The Nature & Nurture Podcast

Dr. Alex Byrne is a Professor of Philosophy at MIT and author of Trouble with Gender.

In this episode, we talk about the problematic concept of gender, which is often used interchangeably to mean sex, gender identity, gender role, gender norm, or gender stereotypes. Alex and I discuss each of these, and their precise definitions in philosophy, biology, or sociology in detail. We also discuss the problem of identity and categorization in philosophy of mind and language more broadly, as a source of some of the confusion. Lastly, we discuss the nuances of defining sex and gender in intersex and transgender populations, the essentialist nature of felt gender identity, the concept of transracialism, the ethics of social and medical gender transition in children, and answer the question: What is a woman? 

00:18 Understanding the 'Trouble with Gender'

02:19 Exploring the History of Gender Philosophy

05:07 The Role of Language in Defining Gender

05:46 The Complexity of Gender Terminology

10:16 The Misinterpretation of Gender Concepts

22:22 The Absurdity of Precise Definitions

41:33 The Biological Definition of Sex

58:18 The Hypothetical Cat-Dog: A Thought Experiment of Social Perception

01:02:32 Gender, Sex, and the Complexity of Identity

01:03:35 The Practical Implications of Defining Gender

01:05:51 Transgender Identity and the Question of 'Passing'

01:20:21 The Philosophical Dilemma of Pronouns and Gender Identity

01:22:33 Transracialism and the Social Construct of Identity

01:46:13 The Controversy of Autogynephilia and Gender Identity

01:53:29 The Reception and Impact of Controversial Philosophical Ideas

Dr. Wolfram Schultz is a Professor of Neuroscience at the University of Cambridge and one of the world’s leading experts on dopamine. In this episode, we discuss the dopamine system's role in reward processing, evolutionary fitness, the functioning of dopamine neurons, the interplay between reward vs punishment, and the complexity of neurons. Dr. Schultz overviews core mechanisms of value-guided decision-making, risk-taking, addiction, the role of prediction error in shaping reinforcement learning, how these are all explained by dopamine, and the differences between dopamine and serotonin 00:18 Understanding Reward Processing in Animals 01:29 Evolutionary Role of Reward System 03:31 Complexity of Reward System and Dopamine Neurons 04:31 Differentiating Reward and Avoidance Systems 05:35 Role of Emotion in Reward Processing 08:07 Exploring Consciousness and its Measurement 08:49 Dopamine Firing in Different Scenarios 11:41 Understanding the Complexity of Neurons 18:23 Exploring the Concept of Prediction Error 27:36 Understanding the Role of Dopamine in Depression 30:52 Understanding the Role of Serotonin and Dopamine 33:55 Exploring the Concept of Metacognition 43:28 Understanding the Development of Reward System in Humans 43:59 Understanding the Reward System in Infants 45:36 The Maturation of the Reward System 46:41 The Role of Neural Connections in Reward System 47:23 The Concept of Reward Sensitivity During Adolescence 48:44 The Importance of Exploration in Reward System 54:53 The Role of Dopamine in Reward System 01:02:41 Understanding Addiction and Dopamine's Role 01:02:45 The Impact of Modern Day Environment on Reward System 01:13:04 The Role of Risk in Assessing Subjective Reward Value 01:18:06 Understanding Individual Differences in Reward Sensitivity 01:20:14 The Never-Ending Journey of Incentive Reward #Neuroscience #Dopamine #RewardProcessing #BehavioralEconomics #Addiction #RiskTaking #NatureandNurture

Dr. Camilla Nord is a neuroscientist, leader of the Mental Health Neuroscience Lab at the University of Cambridge, and the author of The Balanced Brain: The Science of Mental Health.

In this episode we talk about The Balanced Brain, prediction error as the source of positive and negative emotion, how dopamine controls motion, motivation, and pleasure, how serotonin regulates mood and response to the social world, and how anti-depressants and anti-anxiety medications work on the brain. We also talk about the neuroscience of hallucinations in schizophrenia and on psychedelics, the role of homeostasis and the gut microbiome in regulating mood consciously and unconsciously, interactions between the brainstem and cortex in producing consciousness, the role of mindfulness in mental health, and much more. 

00:20 Understanding Emotions and Brain Processes

01:40 Exploring the Impact of Novelty and Curiosity

02:10 Introversion, Extroversion, and the Pandemic

03:16 Understanding Anxiety and its Role in Academia

05:05 The Balanced Brain: A Discussion on the Dynamic Nature of the Brain

06:56 The Influence of Predictive Processing on Mental Health

16:54 Exploring the Role of Psychedelics in Mental Health

21:22 The Interplay of Biology and Social Factors in Mental Health

23:22 Understanding the Role of Disgust in Mental Health

33:52 The Impact of Social Hierarchy on Mental Health

37:20 The Impact of Social Hierarchy on Academics

40:30 The Role of Dopamine in Motivation and Action Planning

42:11 Understanding Parkinson's Disease and Dopamine's Role

44:14 Differences Between Dopamine and Serotonin in Mental Health

45:30 The Effect of Antidepressants on Perception and Mood

47:55 The Role of Serotonin in Depression and Its Treatment

55:38 The Potential of Non-Invasive Brain Stimulation in Treating Depression

01:02:32 The Continuum of Mental Disorders and the Role of Genetics

01:11:37 The Role of Spirituality and Rationality in Mental Health

#neuroscience #mentalhealth #Medication #SSRIs #serotonin #dopamine #depression #psychopathology #society #videogames #brainbodyinteraction #CamillaNord #anxiety #schizophrenia #antidepressants #cognitivetherapy

Dr. Rachel Marsh is the Irving Philips Professor of Medical Psychology in Child Psychology at Columbia University Medical Center, where she runs the Cognitive Development and Neuroimaging Lab. Dr. Marsh studies the neurodevelopment of self-regulatory control and its pathology in disorders such as OCD, eating disorders, and Tourette’s syndrome. More recently, she studies how maternal stress contributes to intergenerational transmission of regulatory deficits.

Dr. Walter Veit is a Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Reading and author of A Philosophy for the Science of Animal Consciousness. He is an expert in philosophy of mind, cognitive and biological sciences, applied ethics, and animal welfare.

In this episode, we talk about philosophy of mind and the evolution of consciousness in animals. Walter outlines his theory of the evolution of phenomenological complexity and affective experience in animals, its similarities and differences with computational theories of consciousness outlined by past podcast guests Kevin Mitchell and Mark Solms, and the diversity of consciousness ranging from humans, to other mammals, to octopuses and fish, to plant life and single cellular organisms. We discuss how animals’ capacity for experiencing pleasure and pain contribute to sentientist morality, whether human morality is anthropocentric, and how Walter’s research informs his views on animal welfare ethics.

Dr. Ellen Langer is a Professor of Psychology at Harvard University and one of the pioneers of the positive psychology movement, known as the Mother of Mindfulness. Dr. Langer has won numerous awards including 3 Distinguished Scientist Award, the Staats Award for Unifying Psychology, and the Liberty Science Genius Award. She is the author of 13 books on mindfulness, including 5 on mindfulness, most recently The Mindful Body.

Dr. Henning Tiemeier is a Professor of Social and Behavioral Science and the Sumner and Esther Feldberg Chair of Maternal and Child Health at the Harvard Chan School of Public Health. Dr. Tiemeier is an expert in pediatric epidemiology, focusing on prenatal exposures and the environmental determinants that influence brain development in children.

In this episode, we talk about pros and cons of different hormone measurement techniques and their use in pediatric epidemiology, neuroscience, and psychology. We also discuss how different environmental stressors, such as socioeconomic status and pollutants, impact brain and cognitive development prenatally, in early childhood, and during puberty. Lastly, we discuss neuroplasticity, and how public health research can intervene to improve the health and cognitive outcomes of at-risk populations during sensitive periods of development.

Dr. Willem Frankenhuis, he's an Associate Professor of Evolutionary and Population Biology at the University of Amsterdam, a Senior Researcher at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security, and Law, and Director of the Research Network on Communicating Strength-Based Approaches to Child Development and Learning in Adverse Conditions. He studies how cognition and behavior develop in harsh and unpredictable conditions. 

The episode delves into what constitutes a typical human childhood, drawing on insights from the intersection of human development, evolutionary biology, and cultural anthropology. 

We discuss 'hidden talents', abilities that adversity can enhance, and 'reasonable responses', behaviors that are adaptive strategies among individuals living in poverty. Dr. Frankenhuis also discusses his theoretical work involving mathematical modeling to study the evolution and development of plasticity – the ability to adjust development in response to different environmental conditions.

Dr. Lars Chittka is a Professor of Sensory and Behavioral Ecology and the founder of the Research Center for Psychology at Queen Mary University of London. He directs the Bee Sensory and Behavioral Ecology Lab, and is the author of The Mind of a Bee. In this episode, we discuss the results of decades of research on intelligence in bees and other insects. This includes findings of numerical and spatial cognition, memory, perception, and personality. Lars describes differences and similarities between bumblebees, wasps, and honeybees, why honeybees produce so much honey and die after stinging and mating, and more. We also discuss the evidence for bees having emotions, feeling, and consciousness, and efforts for the preservation and ethical handling of bees.

Dr. Jack Schultz is a Professor of Anthropology at Concordia University and an expert in the cultural anthropology of religion and sociology of knowledge.

Dr. Kevin Mitchell is an Associate Professor of Genetics and Neuroscience at Trinity College Dublin. He's the author of Innate: How the Wiring of Our Brains Shapes Who We Are, and Free Agents: How Evolution Gave Us Free Will. In this episode, we talk about Free Agents and the question of free will. We discuss what we mean by freedom, how living organisms have inherent biological constraints which actually define ourselves as causal agents. We also discuss the common scientific view of reductionist determinism and its limitations, and how causal agents use the inherent indeterminacy and forward motion of time in our universe as "causal slack" to make predictions and control their behavior in a meaningful way. We talk about the role entropy plays in life and computation, how free will grows as computational and cognitive complexity grows, and how these realities should define our ethical and legal conceptions of moral responsibility. Lastly, we talk about how individual differences in genes, environment, and brain development shape our personalities and constrain us in some ways, but also offer opportunities for unique identity, character development, meaning, and purpose.

Dr. Edward Hagen is a Professor of Evolutionary Anthropology at Washington State University, where he directs the Bioanthropology Lab. 

In this episode, Ed and I discuss the recent controversy of the American Anthropological Association’s decision to censor a conference panel on sex differences, the reality and importance of understanding sex differences in evolutionary anthropology and biology research, and the complexity of sex beyond the binary, such as in the case of intersex disorders and different and conflicting gender norms cross-culturally. We then move on to discuss Ed’s research on the evolution of substance use, including humans’ bizarre taste for spices and bitter plant toxins such as coffee and tobacco. We also talk about the evolutionary advantages and disadvantages for the use of other psychoactive drugs, such as hallucinogens, the evolution of human intelligence, and modern computational neuroscientific theories of consciousness.

Dr. Jennifer Silvers is an Associate Professor of Psychology and the Bernice Wenzel and Wendell Jeffrey Term Endowed Chair in Developmental Neuroscience at UCLA, where she runs the Social Affective Neuroscience and Development Lab. She is an expert in adolescent brain, cognitive, and emotional development, particularly in the development of emotion regulation strategies. 

In this episode, we talk about Jen’s background in developmental neuroscience, the use and limitations of animal models for understanding human brain development, and how adolescence is a particularly exciting window of brain development both due to puberty and other social and environmental changes. We talk about the role of stress and adversity influencing brain development, temperamental factors in emotion processing, emotion regulation as a learned skill, and how puberty interacts with all of these processes. We then discuss relatively recent effects on social and emotional development, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, social media use, and the influence of online dating apps in young adults’ sexual development. Lastly, we talk about other windows of rapid change influencing socioemotional processing, such as pregnancy, and future directions linking our shared interests in hormones and brain development in large-scale consortium-based studies.

Dr. Cory Clark is a social psychologist and Director of the Adversarial Collaboration Project at the University of Pennsylvania. 

In this episode we talk about adversarial collaboration and open science, meta-psychology research on common biases in psychology carried by psychologists themselves, and its moralization. We also discuss gender differences in moral beliefs, how social media and culture shape moral norms, how rationality can combat this, and whether faith is compatible with rationality.

