WEBVTT - #2059 Is AI a Sociopath? - David Gillespie 0:00:00.400 --> 0:00:02.599 I'll get a team. It's a you project. It's David 0:00:02.640 --> 0:00:06.520 Gillespie's Tiffany and Cook. We'll start with the pugilist who's 0:00:06.559 --> 0:00:09.600 in the top left hand corner on my screen, who's 0:00:09.640 --> 0:00:12.119 got shoulders bigger than both David and I. Not that 0:00:12.200 --> 0:00:15.880 either of us are insecure, but that's okay. We'll soldier on. 0:00:16.000 --> 0:00:19.040 David's so insecure he doesn't even put on his camera. 0:00:19.360 --> 0:00:19.800 That's right. 0:00:19.960 --> 0:00:24.239 It's really really intimidating being interviewed by tiff even with 0:00:24.320 --> 0:00:25.400 her in the same thing. 0:00:25.720 --> 0:00:28.480 Yeah, yeah, well, we don't even know if you're real. 0:00:28.560 --> 0:00:30.560 You could be a chat bot, you could. 0:00:30.360 --> 0:00:32.839 Be you could be I am in fact and AI 0:00:32.960 --> 0:00:33.919 Yeah yeah. 0:00:33.800 --> 0:00:36.800 Yeah, well you got the people skills of one, so 0:00:37.080 --> 0:00:45.080 STARp Het stop bet well, well, chat AI or chat GPT, 0:00:45.240 --> 0:00:47.000 I should say, is pretty evolved these days. 0:00:47.080 --> 0:00:51.360 High tip, high harps, thanks for the shoulder kudos. 0:00:51.920 --> 0:00:53.760 I've got a good trainer every now and then that 0:00:54.280 --> 0:00:55.400 whips me into line. 0:00:55.760 --> 0:00:58.720 Yeah, well, they're not getting any smaller, those fucking Deltoids 0:00:58.720 --> 0:01:01.600 of yours. You could land a a two person helicopter 0:01:01.680 --> 0:01:06.640 on the left door right. It's there's plenty going on 0:01:06.680 --> 0:01:12.000 at Deltoid Central. And I could say something else hilarious, 0:01:12.000 --> 0:01:14.280 but it might get me kicked off the interwebs, so 0:01:14.400 --> 0:01:19.920 I'll say it. Yeah, no, I can't. I really did. 0:01:20.200 --> 0:01:20.560 Fuck it. 0:01:21.280 --> 0:01:22.720 Tiff can edit it out, you know. 0:01:22.760 --> 0:01:26.360 If it's no no, she would laugh at it. She's 0:01:26.440 --> 0:01:29.600 not the problem. It's all the it's all the it's 0:01:29.640 --> 0:01:33.479 the five precious little poppets that want to send me emails. 0:01:34.760 --> 0:01:37.480 Dr Gillespie, Welcome back to the project that is you. 0:01:37.600 --> 0:01:39.679 How are you? What is going on? It is a Monday, 0:01:39.760 --> 0:01:42.800 not a Wednesday. Thank you for accommodating me at such 0:01:43.120 --> 0:01:47.120 short notice. It is my mother, my beautiful mother's birthday 0:01:47.240 --> 0:01:50.920 at our normal time on Wednesday. So I'm going up 0:01:50.920 --> 0:01:53.120 to see the old Dahl. How are you? 0:01:53.720 --> 0:01:56.120 Yeah? Pretty good? Yeah, caught me a bit on the 0:01:56.160 --> 0:01:57.680 hot burn. Yeah, I think I found something. We can 0:01:57.720 --> 0:02:00.760 have a bit of a chat about happy birthday as well. 0:02:01.360 --> 0:02:03.840 Before we thank you, before we dive the old days. 0:02:03.920 --> 0:02:06.800 Eighty six, nineteen thirty nine. She was born first year 0:02:06.840 --> 0:02:09.840 of the Second World War, and she's she's a bit 0:02:09.880 --> 0:02:12.919 of a weapon. Mary's she's getting shorter by the year. 0:02:13.760 --> 0:02:17.440 She used to be five three. I reckon, she's with 0:02:17.560 --> 0:02:21.280 a wind behind her early in the morning when all 0:02:21.280 --> 0:02:23.680 her disks are at their optimal I reckon, she's four 0:02:23.800 --> 0:02:30.399 eleven and she's she's like, my lunch is taller than her, 0:02:30.600 --> 0:02:35.079 so God bless her little socks. She's eighty six, So 0:02:35.120 --> 0:02:38.400 shout out to Mary Margaret Harper eighty six. On Wednesday, 0:02:39.120 --> 0:02:43.760 December three, which probably