Monsters, Spotted: The 229th Evolutionary Lens with Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying

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Jun 12, 2024

Guest

Heather Heying

Guest

Bret Weinstein

Evolutionary biologists Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying discuss empathy, psychopathic behavior in corporations, failures of utopias, and the human need for storytelling. They explore concepts like kin selection, reciprocity, and the importance of narratives in understanding the world.

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INSIGHT

Redefining Common Terms

Redefine terms like "empathy" only when necessary for clarity.
Always inform others of your redefined usage to avoid confusion.

INSIGHT

Empathy as a Tool

Empathy is a technique for predicting behavior by inferring another's predicament through your own lens.
Empathy does not necessitate positive feelings; it's about understanding motivations, even enemies'.

INSIGHT

Empathy and Similarity

Empathy's accuracy depends on mental similarity between individuals.
Differences in perspective, like between sexes, can lead to empathetic misinterpretations.

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In this 229th in a series of live discussions with Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying (both PhDs in Biology), we talk about the state of the world through an evolutionary lens.

In this week’s episode, we discuss empathy, sympathy, and theory of mind; corporate personhood, psychopathic behavior, and the limitations of humans; kin selection, and reciprocity, both direct and indirect. Then: utopias, and why they fail, from the hero of Er in Plato’s Republic to the Singularity. And we discuss the human need for story, which exists next to, and perhaps deeper than, our need for analysis and logic.

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Mentioned in this episode:

Lahti and Weinstein 2005. The better angels of our nature: Group stability and the evolution of moral tension. Evolution and Human Behavior, 26(1): 47-63: https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document?repid=rep1&type=pdf&doi=c5669ae3f2b5ba89967ab466b1095ab9c6d99c8c

DarkHorse Evolutionary Lens #128: Wouldn’t Put It Past ‘Em: https://rumble.com/v4zrlvl-the-228th-evolutionary-lens-with-bret-weinstein-and-heather-heying.html

Angus Fletcher, professor of story science, FAQs: https://www.angusfletcher.co/faqs

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