Dr. James Roney is a Professor of Psychological & Brain Sciences at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he runs the Human Behavioral Endocrinology Lab. In this episode we talk about the proximate and ultimate evolutionary explanations of different sex hormones’ roles in coordinating motivated behavior, such as testosterone’s influence on aggression and sex drive, and ovarian hormones’ influence on sex and food drive. We discuss how testosterone leads to sex differentiation in the brain and body both prenatally and during puberty; threshold effects, rather than continuous relationships, between testosterone and motivation; the opposite effects of estradiol and progesterone on women’s sex and food motivation across the menstrual cycle. We also discuss genetic differences in the receptors to different hormones, their interactions with other hormones, and how these subtle differences may predict traits ranging from morphology to sexuality. Lastly, we discuss Jim’s recent research using daily diaries and saliva hormones to test whether daily hormonal fluctuations influence sex drive and other motivated behavior, how smell and pheromones influence attraction in males and females, and how sex hormones influence reward processing in the brain, particularly during puberty. Timestamps: 0:00:51 Hormones act as coordinators in the body 0:02:06 Example of testosterone's input and output relationships 0:05:41 Importance of understanding the inputs and outputs of hormones 0:07:43 Conservation of hormone functions from non-human species to humans 0:09:35 The role of hormones in motivated behaviors 0:11:19 Time lag between stimulus event and hormone response 0:15:19 Evolutionary theories and mating behavior tied to sex hormones 0:18:23 Evolution and psychological functions of testosterone and oxytocin 0:20:08 Understanding hormone inputs and context for coordinated effects 0:21:58 Oxytocin paradox and effects on maternal aggression 0:23:33 Confounding effects of multiple signals on hormone outputs 0:25:14 Individual variability and receptor sensitivity to testosterone 0:26:47 Genetic polymorphism and developmental calibrators of individual differences 0:28:10 Prenatal testosterone and sexual orientation 0:38:21 Threshold effects of testosterone 0:41:06 Continuous relationship between estradiol, progesterone, sex drive, and food drive in women 0:53:01 Testosterone's effect on reward may be more generalized than estradiol and progesterone 0:54:47 Estradiol may affect satiety mechanisms, not just reward systems. 0:56:56 Theoretical framework for risk taking and impulsivity. 0:58:26 Research on anxiety and depression in females during puberty. 0:59:58 Effects of testosterone on motivation and individual differences 1:08:08 Study on concealed ovulatory timing, pheromones, and scent attractiveness during ovulation

Dr. Joseph Henrich is an anthropologist and Chair of the Human Evolutionary Biology Department at Harvard University, where he runs the Culture, Cognition, and Coevolution Lab. Joe is also the author of the WEIRDest People in the World and The Secret of Our Success.

Timestamps:0:00:46 Environmental factors leading to cultural evolution0:03:19 Cultural adaptations, rituals, and technological advancements0:05:11 Cultural adaptations operating outside of conscious awareness0:07:04 The role of religion in cultural transformations0:09:40 Impact of religious prohibitions on social ties0:10:59 Exploring the spread of monotheistic religions0:12:01 The expansion of gods and competition among groups0:13:55 Transition to monotheism and personification of social awareness0:16:18 Intergroup competition and tension between small and large group cooperation0:17:37 Individualistic guilt vs collectivist shame0:19:18 Variation in use of mental state terms in folktales0:23:00 Patterns in cooperation and moral judgment from human nature and cultural evolution0:24:44 Cultural evolution and species differences0:25:56 Intersection of biology and culture in sex and gender differences0:26:24 Culture changes our biology and brain0:28:28 Male inclination towards violence observed in every human society0:29:50 Testosterone levels and aggression linked to social hierarchy0:30:28 Gender paradox: greater gender equality, bigger personality/morality differences0:32:06 Sex differences observed in primates0:35:15 Fathering dynamics in human societies0:37:26 Genetic fitness and hunter-gatherer societies0:41:28 Sex ratio, crime rates, and marriage markets[0:43:32 Dating apps, competition, and inequality0:46:14 Zero sum games, land, and cultural differences0:53:18 Demographic changes and the impact on parenting styles.0:55:07 Adversity-exposed brain and its relation to life history theory.0:57:37 Using surname diversity as a proxy for diversity of thought and experience in a society.1:01:50 Linking surname diversity to occupational diversity, trust, and innovation1:04:32 Christianity's impact on scientific revolution and analytic thinking1:06:11 Bias towards progress and the concept of progress emerging

Dr. Massimo Pigliucci is a philosopher and evolutionary biologist, the K.D. Irani Professor of Philosophy at the City College of New York, a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a prolific author of over 100 academic papers, 16 books including Evolution: The Extended Synthesis, and the best-selling How to Be a Stoic, as well as thousands of posts and short clips of wisdom on his Stoic Meditations and Practical Wisdom podcasts and Rationally Speaking blog. His research interests include the philosophy of science and evolutionary biology, the nature of psueoscience, and practical philosophies like Stoicism and Neoskepticism.

Dr. Stephanie Bugden is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at the University of Winnipeg, and an expert in the psychology and neuroscience of children's math learning. In this episode we discuss the nature versus nurture debate in math ability and the genetic and environmental influences on math learning. Dr. Bugden explains that both genetics and early learning experiences play a role in individual differences in math ability, verbal IQ, and visuospatial IQ. We also discuss whether there are sex differences in math ability at various ages, and how these differences might be confounded by math anxiety. Dr. Bugden also shares her research on the neurobiological processes involved in math learning and the challenges of studying dyscalculia, a math learning disability analogous to dyslexia. Lastly, we discuss the impact of COVID-19 on math learning and the potential exacerbation of socioeconomic inequalities in education.

Kevin J. DeBruin is a former NASA rocket scientist, a science educator and speaker, former bodybuilder and American Ninja Warrior, founder of Space Class, and author of To NASA and Beyond, and To Dare Mighty Things. In this episode we talk about Kevin’s career as a rocket scientist, life at NASA, and his story of perseverance in his books. We also discuss overlap between the mindset of engineers, bodybuilders, and self-help psychologists, sharing in common a detail-oriented focus on planning, breaking down goals into small steps, and self-discipline. We discuss other parallels between rocket science and cognitive science, such as the development of artificial intelligence, neural networks, and everyday technologies such as smartphones made possible due to technological advancements originally developed at NASA for the purposes of spaceflight. Lastly, we discuss the importance of science education, particularly from educators with deep scientific training in order to ensure effective science communication and prevent misinformation. Timestamps: 0:04:29 Kevin's journey to NASA and the challenges he faced 0:18:25 Kevin's day-to-day work life at NASA 0:25:22 Comparison between NASA and private space industry 0:35:41 Kevin's transition from NASA to science education 0:46:01 The importance of technical depth in science communication 0:52:41 The inspiration and impact of working with kids 0:56:21 The Dunning-Kruger effect and the unknown knowns 0:57:22 The connection between physics and neuropsychology 1:00:37 Overview of Kevin's book "To Dare Mighty Things"

Dr. Jonas Kaplan is a cognitive neuroscientist and faculty at USC's Brain and Creativity Institute, where he co-directs the the Dornsife Cognitive Neuroimaging Center. His research focuses on consciousness, the self, belief, empathy, social relationships, action perception and creativity. In this reunion episode, episode, we discuss active inference and predictive processing theories of consciousness, panpsychism, philosophy of mind, and the difference between interoception and exteroception. We further consider the evolutionary psychology of self-awareness, empathy, status seeking, and sexuality, and how these translate to modern technology and mental health. Lastly, we discuss neuroscience and its connection to film and literature, which Jonas discusses on his new podcast Float, and how this connects to cross-cultural analyses of religion, archetypes, and recent debates between Sam Harris and Jordan Peterson on the psychology and utility of religion. Timestamps: 0:01:30 Active inference and predictive processing 0:04:24 Skepticism about applying active inference to interoception 0:08:33 Consciousness, affect, and emotion 0:11:40 Dualism in neuroscience and philosophy of mind 0:13:41 The role of the body in consciousness and empathy 0:16:33 The limitations and challenges of artificial intelligence and empathy 0:20:09 The relationship between consciousness, narrative, and selfhood 0:26:23 Panpsychism and self-organizing systems 0:30:40 Postmodernism and categorical distinction 0:34:04 Pragmatism in statistics and narrative 0:38:08 How the brain recognizes narrative structure 0:40:32 Storytelling in hunter gatherers 0:42:04 Sexual selection, dominance, and creativity 0:49:24 The self as a collection of sub-personalities 0:52:43 Social comparison, stress, and mental health 0:55:08 Sexual selection, social status, and the crowdsourcing of wisdom 1:02:31 The psychology of dating apps 1:07:24 The potential impact of different app designs on mental health 1:09:32 The immersive experience of storytelling and audience engagement 1:13:34 The intersection of neuroscience, film, and storytelling 1:17:03 Black Mirror, technology, and memory 1:20:00 The value of forgetting and the nostalgia bias in memory 1:21:49 The cultural evolution of religion 1:25:24 Archetypes and their usefulness 1:30:40 Pantheism and mathematical Platonism 1:35:24 The necessity of axioms in science

Dr. Paul Bloom is a Professor of Psychology at the University of Toronto, and the Brooks and Suzanne Ragen Professor Emeritus of Psychology at Yale University. Paul studies how children and adults make sense of the world, with special focus on language, pleasure, morality, religion, fiction, and art. He is the author of seven books, including his latest Psych: The Story of the Human Mind. In this episode, we sample some of the many, many topics covered in Psych, including Freud, evolutionary psychology, language development, moral development, and social cognition. We also talk about Paul’s early research on language development and moral cognition, my own research on pubertal hormones and brain development, and the meta-psychology of what makes podcasts interesting. 0:00:02 Introduction to Dr. Paul Bloom and his research 0:01:10 The story behind the article "Natural Language and Natural Selection" 0:05:20 The connection between developmental psychology and evolutionary psychology 0:08:20 The concept of ontogeny recapitulating phylogeny 0:11:41 Transition from language development to moral development 0:13:42 The relationship between disgust and morality 0:16:18 The parallels between physical traits and moral traits 0:19:23 The connection between free will and moral responsibility 0:25:04 The nature-nurture debate and the role of genetics in psychology 0:31:06 The continuum of traits and the question of determinism 0:34:07 The influence of Freud and the shift towards empirical psychology 0:45:06 The history of psychology and the influence of old theories 0:55:20 The role of clinical psychology and the question of mental illness1:01:21 The psychological tendency to rationalize silver linings and find upsides in negative traits 1:06:17 Paul's role as an editor for a journal and prioritizing what to read in psychology 1:08:02 The social intimacy and connection of podcasts

Dr. Ben Smith is a neuroscientist and postdoctoral research fellow in the Social Affective Neuroscience Lab at the University of Oregon.

In this episode we talk about Ben’s research on the social neuroscience of risky decision-making, computational modeling of the reward and punishment system during decision-making, the abstract-concrete tangibility axis of the prefrontal cortex, moral and ideological decision-making, and how decision neuroscience connects to habits, health, and effective altruism.

Dr. Emily Jacobs is an Associate Professor of Psychological & Brain Sciences at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she studies how sex hormones impact brain structure, function, and cognition, particularly during menopause and across the menstrual cycle. 

In this episode we talk about how the brain is an endocrine organ: one which communicates through hormones. We talk about Emily’s research on brain aging and cognition, how sex hormones change the brain during menopause and across the menstrual cycle, and how sex hormones lead to sex differentiation in the brain. We also talk about Emily’s research for women’s health, historical barriers slowing advancement in our understanding of the female reproductive cycle across the lifespan, and modern research efforts taken to remedy this.

