Join Brad and his frustrations as we discuss his love for Starburst and Skittles, album cover music selection, and serious topics like potential threats in America and TikTok censorship in China. We'll also explore Krister Sturmark's "To Light the Flame of Reason," focusing on science, truth, and morality. We will also discuss discrimination against atheists, the role of religion and consciousness, and the importance of open-mindedness. Engage in debates about the plural of octopus, communication in relationships, the relief of mindless TV, and human behavior. Expect a mix of humor, insight, and diverse discussions.
Join Brad and his frustrations as we discuss his love for Starburst and Skittles, album cover music selection, and serious topics like potential threats in America and TikTok censorship in China. We'll also explore Krister Sturmark's "To Light the Flame of Reason," focusing on science, truth, and morality. We will also discuss discrimination against atheists, the role of religion and consciousness, and the importance of open-mindedness. Engage in debates about the plural of octopus, communication in relationships, the relief of mindless TV, and human behavior. Expect a mix of humor, insight, and diverse discussions.
Hello and welcome to another episode of Terribly Unimblivious. In today's episode, our dear friend Brad is distracted, in his own words. I'd like to take it one step further. I'd say Brad's frustrated With what I couldn't tell you. What's this episode about, don't know. I've resigned to the fact that I'm merely just the DJ editing puppet of Brad's right hand. So in today's episode we hope you can get through it, we hope you have some laughs and we hope you enjoy the time with us as well. This is Terribly Unimblivious. Episode 7, brad's Frustrated.
Speaker 2:Yep.
Speaker 1:I said it before and I'll say it again Life moves pretty fast.
Speaker 2:You don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.
Speaker 1:All right, we're live.
Speaker 2:What's up?
Speaker 1:Not much, man. How are you?
Speaker 2:I am distracted.
Speaker 1:I've gathered that based on the text messages and the calls this week. What's? Oh? I guess it's a good time. We don't have to do it right now, but we can let everyone know that Brad's gonna have a new section on the show called Brad's Hot Takes Hot Takes.
Speaker 2:That's not gonna be a new section, is it ever? Yeah, it might just happen.
Speaker 1:It might just happen.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I need to Do. You want one right now.
Speaker 2:I need to learn how to use these FX buttons so I can just be like Brad's Hot Takes you want a Hot Take right now. I do.
Speaker 1:Chocolate sucks. Okay, I was not expecting that one we're gonna start out light. What is the Light and comedic? What is the repulsion or disdain?
Speaker 2:for chocolate. That's correct. It is repulsion. If I walk into somebody's house making brownies, I want to throw up.
Speaker 1:Okay, so this leads me down a different terrain of thought. Now, what culinary or confectionary treats do you enjoy?
Speaker 2:Sugar If it's made with mostly sugar.
Speaker 1:So even like milk chocolate, don't like it. I know people that just don't like dark chocolate, but you're saying just chocolate across the board Chocolate across the board.
Speaker 2:Yeah, if I'm in a really bad state I can stomach like a cat or something. That's about it though.
Speaker 1:So the Snickers commercial would actually be the opposite for you, so when they're angry and then they eat it and then they're happy. But it would actually make you like.
Speaker 2:I mean, if I was actually starving, I could go for a Snickers, probably. All right, we're gonna have to pause this right here.
Speaker 1:All right, Studio won't know. Thanks a lot, cat. We're back. So that was actually perfect. I hit the record button just as you said. Thanks a lot cat.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. Great so back to sugar, sugar. I like sugar, sugar's good. So are you like a star? Are you starburst guy?
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I love starburst.
Speaker 2:Skittles starburst. But again, you have to like limited quantities, Because now you can buy like you used to. You get the little rolls of starburst. Yeah, oh yeah, I got the pink one. Well, now you can just buy a bag of pink ones, and that's too much of a good thing. Here's my hot, take Okay.
Speaker 1:When you buy them individually they don't taste the same as when they come in the wrapper. No, they don't. I don't know what it is. They taste juicier when they come in the single serve package, like the old school ones. But they taste different. When it's just all the same color, they do. I don't know why it's almost more artificial. If that could be a thing with starburst.
Speaker 2:I think maybe they're engaging with the others too much. Self isolation keeps them tastier.
Speaker 1:Hmm, I don't know. Maybe, yeah, I don't like them. Yeah, anyway, the minis suck too. They've changed the flavor of the minis somehow, it's true.
Speaker 2:Yeah, more hot takes to come.
Speaker 1:It's been a moment since we've done a cast. It's been two days Two days Audience won't know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, we started doing this thing a year ago and haven't blown out.
Speaker 1:Do you want to also tell the audience what cool things I mean they'll know about it by the time they listen to this, but what we officially. It's kind of fun to bring the audience on the journey after the fact for them.
Speaker 2:I don't think it is.
Speaker 1:Well.
Speaker 2:I think it's really annoying.
Speaker 1:It is annoying. We are going to publish Monday, but what did we get? What did we get solidified Our album cover. Oh, your album cover you can't really call it a podcast cover. Sure you can, it's the best of it's a library.
Speaker 2:We're just going to come straight out with the best of album. That's actually right out of the gate.
Speaker 1:Out of the best of, because everything we do is the greatest hit, best of it's, just everything it's all that seems like some Oasis shit right there.
Speaker 2:New album cover and album cover Art cover All of it. I don't know what you call it. Yeah, the big pickle, it's just on the thing and it shows the name, and then it shows a picture.
Speaker 1:The big hold up right now is what music intro, outro we pick, because apparently royalties are a thing and they will take you off the list.
Speaker 2:We're not going to have it. I already said I'm going to sing it.
Speaker 1:Oh, have you been practicing? No, okay.
Speaker 2:I need to practice.
Speaker 1:So getting right into it. What's?
Speaker 2:been on your mind this week. I think Hamas is going to come over to America and invade.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:That's what.
Speaker 1:I'm seeing on Tik Tok. I bet the kids in China are still getting nice school things. Why they always talk about that. Tik Tok is very directed depending on where you're at in the world. They censor it in China in a way that they try to push wholesome science and math are fun and cool and you can do these cool things with it. And then the United States are like you guys should do these stupid dances as much as possible.
Speaker 2:And other dumb.
Speaker 1:Well that Hamas is coming over to attack us. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm sure it has to do with immigration and some sort of explosives and weird.
Speaker 1:It is a weird time in the world right now.
Speaker 2:It is a weird time.
Speaker 1:It's not really weird time, you know, but Dan Carlin hardcore history blueprint from, or getting yes, pre-world War One, what about it? Kind of feels kind of pre-World War One.
Speaker 2:Did you know Hans Ferdinand had? His plume was green, it's like a bright green. I saw a colorized photo of him and the wife coming out right before they were assassinated.
Speaker 1:It was interesting His like feathered plume. I thought you meant like the blood spatter.
Speaker 2:And he was not an alien. No, is that what you're getting at? I? Wasn't, but you brought up aliens, and I brought up aliens Already.
Speaker 1:Already, let's go. No but I just, yeah, there was a lot of little skirmishes kind of going on in different parts of the world at that point, yeah, trying to destabilize different regions and I think, make people focus on different areas. Not saying that there's some regime in charge that's trying to do this on purpose.
Speaker 2:It just kind of has a there is to some extent, I think, yeah, the bigger global powers in the world want other bigger global powers to get into those skirmishes, especially if they can do it within their own. So remember, like I don't know, four to six years ago, and there was a lot of talk about like Texas or California or some of these bigger states succeeding from the union, anything.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes.
Speaker 2:I had a drink in my mouth that was a lot of that was traced back to like Russian propaganda. So these little groups would pop up in these towns and be like, oh yeah, come on. Well, we're going to, we're going to hold a rally and it's going to be next to this rally, and then you start going down the rabbit hole and start tracing money back to where things are coming from.
Speaker 1:And who's your friend Vlad? Yeah, I'm not talking right now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and so the idea is just like we're going to put this idea out here and then, oh, look at, we're going to do something in tandem with something that the people that we want on our team are already doing, and then get this conversation started and people are like, yeah, they should like. Texas should be its own thing, california, we don't like California, california should be its own thing. You do understand what happens when we become 50 different countries, right?
Speaker 1:They don't know they don't understand. No founding fathers did.
Speaker 2:Yes, it's significantly weaker.
Speaker 1:Currencies, actually, probably one of the biggest reasons they did that. Wow, that was loud. Was that the whole house? That was just the single unit over there. Yes, that was Alexa telling me that my packages had been delivered. And a little preview for listeners we got two more. We got two more microphones. Yeah, so now standard microphones, because when you listen to the Shannon episode, she did not use a standard microphone and you will understand the audio quality there.
