Episode 17 - BI Book Club 1: The Reality Bubble
In this first Book Club episode Jeff and Darron discuss The Reality Bubble by Ziya Tong. Subtitled “How Science Reveals the Hidden Truths that Shape Our World” the book explores the various ways in which our perception of the world is very different from what’s actually there, and how this is true because of our biology, the workings of our modern economic and political world, and the intergenerational, evolving nature of culturally inherited concepts. Jeff offers a critique of Tong’s presentation which leads to a discussion about the difficulties of presenting information that can be perceived as negative or anti-progress, and the importance of seeing reality as it is, grappling with hard truths, and trying our best to find a balanced perspective.
Notes:
2:23 - Listen to Mindscape Episode 133: Ziya Tong on Realities We Don’t See for an overview and discussion of ideas Tong presents in her 2019 book The Reality Bubble
4:36 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 04 - Too Cultured from October 2020
6:10 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 01 - Why It’s Pointless to Start a Podcast In a Pandemic from September 2020
6:16 - See Jean Baudrillard , Hyperreality, and Simulacra and Simulation
7:52 - Factfulness by Hans Rosling
8:00 - Enlightenment Now by Steven Pinker
9:39 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 12 - A New Enlightenment: The Age of Cognitivism from March 2021
9:56 - Merchants of Doubt by Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway
10:35 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 13 - What We Talk About When We Talk About Politics Part 2: Just the Facts from April 2021
10:44 - See the Wikipedia entry of the “Echo Chamber” effect
16:40 - See “Chickens have gotten ridiculously large since the 1950’s” (Vox, 2014)
18:50 - See the Wikipedia entry on the “environmental impact of meat production” and “Meat’s Sustainability Problem” (The Good Food Institute, 2018)
19:48 - Seven and a Half Lessons About the Brain by Lisa Feldman Barrett - “An organization called Seeds of Peace tries to change predictions by bringing together young people from cultures that are in serious conflict, like Palestinians and Israelis, and Indians and Pakistanis. The teens participate in activities like soccer, canoeing, and leadership training, and they can talk about the animosity between their cultures in a supportive environment. By creating new experiences, these teens are changing their future predictions in the hopes of building bridges between the cultures and, ultimately, creating a more peaceful world.”
26:06 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 15 - The Mind of Gatsby: A Look Through the Cognitive Lens from June 2021
30:22 - The 2008 documentary Food, Inc. is an “unflattering look inside America's corporate controlled food industry.”
30:27 - For more on Chinese surveillance see the “Mass surveillance in China” Wikipedia entry, “Facial Recognition And Beyond: Journalist Ventures Inside China's 'Surveillance State'” (NPR, 2021), “China's Surveillance State Should Scare Everyone” (The Atlantic, 2018), and “The Panopticon Is Already Here” (The Atlantic, 2020)
30:30 - The 2020 documentary The Social Dilemma “[e]xplores the dangerous human impact of social networking, with tech experts sounding the alarm on their own creations.”
31:33 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 08 - System 2, Superman, & Simulacra: Jeff's Amateur Philosophy from December 2020
31:03 - See “Can Prairie Dogs Talk?” (New York Times Magazine, 2017) and “The Linguistic Genius of Prairie Dogs” (Animal Cognition) which discuss the work of animal biologist Con Slobodchikoff, who among other things claims that many animals have language and can talk
33:08 - See the “Pain in animals” Wikipedia entry and “Animals can feel pain. A biologist explains how we know.” (Vox, 2017)
35:22 - The Origins of Creativity by E.O. Wilson
35:54 - See the “Biophilia hypothesis” Wikipedia entry
40:17 - The Secret of Our Success by Joseph Henrich
40:42 - Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harrari
41:31 - Watch “Meet the Chimps” on Disney Plus
42:15 - See The Secret of Our Success website
43:09 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 16 - Partisan Pizza from July 2021
46:35 - Jack Kerouac
48:44 - 1491 by Charles C. Mann
51:44 - Slight correction - the evolution of fish began about 530 million years ago, see the “Evolution of fish” Wikipedia entry for more
54:20 - Watch a hilarious compilation from legendary comedian Mitch Hedberg and see “21 of the Funniest and Most Unforgettable Mitch Hedberg Jokes” (Vulture, 2020)
1:01:33 - Jonathan Locke, Rene Descartes, Thomas Hobbes, David Hume, and Adam Smith
1:03:15 - James Stockdale was a candidate for Vice President of the United States in the 1992 presidential election, on Ross Perot's independent ticket.
1:03:35 - Jim Collins discusses what he calls The Stockdale Paradox, which is based on the experience of James Stockdale who was a prisoner of war during the Vietnam War for over seven years, in his 2001 business classic Good to Great
1:03:58 - In his 2018 book Stubborn Attachments economist Tyler Cowen argues that “if we want to flourish, do what’s best for the maximum amount of people and create a more pluralistic society. One of the most important building blocks of such a society is to have a stubborn attachment to economic growth (in its Cowen variety of Wealth Plus).Cowen defines Wealth Plus as “the total amount of value produced over a certain time period. This includes the traditional measures of economic value found in GDP statistics, but also includes measures of leisure time, household production, and environmental amenities, as summed up in a relevant measure of wealth.”” See “The Clear and Comprehensive Case for Growth” (Archbridge Notes, 2018)