Decoding the Gurus

Amanda Montell is an author, linguist, and podcaster with a new book 'Cultish' on "how cultish groups from Jonestown and Scientology to SoulCycle and social media gurus use language" to manipulate followers and cultivate power.In the interview she offers fantastic insights that cover not only guru linguistics but also the social dynamics of modern cults and 'cultish' phenomenon. We learnt a lot from Amanda and hope you will too!LinksAmanda's WebsiteCultish: The Language of FanaticismSounds like a Cult Podcast

Well, the hosts have had a good long taste of the culture wars and friends, it is a bitter, bitter draught. As a palette cleanser, we return to a simpler time, a better(?) time... The 1980's! When Chris Kavanagh was young and innocent, running about in short pants with a twinkle in his eye and (I assume) lobbing bricks at RUC armoured vehicles for the craic. At nights he would curl up and listen to CASSETTE tapes of a fellow called Anthony De Mello, while the eyes of Pope Ratzinger would stare at him disapprovingly from the poster (I assume) that was on the wall of his room.Yes, we're returning to the gurus our decoders were fans of during their young and impressionable years. And Chris rather liked Fr. Anthony De Mello. Who is he? A Jesuit priest who sounds more like a Buddhist monk with a message of peace, detachment, and the recipe for happiness. He says that society trains us to act like robots, encouraging us to go through life in a depressed haze. After you apply his recipe, you'll still be depressed, but you'll realise the depression is like the clouds, but you are the sky. He's got the good vibes of Bob Ross, but does that conceal something darker? Was spiritual self-help better or worse in the 1980s compared today? Listen, and you shall know all!LinksOne of DeMello's Waking Up Talks on Daily MotionDeMello's Spirituallity CenterMatt and Chris' 'You're Probably Not Galileo' article for Skeptic UKTim Nguyen's appearance on Eigen Bros

Journalist and Twitter lightning rod, Jesse Singal, discusses his new book on Quick Fix psychology, the replication crisis fallout, and the dangers of peddling simple solutions. They cover social media dynamics, audience capture, and the lab leak hypothesis. The conversation explores the complexity of ideas, interdisciplinary collaboration, skepticism in mainstream media, and the political landscape including Trump's presidency. They emphasize the need for genuine discussion and evidence on controversial topics.

Despite promising to leave Weinstein world for an overdue holiday, Matt and Chris have been lured back by a world shattering theory with a cosmic vision of ultimate unity! We are speaking, of course, about Eric Weinstein's revolutionary theory of everything: 'Geometric Unity'. To help uncover the mysteries embedded deep within this scientific Rosetta stone, Matt and Chris are joined by a special guest Tim Nguyen. Tim is a mathematician and the co-author of a recent paper that tried to mathematically construct and critically assess the theory of Geometric Unity as laid out in Eric's content.Eric has not exactly welcomed the critical feedback and has accused Tim and his co-author, Theo, of having nefarious motives and being very bad guys. So we thought it was worth talking to Tim about their real motivations for the paper, their criticisms of Geometric Unity, and whether they are official DISC agents.Join us as we leap one more time into Weinstein world!Notes provided by TimResponse to Geometric Unity paper by Timothy Nguyen and Theo Polya and corresponding blog post. The paper provides 25 clickable timestamps to Weinstein video segments to let the reader confirm directly the veracity the criticisms. Clubhouse recording with Eric evading questions about Geometric Unity and implying his critics are bad actors.Technical notes on Weinstein’s limited responses: 1) Weinstein confesses on Joe Rogan Episode #1628 that “one of the criticisms is valid but is something that I would have brought up anyways” (see time near 73:30). Correspondingly, in Section 8.2 of Weinstein’s Geometric Unity, he admits that “unfortunately, the author is no longer conversant … and has been unable to locate the notes from decades ago that originally picked out the [Shiab] operator”. The inability to construct the Shiab operator remains a fundamental objection to Geometric Unity. 2) Weinstein says here, the authors misunderstand GU as being chiral. But the objection is that the theory has a chiral anomaly, which is not contingent on the theory being chiral. 3) Weinstein suggests here (and on Joe Rogan) that there is incorrect inference that he is using supersymmetry in 14 dimensions. The interview referenced in the response paper suggests otherwise, where he explicitly mentions supersymmetry.The “sign flip” discussion Nguyen used to deduce that Weinstein does not understand the Seiberg-Witten equations concerns the issue of obtaining a crucial bound on the spinor field (as discussed in the Wikipedia article) needed to obtain compactness. Having the wrong sign makes the entire theory ill-behaved.