Dr. Judith Fan is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Stanford University, where she runs the Cognitive Tools Lab: https://cogtoolslab.github.io/
In this episode, Dr. Fan discusses the concept of reverse engineering the human cognitive toolkit, which involves uncovering the principles and constraints that shape our thinking and the tools we use to support our cognitive processes. She explains that cognitive tools are material artifacts, such as numbers, pictures, and language, that help us think and communicate. Dr. Fan highlights the importance of understanding the mechanisms behind these tools and how they interact with our brains.She explores the use of pictures as a cognitive tool and how they have been used throughout history to encode and communicate knowledge. Dr. Fan also discusses the convergence between artificial neural networks and the human brain in understanding visual inputs, such as faces. She explains that these systems can approximate the behaviors of real neurons and provide insights into how our brains process visual information.Dr. Fan emphasizes the role of education in shaping our cognitive toolkit and the importance of providing learners with multiple modalities for engaging with information. She also discusses the potential of emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence and machine learning, in supporting rich and generative forms of learning. 0:00:02 Introduction to Dr. Judy Fan and her research 0:00:30 Definition of reverse engineering and cognitive toolkit 0:02:06 Examples of cognitive tools like accounting devices and pictures 0:08:50 Connection between cognitive tools and advancements in computer vision 0:17:51 Discussion on the similarities between artificial neural networks and human brain 0:22:04 The use of AI systems like DALL·E to create images 0:25:26 The influence of historical and cultural context on cognitive toolkits 0:27:21 The role of education in shaping cognitive toolkits 0:32:15 The potential genetic component of cognitive toolkits 0:37:15 The debate on visual learners and individual differences in learning 0:40:24 The interaction between cognitive tools and unlocking new abilities 0:44:20 Dr. Judy Fan's excitement about future research at Stanford 0:47:14 The potential of screens and technology in education 0:49:41 The importance of scaffolding activities and avoiding drawbacks 0:52:51 The significance of statistics and data science education 0:56:16 The need for more people to think in shades of gray

Dr. Roy Baumeister is a renowned social psychologist and Professor of Psychology at the University of Queensland. In this episode we explore a variety of topics about Roy's research on self-control and decision-making, human sexuality, and the need for social belongingness.

Dr. Lindsey Powell is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at the University of California, San Diego, where she runs the Social Cognition and Learning (SoCal) Lab. 

In this episode we talk about how brain activity is measured in infants and toddlers using methods such as fNIRS, and what neuroimaging research tells us about social cognitive development above and beyond behavioral research. Learn more about Lindsey’s work at: https://socallab.ucsd.edu/ 

Dr. Colin DeYoung is a personality neuroscientist and Professor of Psychology at the University of Minnesota, where he directs the DeYoung Personality Lab. 

In this episode we talk about the science of personality, including the Big Five (Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, Neuroticism) and their neural correlates. We discuss how personality is measured, genetic and environmental influences on personality and its development over time, and the Big Five traits’ connections to areas of my own research on the neuroendocrinology of reward sensitivity and inhibitory control.  

Dr. Barry Giesbrecht is a Professor of Psychological & Brain Sciences at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he directs the Attention Lab. https://attentionlab.psych.ucsb.edu/

Dr. Mahzarin Banaji is the Richard Clarke Cabot Professor of Social Ethics in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University and co-author of the New York Times Bestseller Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People. She is the recipient of countless awards including being one of APA’s William James Fellows for outstanding contributions to psychology and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. 

In this episode we talk about Mahzarin’s career in cognitive and social psychology, and the development of the Implicit Association Test (IAT). We discuss myths and facts about implicit bias, including how the brain forms automatic implicit associations based on statistical learning, and how these biases can be formed entirely independently of conscious prejudice. We discuss examples of this research ranging from moral psychology, to racial bias, and how IAT results differ cross-culturally. Lastly, we discuss Mahzarin’s ongoing research combining natural language processing research and geospatial data to estimate how regional IAT scores correlate with different biases expressed on social media posts coming from different areas. 

Dr. John Delony is a mental health and wellness expert with over two decades of experience working as a researcher, educator, and crisis responder. He is the host of the wildly successful, and live-changing advice-giving Dr. John Delony show, and bestselling author of Own Your Past, Change Your Future: A Not-So-Complicated Approach to Relationships, Mental Health, and Wellness. In this episode, John and I have a wide-ranging conversation centered around the neuropsychology research and personal anecdotes covered in Own Your Past, Change Your Future. We discuss big questions concerning nature and nurture, free will and determinism, child development and parenting, puberty and hormones, finding a balance between motivation and perfectionism, and the neuropsychology of anxiety, and hear a sneak preview of John’s next book.

Dr. Leah Somerville is the Grafstein Family Professor of Psychology at Harvard University, and my very own PhD advisor! She runs the Affective Neuroscience & Development Laboratory, where we study how brain and pubertal development shapes motivation, cognition, emotion, and behavior during adolescence. In this special 100th episode, I interview Leah in person about her research background, the importance of adolescence as a sensitive period for brain development, myths and facts about puberty, hormones, sex differences, and teenage risk-taking, and where developmental neuroscience fits into juvenile justice and our legal conceptions of rational agency.

Dr. Karl Friston is a Professor of Neurology at University College London and one of the world's most influential neuroscientists. He invented statistical parametric mapping, voxel-based morphometry, and dynamic causal modeling, and has authored or co-authored hundreds of scientific publications detailing out these theoretical and methodological advancements in neuroscience, and is also the mind behind the theory of Active Inference: The Free Energy Principle in Mind, Brain, and Behavior. The brain is a fantastic organ, not only because it is amazingly complex, but because it is constantly generating fantasies. In this episode we talk about active inference, what Dr. Friston has called “the physics of belief,” which states that the brain is fundamentally predictive. We discuss the theory of active inference and the mathematics behind the free energy principle, which states that the brain aims to minimize “free energy” or entropy by optimizing to minimize prediction error and maximize expected information gain. We discuss how active inference is inherently tied to motivation, and that consciousness, emotion, and strategic decision making can all be framed in terms of monitoring and minimizing prediction error. We also compare and contrast active inference with other theories of consciousness such as integrated information theory. Lastly, we discuss the neurobiology of active inference and its parallels to cybernetic intelligence, such as how activational and organizational effects of hormones on brain development are analogous to manipulating numeric inputs or weights in an artificial neural network.

Dr. Lixing Sun is a Distinguished Professor of Biology at Central Washington University, and author of The Liars of Nature and the Nature of Liars: Cheating and Deception in the Living World. In this episode we talk about the evolution of lying and deception as distinct strategies. Lying organisms actively alter truth by displaying false signals, whereas deception occurs by exploiting cognitive biases to trick others. We talk about lying and deception in a wide range of species, from insects, to fish, to reptiles, to primates, and finally, humans. We discuss the role of deception in sexual selection, evolutionary arms races between innovative methods to cheat and counter-cheating strategies, such as costly signaling and the evolution of human social intelligence, and how large-scale institutions and social media are both particularly threatening and promising to prosociality in humans.

Dr. Mark Moffett is an ecologist and author of several books including Adventures Among Ants and The Human Swarm. 

In this episode we talk about social behavior in species ranging from ants, to lizards, to chimpanzees, to humans, and their similarities and differences. We talk about intelligence as typically individually-defined, as well as distributed “hive mind” intelligence in simple species like ants, where each ant can function like a neuron in a whole-brain network. We also discuss the evolution of human sociality and compare our propensity for peace and aggression to chimpanzees and bonobos, and our unique social intelligence. Lastly, we talk about cultural evolution and cross-cultural diversity in human societies, and how we both learn and can transcend group biases.

Dr. Ovul Sezer is a behavioral scientist, Assistant Professor of Management and Organizations at Cornell University, and stand-up comedian. 

In this episode we talk about the psychology of comedy and Ovul’s research on impression (mis)management. We discuss effective and ineffective forms of communication, balancing confidence and humility, and the importance of first impressions in social and professional relationships. We also talk about the psychology of virtue signaling, humble bragging, and navigating impression management in the modern social media age.

Dr. Edouard Machery is a Distinguished Professor at the University of Pittsburgh and Director of the Center for Philosophy of Science. He's published over 150 articles and book chapters on a diverse range of topics including the philosophy of cognitive science, moral psychology, the utility of evolutionary theory and neuroscience for understanding cognition, folk psychology, and experimental philosophy. 

In this wide-ranging episode we talk about Edouard’s research on cross-cultural differences in conceptions of free will and determinism, free will and moral responsibility, and how we define a rational agent. We also talk about neuropsychological research on value and decision making, the free energy principle as a theory of cognition, and how statistical reasoning requires us to create probabilistic cutoffs for action, both in science and in decision making. Lastly, we talk about the development of cognition and emotion both within human lifespans and across our evolutionary phylogenetic tree. 

Dr. Scott Grafton is a Distinguished Professor of Psychological & Brain Sciences at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He directs the Action Lab, which focuses on the neuroscience of goal-directed movement. 

In this episode we discuss Dr. Grafton’s background in neurology research, and the historical progression of integrating the neuroscience of movement, perception, and goal-setting. We talk about how modern neuroimaging techniques replicated and expanded upon findings from early neuropsychological studies of brain damage, and how Dr. Grafton uses dense-sampling techniques to scan individual’s brains repeatedly over short intervals, to study how learning changes the structural and functional organization of brain regions involved in perception and motor control. Lastly, we talk about Dr. Grafton’s ongoing research of how the brain interacts with the rest of the body during physical activity to maintain allostasis, and the implications this has for our understanding of the links between perception, action, and brain health. 

Dr. Deon Benton is an Assistant Professor of Psychology and Human Development at Vanderbilt University, where he runs the Computational Cognitive Development Lab.

In this episode we talk about the interacting forces of nature and nurture that give rise to human children’s tremendous ability for learning, language development, causal reasoning, and social cognition. Deon describes his past and future research on cognitive development in infants and young children, as well as experimental paradigms for how to measure infant attention, such as through eye-tracking. We talk about how infant statistical learning can be modeled computationally, and the difficulties of decoupling innate knowledge about the physical and social world from learning in the postnatal or even prenatal environments. Lastly, Deon advocates for the importance of designing effective early-intervention studies to improve life outcomes for young children exposed to adversity.

Learn more about Deon’s work at: https://theccdlab.com/

Dr. Alan Fiske is a Distinguished Professor of Anthropology at UCLA, where he co-directs the Kama Muta Lab, and the author of several books including Structures of Social Life, Virtuous Violence, and Kama Muta: Discovering the Connecting Emotion.

In this episode we talk about Alan’s career as an anthropologist, the research which led to his books, and the social mechanisms which give rise to both peace and violence in human societies. Finally, we talk about Alan’s research on kama muta.

Kama muta is Sanskrit for “being moved by love”. Alan defines kama muta as “Kama muta is the sudden feeling of oneness, love, belonging, or union with an individual person, a family, a team, a nation, nature, the cosmos, God, or a kitten.” Learn more about kama muta, and experience it for yourself, at: https://kamamutalab.org/

Dr. Dan Conroy-Beam is an Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Dan uses an evolutionary and computational perspective to understand mate choice and mating relationships. Specifically, he is interested in how mate preferences are integrated with one another computationally in order to make mating decisions as well as the decision rules people use to navigate their mating markets and their relationships. Dan's work combines agent-based modeling of mate choice with studies of real couples to compare and explore candidate models for how people evaluate potential mates, pursue partners, and regulate their relationships. Learn more about Dan's work at: https://www.danconroybeam.com/

In this episode we cover a wide range of topics including Dan's research on computational mate choice, the theory and history of sexual selection, different reproductive strategies and status signaling in humans and other animals, and environmental factors influencing mate choice ranging from sex ratio, to resource availability, to modern dating app environments. 

Dr. Rob Henderson is a psychologist best known for his research on luxury beliefs. 

In this episode, we talk about risk and resilience factors for success in America, including growing up in stable two-parent households. Rob shares how his experience growing up in the foster care system and his military service primed him for identifying luxury beliefs of the upper class during his studies at Yale and Cambridge. We discuss how luxury beliefs confer status upon elites, but disproportionately harm people in poor and working-class communities. As a case-study, we talk about changing norms surrounding monogamy and casual sex. Lastly, we talk about evolutionary pressures for and against monogamy, cooperation, and different moral values.