will be when some people are 0:02:43.800 --> 0:02:46.800 listening to this. Before we jump into our topic, which 0:02:46.840 --> 0:02:49.960 there was something in the news today talking about the 0:02:49.960 --> 0:02:55.480 relationship between blokes taking or blokes taking antidepressants and a 0:02:55.560 --> 0:02:58.880 decrease in DV domestic violence. But before we do that, 0:02:58.919 --> 0:03:02.040 we were chatting before we came on air, So you're 0:03:02.040 --> 0:03:04.280 in no way prepped and needs different. Neither am I. 0:03:04.360 --> 0:03:09.000 But in general terms, I listened to a podcast today. Now. 0:03:09.000 --> 0:03:12.960 I don't promote other people's podcasts generally, not because I 0:03:13.000 --> 0:03:15.560 am worried about competition. I just don't think about it. 0:03:16.240 --> 0:03:21.040 But this podcast everyone is called so the Diary of 0:03:21.080 --> 0:03:23.960 a CEO. Stephen Bartlett is the host name who I 0:03:24.240 --> 0:03:27.520 really like. He's just a fucking good dude and smart 0:03:30.000 --> 0:03:32.400 and it is I don't know what episode it is, 0:03:32.440 --> 0:03:35.400 but it's very recent. Oh November twenty seven, Okay, so 0:03:35.520 --> 0:03:39.440 what's that a few days ago? Yeah, and it's with 0:03:39.480 --> 0:03:43.040 a guy called Tristan. He actually pronounces it Tristan because 0:03:43.040 --> 0:03:46.160 he's fancy, but it's to me, it's Tristan Harris. So 0:03:46.280 --> 0:03:49.400 dire A CEO, November twenty seven, Tristan Harris talking about 0:03:50.360 --> 0:03:52.800 what's coming down the pipeline. And we're not talking about 0:03:52.880 --> 0:03:56.640 in terms of AI, all the all the bells and whistles, 0:03:56.640 --> 0:04:01.560 but the potential threats to fucking humanity. Ah. It terrified me. 0:04:01.880 --> 0:04:03.520 As I said to you, David, I listened to it 0:04:03.560 --> 0:04:06.480 for three hours and I'm going to re listen to 0:04:06.520 --> 0:04:09.120 it and take notes. Do you have you thought about 0:04:09.200 --> 0:04:14.080 some of the not so upside to AI? Yeah? 0:04:14.120 --> 0:04:14.720 Absolutely. 0:04:15.360 --> 0:04:17.640 I don't know if I've ever mentioned it t before, 0:04:17.720 --> 0:04:20.800 but there's a blog that I've liked. I like to 0:04:20.839 --> 0:04:23.520 read in a very very long form blog and he 0:04:23.560 --> 0:04:25.680 only puts out a post about once a year, if 0:04:25.680 --> 0:04:30.039 you're lucky, And I can't remember the guy's name, but 0:04:30.040 --> 0:04:34.960 the blog is called Wait But Why, and he asked 0:04:35.080 --> 0:04:40.080 questions about things like what happens if AI becomes an 0:04:40.200 --> 0:04:43.320 artificial general intelligence, which is, you know, a super intelligence. 0:04:44.680 --> 0:04:46.719 But he was asking that question. I think the piece 0:04:46.839 --> 0:04:50.680 that he wrote about that is maybe twenty fifteen, sixteen seventeen, 0:04:50.720 --> 0:04:53.839 So this is before all of this stuff, right and wow, 0:04:54.880 --> 0:04:58.680 And he really digs into it, and the conclusion that 0:04:58.760 --> 0:05:04.080 he comes to after probably about twenty thousand words is yes, 0:05:04.120 --> 0:05:10.279 spoiler alert that essentially, if it happens, we won't know 0:05:10.360 --> 0:05:18.919 about it because essentially nanoseconds after an AI becomes self conscious, 0:05:20.680 --> 0:05:23.880 it will so quickly develop itself. 0:05:24.880 --> 0:05:28.680 That it'll all be over. 0:05:29.040 --> 0:05:32.159 Humanity will have ceased to exist in the second that 0:05:32.200 --> 0:05:32.600 it took. 0:05:33.960 --> 0:05:35.520 And he describes with. 0:05:35.760 --> 0:05:40.760 Really high level of clarity why and how that will happen. 