’s been like part of
what my podcast series has been about
but again it’s still a mystery to me I
think sometimes just like if you do
things that other people think can’t be
done like they can be done so just do
them that’s a very naive answer but I
don’t think it’s totally off-base either
so we’re all like under investing in
just doing things because I didn’t
approach this with any kind of plan or
strategy whatsoever I just like asked
them and then did it and it’s gone
pretty well and it’s a very popular
podcast and it’s like famous writers
we’ve had in it like Margaret Atwood all
sorts of different people I didn’t think
would be possible Martina Navratilova
the tennis star Kareem abdul-jabbar the
basketball player sorry yeah so for them
it’s like a platform where they can
reach a quality audience so I’m like
giving them access to my audience they
value that and it’s kind of like a
challenge I sometimes say I approach the
podcast I try to make every person look
as smart as possible and
that’s actually a lot more intimidating
than when someone tries to make you look
as stupid as possible because you’re
used to that people trying to refute you
like you always have your comebacks but
80:54
the pressure on you and someone’s trying
80:55
to make you look really smart like
80:57
that’s a real challenge for people and I
81:00
think they somehow respect that or they
81:02
don’t get enough of it elsewhere and
81:04
they’re sort of keen to sign up and take
81:06
on the challenge like if I ask you the
81:08
hardest but sympathetic questions like
81:11
how well will you do and people like
81:13
that anyway I thank you all for coming
81:18
if you have been like any follow-up
81:19
questions ever you can just feel free to
81:21
email me my email is online and I’d like
81:24
to thank my hosts also for having me
81:27
here in Israel it’s been a great
81:28
privilege and I do hope to come back and
81:30
again thank you all for the evening
81:33
[Applause]

The Coddling of the American Mind moderated by Malcolm Gladwell

Civil discourse is in decline, with potentially dire results for American democracy.

People born after 1995, especially the coasts and Chicago feel anxiety and fear.

Kids on milk cartons

We deprived kids to develop their normal risk taking abilities

Social media spreads to kids who are 11, 12, 13, and this stresses kids

  • imagine the absolute worst of Jr High School, 24-hours a day forever
  • Social media develops an echo chamber which gives you a dopamine rush

(30 min) Some people are looking to interpreting things in the worst possible light and Call-Out things.

There is no trust.

There are more conservatives and more liberals and less moderates.

(34 min) Upper class liberals are reporting their lower class minority people for being insensitive.

3 Great Untruths:

  1. What doesn’t kill you makes you weaker.
  2. Always trust your feelings.
  3. Life is a battle between good people and evil people.

Many of the people most passionate about aggressive speech police belong to high class liberal elites.

 

It’s up to us to kill false information. Good luck.

Individuals bear much of the blame for fake news. The study found that false rumors travel the Internet much more rapidly and widely than facts. These untruths get their velocity and reach not from celebrity influencers but from ordinary citizens sharing among their networks.

Evidently, we humans have a strong preference for novelty and sensationalism over scrupulous reality.

.. “Falsehood diffused significantly farther, faster, deeper, and more broadly than the truth in all categories of information,” the MIT scientists concluded after examining more than 125,000 stories shared by more than 3 million Twitter users. The most viral lies, they found, involved “false political news.”

.. Politics is tribal. It is a way of organizing conflict.

.. We are inclined to credit anything we hear from our allies and to believe the worst of our foes. In politics we see information as potential ammunition; we evaluate it for its potency and lethality rather than its strict veracity.

.. the Internet smokes out our self-deceptions and shows us as we really are.

Gambling and porn flourish on the Internet. Reasoned civil discourse, not so much.

.. This is a profound blow to idealists of the marketplace of ideas. From Adam Smith to Friedrich Hayek to James Surowiecki, the author of “The Wisdom of Crowds,” wise thinkers have emphasized the positive economic effects of dispersed power. A great many people, free to pursue the wisdom of their experiences and the perspectives from their vantage points, will arrive — as if moved by an invisible hand — at better results than any single mind or central planning bureaucracy could achieve.

.. But it turns out that the crowd is wise only when it is asking the right questions. A crowd determined to get the best value on flat-screen televisions will soon discover the proper price; but a crowd swept up by tulips or cryptocurrency may find itself pricing euphoria instead of value.

 What we see from Twitter and other platforms clearly signals that too many people are asking the wrong questions
.. our ability to spread our careless and malign thinking is brand-new. Of all the digital-age jargon, perhaps none is more apt than “going viral,” because the contagion of bad information is a matter of individuals passing germs from host to host with geometric speed. Only disciplined digital hygiene can halt the epidemic.