0:00:02Introduction to Dr. Rob Henderson and his research on luxury beliefs and social status0:00:47Discussion on the deteriorating state of young men in America0:03:21The differential effects of family structure on boys and girls0:04:56The interaction between nature and nurture in determining life outcomes0:06:08The impact of environmental inputs on cognitive ability and personality0:08:38The importance of stable and decent childhoods for children's well-being0:11:54The different ways in which "Lost Boys" manifest their struggles0:14:35The role of the military in providing structure and stability0:16:26The cultural shock experienced by Dr. Henderson at Yale0:20:22The concept of luxury beliefs and their role in conferring status0:25:21The moralization of luxury beliefs and the language treadmill0:28:08The harms caused by luxury beliefs, particularly in relation to monogamy0:36:56The impact of luxury beliefs on lower status people0:45:40The impact of luxury beliefs on mating psychology and relationships0:53:49The consequences of polyamory and the importance of monogamy for children1:00:08The potential consequences of a society-wide shift towards polyamory1:05:04The frustration of entitled attitudes towards income and education1:05:40The complexity of evolutionary forces and moral norms1:06:41The limitations of grounding morality solely in evolutionary models1:08:11The influence of economic education on selfish behavior in games1:09:21The importance of reputation and belonging in human psychology1:11:30Dr. Henderson's book and its exploration of personal experiences and social commentary

Dr. C. Sue Carter is a Professor of Psychology at the University of Virginia and Distinguished Research Scientist at Indiana University, where she also holds an Emerita position as Rudy Professor of Biology and was formerly Director of the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender, and Reproduction. She is a Fellow and past President of the International Behavioral Neuroscience Society, and is known for her pioneering work on oxytocin, the love hormone, and its role in parental care and romantic pairbonding.  

In this episode we discuss how neuroendocrinology research has evolved over the course of Dr. Carter’s career, and how oxytocin became known as “the love hormone”. We discuss her early research examining oxytocin’s role in parental care, pairbonding, and sex drive in prairie voles, and contrast these findings to early evolutionary theories centered around testosterone and other sex hormones. We also talk about vasopressin, a hormone related to oxytocin, and discuss its role in more nuanced forms of care such as defensive aggression. Dr. Carter introduces the term of “sociostasis” as a social form of homeostasis which oxytocin and vasopressin are central to regulating. Lastly, we talk about oxytocin’s interactions with sex and stress hormones prenatally, during infancy, and during puberty, and how the early environment may epigenetically our oxytocin receptors and have lifelong impacts.

Dr. Adam Morris is a cognitive scientist and Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Psychology at Princeton University.

In this episode we talk about Adam’s research on the connections between mindfulness, decision-making, and introspection. We talk about the cognitive mechanisms involved involving in weighing pros and cons of your decisions, how various decision-making strategies may be computationally modeled, and how there may be a disconnect between people’s interoceptive beliefs about their decision-making processes, and what they actually do. Lastly, we talk about the science of mindfulness, and Adam’s ongoing research plans of an intervention study to test whether mindfulness training helps people introspect better about their own decision-making.

Dr. Brynn Sherman is a cognitive neuroscientist and postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Pennsylvania.

In this episode we talk about Brynn’s research on the interaction between statistical learning and memory errors, and how memory is studied using behavioral tasks and neuroimaging. We discuss the distinction between episodic memory and semantic memory, memory encoding and consolidation, and between knowing and remembering. We also discuss Brynn’s more recent research on the effects of stress and sleep on memory, and how these effects manifest in the brain.

Dr. Michael Levin is a developmental and synthetic biologist at Tufts University, where he is the Vannevar Bush Distinguished Professor and director of the Allen Discovery Center and Tufts Center for Regenerative and Developmental Biology.

In this episode we talk about Mike’s research, which ranges from studying the molecular biology of cancer, to the bioelectrics of limb regeneration, to memory and higher-order cognition. Mike describes the overall theme of his research as understanding the embodied nature of cognition in organic and synthetic systems, and the philosophical implications of this worldview. We discuss a wide variety of topics ranging from the neurobiology of planarian flatworms, to the future of regenerative medicine, to philosophical questions about the definitions of life, consciousness, and artificial intelligence.

0:02:05Exploring the concept of mind embodied in different architectures0:03:26Understanding morphogenesis as a collective intelligence of cells0:04:47Shift in problem space and intelligence from single cells to multicellular structures0:06:42The intentionality of animals and the continuum of agency0:09:27Choosing the appropriate model system for research0:11:11Dr. Levin's background and evolution of his research0:17:10Interest in the intersection of engineering and biology0:19:59Studying the bioelectric communication in cellular networks0:22:56Computational models of morphogenesis and cognitive aspects of development0:25:19The complexity of intelligence and the binary distinction of living0:27:25The continuum of life and the challenges of defining it0:29:49The ability to learn and memory in planaria0:37:00The challenges of defining individual identity and memory0:39:23The unique regenerative abilities of planaria and salamanders0:41:06The future of regenerative medicine and synthetic biology0:45:24The potential of somatic psychiatry and tissue training regimes0:47:44Understanding complex cognitive machines and the limits of understanding0:51:06Different notions of understanding emergent phenomena0:53:29The challenges of understanding neural networks and biological networks

Dr. Daniel Schacter is a Professor of Psychology at Harvard University where he runs the Schacter Memory Lab, and author of The Seven Sins of Memory.

In this episode we talk about the history of memory research over the last 100+ years, beginning with simple behavioral tasks and up to modern neuroimaging. Dr. Schacter overviews different dimensions of memory scientists have identified, including episodic vs. semantic, implicit vs. explicit, and the processes of encoding, consolidation, retrieval, and reconsolidation. We then discuss each of The Seven Sins of Memory: Transience, Absent-Mindedness, Blocking, Misattribution, Suggestibility, Bias, and Persistence. Lastly, Dr. Schacter describes some of his more recent research on the relationship between episodic memory and imagination and creativity.

Dr. Joshua Greene is a psychologist, philosopher, Professor at Harvard University, and author of Moral Tribes: Emotion, Reason, and the Gap Between Us and Them.

In this episode we talk about Josh’s early research on moral psychology, specifically trolleyology. He describes his empirical research on the famous trolley problem thought experiment in philosophy, and how people generally approach these problems via two different modes of reasoning: slow and rational, and fast and emotional. We talk about the evolutionary origins of these distinct moral cognitive processes, and an alternative framework to utilitarianism known as deep pragmatism. Lastly, Josh talks about his recent research on this pragmatic approach to moral psychology, including The Giving Multiplier which aims to motivate people to donate to more effective charities.

Josh created a special code for viewers of The Nature & Nurture Podcast to use on The Giving Multiplier. Use The Giving Multiplier to donate to charities of your own choice as well as highly effective charities identified by Josh’s lab. With this code, an extra 50% will be matched and added to any amount you donate:

https://givingmultiplier.org/invite/NATURENURTURE

Code: NATURENURTURE

Dr. Dorsa Amir is a psychologist, anthropologist, and postdoctoral research fellow at the University of California, Berkeley.

In this episode we talk about child development and decision-making through the interdisciplinary lenses of anthropology, psychology, evolutionary biology, and behavioral economics. We talk about some of Dorsa’s theoretical research on how human environments have changed across cultural and evolutionary histories, and how plasticity in child development allows humans to adapt to various forms of environmental threat, deprivation, and uncertainty. We also talk about Dorsa’s experimental and cross-cultural research on child decision-making, and how these adaptive behaviors also vary across environments, resource availability, and uncertainty. Dorsa describes how the field of developmental psychology is slowly moving away from WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic) assumptions in order to gain a richer understanding of the full scope of child development across cultures.

Dr. Anita Collins is an award-winning educator, researcher and writer in the field of brain development and music learning. She is the author of The Lullaby Effect: The Science of Singing to Your Child and The Music Advantage: How Learning Music Helps Your Child’s Brain and Wellbeing.

In this episode we talk about the neuroscience of music education, and the brain and cognitive benefits of musical training in children and adults. Anita describes how music is unique in that it combines multiple modalities of the brain including auditory processing, visual processing, fine motor control, strategic planning, and creativity. We also discuss music as a means of social and mother-infant bonding, and evolutionary theories as to how music has emerged as an adaptation across every human culture.

Dr. Samuel Gershman is a Professor of Psychology at Harvard University, where he directs the Computational Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory. He is also the author of What Makes Us Smart: The Computational Logic of Human Cognition.

In this episode we discuss Sam’s book, and the central argument that human brains are computers that must operate based on both limits of information and limits of computational power. These limits are what lead to biases, but Sam stresses that biases in human cognition, such as falling for optical illusions, are in fact what make us smart. We talk about some of the mechanisms by which we learn, such as statistical learning, and discuss the similarities and differences between human learning and modern artificial intelligence. We also discuss some of Sam’s theoretical research on the computational and neural mechanisms involved in learning and memory, and discuss how this model may apply to animals as simple and diverse as small planarian flatworms.

Dr. Frank von Hippel is a Professor of Ecotoxicology and Environmental Health Sciences at the University. He is the host of his own successful podcast, The Science History Podcast, and author of The Chemical Age.

In this episode we talk about Frank’s own field of ecotoxicology, the study of environmental toxins and their effects on humans and other animals, and Frank’s book The Chemical Age. We discuss the pros and cons of advancements in chemistry, from advancements in medicine and agriculture to chemical warfare and the environmental harms of industrialization. We also talk about what makes something a toxin, how our bodies respond differently to organic vs. synthetic compounds, and about the massive benefits and potential harms of pesticide use in modern agriculture. Lastly, we talk about Frank’s own research on how pollutants such as plastics harm humans and animals in the Arctic, and about both the threats of climate change to biodiversity and how we might overcome them.

Dr. Robert Epstein is a longtime psychology researcher and professor—a distinguished scientist who is passionate about educating the public about advances in mental health and the behavioral sciences. The former editor-in-chief of Psychology Today, Dr. Epstein is currently Senior Research Psychologist at the American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology. He is also the founder and Director Emeritus of the Cambridge Center for Behavioral Studies in Massachusetts. He is also the author of The Case Against Adolescence, and its updated release Teen 2.0.

In this episode we discuss Dr. Epstein’s case against adolescence, the argument that historically, the social transition from childhood to adulthood was more rapid, and that the view of adolescence as a distinct phase of the lifespan is a relatively modern and Western concept. Dr. Epstein and I engage in a healthy debate on this topic, informed by my own research on adolescent development and the view that puberty marks a distinct and protracted period of physiological, neural, and psychological development.

In support of his argument Dr. Epstein discusses a wide-range of social and technological transformations impacting childhood development and our views on teenagers across the last two centuries, including industrialization, mandatory education, child labor laws, and more recently, social media and technology use. We additionally discuss positive steps towards promoting healthy development in teens, including individualized education, increased autonomy, and increased responsibility.

Dr. Jason Mitchell is a Professor of Psychology at Harvard University, where he directs the Social Cognitive & Affective Neuroscience Laboratory. His research uses a combination of neuroimaging and behavioral measures to investigate the cognitive processes that support inferences about the psychological states of other people and introspective awareness of the self.

In this episode we introduce social neuroscience as a field of research at the intersection between social psychology and cognitive neuroscience, and discuss the neuroscience of mindreading. Mindreading, in this context, refers to our social cognitive capacity for thinking about the thoughts and feelings of others, otherwise known as mentalizing or theory of mind. Jason and I discuss how mindreading relates to other processes such as introspection, and how mindreading may be accomplished either through mental simulation (placing oneself in another’s shoes) or heuristics. Next, we discuss Jason’s own research on the neuroscience of introspection and mindreading, and his findings that mindreading looks more similar to introspection in the brain when reasoning about others more similar to us. Lastly, we discuss more exotic forms of mindreading such as animal theory of mind and empathizing with inanimate objects or cartoons, and what these processes tell us about the cognitive mechanisms underlying mindreading and empathy.

Dr. Bryce Huebner is the Provost’s Distinguished Associate Professor of Philosophy at Georgetown University, where he conducts research connecting philosophy of mind, cognitive science, biology, and moral psychology.

In this episode we talk broadly about what it means to be conscious, and how cognition and emotion are governed by bodily processes. Bryce and I discuss how philosophy of mind ought to be informed by the biological limitations that give rise to complex thought, how much of our thought and behavior revolves around maintaining homeostasis and satisfying conflicting motivations, and how both nature and nurture give rise to individual differences in these processes. We also talk about the possibility for artificial intelligence and consciousness in non-human animals, and discuss the relationships between consciousness, life, and functionalism. Lastly, we discuss the concept of distributed cognition in Bryce’s book Macrocognition, and how this relates to moral psychology.