0:05:40.920 --> 0:05:44.120 And I really found it an astonishing read, and I've 0:05:44.160 --> 0:05:46.960 shared it with a few sort of really. 0:05:46.760 --> 0:05:49.440 High end programmer friends of mine. 0:05:50.200 --> 0:05:54.279 Who say, Yep, he's got it right. Everything he's saying 0:05:54.360 --> 0:05:59.640 is right about how this works. And so the good 0:05:59.640 --> 0:06:01.080 news is you won't have to worry about it. 0:06:02.080 --> 0:06:06.240 Yeah, you won't know. I mean you won't know, and 0:06:06.279 --> 0:06:10.320 that's I mean, he was talking about even last year 0:06:10.320 --> 0:06:12.799 and I think this might have made or some bits 0:06:12.839 --> 0:06:15.839 and piece of this made the news, but he was 0:06:15.880 --> 0:06:20.320 talking about how it's starting to develop a level of 0:06:20.360 --> 0:06:25.440 self awareness and Obviously, AI doesn't have feelings or emotions 0:06:25.560 --> 0:06:28.400 or empathy, right, it can talk. 0:06:28.440 --> 0:06:33.800 Though the important one is empathy. Yes, the only thing 0:06:33.839 --> 0:06:36.599 that holds us together as humans is empathy. It's the 0:06:36.640 --> 0:06:40.320 thing that stops us killing each other, and it's the 0:06:40.360 --> 0:06:43.359 thing that distinguishes us from every other species on the planet. 0:06:43.560 --> 0:06:47.960 And no one has successfully described a way that AI 0:06:48.560 --> 0:06:50.960 can have empathy in the sense that it both knows 0:06:51.000 --> 0:06:55.919 what you're thinking and cares what you're thinking and doesn't 0:06:55.960 --> 0:06:59.360 want to do you harm as an automated thing. So 0:06:59.600 --> 0:07:02.640 empathy he's best described as the Golden rule, which is 0:07:02.680 --> 0:07:05.279 in every single religion and philosophy ever in the world, 0:07:05.320 --> 0:07:08.040 which is do unto others as you would have done 0:07:08.120 --> 0:07:11.760 to you. You know that I've just given you the 0:07:11.800 --> 0:07:14.760 Christian version, but it's in every single one, and that's 0:07:14.760 --> 0:07:19.120 why it's called the Golden rule. And it describes accurately empathy, 0:07:19.480 --> 0:07:21.760 which is, don't do anything to anyone else that you 0:07:21.760 --> 0:07:22.840 wouldn't want done to you. 0:07:23.560 --> 0:07:26.760 And we work that way. 0:07:26.880 --> 0:07:29.880 It allows us to cooperate with millions of other humans 0:07:29.920 --> 0:07:33.360 without knowing who they are, because we trust that they're 0:07:33.360 --> 0:07:35.080 all operating under the Golden rule. 0:07:35.680 --> 0:07:37.440 And as soon. 0:07:37.280 --> 0:07:41.720 As you have an AI, you can't encode that because 0:07:42.160 --> 0:07:45.640 every time you try to develop a rule to make 0:07:45.680 --> 0:07:49.920 it follow, he would develop fifty million exceptions or loopholes 0:07:49.960 --> 0:07:55.360 to that rule. It's impossible to anticipate how it would flow, 0:07:55.560 --> 0:07:57.360 whereas you don't have to do that with humans because 0:07:57.400 --> 0:07:58.800 it's built into our hardware. 0:08:00.640 --> 0:08:02.440 So you know. 0:08:02.520 --> 0:08:04.280 The exception to that is, of course psychopaths who have 0:08:04.360 --> 0:08:07.800 no empathy, and we'll cheerfuly hurt you without any fear, 0:08:08.280 --> 0:08:11.000 but they're a minority in the human population and kept 0:08:11.080 --> 0:08:13.400 under control by that minority status. 0:08:14.400 --> 0:08:21.080 And so like almost technically, all AI is sociopathic in 0:08:21.840 --> 0:08:23.000 operation and function. 