Speaker 2:She didn't understand that the microphone didn't need to be in her mouth, so she did seem to struggle with that. We had to. It definitely needs some editing.
Speaker 1:It definitely resembled you in a way. I don't know.
Speaker 2:Small skinny Directional In her mouth. Wow, that's rude Dick.
Speaker 1:I know Never been accused, not of being one, yeah.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, back to Hamas. Religious beliefs, that's what's been on my mind.
Speaker 1:Why don't you give the bookstore an adult slash story that? Oh yeah, that one Hot take this was fascinating.
Speaker 2:This might be an actual hot take, and I don't know the so was it just yesterday. I think, yeah, it was just yesterday I went to our Books a Million bookstore, which I don't know anything about. Books a Million. You went to BAM, but I'm going to guess that I don't like them. It's the old borders.
Speaker 1:But it's not borders, it's not Well. Borders went out and Books a Million bought the most profitable borders when borders went bankrupt.
Speaker 2:So I walked in there because I was looking for a particular book, which I did find in the philosophy section. So the way that their shelves are all set up, they're like three foot wide, about six foot tall Essentially that's the shelf, and then they're all jam packed together to make a bookstore. And the philosophy section was one whole bookshelf, not both sides, not front and back, just a front, and that was a little disappointing because the tarot card section was three bookshelves, which seems odd.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:And the religious slash. Christian bookshelves were half the fucking store. So that's a lot. That's a lot. Yeah, reasonable, rational discourse on bookshelf.
Speaker 1:Learning how to communicate in a bi-directional way versus a singular direction which is being spoken to Also you already have a book.
Speaker 2:You already have the book, the book. How many books do you need about the book?
Speaker 1:You need the journal to be able to journal about the book. You need to journal the journal about the book, the journal's journal, the book. You said how big was the book?
Speaker 2:The Bible cover. So the covers that you can put on your Bible five to six times bigger than the philosophy section.
Speaker 1:It's just capitalism working it is. They know what it sells, they know what it doesn't sell. It does it a little bit as a society, though, of what we are consuming, consuming.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so On that note, Because it's a religious thing you got to put that microphone in your mouth, man. No, I don't. There you go, just settle down.
Speaker 1:Why don't you set your sources first?
Speaker 2:I Gotta find this first. I didn't mark this one because I came across it on accident.
Speaker 1:Lotta lot of downtime in this podcast.
Speaker 2:Why don't you fill it with something?
Speaker 1:Okay, dylan's hot take. Brad doesn't know how to cite his sources.
Speaker 2:I do, but I'm going to actually get there in a hot second.
Speaker 1:So I looked up books a million founded in 1998, 1917 really yeah, well, bullshit. Florence.
Speaker 2:Alabama. They didn't even have a million books in 1917.
Speaker 1:They're burning a lot of books. In 1917 somewhere that's not sure I made there burning books now there?
Speaker 2:well, we're not books a million, no, we're talking about people in general. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I was in the middle of all this. Right now there's a lot of, there's a lot of the Grimes, the, the northern Des Moines areas, absolutely just kind of Back and forth about what can, it cannot be in school system right now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so what should kids not read about? And by kids, let's go with high school.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't know that's it. Where do you, where you draw the line?
Speaker 2:You better make a beggar list than that I'm.
Speaker 1:I'm just saying it's so hard to even wrap your mind around. How do you start defining those things? Because it just how do you define what you can and cannot Read? I mean because you can be like, well, this is this, this gruesome, terrible stuff over here. You're like, okay, who decides what's gruesome and terrible? Or is that lines to pick? Whatever category? You don't want your kids, you know pornography and I think it's more.
Speaker 2:I think it's more of a gradual line. So if you're gonna teach a Fourth grader about the Holocaust, mm-hmm, your line's gonna be right. This is, these are the facts that are, that are necessary, without the gruesome intensity of the details mm-hmm and for a freshman that's gonna be different. And then I mean, once you're 18, all bets are off. True, you know, but who decides mmm, reasonable people Okay sure sound good yeah okay, there's.
Speaker 1:There's only like just maybe one major flaw in there. Is that reasonable?
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, we're gonna get to that.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, that's like this whole podcast right. Talk about the book. It's got a nice cover, the book is.
Speaker 2:This is one I just came across. This was not the one I was looking for, but this is one that I have a feeling. We're gonna cite a lot. I'm excited about and then you talked about it coming months To light the flame of reason.
Speaker 1:Yes, krister Sturmark, he's.
Speaker 2:Swedish. Okay, and so interpret that as you will into in just a quick summary.
Speaker 1:You you said it's it's. It's more of a manual than a, than a non-fiction read. It's more of a how-to where you can kind of pick pieces out of.
Speaker 2:I mean, it is a non-fiction read, but the subtitle is clear thinking for the 21st century, so I will read the. Let me read you the intro cover. We'll just kind of glance over it and then I Just started getting into this. So I'm already highlighter happy, which is why I love to buy the books so that I can just Doodle in them. Okay, as needed To light the flame of reason is about the art of clear thinking, an art that is needed now more than ever in the world.
Speaker 2:We live in, a world filled with populist dogmas, anti-science attitudes and pseudo philosophy. Krister Sturmark, with Pulitzer Prize winning author Douglas Hofstadter, provides a set of simple tools for clear thinking, as well as a deeper understanding of science, truth, naturalism and morality. He offers insights into the rampant problems of extremism and fundamentalism and suggestions for how the world can move toward a new enlightenment. So his idea of kind of, in a sense and I've actually read, going back through my own journals from like 12, 13 years ago, mm-hmm, about, especially from a religious standpoint, how I feel like we were slipping backwards, like how there was this progress, how we weren't so dogmatic in in the views of religion, and then, some time around, I don't know, oh, nine ten, 2011, something like that.
Speaker 2:There there was kind of this resurgence of Fundamentalist extremism. You know the American nationalism of, of the right-wing Christian nation. So that is his. This is basically a manual for how to get out of that type of mindset. Now my first question is Clearly, a lot of the people that could benefit the most from reading a book like this? We'll never read a book like this, so that's problem one. So found the stat by the way, this is later in the book when I happened to come across it as we're talking about Religious, what do we want to call it anti?
Speaker 1:I think this goes back to the the text message earlier, which is saying kind of completely alienate the Christian base.
Speaker 2:No, it's not just Christian base. So like if you, if you, were just against any particular Religion, mm-hmm, atheism, although not a religion, is Maybe most persecuted in a public domain. So here's an interesting stat. This is from a 2012 Gallup poll in the United States. What sorts of people would be unacceptable as a president? So, out of the people that answered this poll, so this is 2012, 2012, okay, so honestly, so we're at?
Speaker 1:this is the end. Of this is at the end of Brock's first term.
Speaker 2:Yes, 4% said they would not vote for a black person. 5% would not vote for a woman. So Pretty, pretty low percentages overall, not low enough, but pretty low. That friction, racism and friction six percent would not vote for a jewel. Okay, so now we're. Now, we're getting up there. Okay, like 30%. Do you want to guess the next one? 30%, there's three more, so I'm gonna give you. Okay, there's three more categories. Okay, 30% is I.
Speaker 1:Think atheism is gonna be the number one, just based on what you're saying here. So I don't think that's it.
Speaker 2:Muslim oh, close, that's number two.
Speaker 1:Oh, homosexual oh 30%, okay, oh yeah, muslim comes in at 40%, and where's atheists coming at 43%, 43%? Remember when it was a big deal that JFK was Catholic.
Speaker 2:He was the first Catholic president, yes, I do remember, because I was alive in the 60s.
Speaker 1:Sorry, I have a hard time taking in information, not believing that I was there at times, but when you read, about it.
Speaker 1:When you read about it they're like what, we're just gonna have the Catholic Church. I mean that was the thing. Is they literally thought the Vatican? I mean that was one of the whether it was the Republican serious theories. You know whether it was the Republicans and you know kind of tactics at that time to try to get the nation and not believe in JFK. But it was. Is the pope gonna be run to the country from the Vatican through this man?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's crazy but that's a, that's a, it's a weird, that's a weird stat, but it's kind of to this point, though, and what we're saying is Is it unreasonable to question people's beliefs, because there is so much power behind some of those beliefs, which?
Speaker 2:is it?
Speaker 1:is it reasonable? Is it, is it unreasonable to be questioning people that are so devout in one area? Because is it? It's scary, in a sense. Where it's, you're just gonna close your mind off to the other possibility.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, so this entire book is based upon, upon the assumption that you can have an open mind, and that was actually a part that I had just got to you, which is Kind of interesting. So Because of of how we define open-mindedness or how we don't define it. So he kind of, he kind of gives some examples of. So say, you believe in ghosts? I don't believe in ghosts, mm-hmm, who's more open-minded? They got a losing ghost.