Dr. Randolph Nesse is a Professor Emeritus in the Departments of Psychiatry and Psychology, and the Institute for Social Research at The University of Michigan, and one of the pioneers of the field of evolutionary psychiatry. He is the Founding President of The International Society for Evolution, Medicine, and Public Health, and author of the book Good Reasons for Bad Feelings.

In this episode we talk about the field of evolutionary psychiatry, and more broadly about the evolution of both negative emotions such as fear and anxiety and positive emotions such as happiness. We talk about how humans have evolved with a “negativity bias” which primes us to sense threat, even in the case of false alarms, and how at the extreme this leads to anxiety disorders. On the other hand, we talk about how either a lack of positive emotion (depression) or excess positive emotion (mania) can be pathological, and how evolution must act to fine-tune our emotions for the right context. Overall, we have good reasons for bad feelings, but knowledge of why our emotions have evolved and what contexts they evolved in can help us fine-tune our emotions in our modern environments.

Find Dr. Nesse’s book and learn more about his work at: goodreasons.info

Dr. Steven Pinker is a Cognitive Scientist and the Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. He is an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences, a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist, a Humanist of the Year, a recipient of nine honorary doctorates, one of Foreign Policy’s “World’s Top 100 Public Intellectuals” and Time’s “100 Most Influential People in the World Today,” and the bestselling author of 12 books including The Language Instinct, How the Mind Works, The Blank Slate, The Better Angels of Our Nature, Enlightenment Now, and most recently, Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scare, and Why it Matters.

In this episode we discuss Dr. Pinker’s latest book Rationality, and how rationality is best defined as using knowledge to achieve a particular goal. We talk about the distinction between rationality as expressed in formal logic and ecological rationality, why people (including hunter-gatherers) may fail at logic puzzles but excel at those same puzzles when applied to reasoning about social or resource dilemmas. We also discuss cognitive biases that interfere with rationality, such as the “myside bias” and how the availability heuristic distorts our memories, and how these biases may be overcome through looking at the world in data. Additionally, we discuss how many irrational beliefs, such as conspiracy theories, are not failed attempts at objective descriptions of the world, but rather beliefs constructed using a “mythology mindset” that attempts to convey a moral message. Lastly, we discuss how rationality relates to enlightenment values, and the case to be (cautiously) made for rational optimism.

0:00:50Motivation for writing the book0:03:43Defining rationality0:05:22How people can behave more rationally in real-life situations0:10:30The rationality of hunter-gatherers0:13:07The relationship between intelligence and rationality0:14:51The role of cognitive biases in irrationality0:19:39The influence of social factors on rationality0:24:07The scarcity of rationality and the spread of irrational beliefs0:30:57The role of memes and cultural evolution in irrational beliefs0:35:06The possibility of rationality being hijacked by parasitic ideas0:38:42The importance of trust in scientific and journalistic institutions0:43:12The connection between rationality and progress0:46:29The need for a cognitive immune system against irrational beliefs0:50:10The continuation of progress and setbacks in different areas0:54:38The connection between rationality and moral philosophy

Dr. Ilan Dar-Nimrod is an Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of Sydney, and an expert on how people reason about genetic causes of behavior, the psychology of gender and sexuality, and the existential psychology of death.

In this episode we talk about psychological essentialism, the belief that people have an innate “essence,” and how over time, as society has become more secular, people have become genetically essentialist. We talk about how genetic essentialism is associated with more sympathy for wrongdoers, due to lower beliefs in free will. We also talk about how essentialism is associated with divisive groupthink, as in the case of gender and sexuality. Lastly, we talk about the relationship between essentialism and existentialism, noting that people who are more essentialist are more likely to believe in an inherent order to the world, while people who are more secular must grapple with finding their own meaning.

Dr. Imac Zambrana is an Associate Professor of Education at the University of Oslo, and an expert in the study of children’s language development, social cognition, and social learning. She is also the Chief Scientific Officer at Nordic Neurotech, which aims to use virtual reality to help with psychological and medical research.

In this episode we discuss Imac’s research on childhood language development, and how this process is influenced by social learning, such as through the pointing gestures of parents. We also discuss children’s learning more broadly, including intrinsic and extrinsic motivations for learning, breadth vs. depth of knowledge, and how digital media has shaped children’s learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. Lastly, we discuss Imac’s work with Nordic Neurotech, including how virtual reality technology can be used to improve children’s educational outcomes, and how neuroimaging technology can be used in therapeutic medicine.

Dr. Valerie van Mulukom is an Assistant Professor at Coventry University’s Centre for Trust, Peace, and Social Relations, and a Research Associate at the University of Oxford’s Centre for the Study of Social Cohesion. Her research spans a broad range of topics, roughly unified within the cognitive and evolutionary science of imagination, memory, and belief.

In this episode we talk about Valerie’s early cognitive research on imagination and memory, and her more recent research on belief, including religious, secular, and conspiracy beliefs. We talk about how cognitive heuristics such as social learning bias evolved and shape our beliefs, how cultural evolution selects for specific beliefs, the role imagination plays in children’s play and intuitive science, and how we inevitably construct worldviews to explain the world - whether these worldviews are scientific, religious, or conspiratorial.

Dr. Anna Lembke is a Professor of Addiction Medicine at Stanford University, Program Director of the Stanford Addiction Medicine Fellowship, and Chief of the Stanford Addiction Medicine Dual Diagnosis Clinic. She is a diplomate of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, a diplomate of the American Board of Addiction Medicine, and the bestselling author of the books Drug Dealer, MD – How Doctors Were Duped, Patients Got Hooked, and Why It’s So Hard to Stop, and Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence.

In this episode we talk about what dopamine is and how it governs the brain’s systems of pleasure and pain, how dopamine causes addiction (both with drugs and behaviors), how addiction has become a public health crisis in the United States, and what we can do about it. We talk about addictive technologies such as smartphones, and how this impacts today’s youth, and strategies for dopamine detoxification in order to promote happiness and well-being. Lastly, we discuss the difference between biological and sociological problems, and discuss Dr. Lembke’s warning against doctors overprescribing drugs and attempting to “biologize” non-biological problems.

Dr. Alan Levinovitz is an Associate Professor of Religion at James Madison University, and author of Natural: How Faith in Nature's Goodness Leads to Harmful Fads, Unjust Laws, and Flawed Science.

In this episode we talk about Alan’s book Natural, and attempt to understand why people gravitate towards assuming what is natural is good, what is unnatural is bad, and how people come up with ideas of naturalness in the first place. We contrast examples such as “unnatural” foods and medicines improving our lives, and “natural” diseases harming us, to make the case that what is natural may not be good, and what is unnatural may not be bad. We discuss historical and evolutionary reasons, including reducing uncertainty, for why humans tend to deify the natural and associate it with the good, as well as the philosophical implications of these differing worldviews, and how to cope with uncertainty.

Dr. Frans de Waal is a primatologist and the C. H. Candler Professor in the Psychology Department of Emory University and Director of the Living Links Center at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center. He has been elected to the (US) National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences. He’s the author of several bestsellers including Chimpanzee Politics, Good Natured, Our Inner Ape, The Age of Empathy, Mama’s Last Hug, and most recently, Different: Gender Through the Eyes of a Primatologist.

In this episode, we talk about Dr. de Waal’s most recent book, Different, comparing and contrasting sex and gender differences amongst humans, chimpanzees, and bonobos. Chimpanzees are patriarchal, competitive, and aggressive; while bonobos are matriarchal, peaceful, and highly sexual. Humans are somewhere in-between. We talk about how the field of primatology evolved over the decades, especially during the feminist revolution, and how old views of human and primate evolution focusing on male-dominance and violent competition, rather than egalitarian cooperation, have gone out of fashion. We talk about the role human moral values play in shaping the behavioral sciences, both for good and for bad. Lastly, we talk about how understanding which gender differences are natural and which are socially constructed allows us to reduce sexism and discrimination.

Dr. Kim Meidenbauer is a social, cognitive, and environmental neuroscientist, Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Chicago, and incoming Assistant Professor at Washington State University. Her research focuses on how the physical environment influences brain development, and in turn, our cognition, emotion, and social behavior.   

In this episode we talk about Kim’s research on how physical environmental stressors, such as heat exposure, influence our brains and predict social behavior, including crime rates. Additionally, we talk about the positive effects of greenspace, spending time in nature, on development and mental health, and how these effects can be measured using data gathered from smartphones and social media posts.   We talk about the question of free will: how free are we really, if our brains and behaviors are shaped by environmental and genetic influences? Lastly, we talk about the important policy implications of Kim’s research, especially as climate change accelerates and as we become more aware of the influence of the physical environment on our mental well-being.

Dr. Tal Ben-Shahar is a psychologist, best-selling author of the books Happier and Being Happy, and co-founder of the Happiness Studies Academy.

In this episode we talk about the science of happiness, its roots in positive psychology, and what psychology commonly gets wrong about happiness. We talk about how happiness is neither synonymous with pleasure nor the “just fine” state of not being unhappy. We talk about mismatches between our current environment and our ancestral environment, and how lack of exercise, poor nutrition, and poor social bonds contribute to the epidemic of unhappiness. We talk about anti-fragility, meaning, delay of gratification, and how an optimal level of stress and scarcity is necessary for happiness. Lastly, we talk about how Tal founded the Happiness Studies Academy, and how happiness studies has emerged as an interdisciplinary new science.

Dr. Sofie Valk is a neuroscientist, Head of the Cognitive Neurogenetics Lab at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, and Research Group Leader at the Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine, Brain and Behavior (INM-7), Research Centre in Jülich, Germany, where she studies the interplay of genetic factors and social behavior on brain structure.

In this episode, we talk about Sofie’s background in neuroscience and cognitive science, her PhD research on how brain structure relates to empathy and theory of mind, and her current research on genetic factors relating to brain development and social cognition. Additionally, we discuss the nature and nurture debate in the context of neurogenetics research, and how genetic influences can be modeled by comparing twins, siblings, and non-related strangers for similarity.

Dr. Courtney Hilton is a cognitive scientist and postdoctoral research fellow at The Music Lab at Harvard University.

In this episode we talk about Courtney’s background as a musician and transition into cognitive science, and how musical cognition is studied in humans. We discuss evolutionary theories of whether music evolved for socially adaptive purposes or as a byproduct of language, how certain universal acoustic patterns such as higher pitch during play and in speaking to children, and lower pitch to signal dominance during conflict, may have given rise to the different emotions music can elicit, and how we find an optimal level of complexity in enjoying music. Additionally, we talk about Courtney’s recent work on cross-cultural patterns of music, such as singing to infants, as well as how music and musical cognition differs across cultures.

In this episode, we talk about all things narcissism: from its manifestations (grandiose vs. vulnerable), behavioral patterns, personality traits, status and reward seeking, genetic and social determinants of narcissism, the role of technology and social media use in fueling narcissism, and narcissism as an evolutionary adaptation to certain ecological niches. We also discuss Dr. Campbell’s research on “geek culture” and how this relates to status seeking and narcissism, and how narcissism relates to the hero’s journey and costly fitness indicators in evolutionary theory. Lastly, we discuss the inverse of narcissism, imposter syndrome and intellectual humility, how arousal theory and affect relate to one’s ego, and how understanding narcissism can help foster a healthy sense of self.

Dr. Mark Ho is a Cognitive Scientist and Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Princeton University. His research provides insights into human planning and social cognition by developing computational theories (e.g., using probabilistic models, reinforcement learning, neural networks) and testing those theories experimentally with people.

Learn more about Mark’s work at: https://markkho.github.io/

In this episode we discuss Mark’s recent research on value-guided construals (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-04743-9), and how the problem of navigation relies not just on devising a path to your destination, but also how detailed to construct your mental map. Value-guided construals refer to dynamically adjusting the detail of our mental representations necessary to achieve our value-guided goals.

We then talk about mental representation more broadly, both in humans and artificial intelligence, and discuss the role of intentionality and agency in humans and machines, using examples such as natural language processing algorithms and autonomous vehicles.

Lastly, we talk about free will and how value-guided construals may also be utilized in social cognition, how our value-guided construals relate to other aspects of cognition such as attention, and Mark’s future research plans.