The big dog of the Intellectual Dark Web, Jordan Peterson, is back! And this hero, this mythical archetype, is welcomed back from his long hiatus by DTG regular, Bret Weinstein . To his credit, Bret does the impossible and makes Jordan seem surprisingly humble and reflexive simply by virtue of comparison.The duo cover a lot of territory, ranging from hot takes about how hospitals probably kill more people than they save (Peterson), the evolutionary modules controlling rape and genocide (Weinstein), how religion contains the ultimate evolutionary cheatsheet to ascend the hierarchy (Peterson), and how they are both absolutely crucial for understanding everything wrong with what's going on these days (BOTH).So yes... Chris and Matt couldn't resist returning to this epic crossover of two guru favourites one last(?) time for a bit of decoding. There's a heaping of the usual trademark guru dynamics on display, as well as the obligatory ersatz academ-ese, mutual back-patting, and huge leaps of speculative reasoning. These guys ping-pong back and forth to build up a pretty impressive synthesis of latent religious symbols and Bret's bespoke alternative evolutionary theory of 'lineage selection'. You will come away with your brain a smouldering ruin after dealing with so many high level ideas... you have been warned!P.S. If you make it all the way to the end you'll get to hear Matt DESTROY a so-called philosopher's Low Quality Criticism with REASON and SCIENCE.LinksDarkhorse Podcast: Jordan Peterson is Back!Jordan B. Peterson Podcast S4E10: Minefields and the New Political Landscape | Bret WeinsteinCritical Article on Peterson that appeared in the Times that he complains aboutTWiV 760: SARS-CoV-2 origins with Peter Daszak, Thea Kølsen Fischer, Marion KoopmansTWiV 762: SARS-CoV-2 origins with Robert Garry Nice blog debunking the claims made in Wade's Medium piece on the Lab Leak Detailed Twitter thread by virologist Kristian Andersen discussing lab leak investigationsP.P.S. The Alternative Title: 'Lineage selection hierarchy heroes 2: Choose your guru!' suppressed by the Distributed Australian Dilettante or DAD.

This episode wasn't meant to be about Ivermectin, or Bret and Heather's unique ability to apply an 'evolutionary lens' to understand everything, including virology, epidemiology, immunology and the culture war... but it is.....We meant to make a few topical comments prior to the main episode, but the comments led into some rants, and then with the clips, those rants metastasised into a full-sized episode. So the duo had to travel back in time to record a new introduction, and back again, forward this time, in time, to record the outro and it all got very complicated.Anyway, it is what it is!Bret and Heather are 95% sure that the COVID vaccines are like playing Russian Roulette with a loaded gun, and that the scientific and public health authorities are lying to everyone, and we would be better off avoiding these risky vaccines and taking Ivermectin instead. Bret even demonstrates how to swallow a pill live on air. But they are not anti-vax! No not at all. They're not conspiracy theorists either! Of course they're not. Conspiracy hypothesisers, maybe... but there is a crucial distinction there. Either way they have concerns, and Matt and Chris have concerns with their concerns. So enjoy this very special 'meta' episode.Also, stay tuned after the music ends for one of Matt's rare rants. Live mic situation, and Chris snuck it in there.LinksDarkHorse Podcast Episode 80: What Covid Reveals About our LeadersDarkHorse Podcast Episode 79: #NotAllMiceDarkHorse Podcast with Geert Vanden Bossche & Bret WeinsteinScienceBasedMedicine article examining the new hype over IvermectinNew Discourses Podcast Episode 35 (James Lindsay): How to End Vaccine HesitancyGood article on Politifact covering the lab leak 'controversy'