Speaker 2:No, okay, not necessarily. All right. So the degree of the open-mindedness depends upon how willing you are to change your belief. So this is in first chapter, and he says one degree. One's degree of openness shouldn't have to do with what one believes, should it Shouldn't it instead be measured by how willing one is to change one's opinion on the basis of new facts and pieces of evidence? So you believe in ghosts? I don't believe in ghosts. Are we gonna do this the whole time?
Speaker 2:I Think so okay so I Say I don't believe in ghosts. I don't care what happens ever. If I'm face-to-face with something that is totally Unexplainable to me, I will never believe in ghosts. And you say I believe in ghosts, but if Something were to come out that substantially proves that this is not possible in any realm, I'm willing to change my mind about that. That means that you're the more open-minded one, absolutely so. Sometimes we get into these arguments where the person that believes the least believable thing is the most open-minded. Like no, that's just. That's not how that works. It's it's the ability to be able to change your mind, which Is an entire conversation, especially about religion, where If you If, no matter what, you're not going to change your mind about something, no matter what, that seems like a real problem to me.
Speaker 1:Same here is kind of touched on that in that modern wisdom podcast, saying you know he goes, I. I'm not here to change anyone's opinion or mind because at the end of the day, do I think it's even possible if I had Substantial proof of proof in my mind that something did not exist. He goes. You've just taken the very existence away from someone, so why would they want to change?
Speaker 2:and and they A lot of times they don't, they don't want to change, and I think some of that goes back to that nuance that we always talk about, where it's so much easier to just be stuck in a dogmatic way of thinking, because this is, this is what this book says and this is what I'm gonna follow. It's because you don't have to think you they don't. It is easier, so how?
Speaker 1:many, how many of our friend? I mean how many guys and I'm just gonna use CrossFit Bond as an example, the gym we used to work out together how many of the military guys that had done tours overseas were like we would love another one back. We would love like you got any more of those deployments.
Speaker 2:you know the, the Chappelle it was the Chappelle me and they just said we'll leave them Not.
Speaker 1:I won't name them right now just for their sake, but they would just be like, yeah, you go over there. Is it dangerous 100%? But it's easy. I can wake up, I can work out, I go, do my little. Whatever, my mission is not easy.
Speaker 2:It's simple.
Speaker 1:It's simple, yes sorry it's we should that is. That is a good clarification there.
Speaker 2:Thank you you you have very direct Parameters parameters of what your job is going to be, and there's no other bullshit to concern yourself with. You know, you do, you get up, you stay in shape, you make sure you have food you do the job that I great, yep, and then you go on mission and then you come back and that's that's what your focus is.
Speaker 1:you're not not worried about the mortgage not worried about who's gonna get to the next level the mortgage. Not worried about who's gonna get the kids from daycare.
Speaker 2:Not worried about I mean, I I think that's over simplifying. Obviously there's a human element there where, yeah, on one hand, yes, when you were in, like what I think, probably when they go out on mission, maybe that's when it's at its simplest because you were fully engaged in that moment. And Then when you come back and you're sitting in a basin and you're not under immediate threat from anything, that's when maybe you start thinking about, you know, my wife at home and what are my kids doing, and all this kind of stuff, and therein lies a lot of the problems when they come home too, is Now.
Speaker 2:I only think about this. I don't have this very clear defined job to do, and that's not a problem for everyone, but it is a problem for a lot of people. I.
Speaker 1:See that in my job where, if it is not cut and dry these tasks and these are brilliant people that do really, really complex jobs on computers and networks but if it is not cut and dry Directive driven work and it takes a level of Risk in the sense of I kind of have to put myself out there because I'm testing something new, or I'm or I'm not quite sure, or there's no clearly defined a directive and they've got a kind of weed you know wander through the weeds themselves on it. They struggle because they don't it. It's, it's not simple.
Speaker 2:But that's also like from a military standpoint, why, when you're talking about seals or green berets or any of the the high level, you know special forces groups, yeah, it's not a physical. There's plenty of people that can probably do the physical things that they do. There's not very many that can handle the mental problems and Just the constant problem-solving that those guys have to go through.
Speaker 1:That's what it is, and I listened to a quote from Andy stumped the other day. He was hilarious he goes, yeah, we would train and train, and train in a certain scenario and then, all of a sudden, it was oh, the birds can't go within three miles of the objective we were supposed to land on. Oh, and you have a creek, you have or you have a river you have to cross. Yeah, and you have this, this, this and this, and you're gonna be on the opposite side of the compound where we don't even know where those Doors are, because we thought you're coming from that side, the other side. Yeah, he goes. Well, I guess we'll figure it out. That it's. We're not canceling. No, that was a.
Speaker 2:This side note lions a candelar Mm-hmm. That book, great book, where they they. It's a special force of the Greenbrae group that goes out and with the Afghan as part of the Afghan army as their support.
Speaker 2:So it's a group of I can't remember what the numbers are 10, 12, something like that Greenbrae's, and then there's maybe about a hundred, about a hundred Afghan, like soldiers, and they're supposed to be providing Back up for an escape route to a much, much larger force, that is, pushes the. It was the. It was Canadian and US joint forces, wasn't it it?
Speaker 1:was like some mountain division that was coming through a mechanized unit. It was very large and they were basically trying to push Like Taliban through.
Speaker 2:A funnel.
Speaker 1:It was an escape route and they were trying to close, and they had to go across the desert and and set up in a way so that, if these people tried to escape through this, this canyon area or whatever they were there to cut them off.
Speaker 2:And in Doing so happen, since they happened upon the Taliban training center with with just a ton of fighters and high level officers. And so, yeah, you, you have to be able to think quickly on your feet, for sure, but that is a very important thing, but that is, uh, probably a pretty good example of open-mindedness, because If you are closed-minded, in those situations, you're like, no, this is the mission, this is the intel we have, this is how we're going to execute. And then you get out there and it's not like that at all. So your real world perception Is drastically different than your intel, but you choose to not Deviate from the mission plan. You're gonna get fucked, mm-hmm, and I feel like it's pretty safe to say that special forces guys are pretty good at not getting fucked, and I think that's, I think that's why you know.
Speaker 2:Problem-solving proud they're able to problem solve on the fly in the most stressful situations.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, it's a great. It's a great lesson for life too, because they don't get to pick and choose what their open-mindedness needs to be. You know, you kind of hear that too, like, well, I'm open-minded, but only about these things.
Speaker 2:It's it's not, it's not really it's it's it's.
Speaker 1:You don't really get to you either open-minded or you're not.
Speaker 2:You don't get to pick and choose what you want to be open-minded about yes, and and it kind of goes back to the brunet brown the, the bullshit thing we talked about in the previous episode, and this quote In the book I'm reading now today's science has not fully explained the nature of consciousness, but perhaps in the future we will be able to do so. We just don't know today. So he's talking about things that are currently unexplainable, um, and how we react to that. So in a sense he's just saying listen, we don't know enough about this to make any clear claims about the, the true nature of this, so Maybe we'll figure it out. But that is part of the science, where we continue to evolve and we continue to figure Things out that we didn't previously know.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm, that's kind of how knowledge works, and it's really annoying when another side that comes from Entirely a belief system without a knowledge base says, yeah, but you don't know this, like because you don't know everything, and clearly my side is right. Well, that's not, it's not how that works, no, so yeah, it's, it's frustrating. It's frustrating, I would say so.
Speaker 1:So we get back to is in society. I mean kind of the takeaways from your, your bookstore running. It obviously seems like as a society right now and that's an easy metric to. It's an easy metric to Measure because stores don't sell stuff or stores don't put more into a product that doesn't sell no much.
Speaker 1:And so, no, as a society it looks like we're we're looking for an answer because, you know, religion does provide answers and a level of relief or comfort to people. And, by the way, I don't think either of us are saying religion is wrong.
Speaker 2:That's so, but it's here's another Don't okay, extra from his preload, because this is exactly that and this is his belief. I also have Sam Harris here somewhere, which is probably not exactly the same, but probably a little more aggressive. It's probably a little bit more aggressive. Sam is a little bit more aggressive on that. But from the prelude to, to light the flame of reason, every person can believe what they wish to believe, as long as it does not infringe on others and as long as citizens are not compelled to submit to a state religion. So that's basically, that's essentially what you get at greatest hits right there boom so Can politicians believe whatever they want to?
Speaker 2:Yeah, mm-hmm, might you have an issue with that? I still think top guns the greatest documentary of all time.
Speaker 1:It's hard to be Mmm, actually a lot. Oh oh it goes between that Armageddon.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but that's a documentary. That hasn't happened yet, but it's gonna.