Dr. Isabelle Brocas is an economist, neuroscientist, Professor at the University of Southern California, and co-director of the Los Angeles Behavioral Economics Laboratory and the Theoretical Research in Neuroeconomic Decision Making Institute.

In this episode we discuss, broadly, how neuroeconomics emerged as an interdisciplinary field combining economics and neuroscience in order to better explain what makes humans rational or irrational in different situations. We discuss game theory, the concept of rationality, Isabelle’s own research on neurodevelopment and strategic decision-making in children, the nature and nurture debate in the context of the development of economic reasoning, and finally, intervention studies which may help improve education and well-being in disadvantaged youth.

Learn more about Isabelle’s work at: https://isabellebrocas.org/

Dr. Andy Norman is a philosopher, Director of the Humanism Initiative at Carnegie Mellon University, Founder of the Cognitive Immunology Research Collaborative, and author of Mental Immunity: Infectious Ideas, Mind-Parasites, and the Search for a Better Way to Think.

In this episode we discuss Andy’s book and the concept of mental immunity, the evolved system in our mind used to combat mind-parasites, much like the body’s immune system combats physical pathogens. We cover a variety of topics including mental heuristics, ingroup-outgroup bias, cultural selection of memes, conspiracy thinking, truth seeking, fixed vs. growth mindsets, and the role of science and rationality in public discourse.

Dr. Iris Berent is a Professor of Psychology and Director of the Language & Mind Lab at Northeastern University. She is also the author of several books including The Blind Storyteller: How We Reason About Human Nature.

In this episode we discuss Iris’ early work on language development, and how innate capacities for language inspired Iris to study our beliefs about innate parts of human nature. We talk about intuitive dualism, the tendency for us to separate mind from body in how we reason about our own cognition and behavior, and essentialism, our tendency to believe that our bodies have innate and immutable characteristics. Putting these two pieces together, the central thesis of The Blind Storyteller is that we are blind to our own human nature, because we tend to discount innate theories of mind.

Dr. Gary Laderman is the Goodrich C. White Professor of American Religious History and Cultures at Emory University, and the author of numerous books on death, spirituality, and culture, including Don’t Think About Death.

In this episode we talk about Gary’s research on cultural perspectives on death throughout American history, including throughout the Civil War and after the development of the funeral industry. We discuss the role spirituality and religion play in conceptions of death, cross-culturally, and how conceptions of what is sacred extend beyond the traditionally religious. We also talk about how psychedelics and other drugs influence our perceptions on life and death, which will be the subject of Gary’s next book Sacred Drugs.

Dr. Fiery Cushman is a Professor of Psychology and Director of the Moral Psychology Research Lab at Harvard University.

In this episode, we talk about the distinction and overlap between moral psychology and experimental moral philosophy research, universalist vs. relativist moral values, the evolution of cooperation, whether individuals look to themselves or the state to punish moral transgressors, aggression as it relates to moral virtue, and virtue signaling. We also discuss topics of Fiery's own research including motivation for punishment of moral transgressions, the phenomenon of moral luck, and punishment of bad luck outcomes as used to teach moral lessons.

Dr. Erik Nook is a clinical psychologist, neuroscientist, and Assistant Professor of Psychology at Princeton University. 

In this episode we discuss the philosophy and early history behind the study of emotions, and outline several schools of thought including constructivism. Erik and I talk about individual differences in emotion processing, how language influences the way we represent and regulate our emotions, emotional development in children and adolescents, and how Erik's personal experiences as a clinician have shaped his research on the interaction between emotion and language. 

Dr. Christian Nawroth is an applied ethologist and a postdoctoral research fellow at the Institute of Behavioral Physiology in the Research Institute for Farm Animal Biology.  

In this episode, we discuss Christian's research on farm animals, including goats and pigs, and what this research tells us about their intelligence, social cognition, memory, and decision making. We also talk more broadly about the aims of such farm animal research, and contrast basic science research with the goal of better understanding animals to improve their welfare, with animal research conducted with the goal of improving efficiency in food production. Lastly, we discuss the ethics of animal welfare, and future lines of research that might allow us to better understand animal consciousness, including virtual reality approaches.   

Learn more about Christian's work at: https://christiannawroth.wordpress.com/

Dr. Sami Yousif is a cognitive psychologist and MindCORE postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Pennsylvania.

In this episode we dive deep into two topics among Sami's wide range of research experiences: spatial cognition and teleological belief. 

We discuss spatial cognition, imagistic vs. propositional vs. coordinate representations of space and navigation, the development of spatial reasoning in children, and how spatial cognition differs between humans and animals.   

We also discuss teleology, or the explanation for the purpose of things, and how teleological beliefs differ across individuals and across framing of questions. In particular, "why" questions may be broken down into either descriptive "how" questions or teleological "purpose" questions.  

Learn more about Sami's work at: https://www.samiyousif.org/

Dr. Adam Green is a cognitive neuroscientist and the Provost's Distinguished Associate Professor of Psychology at Georgetown University, where he directs the Lab for Relational Cognition. He is the Founder and President of the Society for the Neuroscience of Creativity, and Editor-In-Chief of the Creativity Research Journal. 

In this episode we discuss Adam's expertise in creativity research, the extent to which creativity is innate or can be learned, whether creativity is a unidimensional or multidimensional construct, and how creativity manifests in the brain. We additionally discuss some of Adam's recent and ongoing work on the neuroscience of belief, including how religious believers and non-believers create representations of God. Lastly, we touch on the subject of belief in free will, and whether the brain is truly a deterministic system.

I hope to continue the conversation on free will and neurophilosophy with Adam sometime soon. In the meantime, learn more about his work at: https://cng.georgetown.edu/home

Dr. Megan Peters is a cognitive neuroscientist and an Assistant Professor of Cognitive Sciences at the University of California, Irvine, where she directs the Cognitive & Neural Computation Lab. 

In this episode we discuss Megan's background in cognitive science, and a research path which allowed her to combine interests in computation with philosophical questions about human subjective experiences. In a wide-ranging conversation we discuss how consciousness and subjective experience might arise from a collection of neurons, the phenomenology of perception, human perception and decision-making under uncertainty, unconscious perceptions, metacognition and confidence about our subjective experiences, and how metacognition differs from error-correction in artificial intelligence. 

Learn more about Megan's work at: https://faculty.sites.uci.edu/cnclab/

Dr. Bill von Hippel is an evolutionarily social psychologist and a Professor of Psychology at the University of Queensland, Australia. He is also the author of The Social Leap: The New Evolutionary Science of Who We Are, Where We Come From, and What Makes Us Happy. 

In this episode we discuss The Social Leap, a journey through over 6 million years of human evolution: from our moderately intelligent, moderately social chimpanzee-like ancestors, to the hyper-intelligent, hyper-social species we are today. Bill and I discuss a number of revolutions and selection pressures that led to our evolution, including environmental changes, the rise of bipedalism and tool use, long-distance hunting, mastery of fire and cooking, and most importantly, the social intelligence necessary to communicate and cooperate. 

Dr. Nilam Ram is a Professor of Psychology and Communication at Stanford University, and one of the founders of the field of screenomics: the new interdisciplinary field of research based on the time-series analysis of screens and digital behavior. 

In this episode, we discuss Nilam's background in finance and quantitative psychology, the use of longitudinal research methods to examine changes in behavior and cognition throughout the lifespan, and the use of experience sampling methods in developmental science. As smartphones became more pervasive, Nilam describes the rise of mobile sensing methods in psychology, eventually leading to the birth of screenomics. We finally discuss the broad goals and potential applications of screenomics research, including interactive media which predict behavior, and the precautions taken to ensure smartphone data is analyzed with ethical and privacy concerns in mind. 

Dr. Abigail Marsh is a Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at Georgetown University, where she directs the Laboratory on Social and Affective Neuroscience. She is also the author of The Fear Factor: How One Emotion Connects Altruists, Psychopaths, and Everyone In-Between.

In this episode, we discuss Abby's background in social psychology, and a life-changing experience of hers that motivated inquiry into the nature of costly altruism. In a wide-ranging conversation we discuss the neural correlates of empathy (or lack thereof) in psychopaths and altruistic kidney donors, animal research on care and evolutionary theories of empathy, the role of oxytocin in governing care, how social media hijacks our systems of reward and fear, and how mindfulness and in-person interactions may improve trust and well-being. 

Dr. Glenn Fox is a faculty member at the University of Southern California's Lloyd Greif Center for Entrepreneurial Studies, in the Marshall School of Business. His current projects focus on neural systems for emotion regulation, high stakes training, and developing entrepreneurial mindset skills in founders and business leaders. Glenn is also the Director and Founder of the USC Found Well Initiative which aims to understand and promote entrepreneurial mindset in founders and business leaders.

In this episode we discuss Glenn's background bridging neuroscience and business in understanding human decision-making, and the neuroscience behind several traits important for leadership, including emotional resilience, empathy, and gratitude. Additionally, we discuss personality differences in entrepreneurial thinkers and their relation to neuroscience, including the extent to which leadership ability is biological vs. a learned skill. 

Learn more about Glenn's work at: 

https://glennrfox.com/

Follow Glenn on social media:

https://twitter.com/glennrfox?s=20&t=BULakuBbyXxDtY4h577DiQ

https://www.linkedin.com/in/glenn-r-fox-phd-2418bba1

Dr. Aaron Sell is an evolutionary psychologist and Assistant Professor of Psychology & Criminology at Heidelberg University with expertise in the evolution of anger, aggression, and hatred. In this episode we discuss how these different emotions are psychologically distinct, their evolutionary adaptiveness, and the "mismatch" between experiencing these emotions in tribal settings and in our modern interconnected world.

Dr. Cedric Boeckx is a biolinguist and Research Professor at the Catalan Institute for Advanced Studies at the University of Barcelona. In this episode we discuss Cedric's research background, talk about what language is, from a scientific perspective, how it evolved in humans, and how it can be studied through cognitive psychology, computational modeling, and the human fossil record.

Dr. Robert Barton is a Professor of Anthropology at Durham University who studies primate brain evolution and cognition.

Dr. Edward Slingerland is a Distinguished University Scholar and Professor of Philosophy at the University of British Columbia and author of Drunk: How We Sipped, Danced, and Stumbled Our Way to Civilization. In this episode we talk about his book Drunk and dive into the history of alcohol, its health and societal benefits and costs, competing evolutionary theories as to why humans like alcohol, and how alcohol use changed with the rise of modern distillation technologies. Learn more about Edward's work and find his book at: https://www.edwardslingerland.com/drunk

Dr. Andrew Knoll is the Fisher Professor of Natural History at Harvard University, and author of A Brief History of Earth: Four Billion Years in Eight Chapters. In this episode, we further condense those four billion years into one introductory-level conversation. Dr. Knoll walks us through Earth's early history and the evolution of life on Earth, his background in geology, and research examining what Earth's early history can tell us about how life evolved. For more in-depth coverage of these topics, see Dr. Knoll's book: https://www.amazon.com/Brief-History-Earth-Billion-Chapters/dp/0062853910

Dr. Nicholas Christakis is a physician, sociologist, network scientist, and Sterling Professor of Social and Natural Science, Internal Medicine & Biomedical Engineering at Yale University. He is also the author of numerous books including Blueprint: The Evolutionary Origins of a Good Society, and Apollo’s Arrow: The Profound and Enduring Impact of Coronavirus on the Way We Live. 

In this episode we discuss Dr. Christakis' background in medicine, and his transition into network science: the study of social networks, how they form, change, and interact to shape our behavior. We discuss how network science can be understood both from an evolutionary perspective, as in Blueprint, and in public health, as in Apollo's Arrow. Pandemics are nothing new to humans, and Dr. Christakis argues that we can learn from our evolutionary and historical past in facing COVID-19 and other potential pandemics, and respond to them better than ever if we put such knowledge and our technological advancements to good use. 

Dr. Mark Solms is a neuropsychologist, Professor at the University of Cape Town, and author of The Hidden Spring: A Journey to the Source of Consciousness. In this episode we discuss Dr. Solms' background in neuropsychology, the overlap between modern neuropsychology and psychoanalysis, and Dr. Solms' early research on dreaming. We then discuss the illusive nature of consciousness, Dr. Solms' central arguments in The Hidden Spring that consciousness is evolutionarily ancient and grounded in feeling, and modern attempts of using quantitative methods to tackle the mystery of consciousness. 