Just as the Terror was used by Robespierre and the Jacobins during the French Revolution two centuries ago, fear and draconian control is being used today to usher in... The Great Reset.Or so Michael O'Fallon would have you believe. O'Fallon is the founder of Sovereign Nations, a Christian nationalist organisation that aims to "prepare warriors for the battleground of ideas". He's recently been collaborating with James Lindsay, renowned culture warrior and online troll, to teach us all how critical theory and social justice are hell bent on destroying Our (or at least Western) Civilisation.Chris and Matt are joined by Aaron Rabinowtiz, host of Embrace the Void (@ETVPod) and Philosophers in Space podcasts, PhD student and lecturer at Rutgers University. Aaron has Done the Work, he has the Documents, he's been privy to the secret conversations, and he's here to help the boys decode just WTF is going on here.So, what's the deal with O'Fallon? Is he a sorely-needed, breathy and bombastic prophet bearing a critical message of our impending doom? Why does he take such long pauses? Where did he get such a laughably inaccurate understanding of the French Revolution? We can't promise all the answers in this episode, but we're going to give it a shot. The Future of our Civilisation.... Depends Upon It.........Dun Dun Daaaaah!LinksSovereign Nations' The Causes of Things Podcast Episode 25: The Great ResetEmbrace The Void Episode 150: Sovereign Nations and the Grievance HoaxersPhilosophers in Space Facebook GroupSovereign Nations Website

Who would have thought it, the Hollywood A-lister and founder of the luxury lifestyle brand 'Goop', Gwyneth Paltrow also finds time to host a podcast. Making her a prime target for Matt and Chris, who simply cannot stomach the competition!Fans have the option to join Paltrow in questing for the eternal and well-guarded secrets of health and wellness. But unless you're only after some lip-balm, this total holistic and integrative lifestyle is not going to come cheap! As we learn from her special guest Kristine Gedroic you are also going to need some precision medical diagnostics to balance with your biome, cleanse your cell membranes, and undo the horrors of 5G. And that isn't even addressing the panoply of parasites that we are all (apparently) infested with. So this is why Matt and Chris haven't been actualising their spiritual selves recently. In some ways, this health and wellness space is familiar stomping ground for Matt and Chris (and maybe for many listeners too). However, the duo reckon that Paltrow, Goop, and the whole industry is very 'Now' and might even hint at some exciting new directions elite culture is taking. Check it out! And get yourself checked for bespoke parasites while you're at it. Seriously... we are all riddled with them.LinksHow do we deal with- and prevent- chronic illness? Goop Podcast with Kristine GedroicGwyneth Paltrow: Ask Me AnythingHard Talk interview with Gwyneth Paltrow

Sam Harris is a public intellectual who inspires strong reactions both positive and negative. Here, Matt and Chris dip their toes into Sam's introspective universe by analysing a recent 9 minute mini-episode of his Making Sense podcast titled 'Some Points of Confusion'. Sam intended to clear up some recurrent misunderstandings he has observed with maybe as much as 99% audience with this episode. What could be causing such a fundamental error and does he succeed in resolving the confusion? Join us to find out.In the episode you will learn about the true teachings of Jesus, how incredibly niche Chris' undergraduate degree was, the introspective case for social welfare, and why all meditators inevitably deny the existence of free will.This is an interesting one. And whether you love or hate Sam, we hope you find some value in our non-enlightened ejected introspections.LinksMaking Sense Episode 243: Some Points of Confusion

Matt and Chris are helped again by a guest in their endless quest to get the bottom of what the Hell is Going On and What It's All About.Phrost describes himself as "the world's most dangeous nerd" and is not only an expert in the fighting arts (like, actual real fighting) but is also no slouch when it comes to combatting bullshit.He identifies as a soldier, a scientist, and as a shill for "Big Reality".And his site bullshido.net as well as his podcast The Art of Fighting BS comes up with the reality-based goods. Not only in debunking bullshit in martial arts but also with regard to miracle health cures, supplements, pop psychology, COVID and many other honey traps for the curious and the unwary.Tune in as Matt and Chris compares notes with Phrost on how and why people delude themselves. Marvel at Phrost's offers to fight Alex Jones, Steven Seagal, and (gasp) Gwenyth Paltrow (for Science!). Matt himself accepts the the offer to fight Phrost, conditional on him being ensconced comfortably within a properly equipped Armoured Fighting Vehincle.