Speaker 1:So they minority reported the Armageddon movie they might have. I.
Speaker 2:Just, I just saw an article the other day.
Speaker 1:They are we in setting their trying to your report of the Armageddon?
Speaker 2:Oh, like we got, we got ideas implanted.
Speaker 1:But then to minority report the arm.
Speaker 2:So we are exploring a trillion dollar asteroid or trying to, and all that works, reminding it, no, no, no, not yet like that. They're trying like the Leo movie, I think what's?
Speaker 1:What was the Netflix movie? That he did where it was he was the astro scientist that was so good. Jonah Hill, all of them.
Speaker 2:Oh.
Speaker 1:Jonah Hill is not in good limelight right now.
Speaker 2:No. What why not?
Speaker 1:you didn't see all the text messages you send in his girlfriend, or he was being super controlling. Were they good?
Speaker 2:I've seen better, was he? Was he being funny? No, she just missed the humor.
Speaker 1:No okay, so I don't. Jonah Hill is a big advocate for mental health in Hollywood. He's been honest about his struggles, got that. I don't know if you've seen the documentary on Netflix called studs no, I haven't seen it yet. So anyway, trying to do a little documentary on his honest, on his therapist Stutzman is the guy's name fascinating gentlemen. Kind of takes the Jason Born, no Darulo. What's the therapy on therapy show on Apple TV.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, yeah, I Can't remember names.
Speaker 1:I know I'm drawing blanks. Right now my brain is foggy.
Speaker 2:It's uh, yeah, help me out, shannon, she loves it. It's got Harrison Ford.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Jason.
Speaker 1:I'm so sorry, we're so bad right now shrinking, sorry. Yes, I was thinking tiny Jason Segal who says was I looking for there?
Speaker 2:So you know how you know him and Steven were brothers. That's not true. They'd be kind of cool if it was, though It'd be kind of cool.
Speaker 1:Uh, but Jason Segal takes the vigilante therapist approach which is just let just fucking listen to me and I'll tell you, you know, and which is very adverse to how Modern psychology where I mean most therapists would say you have to come to the realization on your own. We'll ask very pertinent questions, we can have some input, but we don't want to be too biased because I could start the morph right. Um, stutzman is very much like hey, motherfucker, listen to me. Yeah, he definitely is like Jason's character and and and Jason at least is kind of the character he plays in shrinking is kind of passive about it in a way. It's not, it's, it's, it's not quite.
Speaker 2:Listen to me, stutzman is well, he doesn't, he doesn't know if it works, he's he Stutzman is no holds barred.
Speaker 1:Like I got sick and tired of Watching my client struggle for three years and he's like I just want to grab him and say do this and you'll be fine. And then it's fascinating because he has a couple methods that I've actually followed myself, which is turn up, turn up, turn a negative situation into a positive and Good, a good example and that's an easy thing to say, but good, for instance, if I'm, if I'm, if I'm going to bed. And all of a sudden you ever go to bed and just know like I was tired, but I had won too many thoughts and now Game over like never.
Speaker 1:I never have won too many thoughts. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not going to bed tonight, and I used to just sit in bed, don't try to try to just sleep, okay, eventually, you would eventually go to sleep.
Speaker 1:And then you're there for four and a half hours and what you've done is you've just sat there for four and a half hours doing nothing besides trying to sleep, okay, and this whole thing would be, you know what in your in your gut? You knew you weren't gonna be able to sleep, so you should just get up and go attack Whatever the problem is, and even they don't even have to go attack the problem. But hey, I have to do this job tomorrow or I have to prepare for this. Just go up and go do it, because you're not gonna go to bed and he goes. Yeah, it's gonna suck, because you're gonna be really tired, you're gonna be really, you know, moody the next day. But you did something in the time that you weren't gonna do anything anyway. What about? Just totally?
Speaker 2:shutting off though. Okay, okay is that a thing? Do you know how to shut off like if you?
Speaker 1:yeah, sometimes.
Speaker 2:I can, I can't yeah.
Speaker 1:I do it on vacation all the time. I can do it on vacation like I can, I it's. But when I shut off, it's kind of I can't. If it's a I have to go to work tomorrow or I have to do something tomorrow thing, that's not enough.
Speaker 2:Decom time for me. I have to.
Speaker 1:I have to like. Vacation to me is it was especially when we went to Spain and we you know, we kind of talked about in the travel episode or that. Yeah, was this episode. Number two, three. I don't remember the first three days I was still hardwired for work. I was on my phone all the time. Yeah, I was. I was on my laptop making sure, checking in with team, and then by day three I was starting to like a little bit less, little bit less than then the whole rest of the trip. I'm like they'll figure it out.
Speaker 2:Mine is more like if I can't do anything about the issue that's going on in my head, then I'm gonna turn it off. I can't, because it's. It's a waste of my energy, mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:That was the tremendous amount of energy Otherwise. I'm an incandescent light bulb, I'm not LED.
Speaker 2:So I may be thinking that I want to do this if I, if something was left incomplete or there's something big awaiting me when I get back, mm-hmm. But I can't do anything about it. Yeah, not even in that state, physically mm-hmm. So I'm gonna try to not waste the energy on that.
Speaker 1:That's about one of the few times that I do. You're a better man than me. Well, so back to Jonah Hill, obviously. So Jonah Hill's this big mental health advocate and he was actually kind of how would I Gaslighting his ex with therapy? Don't like that. He was texting her and being, basically, she's a professional surfer, she's in a bikini all the time because she's she's out surfing and when you're a surfer it's not a massive professional sport. You're with, it's like a guy and girl thing, and so she's with other dudes that have their shirts off, that are surfing and professional surfers. And Jonah was like going off and on being saying you know, my therapist says that it's okay for me to have boundaries and I don't think you should be with other guys with their shirts off and this is just uncomfortable for me, you know. Do you know what you're doing to me and my image? And he was like gaslighting with therapy. It was pretty bad.
Speaker 2:Hmm.
Speaker 1:And you know what I haven't seen on Netflix recently? What then?
Speaker 2:pushing stutz's documentary, oh Also it is okay to have boundaries by a hundred percent, but Boundaries dealing with what also? Or insecurities.
Speaker 1:Boundaries are mutual, though. It's before for them to work. They are, that's exactly it, but it's so. You and your head need to come up with boundaries. Your, whoever you're dealing with, needs to come up with boundaries. And this isn't just a significant other situation. It can be a work boundary, it can be whatever, but a Boundaries, only boundary. If you, you mutually agree to it, I can say, brad, don't get within three feet of me and you can be like, well, that doesn't work for me.
Speaker 2:So why would? We ever hang out again Like what he's doing is is exactly what we just talked about in that quote. Every person can believe what they wish to believe, as long as it does not infringe on the others, mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:So One she's probably not agreeing to that. So two either you Want all of the dudes that she serves with to wear shirts and I think I think has nothing to do with what you think so you want to impose your beliefs on them, or or you want her to not do the thing that she loves to do. Those are kind of your two options. Yep, mmm, both of those sound like you're infringing on others personal rights that they surely should have. So that's a take on that Too bad it's.
Speaker 1:Yeah, relationships are hard man.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a different episode.
Speaker 1:That's a different episode. Are we gonna have Shannon on that episode?
Speaker 2:We don't want to get bogged down on that, do we?
Speaker 1:No, I think what we can discuss, not interpersonal relationships in terms of significant others, as I'm saying, but, uh, communication, communication is really hard for people. We I, yes, I work when it goes back to this which is, how do we, how are we able to mutually Discuss what isn't isn't okay for us, without it becoming personal for the other person, but then also being able to, and because what happens is is somebody says something and it's not exactly how the other person thought it needed to go, and they don't know how to react to it. So they're in line. I mean, it all starts tying in with itself, which is being able to pivot, being able to be open-minded and then being able to problem solve, because I know the communication part For me personally, when it works well has more to do with the authenticity of it.
Speaker 2:Can you express what you are actually feeling? Mm-hmm instead of what somebody wants to hear, or what you don't want somebody to hear, or what you're scared of saying.
Speaker 1:So you say something else or people that try to manage other people's feelings or you communicate the minor problem instead of the major problem things like that and I just.
Speaker 2:This has been a work in progress for me for 20 years now, where, instead of locking everything down inside Not a hundred percent of the time, now only do it like 95 percent of the time, so like 5% increase in communicating.
Speaker 1:But it's me, I was expecting clapping sounds.
Speaker 2:I Don't have that.
Speaker 1:I don't. I barely know how this thing works, man bullshit. I've watched YouTube videos and I'm getting better.