0:00:04 Introduction to Dr. Mark Solms and his interest in consciousness 0:03:22 Dr. Solms' background in psychoanalysis and its influence on his research 0:06:56 The importance of studying subjective states in neuroscience 0:10:48 The shift towards appreciating subjectivity in the field of neuroscience 0:15:20 The study of dreams and their connection to emotion and memory 0:18:58 The transition from studying dreams to studying consciousness 0:22:48 The relationship between feeling and consciousness 0:30:56 Collaboration with Karl Friston and the exploration of consciousness 0:39:27 The emergence of feeling from non-feeling and the study of artificial consciousness 0:46:33 The discussion on panpsychism and the limits of consciousness 1:00:14 The connection between free will, feeling, and probabilistic choices

Dr. Jeremy DeSilva is an Associate Professor of Anthropology at Dartmouth College, and author of the book First Steps: How Walking Upright Made Us Human. He is a paleoanthropologist, specializing in the locomotion of the first apes (hominoids) and early human ancestors (hominins). His particular anatomical expertise-- the human foot and ankle-- has contributed to our understanding of the origins and evolution of upright walking in the human lineage.

In this episode we discuss Jeremy's book First Steps and his research on the evolution of human locomotion: from quadruped apes to upright humans. We additionally discuss how paleoanthropologists identify and date fossils, and how the fossil record can be used to understand our evolutionary past. 

Dr. Randy Thornhill is an evolutionary biologist and a Distinguished Professor of Biology Emeritus at the University of New Mexico. He is a pioneering researcher of parasite-stress theory, which describes how pathogens have throughout history shaped our behavior and values. 

In this episode we discuss parasite-stress theory and the behavioral immune system, and how conservative values are cross-culturally associated with regional parasite prevalence. Additionally, we discuss these findings in the context of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, and how advancements in sanitation throughout history may have given rise to more liberal ideals. 

Dr. Beth Smith is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Southern California where she directs the Infant Neuromotor Control Laboratory. Dr. Smith's research focuses on the development of neural control of movement during infancy and evaluates interventions for neural and functional development in infants with or at risk for developmental delay.

Dr. Katie Bottenhorn is a neuroscientist and postdoctoral researcher at the University of Southern California. In this episode we talk about Katie's background in neuropsychology, the methodological aspect of neuroinformatics, and Katie's dissertation research focusing on how hormonal fluctuations during the menstrual cycle impact women's brains. Additionally, we discuss gender imbalances in STEM fields such as neuroscience, and compare large sample neuroimaging studies to deep phenotyping approaches featuring a large number of scans within a small sample. 

Timestamps:

0:00 - Introduction

0:46 - Pursuing psychology and chemistry as an undergrad

3:33 - Neuroimaging vs wet lab neuroscience research

5:47 - Plans for neuroscience grad school

9:13 - STEM gender imbalance and the "leaky pipeline"

11:11 - Katie's transition into methodological research

15:52 - Pursuing data science without a math or computer science background

18:33 - Applying deep phenotyping methodology to studying women's health

20:55 - Dense sampling methods in neuroimaging: more scans, not more participants

24:14 - The replication crisis in neuroimaging

26:11 - Big data neuroscience via large samples vs. deep phenotyping

28:25 - Katie's dissertation work looking at how hormonal fluctuations change women's brains

32:00 - Determining causality in brain and behavior

34:59 - How hormones change brains during puberty

36:46 - Katie's plans for postdoctoral research

Dr. Babak Hemmatian is a cognitive scientist and postdoctoral research fellow at the Beckman Institute of the University of Illinois. His research focuses on using natural language processing techniques to analyze natural discourse, such as social media posts, as they relate to personal and political beliefs. In this episode we discuss Babak's background in computational cognitive science, his PhD research analyzing how Reddit and Twitter users' perspectives on the legalization of gay marriage and marijuana use changed over time, and the ethics of collecting data from social media users. 

Dr. David Geary is a cognitive developmental and evolutionary psychologist and Curators' Distinguished Professor and a Thomas Jefferson Fellow at the University of Missouri. He is an expert in children's mathematical development and the evolution of human sex differences. 

Dr. Mark Schaller is a Professor of Psychology at the University of British Columbia and one of the pioneering researchers of the behavioral immune system. 

Dr. Rosalind Arden is a behavioral geneticist, Research Fellow at the London School of Economics, and an expert in the study of intelligence. In this episode we discuss the genetic and environmental factors that influence human intelligence, and Rosalind's pioneering work studying intelligence in dogs.

Dr. Arik Kershenbaum is an evolutionary biologist and lecturer at the University of Cambridge with expertise in studying animal communication. In this episode we discuss his book, The Zoologist's Guide to the Galaxy, and the many universal features of evolution and communication that we might expect to find in alien life. 

Dr. Julia Marshall is a postdoctoral researcher at Boston College, where she studies children's cooperative development, moral development, and desire to punish. In this episode we discuss Julia's background in psychology, how moral values can be studied empirically in children, the developmental factors that lead to the desire to punish and cooperate, and compare children's and adults' prosocial norms. Learn more about Julia's work at: https://www.juliaannemarshall.com/ 

Timestamps: 0:00 - Introduction 0:25 - What first got Julia interested in psychology 3:48 - How is morality studied empirically? 6:41 - Are children's moral beliefs innate, or socially constructed? 7:37 - Children and adults have different views on punishment 13:44 - How psychological studies with children differs from studies with adults 16:18 - Sampling bias in psychology research 17:40 - Studying cooperative behavior vs. antisocial behavior 19:57 - Social behavior in humans vs. animals 24:38 - How third-party punishment arises in humans 31:04 - Fairness as expectation of norms 33:15 - Is all prosocial behavior inherently selfish? 38:27 - Conformity vs. following one's conscience 42:51 - How temperament and aggression influence cooperation 46:29 - Julia's current and future research

Dr. Ryan Boyd is a computational social and behavioral scientist at Lancaster University. In this episode, we discuss Ryan's background in psychology, his transition from experimental to computational psychology, and his exposure to natural language processing. Additionally, we discuss how natural language processing research can be used to analyze text and predict personality, behavior, and authorship. Finally, we discuss the ethics of data collection on social media, and forms of data science that may be used to protect privacy. 

Dr. Danbee Kim is the pioneer of field neuroscience: the non-invasive neuroscientific study of animals in their natural habitats. In this episode we discuss Danbee's motivation to create field neuroscience, the amazing neurobiology of cuttlefish, and Danbee's field neuroscience work on cuttlefish and humans for her PhD dissertation. She currently works at the UK-based company NeuroGears, focusing on building collaborative projects that use storytelling and interactive experiences to help people apply scientific methods of understanding to their daily lives. Learn more about Danbee's work and find her graphic novel "The First VIRS" at: http://www.danbeekim.org/

Dr. Brad Duchaine is a Professor of Psychology at Dartmouth College, where he runs the Social Perception Lab. Sarah Herald is a Psychology PhD Student working in the Social Perception Lab. In this episode we talk about the neuropsychology of social perception, facial recognition, and face processing disorders including prosopagnosia (the inability to recognize faces) and prosopometamorphopsia (PMO; distortions in face perception). Learn more about their research, and get in contact for a research study if you or someone you know has a face processing disorder at: https://lab.faceblind.org/index.html

Dr. Manoj Doss is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research at Johns Hopkins University. In this episode we discuss his background in neuropsychopharmacology and his research studying the effects of psychedelic drugs on episodic memory and cognition. 

Dr. Kevin Mitchell is an Associate Professor of Genetics and Neuroscience at Trinity College Dublin. In this episode we discuss his background in genetics and neuroscience, the evolution of cognition, and the interplay of genes and environment in shaping human behavior, philosophy of mind, and his book Innate: How the Wiring of Our Brains Shapes Who We Are. Learn more about Kevin's work at: https://www.kjmitchell.com/

Dr. Eric Schwitzgebel is a Professor of Philosophy at the University of California, Riverside. In this episode we discuss his thoughts on "in-between" beliefs, moral philosophy, and why most theories of consciousness are crazy.

Dr. David McKemy is a Professor of Biological Sciences at the University of Southern California. He is an expert in the neurobiology of pain. 

Dr. Tor Wager is a Professor of Neuroscience at Dartmouth College, where he runs the Cognitive & Affective Neuroscience Laboratory and conducts research on emotion and belief. Learn more about his work at: https://sites.dartmouth.edu/canlab/

Dr. Edward Hagen is a Professor of Evolutionary Anthropology at Washington State University. In this episode we discuss the field of anthropology, evolutionary approaches to studying mental health and substance use, and the evolution of leadership.   

Video available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DW3g4ElSF3c&lc=UgzzkXB9wQ24E2OZYgx4AaABAg

Timestamps: 0:00 - Introduction 0:26 - What is anthropology? 4:51 - How Ed became interested in biological anthropology 7:15 - How anthropologists differ from historians 9:33 - Evolutionary approaches to human behavior 17:00 - Studying mental health through the lens of evolutionary psychology 25:12 - The "mismatch hypothesis" of depression  28:36 - Kin selection 31:51 - Evolutionary medicine and infectious disease 36:09 - The evolution of substance use 40:53 - The paradox of drug addiction 43:02 - Why adults like bitter flavors 44:43 - Why some animals deliberately consume toxins 52:04 - Just the right amount of toxin 54:45 - Evolving the enjoyment of drug use 1:00:20 - How humans discovered complex drugs 1:02:00 - The evolution of leadership

Dr. Oriel FeldmanHall is a social affective neuroscientist and an Assistant Professor at Brown University, where she studies the neural basis of human social behavior, with a focus on morality, altruism, and socio-emotional decision-making. Learn more about Oriel's work at: http://www.feldmanhalllab.com/

In this episode we discuss Oriel's background in psychology, her research on moral decision-making and altruism, and how these subjective constructs are operationalized and measured in neuroscience. We also discuss her current and future work of studying the neural basis of social cognitive mapping. 

Dr. William Ngiam is a cognitive neuroscientist and postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Chicago, where he studies visual working memory. Learn more about his work at: https://williamngiam.github.io/

In this episode we discuss William's background in neuroscience, the neural mechanisms behind visual working memory, and what cognitive psychology tells us about the philosophy of perception. Additionally, we discuss William's involvement in the open science movement and the reproducibility crisis in science, better termed the "credibility revolution." 

Dr. Richard Tremblay is an Emeritus Professor of Pediatrics, Psychiatry, and Psychology at the University of Montreal and one of the world's leading experts on childhood aggression. In 2017 he received the Stockholm Prize in Criminology for his work on studying the developmental origins of aggression in children and his intervention studies meant to improve the developmental trajectories of delinquent children.

In this episode we discuss Dr. Tremblay's background in psychology and his large-scale longitudinal studies of the development of aggression in children which showed that aggression is most frequent in toddlers, and declines with age. We additionally discuss his use of twin studies to examine what proportion of aggression is due to genetic vs. environmental factors, sex differences in aggression, environmental risk factors for criminality, and interventions which can be made to improve developmental trajectories in high-risk children. 

Dr. Johnna Swartz is an Assistant Professor of Human Development at the University of California, Davis. Learn more about her research at: https://swartzlab.faculty.ucdavis.edu/

In this episode we discuss Johnna's background in psychology and neuroscience, her ongoing research examining the neural correlates of depression in adolescents cross-culturally, and what neuroscience teaches us about mental health. 

Dr. Michael Serra is an Associate Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience at Texas Tech University. Learn more about his research in the Learning and Metacognition Lab here: http://webpages.acs.ttu.edu/mserra/ 

In this episode we discuss the cognitive and neural basis behind learning and memory, Michael's work researching metacognition in the context of education, and what cognitive psychology teaches us about how to be better learners. 

Dr. Jakub Szymanik is an Associate Professor in the Institute for Logic, Language and Computation at the University of Amsterdam. 

In this episode we discuss natural language processing, artificial intelligence, and Jakub's research on forms of linguistic cognition such as quantifiers and categorical reasoning. 

