Navigating the Tall Poppy Syndrome

This is a cross-post of some interviews Rob did recently on two other podcasts — Mission Daily (from 2m) and The Good Life (from 1h13m).

Some of the content will be familiar to regular listeners — but if you’re at all interested in Rob’s personal thoughts, there should be quite a lot of new material to make listening worthwhile.

The first interview is with Chad Grills. They focused largely on new technologies and existential risks, but also discuss topics like:

• Why Rob is wary of fiction
• Egalitarianism in the evolution of hunter gatherers
• How to stop social media screwing up politics
• Careers in government versus business

The second interview is with Prof Andrew Leigh - the Shadow Assistant Treasurer in Australia. This one gets into more personal topics than we usually cover on the show, like:

• What advice would Rob give to his teenage self?
• Which person has most shaped Rob’s view of living an ethical life?
• Rob’s approach to giving to the homeless
• What does Rob do to maximise his own happiness?

Get this episode by subscribing to our podcast on the world’s most pressing problems and how to solve them: type 80,000 Hours into your podcasting app.

The 80,000 Hours Podcast is produced by Keiran Harris.