Speaker 2:So what happens when, usually, if I'm in a really depressive state and I'm I'm still trying to function, but I'm clearly not At a hundred percent I usually end up writing, so I will write something. So to my wife, I will write something and you deliver it to her do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like this just happened last week and I wrote it down. I Think she was in the shower or something. I said it on the pillow and she read it. That's it. It's easier for me to write it down and I can Write it more concisely than I can say it, because you can control Because, yeah, I understand that when you're, when you're talking to somebody, you can.
Speaker 1:There's a lot more emotion involved in talking.
Speaker 2:There's a lot more emotion talking. That's. That's part of the issue. The other issue is that you can't always you get out everything that you want to say without the back and forth. So I can say something and she might say why don't feel like I've done that? I don't feel like you, you know, why don't you try this? Maybe you should do this. So I just just let me, you know word, vomit onto this piece of paper, read that, take it for what it is, and then we can have a discussion about that. So and it's hard to, it's hard to put into words what you are physically feeling. So women, ladies out there, write down how childbirth felt to you and then give it to your husband or significant other.
Speaker 2:You think it's gonna fully convey All the feelings that you had?
Speaker 1:probably not, but it'll give them an idea, depending on the descriptors you use and things like that, so it's not a perfect way of doing it but it's a much better way of doing it than not doing it 100%, and that's Something that's happened in my relationship as well, as we both are very the best term would be compartmentalized at time, the car compartmentalized at times, and we both do have issues trying to communicate in person to each other, and At first it was text messages, and then text messages would turn into text message fights, which wasn't effective, but what we found is that the the most effective in. Then what happens is those are kind of. I forget the, the relationship psychologist. He's one of the. It's a Kaufman, dr Drew Pinsky. No, no, come on, but he talks about micro. It's basically micro rejections, which is the okay. So when somebody lays out their feelings, no matter what format it is, and in your immediate response is To try to Change that opinion, mm-hmm or like you know, basically it's a well, that's not how I saw it type thing.
Speaker 1:Yes, you've immediately rejected their feelings, and so why would they open back up to you, right? And so the best thing we've done is this is what I felt when you did this, and it is easier through text messages, kind of the medium We've chosen because we were doing to your point, I was doing zero, and now we're at 5% and we've seen tremendous benefit from that, yeah, and who knows where we can you know, and that 5%, those allowed us to have what some people might consider easy conversations to have in person but to us are difficult because, you know, on our level of Comfortability.
Speaker 1:That's where we're at, but it's now okay. I appreciate you reaching out to me and letting me know how you feel and I'll think on that and then we can, you know, revisit this versus the immediate of. Well, this is how I felt it's let them have their feelings, let them have their moment. That validates it, it makes them feel a little bit safer and and you move on. And it's true, whether you think it's right or not, it's True. For them it is.
Speaker 2:And that's where I get wrapped up with people too, is the.
Speaker 1:My, my biggest pet peeve is caveat it apologies, which is I'm sorry, but or. Well, I only did it because or this is why I. I hate caveat it apologies because I'm sorry, I'm sorry, no-transcript. Intent and actuality are two different things. Well, I didn't mean for you to feel not to be a dick, but what? No, that's a classic one that well, yes, that one as well, but it's I didn't. I didn't mean for you to feel the way you're feeling. Well, at the end of the day, you still made them feel that way, or you, that person, still made me feel that way. And there's a fine line there too, which is you know, we can get into that thing, which is you know, well, we can't control everyone's feelings, but if it's somebody super close to you, then that's, that's a thing you have to take responsibility for.
Speaker 2:You can't, but you can have the conversation about what was it that I did that made you feel that way. How could that go differently? Or how can I express intent in a different? Way so that you don't misinterpret, because I didn't intend for you to feel that way.
Speaker 2:What, what happened? How can I do that differently? And if you, if you're caring for that person, then you will try to. You'll try to do that. And also, if they care for you, maybe they'll be a little more lenient on how severely they take criticisms or whatever the thing was that made them upset Mm-hmm. You know so, or humor, or whatever.
Speaker 1:Get off your phone. It's a phone for you, sam.
Speaker 2:No, it's not, you're on a laptop.
Speaker 1:Dick, I'm looking up sightful information for this podcast?
Speaker 2:I am too. Do you know how?
Speaker 1:hard it is to try to mix this thing. Shut up research. All you do is press a button and then you want me to add oh, by the way, audience, we're getting video because Brad insists we get video.
Speaker 2:That is. It's a nothing Absolute, not true. You're not being open-minded, oh, I'm open-minded.
Speaker 1:It, it, it gonna have to control those video cameras too. You're gonna have to control them.
Speaker 2:There is the whole bookstore thing, the way this book starts off. In the prelude he says the new age has become Generation X's religion. So like new age movement, which is astrology, feng shui, tarot cards, anything homeopathic.
Speaker 1:We talking about Salt Rocks.
Speaker 2:That's yeah, for sure. One of them Salt Rocks crystals what else?
Speaker 1:All right, I recant. I retract my statement about you can't pick and choose. Being open-minded Salt Rocks, I'm not open-minded.
Speaker 2:Come on. It's about the energy and the chakras and the what else? Chakra balancing God, shane, that's gonna hate this part.
Speaker 1:Does she?
Speaker 2:know Curly and photography. I don't even know what that is.
Speaker 1:What is it that's?
Speaker 2:interesting. But so he says, when believers are confronted with the fact that there is nothing to support these theories, such as some of the new age theories, nothing that would indicate that they are true, they often point to a criticism inspired by new age thinking, namely criticism of the very concept of truth. Claims are not true or untrue, so this idea runs. They are merely true for certain people or true for certain cultures. Such and so may not be true for you, but it is true for me. Subjective truth, subjective truth. I feel like we've talked about that.
Speaker 1:This is like some, fourth dimension shit.
Speaker 2:Such a relativist stance is really the result of intellectual laziness on the part of people who prefer to glibly slip from one idea to another rather than reaching conclusions through careful deliberation.
Speaker 1:Okay, I love that, because this drives me bat shit crazy. It does when people get into the. Well, it's just so complex and that you're not open-minded enough and it's so much we can't understand that. The fact that you wouldn't even allow that to be in your mind. You're like why would I allow this to be in my mind if there's nothing that can even allow me to make a? I'll give you a half leap. I'll give you a half leap, but there's not even a half leap there to jump to. We've just made some crazy wild accusations and our conclusions and you always talk about that in logic, the study of logic, which is just because A equals B, it doesn't actually mean that B, or what is it? What's the? A equals B, b equals C, but it doesn't mean A equals C, a equals C. No, that is actually logic.
Speaker 1:That's why okay, what is it? And that's what I'm saying. That doesn't make any sense. I don't know what you're trying to get at. We're gonna have to block this part out.
Speaker 2:You're gonna have to delete this part. Yeah, we're gonna have to delete this part.
Speaker 1:It's beautiful being an editor.
Speaker 2:It's possible.
Speaker 2:But yeah, we talked about it in the last episode, where the either or thinking is easier because you get to stay on one side and you don't have to go through the trenches of the middle, and that, essentially, is a little bit what it is, but it is funny because you will catch glimpses of these people that are and this also happens on I think he actually mentions this somewhere. But the pyramid scheme, like the marketing businesses, yeah, very much along the same lines of thinking, where, all right, this is our thinking point. Please do not deviate from this, because this is the word of the makeup gods, or the essential oil gods, or the whatever, the thing is that you're trying to sell Advocate.
Speaker 2:Okay, all right, that's maybe one of them.
Speaker 1:I am Advocate, but God of energy, I think Yoli Okay, transformers Dude, I think Yoli might be my favorite, didn't Yoli?
Speaker 2:just give you the shits. I'm gonna take that as a yes. Excuse me.
Speaker 1:No, my buddy Sean has the best hot take on Yoli. He goes Yoli is this health and wellness brand. That is what they are. They're health and wellness, okay, and look at the people that sell Yoli and talk about how great it is to be so healthy in their lives and all these other things. This is gonna be a hot take, it's. They're not necessarily healthy by traditional standards.
Speaker 2:What are people looking for when they participate in these types of groups? They wanna Especially from a health and wellness standpoint. What are they looking for?
Speaker 1:They want validation that what they're doing is the right way, which is there is a magic in Yoli's case is a magic bullet and I they want a magic bullet which is exactly or it's okay. They're looking for validation that I only wanna be on the treadmill and walk for 30 minutes a day and I wanna have my shakes and I wanna feel good, that that's a healthy lifestyle. Like cool You're together. That's awesome.
Speaker 1:You got a whole bunch of people saying that is the way, whereas there it's no different than CrossFit, though that I mean look at how aggressive they got. I mean they create CrossFit created a cult.
Speaker 2:No, I thought they were pretty chill.