Dr. Katie Gordon is a licensed clinical psychologist, co-host of the Psychodrama Podcast, and the author of The Suicidal Thoughts Workbook. Learn more about her work and find her book and podcast at: https://kathrynhgordon.com/ 

In this episode we discuss Katie's background in clinical psychology, her work as a therapist, suicide prevention, and tips for managing mental health.  

Timestamps:  0:00 - Introduction 0:59 - How Katie became interested in clinical psychology 2:37 - Introduction to psychology research 4:35 - Working in a mental hospital before grad school 5:37 - How to manage one's own emotions when working with suffering patients  7:24 - The types of patients Katie works with 9:06 - Nature vs. nurture in mental illness 13:23 - Therapy's role in society 15:39 - Tools from therapy that everyone can use in their relationships  17:40 - What progress looks like in therapy 21:04 - Teaching patients to solve problems rather than solving their problems 22:21 - How it feels to see a patient improve 26:15 - Suicide prevention 28:17 - The Suicidal Thoughts Workbook 29:40 - Suicidal ideation 32:18 - Suicidal thoughts 34:40 - Sex differences in suicidal behavior 36:10 - Suicide attempt survivors  37:25 - Suicide in popular media 39:47 - How being a therapist has influenced Katie's personal relationships 42:27 - The Psychodrama Podcast 43:56 - Comedians and therapists 46:21 - Honesty in therapy 47:17 - Mental health diagnoses and misconceptions 49:31 - Unconditional positive regard

Dr. Nadia Chernyak is an Assistant Professor of Cognitive Sciences at the University of California, Irvine. In this episode we discuss her research on children's moral development, conceptions of fairness and inequality, and the role numeracy skills play in these conceptions. Learn more about Dr. Chernyak's research at: https://www.dosclab.com/   

Video available at: https://youtu.be/MOjgJGU-KW4

Timestamps: 0:00 - Introduction 0:35 - How Nadia became interested in studying moral and social development 1:48 - Psychology vs. philosophy  2:48 - Conducting psychological experiments with young children  4:06 - Inequalities perceived by young children and even monkeys  8:55 - When and how children begin to apply moral stances to inequality 10:42 - Nadia's research on children's moral cognition 14:24 - Is the motivation for sharing innate?  15:28 - How temperament influences moral values  16:37 - Why Nadia focuses her research on children  17:45 - Looking at numeracy development in the context of fairness and morals  22:18 - How perceptions of inequality scale 25:26 - Cognitively advanced but selfish children  27:05 - Merit vs. equality  28:30 - Practical implications of Nadia's research 31:01 - The difficulty of comparing unquantifiables   32:18 - Cognitive mechanisms behind the development of high-level reasoning 34:00 - Moral stage theory  34:53 - Moral thought experiment  36:32 - Fairness vs. prosociality  40:09 - Group biases in prosocial behavior 42:20 - Overlap between moral psychology and moral philosophy  46:02 - Creating quantifiable scales of unquantifiables  49:00 - Evaluating ulterior motives 51:18 - Nadia's plans for future research 55:10 - How stereotypes influence cognition

Dr. Felipe De Brigard is a Professor of Philosophy, Psychology, and Neuroscience at Duke University, where he runs the Imagination and Modal Cognition Lab. Learn more about his research at: https://www.imclab.org/   

In this episode we discuss Felipe's background in philosophy and neuroscience, his research on imagination and counterfactual thinking, and the role of memory in consciousness.   

Timestamps:  0:00 - Introduction 0:29 - Felipe's background in philosophy and neuropsychology 1:58 - Bridging philosophy and cognitive neuroscience in his PhD 3:41 - Neuroscience as an applied medical field vs. a theoretical study of the mind 9:00 - The rise of experimental philosophy  11:12 - Felipe's research interests in memory, imagination, and counterfactual thinking 15:26 - The role of memory in consciousness 22:07 - Is experience discrete or continuous? 24:37 - Phenomenology in neuroscience 30:59 - Does multitasking exist?  33:08 - Different types of cognitive processes involved in imagination 36:09 - Felipe's own research on counterfactual thinking 39:20 - Differences in brain activation when imagining things that do vs. do not involve yourself 43:25 - The evolution of counterfactual thinking  46:35 - How counterfactual thinking influences our memory 47:36 - The most interesting question Felipe would like to see answered in his career

In this episode I interview Dr. Essi Viding, Professor of Developmental Psychopathology at University College London and author of Psychopathy: A Very Short Introduction. We discuss her research on the development of antisocial behavior, the degree to which psychopathic traits are influenced by genetic and environmental factors, and early-intervention strategies which may help improve the developmental trajectory of antisocial children.

In this episode I interview Dr. Zlatan Damnjanovic, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Southern California. We discuss his research in logic and the philosophy of mathematics, the epistemological of whether the languages of logic and math are universal or man-made, and the historical development of formal systems of logic and mathematics. Additionally, we discuss the paradox logical systems necessarily being either incomplete or inconsistent without the fundamental axiom of truth-preservation (i.e., not contradicting oneself).

Video available at: https://youtu.be/pfLqUJvIBLI 

In this episode I interview Dr. Carlos Cardenas-Iniguez, neuroscientist and postdoctoral researcher at the University of Southern California. We discuss his background in cognitive neuroscience, his transition to researching the influence of social and environmental factors on the brain, and his current work in environmental neuroscience. Additionally, we discuss issues in science including the operationalization of variables, identity, (statistical) power, and group stratification.

Dr. Mark Goulston is a psychiatrist, former UCLA professor with expertise in suicide prevention, former FBI and police hostage negotiation trainer, inventor of the therapeutic technique of Surgical Empathy, bestselling author of 9 books, and host of the My Wakeup Call podcast. 

In this episode we discuss Dr. Goulston's books "Just Listen" and "Get Out of Your Own Way." In addition, Dr. Goulston shares stories from his training as a psychiatrist and discusses the technique of surgical empathy in both clinical and personal settings.

Video available at: https://youtu.be/R9dONx1DhVc

Learn more about Dr. Goulston at https://markgoulston.com/

Find Dr. Goulston on Twitter and Instagram @MarkGoulston

Listen to Dr. Goulston's course Defeating Self Defeat at: https://himalaya.com/defeat (Use promo code DEFEAT to access for free)

In this episode I interview Dr. Daniel Lapsley, Professor of Psychology at Notre Dame University. We discuss the overlap between philosophy and experimental psychology in the study of morality, early psychological theories of moral development including those of Piaget and Kohlberg, modern perspectives on moral psychology including Haidt's Moral Foundations Theory, and the value of intellectual humility.

Video available at: https://youtu.be/4KNK4l4oNkA 

In this episode I interview Dr. Vera Gluscevic, Gabilan Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Southern California. We discuss her background in astrophysics and her research in cosmology, the beginnings of our Universe, the mysteries of dark matter and dark energy, and touch briefly on metaphysics and the probabilistic nature of the quantum world.

In this episode I interview Dr. Alex Bezzerides, Professor of Biology at Lewis-Clark State College, about his book Evolution Gone Wrong: The Curious Reasons Why Our Bodies Work (Or Don't). We discuss his background in biology, inspirations for the book, our evolutionary past, and the trade-offs that come with adaptation: from the benefits of walking on two feet and having large brains, to the pains of backache and childbirth.  

Find his book here: https://www.amazon.com/Evolution-Gone-Wrong-Curious-Reasons/dp/1335690050/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=

In this episode I interview Dr. Cecilia Heyes, Professor of Psychology at Oxford University, about her book Cognitive Gadgets: The Cultural Evolution of Thinking. We discuss her background in animal research, the nature vs. nurture debate, culture as an evolutionary process, and discuss various "cognitive gadgets" such as literacy and imitation, which Heyes argues are not biologically programmed, but culturally evolved feats of cognition.

Find her book at: https://www.amazon.com/Cognitive-Gadgets-Cultural-Evolution-Thinking/dp/0674980158

In this episode I interview Dr. Toby Mintz, Professor of Psychology and Linguistics at the University of Southern California. We discuss language in the context of cognitive science: from artificial intelligence to human language development, and discuss his research on language acquisition in infants and children.   

Video available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQoO1KopuLM

Papers discussed:  

Mintz, T. H. (2003). Frequent frames as a cue for grammatical categories in child directed speech. Cognition, 90(1), 91-117.  

Mintz, T. H. (2005). Linguistic and conceptual influences on adjective acquisition in 24-and 36-month-olds. Developmental Psychology, 41(1), 17.

In this episode I interview Dr. Frank Manis, Professor of Psychology at the University of Southern California and author of The Dynamic Child. We discuss his early career studying literacy development and dyslexia, his textbook and MyVirtualChild program, and his thoughts on the field of developmental psychology.

Video available at: https://youtu.be/9CLnqbtlhYs

In this episode I interview Dr. Megan Herting, neuroscientist and professor of Preventive Medicine at the University of Southern California. We discuss her early career and transition from behavioral neuroscience in rats to humans, recent studies in neuroimaging and environmental neuroscience, and the importance of science education and holism.

Papers discussed:

Cserbik, D., Chen, J. C., McConnell, R., Berhane, K., Sowell, E. R., Schwartz, J., ... & Herting, M. M. (2020). Fine particulate matter exposure during childhood relates to hemispheric-specific differences in brain structure. Environment International, 143, 105933.

Campbell, C. E., Mezher, A. F., Eckel, S. P., Tyszka, J. M., Pauli, W. M., Nagel, B. J., & Herting, M. M. (2021). Restructuring of amygdala subregion apportion across adolescence. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 48, 100883.

Timestamps: 

0:00 - Introduction 0:35 - How Megan first became interested in psychology & neuroscience 3:25 - Megan's research experiences as an undergraduate 6:38 - Learning to read scientific jargon in academic journals 8:30 - How Megan decided to pursue graduate school 10:45 - Navigating graduate school as a first-generation student 12:44 - How Megan's research interests developed in graduate school 15:07 - Megan's PhD dissertation on how exercise influences brain health in adolescents 19:26 - Switching focus post-PhD and searching for faculty jobs 22:50 - Teaching in addition to doing research 26:38 - Research in the Herting Neuroimaging Laboratory from 2016-2020 28:15 - The national Adolescent Brain & Cognitive Development (ABCD) study 33:13 - How air pollution impacts the developing brain 37:30 - Environmental neuroscience as a means for public policy intervention 40:42 - Why does the brain get more attention than the body?  44:40 - Sex differences in the amygdalae of adolescents 50:05 - The role visual learning plays in understanding the brain 53:11 - Megan's ongoing and future work 55:29 - The importance of science communication

In this episode I interview Dr. Jonas Kaplan, cognitive neuroscientist and co-director of the Brain and Creativity Institute at the University of Southern California. We discuss his early career and inspirations, his favorite studies, and the neural underpinnings of belief and consciousness.

Video available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2cTprF6_u8 

Timestamps:  0:00 - Introduction 0:40 - How Jonas first became interested in neuroscience 2:00 - Jonas describes an experience in college which changed his views on consciousness 3:40 - Jonas describes his college studies and research 5:57 - Jonas describes his graduate school experience 11:10 - Left brain/right brain hemispheric specialization 14:53 - Back to graduate school and the rise of neuroimaging technology 17:03 - The timeline of MRI technology and how it works 22:22 - Post-graduate school and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) 29:34 - Moving to USC & working with Antonio Damasio 33:38 - Predicting visual stimuli on the basis of activity in auditory cortices 38:19 - Working with Sam Harris to study the neural correlates of religious belief 39:55 - The role of belief being tied to identity 44:22 - Free will and the deterministic universe 47:05 - Challenges to belief and trait openness  49:45 - The impact of environment on belief 51:21 - Evolutionary selection for different patterns of belief 53:20 - Why we believe in free will 1:01:49 - Panpsychism and the origins of consciousness 1:07:20 - Conclusion and future work

Papers discussed: 

Meyer, K., Kaplan, J. T., Essex, R., Webber, C., Damasio, H., & Damasio, A. (2010). Predicting visual stimuli on the basis of activity in auditory cortices. Nature Neuroscience, 13(6), 667.

Kaplan, J. T., Gimbel, S. I., & Harris, S. (2016). Neural correlates of maintaining one’s political beliefs in the face of counterevidence. Scientific Reports, 6(1), 1-11.