Polarization, Powerlessness, and what We can Actually Do

On this week’s episode of The Origins Podcast, I am excited to release a conversation that has been sitting in our archives for more than a year. When we first recorded this discussion with conflict mediator and systems thinker Diana McLain Smith, political polarization was already a significant national and international problem. It has only gotten worse.The world seems more tribal than ever, and there is constant pressure to have to pick a side in every argument and not listen to any different opinions, or even divergent facts. In this episode, we step back from that noise and ask what our deep evolutionary wiring for in group loyalty means in a complex modern democracy, how history and culture can turn ordinary differences into hardened divides, and what it might take to reduce the space between “us” and “them” rather than accept permanent hostility as normal.Through stories that range from local communities like Billings, Montana and Lewiston, Maine to the quiet work of reform in the United States Congress, Diana draws on decades of experience with families, organizations, and civic coalitions to show that citizens are not as powerless as we often feel, especially when we resist the demand for instant certainty and allow ourselves to say, “I do not know, I have not really thought about that before. I’m not on any one side. Let me look at the evidence before I form an opinion.”

This is the basis of much of the scientific method, and it is something that we can all learn to do too. The benefits are immediate. You approach life with more curiosity, and you are freer from assumptions and biases.

Conversations like this go to the heart of the Origins Project Foundation mission, which is to bring the habits of mind that underlie science into our shared public life. My conversations on the podcast blend serious works in physics, psychology, and history with urgent questions about how we live together, and to model what it looks like to treat ideas as hypotheses to be tested rather than badges of tribal identity.

In an environment that rewards outrage more than understanding, a commitment to evidence, curiosity, and a willingness to change one’s mind is not just an intellectual posture, it is a civic act.

This episode with Diana is offered in that spirit.

As always, an ad-free video version of this podcast is also available to paid Critical Mass subscribers. Your subscriptions support the non-profit Origins Project Foundation, which produces the podcast. The audio version is available free on the Critical Mass site and on all podcast sites, and the video version will also be available on the Origins Project YouTube.