Speaker 1:With Glassman and his little administrative regime was doing in terms of it was it was in terms of RABDO, oh, God Well, that too.
Speaker 1:But it was why would all these people pay all this money to CrossFit to start to have an identity as being a CrossFit gym, when all those techniques and all those tools were just pulled from general knowledge of fitness and he just put it together in a way that people like a system, people like a system. There's some marketing benefit there. It gives you a little bit of clout, but at the end of the day it was I wanna go to the games, I wanna get to know everyone. I wanna know Dave Castro, I wanna know this. I mean, it became a cult popularity sensation.
Speaker 2:It was very weird, but they had way better results than Yoli 100% for sure.
Speaker 1:But two sides of the same coin. One just likes their shakes and 30 minute jogs.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's the reason that I follow a lot of health fitness nutrition type experts that they do look great and they eat healthy and they work their ass off.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:And they do well for themselves. But they'll never be glassman rich, you know.
Speaker 1:No.
Speaker 2:They'll never be owner of Yoli rich, because essentially there's not enough people that want to do that work. And the same thing applies intellectually. There's. I do this thing sometimes where I drive home, like if I'm driving home later at night, especially in the winter time, so it's dark out and you're driving past and you know any, any number of houses and they have a big window and you see the TV on and you assume someone sitting there just watching a TV and I just think to myself, like what's that? Like what's it like to just come home, eat some dinner, sit down, watch like two hours TV?
Speaker 2:Go to bed go to bed and get up, go to work. I don't, I don't quite understand. I mean, I'm not saying I wouldn't like that, that time freedom a little bit and I could carve that out if I really wanted to but if you, let's generalize for a second breaking our own rules for generalizing that Just from a okay, let's generalize from a political standpoint.
Speaker 2:And this can be wrong. It's good a hundred percent be wrong. But if you, if you have a take on a specific hot topic, you're gonna get generalized into a group, right, mm-hmm. So imagine that you watch from 7 to 10 pm One of the four major channels, consistently Nick at night.
Speaker 1:No, like ABC NBC. Oh, so you're just gonna watch that one, you're just gonna watch the shows.
Speaker 2:Okay, 7 pm, 10 pm, until the news. Maybe you'll catch a little bit of the news that comes up to you.
Speaker 1:I remember when digital cable came out and game show network now, that I'm actually walking through this.
Speaker 2:I think this might be better than the people that watch cable for three hours. Okay, I'm listening but it's just so. When we watch comedy, so we'll watch like stand-up comedy or Maybe a funny show.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:And then you watch comedy that's on ABC at 8 o'clock at night.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:And do you laugh? No, no say, because it's not funny to me. It's not funny to me, but there's Millions of people that watch that show.
Speaker 1:America's got talent, whatever it is, I mean the cheesy lines, all the whatever it is. Yeah.
Speaker 2:What is that? What is?
Speaker 1:that it's mindless, yes, and it lets you check out. Okay, I mean.
Speaker 1:I accept that in a weird, in a weird roundabout way, brad, it's, it's, it's meditative and I don't. I don't think it's a quiet and I don't. I don't. I'm not using term meditative to be conflated with somehow quality or no or benefit, but but you, meditative in the sense of it is I guess we could say hip hypnotic is probably a better term. Where it is, it is hypnotic so and it allows you to escape because you're, you're wrapped into Something that's familiar, because when they say season, I laugh.
Speaker 1:They're like America's got talent season 27 it ends Like five weeks, like three weeks later, it's back on it. Yeah, you might as well just say it's a, it's a revolving show that has different contestants win every once in a while, but the term season is loose here, so it's just it's, it's, it's. I guess what am I trying to say here? It's, it's Okay. So I have a question. Okay, let's, it's consistent. Sorry.
Speaker 2:It's yeah, yeah, that's for sure. Consistency is a thing?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it does calm people. Consistency calms people. Yes, consistency drives me nuts.
Speaker 2:So let's be open-minded and assume that Can I make a drink before we have this conversation? A majority of people yeah, go, you can go. I'm gonna go on this rant right now. I want to listen to it, though the majority of people that do this consistency where they are watching like mediocre television. Mm-hmm, and they want to it is like a form of meditative checkout state mediocre is also subjective.
Speaker 1:Yes, if we're falling the same guidelines, we're talking about, it's subjective. You don't get to be the keeper it is objective. You don't get to be the keeper, the keys, just because you think how many times do they like win awards?
Speaker 2:That's not the point. Yeah, that's a, that's a metric.
Speaker 1:How much money do you think they bring in? That's a metric too.
Speaker 2:Yes, oh, okay, I'm gonna go there. No, okay, okay, you keep going that they use this as a form of meditation and Calming, and it is. It could be, it knows this, it could be people that that had let's again, let's generalize like nurses they have a highly stressful, non-stop job or construction workers that are barely works. So like let's not go that far. They're just like physically exhausted.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm at the end of the day and they don't want. Yeah, they're the you. You get to a point where Thinking uses too much energy that you don't have because you were Spent at the end of the day. Okay, and the shows that are on are mindless. They, they are their nighttime soap operas to some extent. Yep, I mean, the best ones are, because you don't get ten seasons out of something that is Just mind-blowingly original, true?
Speaker 2:So how? How do you get open-minded ideas, two groups like that? Because the idea of so like the idea of this book Right to light the flame of reason, clear thinking for the 21st century. It is a manual on how to better do that and I think are hopefully overarching theme of this podcast is how do we better do that? And it's not to compartmentalize people into People that already do it, people that don't do it, or people that want to do it and people that don't want to do it. It is how do you get the most people involved in that? And it's because it's not about Taking a side, mm-hmm. So it's not that I'm gonna sit here and be like I want you on my side. It is that I want you to grow critically, think about what side to be on, mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:Not just and even challenge the idea of sides.
Speaker 1:Yeah because, at the end of the day, you, you, your neighbor's, your neighbor, I mean but who are we in the game of life? Who are you really competing with? There are absolutely outside threats. There are absolutely People that do not want to see you succeed, but we create division, we create false divisions with people at times that are just Caused so many more headaches. That is necessary, which is we all live in the same community. We want, at the end of the day, we want the best thing in the community, which is everyone wants to feel, everyone wants to prosper.
Speaker 1:I Fail to use another term besides prosper in the sense that you can't start, you can't start dictating what safety feels like. You can't start Dictating. You know we can all probably at some level, come to a conclusion on what safety, minimum safety standards would be, which is you should be able to walk on the sidewalk outside your house without feeling like you're gonna be attacked. You know, but there's levels to safety at the same time where people can ramp that all the way up to. Nobody should ever disagree with me on anything. So you know there's levels like we've talked about. Yeah, at the end of day, though, the pie and this is what I get wrapped up into is the pie is not only finite Right, and there's only so many slices.
Speaker 2:Yeah, especially what happens if we mine this asteroid what happens in?
Speaker 1:what happens is, when you grow together, the pie gets bigger and it's like, oh, there's more opportunity for everyone at this point and People really do this us versus them thing, versus how do we all get what we want by growing together, which is okay long term?
Speaker 2:we need to get here, but this is the short term and we need to fix this first so, but sometimes the growing together isn't increasing the size of the pie so much as it is increasing the Amount that you are happy with the current size. There's that too, so so there's also there's a duality there. There's also a thing that says I, I, this is all that I have, is more than enough. So how do I go about being happier in helping other people be happier with what they have? And that's not to say that's a slippery slope, because and say, yeah, but you're alive, I know you're starving, you don't have a house. Well, you're alive.
Speaker 1:You'd be happy about it.
Speaker 2:Happy, well, that's yeah. That's a hard one, that's a different that's a different story, but there's a lot of us that Do have what we need to and need to figure out a way to to be a little bit more at ease with what we have.
Speaker 1:I'm guilty that I'm next level every time, every time. Once I get someone like what's the next step?
Speaker 2:What's the next step? I think that's.
Speaker 1:That part is kind of human nature Is it for the people that want to go home and watch two hours of television after their TV dinner.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because they know they're gonna go to work the next day. I mean, if you go back to like hunter-gatherer, yeah, they're probably Pretty happy in their community. But they also knew that they had to go. Yeah, do it again.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:It wasn't, I don't. Maybe they were thinking man, I wish, I wish someone could go do this for me. And then somebody did think that and they're like oh, slavery, and that's how that started, probably. Whoo. They're like you know what? I'm really happy in my community, but if I didn't have to go find this food every day, that would be great. I wonder who would go do that for me? Oh, nobody, volunteers. Okay, well, let's just make them, that's a, that's a whole other podcast.
