“You Are Not So Smart” Biases, Heuristics and Fallacies with David McRaney

How many of your Facebook friends do you think you know? Would you help a stranger in need? Do you know why you’re so in love with your new smartphone?

The truth is: you’re probably wrong.

This episode examines the assorted ways we mislead ourselves every single day, a psychology course with all the boring bits taken out.

Prepare for a whirlwind tour of some of the latest research, fused with a healthy dose of humour. You’ll discover just how irrational you really are, which delusions keep you sane, how to boost your productivity, and why you’ve never kept a New Year’s resolution. We welcome the author of “You Are Not So Smart: Why Your Memory Is Mostly Fiction, Why You Have Too Many Friends On Facebook And 46 Other Ways You’re Deluding Yourself” and host of the You Are Not So Smart Podcast, David McRaney

We discuss:

• What are Biases, Heuristics and Fallacies
• Why we create mental shortcuts
• The ancient architecture of the brain
• Priming
• How Casinos Prime Us
• Confabulation
• Split-Brain patients and confabulation
• Why our brains seek patterns
• The Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy
• The Availability Heuristic
• The video mentioned during the show: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CNmsVl4xkhg

More about David here: http://davidmcraney.com/ https://youarenotsosmart.com

“There is only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that’s your own self.” —Aldous Huxley

Have you ever wondered what a profiling session would tell you about yourself?

Our guest helps some of the most successful people in the world to understand their behaviour and improve their performance. Here she guides you through the professional profiling assessment process in private, to help you discover your strengths, understand what really drives you and learn which environments will help you to excel.

Our behaviour is at the core of what we do. This is your ultimate self-awareness toolkit to help you understand both your own and other’s behaviour and to positively influence it. Along the way you may even start to sleep better, think more clearly and have good moods more often.

More about Fiona here: https://fionamurden.com/

“Optimism, like pessimism, is a bias, and to be avoided. But summoning the determination to rise to a challenge and succeed is a virtue.” – Calum Chace

Today’s guest argues that in the course of this century, the exponential growth in the capability of AI is likely to bring about two “singularities” – points at which conditions are so extreme that the normal rules break down.

The first is the economic singularity, when machine skill reaches a level that renders many of us unemployable and requires an overhaul of our current economic and social systems.

The second is the technological singularity, when machine intelligence reaches and then surpasses the cognitive abilities of an adult human, relegating us to the second smartest species on the planet.

These singularities will present huge challenges, but this he argues that we can meet these challenges and overcome them. If we do, the rewards could be almost unimaginable.

Artificial intelligence can turn out to be the best thing ever to happen to humanity, making our future wonderful almost beyond imagination. But only if we address head-on the challenges that it will raise.

We welcome expert on artificial intelligence, and its likely future impact on society and bestselling author of many books including the focus of today’s show “Artificial Intelligence and the Two Singularities”, Calum Chace, welcome to the show

We discuss:

• The Terminology
• Technological Singularity
• Economic Singularity
• Exponential Change
• Artificial General Intelligence
• The AI race
• Technological Joblessness
• Universal Basic Income
• Impact on Society
• What is being done
• The Gods and the Useless
• Transhumanism
• Augmented Humanity
• Centaurs
• Privacy Concerns

More about Calum here;

http://www.pandoras-brain.com/

and the book here:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0815368534/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i6

The Beginning of Infinity, Explanations That Transform the World, David Deutsch,

A bold and all-embracing exploration of the nature and progress of knowledge from one of today’s great thinkers. 

Throughout history, mankind has struggled to understand life’s mysteries, from the mundane to the seemingly miraculous.

Our guest is a multiple award-winning pioneer in the field of quantum computation and argues that explanations have a fundamental place in the universe. They have unlimited scope and power to cause change, and the quest to improve them is the basic regulating principle not only of science but of all successful human endeavour.

This stream of ever improving explanations has infinite reach. We are subject only to the laws of physics, and they impose no upper boundary to what we can eventually understand, control, and achieve.

He applies that worldview to a wide range of issues and unsolved problems, from creativity and free will to the origin and future of the human species.

We welcome David Deutsch, Fellow of the Royal Society, a pioneer in quantum computing, visiting Professor of physics at the Centre for Quantum Computation at Oxford University, multiple TED Talker, optimist and author of The Beginning of Infinity,  Explanations That Transform the World.

We discuss:

• What David calls good explanations.
• Error as unavoidable in the growth of knowledge.
• Fallibilism
• Education
• Creativity
• Artificial Intelligence
• The misconception that knowledge needs authority to be genuine or reliable
• All scientific theories are testable conjectures
• Every explanation begins with conjecture
• The growth of knowledge consists of correcting misconceptions in our theories
• The Principle of Mediocrity
• The Spaceship Earth metaphor
• We touch very lightly on the Multiverse

https://www.daviddeutsch.org.uk/

“If you’re treated a certain way you become a certain kind of person. If certain things are described to you as being real they’re real for you whether they’re real or not.” — James Baldwin

We are living in a time of mounting political segregation that threatens to tear us apart as a unified society. The result is that we are becoming increasingly tribal, and the narratives of life that we get exposed to on a daily basis have become echo chambers in which we hear our beliefs reinforced and others’ beliefs demonised. 

At the core of tribalism exists a paradox: as humans, we are hardwired with the need to belong, which ends up making us deeply connected with some yet deeply divided from others. 

When these tribes are formed out of fear of the “other,” on topics such as race, immigration status, religion, or partisan politics, we resort to an “us versus them” attitude. 

Especially in the digital age, when we are all interconnected in one way or another, these tensions seep into our daily lives and we become secluded with our self-identified tribes. 

Today’s guest explores how our human need to belong is the driving force behind the increasing division of our world. 

Drawing upon decades of leadership experience, he probes the depth of tribalism, examines the role of social media in exacerbating it, and offers tactics for how to combat it. 

Filled with tested practices for opening safe and honest dialogue in the workplace and challenges to confront our own tendencies to bond with those who are like us, his book “Our Search for Belonging” is a powerful statement of hope in a disquieting time.

We welcome diversity and inclusion expert and author of “Our Search for Belonging: How Our Need to Connect Is Tearing Us Apart” Howard J. Ross

We talk:

• Bias
• Polarisation
• Why we tend to form tribes
• Race and Gender
• Politics
• The brain
• White Privilege
• Empathy
• Media
• The Toilet Assumption

More about Howard here:

https://www.amazon.com/Our-Search-Belonging-Connect-Tearing/dp/1523095032

http://everydaybias.com/

https://twitter.com/HowardJRoss