Speaker 1:But you, you bring up a good point. We're gonna do it on the history of that now, like who was the guy that was Going to his buddy saying I have an idea, and it might sound a little crazy, but we're gonna get rich.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but it it always happened as long as there's large communities and people. It always happened yeah so, okay, we have all of these people and we have the lowest group doing the worst work. Mm-hmm but now we have this giant army and we just took over all these other people that we don't really like. They're gonna do the worst work or we're just gonna kill them all. Those are your options. I mean, that's kind of how it started, yeah so that'd be a good podcast name.
Speaker 1:Slavery or genocide, which one do you want? Hmm, stuff choice. All right, hold your thought there. I Don't remember where we left off great segue. We're not exactly what we'd call radio personalities, yet killing it.
Speaker 2:Am I killing it? Do you want to hear some original text? Yeah, yeah, not really, I don't know. This is free flow. Thought from mine, truly yours truly, maybe yours truly.
Speaker 1:What thoughts?
Speaker 2:I don't know, I'll just read you some okay. This is from July of 2009, but this is one particular book Journal, whatever you want to call it, july 2009 that I was dating a redhead in July 2009.
Speaker 1:So was I. I'm so shenan cute.
Speaker 2:Wait, was I married? I don't know. Yeah, when did I get married? I Don't know 2006.
Speaker 1:I was a junior in high school 2006.
Speaker 2:I was married to a redhead in 2009. Look at me go doing math 17 years. Got her a table. You know Jesus was a carpenter too. I try to wear sandals on his behalf. Hmm, everybody doesn't get it. July 2009 I have been reading Sam Harris's the End of Faith and have become more aware of several things. One it seems almost imminent that religious fanatics of the world will destroy a vast majority of life on this planet, as they always have. Number two More voice voices like mine must be heard on some type of platform. Number three People will not want to change.
Speaker 1:So I already hate 2009. Brad, you don't like you don't like that.
Speaker 2:It seems Pretty relevant to 2023.
Speaker 1:Brad also. Yeah, who said I like 2023? Brad?
Speaker 2:Nobody said that, so I started from the beginning, my beginning and what set me on the road I have been traveling. What it comes down to in its most basic form is critical thinking, questioning, doubting and longing for understanding. I thought, with so much progress being made, this basic idea of critical thinking would really be taking hold. Yet it seems as though we are in a time warp, back to the 15th century, when it be. When it comes to religion and critical reasoning, we feed off of emotions. We find security in our mob mentality. We rally around those who stand up against something, even if that what they're standing for is wrong. I wonder how many people have truly felt love, wonder, awe and understanding. I wonder how many people have felt inspired by others, made others understand their insights, tried to understand their own? That which we think we are and that which we think we perceive are undivided, which is a quote I always go back to.
Speaker 1:I was gonna ask this before I. We took that quick break, but how do we and this was in response to you how do we get the message out? And do you want to hear my smart, my smart-ass answer? Or do you want to hear my, my, my real answer.
Speaker 2:I don't think you have a real answer, so give me the smart-ass one actually really good because it was a trick.
Speaker 1:It's a trick question.
Speaker 2:They're both great.
Speaker 1:What? How do you, how do you monetize critical thinking? Because when you think about it, where we're at right now is you can. We've monetized religion, we've monetized these other. It's not just religion, it's just the easy button. We've monetized the easy button, people have monetized that, but now and that's made their lives easier per se, not necessarily better. Easy doesn't need to be conflated with better, because Just because I can go through my day without having to think doesn't necessarily mean I'm living fulfilled life.
Speaker 2:But how do you examine? Life is not worth living, that I 100% agree, but why do other?
Speaker 1:do other people know that? Do other people agree with that? Who knows? But how do you? How do you create such a powerful message behind critical thinking, which is you're going to have to work really hard To be there to do this and it's not gonna be fun and it's gonna cause you anxiety and you're not gonna be able to check out all the time and what?
Speaker 2:what if you start?
Speaker 1:So, and what I? And maybe monetization is the wrong, but how do you so when?
Speaker 2:you start high jumping, you don't set the bar at six feet.
Speaker 1:I did six grade that you Couldn't even dunk. What are you talking about? I could dunk in six grade bullshit.
Speaker 2:Okay, it's not true.
Speaker 1:All right I.
Speaker 2:Need video.
Speaker 1:All right, it's not true. It was eighth grade, see, and high jump was an eighth grade to you. I'm sorry.
Speaker 2:So what if we set the bar low and go back to that Brunner Brown Bullshit and just say I don't, I don't know enough on that? Now you're asking what if you start there?
Speaker 1:now you're asking people to be vulnerable.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but being vulnerable is easier than being smart true but it requires well, so let's let's take it back even, maybe more.
Speaker 1:Let's go to the root where and what culturally Did we as a society decide that it wasn't okay to Express and have feelings, when I mean it goes back to the the beginning of time, I mean yeah, so that's a.
Speaker 1:I don't try to think back historically and that's the crazy part is Like there were like this is this is the, this is the sad real. I mean, it's not sad reality, this is reality, life up until the modern age, which, not to be confused with these young, these young bucks, and they're in their new age-ness. And Carillion photography oh good, I learned about that is, by the way oh cool, yeah, they just put electricity on shit and then you take a picture of it and it does some crazy stuff.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Okay. Anyway, Life was so harsh and life was so hard, you didn't have time to think. You had to react every moment. But you didn't have long-term thinking. It was like we don't have time to think about how we feel we have to survive as a family, as a society. It was survival, and only in the last 150 years, maybe a little bit longer, we can kind of debate that time range. Have we actually been safe enough or had the luxuries that provided not just the upper class but middle class, lower class, the ability to be able to sit down and kind of think long-term and say, okay, I'm not just living day-to-day in a constant state of fear of how to survive, it's pretty much guaranteed I'm getting to tomorrow minus some bad accident or something kind of going off the rails. So we've never really evolved into being able to express that.
Speaker 2:I think we did. Okay, I think we did at one point. I think that's what the first enlightenment was really about, and we also may have had other points in previous history that we're unaware of, probably due to aliens, that's twice. Maybe asteroids, you don't know, could be giant sharks, I don't know. There could have been an underwater civilization, but for sure the enlightenment.
Speaker 2:That's why in this book he's calling for a new age of enlightenment. So it's, the original enlightenment was coming out of the Dark Ages and it was an intellectual and philosophical movement that brought a whole slew of new ideas and scientific discoveries and ideas of philosophical thought that hadn't really been able to flourish since Socrates and Plato, I mean since Greek was a stable, civilized nation, which is what it takes for usually ideas to advance. And so if you look at where Stable nations If you look at where we're at now, where there is an overwhelming majority of people that let's just take the United States Overwhelming majority of people that have housing, have food on a regular basis, have a somewhat stable government, more stable than at least past governments, world history speaking, and yet what kind of intellectual advances are we making?
Speaker 1:Chad GPT.
Speaker 2:That's a good one.
Speaker 1:God damn it Is that it the self-driving Ubers that are causing traffic jams in cities, because they don't know what to do and they all get called the same area.
Speaker 2:But also, like with the Enlightenment, you have these huge new ideas. But if we were to travel back in time, which we're gonna do a time traveling episode, because I find it extremely entertaining.
Speaker 1:We've discussed this, though, and this kind of goes to Rick Rubin's book, which is on being creative. I don't remember. It's a great book. Pick it up if you haven't read it. But he has a section there where he says an idea is not your idea. An idea is only your idea when you take it to fruition, and you kind of were discussing that, how you had written what you thought was an original idea, and then you came across some philosophers from what age? 1800s.
Speaker 2:No, who knows?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and they were basically proposing the same ideas you had. Even though you had no prior knowledge. No prior knowledge and that you had had no kind of push in that direction from anyone. You had an idea that somebody else had. So it's basically saying ideas cannot be owned and they exist for. Unless you're patented. Yes, until they're patented. And then somebody says those, Until you put it on paper, until you actually make it something. An idea is an idea. It's a. It's a wisp. It's a wisp in the air.
Speaker 2:But going back to, like the original enlightenment, if you look at the high level thinkers, what did the rest of the population look like during the enlightenment?
Speaker 1:Oh, my goodness.
Speaker 2:Were they sitting at home watching three hours of of mainline TV type people?
Speaker 1:No, but they were. It was, they didn't have TV. They didn't have TV, brad. Come on, don't be that guy. Come on, they didn't have TV you know what I'm saying it was invented at least 10 years after the enlightenment.
Speaker 2:But you, but was it a a very small sect of people? It was a very small sect of people You're.
Speaker 1:You're being Owen Wilson from the night in Paris, midnight in Paris. Wow, have you seen that? Wow, I knew that was coming. You seen that movie?
Speaker 2:No, you know I haven't really seen it. It just seems like a real wow type of movie.
Speaker 1:Your impressions way too good. I don't like it. Wow Okay, stop Okay.
Speaker 2:Uh oh, and Wilson was a cat in a previous life. Did you know that? I believe it, yeah.
Speaker 1:Wow, wow and he has nine.
Speaker 2:He has nine noses.
Speaker 1:No, so I just I gotta tell you so he have you ever seen the movie?
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:It's he, him and his wife or his fiance, whoever in her family, go to Paris and they're all wrapped up in the glitz and glam of modern Paris, which is shopping and all these things. And he's Hemingway was here. You know, all the greats were here. All this, you know this was this, used to be such a renaissance of the time, and why aren't we? Why aren't we going out and exploring these areas and these people and like why? And he's very like melancholy about today's society, Okay, and then he's, he wants to go to this certain cafe that whoever went to back in the day, you know the 1920s, 1930s is kind of where his heads wrapped around and he goes for a walk by himself, cause no one in the family wants to go with him, and he just wanders kind of drunkenly, aimlessly, and then all of a sudden he shows up at a, a cafe, and everyone's kind of in period clothing and he realizes he found a time warp and he's actually back in the 1920s and he's with those people that he's talking about.
Speaker 1:Okay, and all they can talk about Brad, is about how the time that they're in is terrible and that they want to go back to, like, the 1880s or the 1860s and that was a period of real enlightenment and real beauty and real, you know nuance and all these things. And so you kind of over the course of the movie it's, you're always chasing the past because you think there's something more beautiful back there. But it's not really true.
Speaker 2:You create beauty in every moment, it's just it's like it's true, because the 1980s were the best decade ever. I wasn't alive. Fight me.
Speaker 1:I wasn't alive, how would I fight you?
Speaker 2:Does that mean automatically win?
Speaker 1:No, I just don't want to go to jail for manslaughter.
Speaker 2:Oh okay, Well suit yourself Okay. No, I mean there's. I think there, yeah, there's that nostalgia for the past, but then why do we keep pressuring for the future?
Speaker 1:Cause there's more money in the future.
Speaker 2:Well, you're not going to get any money out of the past.
Speaker 1:No, you're not.
Speaker 2:Unless you're an archeologist right I think you're right, I don't know, but you seem perplexed. I do. I kind of want to go back.
Speaker 1:Where would you like to go back, da Vinci? I think you're one of many people that would love to go back and see that.
Speaker 2:Can you imagine? So here's an impossible question. Okay, think of something right now that will not be created for another 400 years. You failed, da Vinci did it like 17 times.
Speaker 1:Something that you create right now wouldn't be created for that 400 years.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I hit a helicopter.
Speaker 1:Didn't work. I hit the idea for a helicopter. Okay.
Speaker 2:You seem unimpressed.
Speaker 1:I'm not it's a whirley.
Speaker 2:It was a whirley burger, it was an inverted corkscrew.
Speaker 1:I really appreciate it. But that's the thing is he under at that point he had taken it was. His thing was is he had an innate ability to kind of understand things he didn't understand, if that makes sense. He was almost kind of like idiot savant. He had he could understand the actual readings and the technologies that was out, the written actual tech. And then he, you know like okay, we understand this in physics right now At that point, what they had understood in physics, what they had understood in science and maths and other things. But he also was like what? This kind of feels good too. So I'm gonna go that direction. He kind of went experimental, hypotetic.
Speaker 1:He just happened to have really good intuition, but also how much of that came out of just natural observation of the world.
Speaker 2:Not just for him but from he was attuned from a ton of people, but that's a great point though.
Speaker 1:People that are attuned to, they don't again, it's the go home, get hypnotized. Wake up, go to work, go home, get hypnotized. There's something to be said about this openness that we keep going back to in this episode, which is being attuned to the outside world. What are your natural observations? You'll start to see patterns, and you might even know that you're seeing patterns, and those patterns only click when you need to understand that pattern which is oh, I've seen this time and time again.
Speaker 2:Well, that goes back to the range book right, where people from wildly different specifics come together and somebody that may be working on a mechanical problem gets help from somebody that is an environmentalist, because they've seen a particular thing happen in the real world that is trying to be solved in this mechanical engineering standpoint. Like oh yeah, I've seen this. Try this. This is how it works in the real world, and without that cross-reference it's much harder, so you know.
Speaker 1:I was a tanker growing up. I built a lot of things that worked, not because I had a functional understanding of mechanical engineering, but you just were like it's because you failed all the time.
Speaker 2:Oh no, I didn't pull the Edison thing, but Because you just bought out everyone that made light bulbs work.
Speaker 1:Something to be said about not being the innovator and just the buyer, the buyer, the buyer. The buyer reaps benefits too, not all the time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, look at, look at Tesla.
Speaker 1:Yeah what's?
Speaker 2:he got a car named after him that he didn't make.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I would like to.
Speaker 1:So you wanna go back to the Renaissance. I wanna go back to Tesla and be like I'm your business manager. That guy needed a manager, he needed somebody. That's a guy where a PR team would be like listen bro, we can get around you. He might've needed like the mob.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, that might've helped him out. And they were just like listen, this guy, he's your guy. All of them Listen, no, he's your guy. Like okay, okay, nikola, you're our guy.
Speaker 1:That's what he needed. Edison he's out, tesla he's in. I feel like Edison had a mob AC versus DC. That's all it was, man, I know.
Speaker 2:And yet, years later, they conjoined to make some of the greatest rock music of all time.
Speaker 1:Don't talk about Angus that way, no.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Do you know the difference between AC and DC current? What about Wagyu?
Speaker 2:Oh, I thought we were talking about.
Speaker 1:Is that a rapper? No, oh. Angus Wagyu. Well, angus is a cow, wagyu's a cow. We've lost it. What do we lost? What is Brett's hot take and what does he want to convey to the audience right now?
Speaker 2:All right, what do you want me to end on? Something happy or something sad?
Speaker 1:Both.
Speaker 2:Okay, ready.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:It's from Sam Harris Letter to a Christian nation.
Speaker 1:We've totally lost all of our viewers before we even had one, highly recommend you listen to this.
Speaker 2:Those with the power to elect our presidents and congressmen, and many who themselves get elected, believe that dinosaurs lived two by two upon Noah's Ark, that light from distant galaxies was created and route to the earth, and that the first members of our species were fashioned out of dirt and divine breath in a garden with a talking snake by the hand of invisible God. And what more do you need to know? That's it.
Speaker 1:You're gonna have to elaborate on that.
Speaker 2:No, that's it. Is that wrong?
Speaker 1:It's not wrong.
Speaker 2:It's not wrong. There's nuance there, though.
Speaker 1:There's nuance there that you're not explaining.
Speaker 2:How so Did dinosaurs go on the Ark? No, how do you know?
Speaker 1:Well, you're right, I'm not being open minded.
Speaker 2:I apologize, I don't know there's an Ark in Kentucky that has dinosaurs. There Is it?
Speaker 1:Kentucky. Or did they build that replica Ark? It's not very big. It's not as big as you think it would be Based on the story. It's not as big as you think it would be. It's pretty big though. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I mean, compared to a bass boat, it's pretty big, I mean you don't think it's as big enough for all the dinosaurs, though.
Speaker 1:Do you think they wanted to eat the chickens?
Speaker 2:No, they were clearly all compartmentalized and fed.
Speaker 1:So are they fed? I don't know Did they just starve.
Speaker 2:I don't know man.
Speaker 1:Was it 40 days and 40 nights.
Speaker 2:No, that was Moses. Yeah. How long were they on the Ark? I don't know. Was it years? I don't know. Did they eat fish? Did they have an aquarium?
Speaker 1:You obviously have some research to do. You're a resident research. I'm the tech guy, I'm the idiot.
Speaker 2:All right, let's end on this. Okay, I believe that octopus is octopi.
Speaker 1:I think it is octopi, plural octopus.
Speaker 2:Octopuses, that sounds better, it's octopi.
Speaker 1:It's octopi, oh octopods.
Speaker 2:That's different.
Speaker 1:Yeah, plural octopus.
Speaker 2:That's different. Octopi are aliens.
Speaker 1:Okay, look it up. Okay, brad H, chocolate and octopi are aliens and we're gonna leave you at that. We apologize for you having to listen to this episode today, everyone. Leave us feedback we don't have a way to get it right now. When this comes out, there will be a way. Yes, this actually is probably around Christmas, although we should probably do a Christmas episode.
Speaker 2:Merry Christmas. Merry Ha ha, ha ha Clark.
Speaker 1:Merry Christmas. Why is the box meowing Thanks for hanging around. You're still here.
Speaker 2:It's over.
Speaker 1:Go home.
Speaker 2:Go.