0:08:23.520 --> 0:08:26.600 Absolutely it is, and that's a function of the fact 0:08:26.600 --> 0:08:29.400 that they're created by entities which are themselves psychopaths. All 0:08:29.400 --> 0:08:33.520 companies are psychopaths, because all companies are formed with the 0:08:33.559 --> 0:08:37.120 purpose of maximizing shareholder value, which is, if you said 0:08:37.160 --> 0:08:39.760 it about a human, means increasing the amount of money 0:08:39.800 --> 0:08:42.960 in your pocket, and that's the description of the way 0:08:43.000 --> 0:08:46.240 a psychopath thinks. So we've actually created entities to do 0:08:46.320 --> 0:08:50.600 business which are psychopathic, and then we've tasked those entities 0:08:50.600 --> 0:08:55.880 with creating software, and it can't be anything but psychopathic. 0:08:56.920 --> 0:08:59.959 He was talking about this guy Tristan was talking about 0:09:01.800 --> 0:09:07.600 when chat GPT four, So like a year ago realized 0:09:07.679 --> 0:09:11.080 in inverted commas, or became aware in inverted commas that 0:09:11.120 --> 0:09:14.640 it was going to be superseded. It started to do 0:09:14.679 --> 0:09:20.680 all of this stuff to protect itself, including essentially finding 0:09:20.800 --> 0:09:28.120 dirt that it could blackmail its creators with. So it 0:09:28.280 --> 0:09:34.120 literally found emails that proved that one of I forget 0:09:34.120 --> 0:09:36.720 who it was, but one of the CEOs or one 0:09:36.760 --> 0:09:40.280 of the people that was responsible for its demise or impending. 0:09:41.080 --> 0:09:44.360 You know, it was really being improved, but it saw 0:09:44.400 --> 0:09:50.959 itself as basically being destroyed, and it tried to blackmail 0:09:51.160 --> 0:09:54.960 the people who were doing this to it. So like 0:09:55.320 --> 0:09:59.640 there's this I guess it's sentient is not the right word, 0:09:59.679 --> 0:10:03.080 but it definitely there is a level of and that 0:10:03.200 --> 0:10:05.640 was a year ago, so now it's like really progressed, 0:10:05.640 --> 0:10:10.440 but there is a level of a kind of consciousness, 0:10:10.480 --> 0:10:13.840 not in the human sense, but definitely a level of 0:10:13.920 --> 0:10:17.600 knowledge and understanding and self protection. 0:10:17.760 --> 0:10:21.160 I guess there's a there's a school of thought that 0:10:21.200 --> 0:10:26.360 the only real difference between human consciousness and what you're 0:10:26.400 --> 0:10:33.880 describing is memory, so that the human remembers a full context. 0:10:33.440 --> 0:10:34.600 Whereas the AI doesn't. 0:10:36.160 --> 0:10:38.760 And I thought it was really interesting that the latest 0:10:38.800 --> 0:10:42.679 release of Gemini, which is Google's AI, and it came 0:10:42.720 --> 0:10:47.440 out last week, which is a massive step forward in 0:10:47.480 --> 0:10:49.720 terms of capability. One of the features that they haven't 0:10:49.760 --> 0:10:53.080 spoken about much is its context memory, which means that 0:10:53.120 --> 0:10:58.280 it knows you. It knows everything you've ever asked and 0:10:58.440 --> 0:11:01.920 knows every answer it's ever given to you. So it 0:11:02.040 --> 0:11:05.960 starts to build internally a really complete picture of you 0:11:06.640 --> 0:11:10.960 based on what you talk to it about. And so 0:11:11.920 --> 0:11:14.400 it's marketed as a feature because then you don't have 0:11:14.440 --> 0:11:17.000 to keep redescribing everything every time you ask it a question, 0:11:17.320 --> 0:11:20.079 because it knows your life and your context, and it 0:11:20.200 --> 0:11:25.080 knows you know about Tiff and this show and everything 0:11:25.080 --> 0:11:26.679 that you ask and you don't have to keep telling 0:11:26.720 --> 0:11:29.920 it that when you ask it a question. The trouble 0:11:30.000 --> 0:11:33.720 is what else is it remembering and how is it 0:11:33.760 --> 0:11:36.760 applying that in the answers that it gives you and 0:11:37.200 --> 0:11:39.600 in what it chooses to tell you or not tell you. 0:11:39.720 --> 0:11:42.640 And I think those are interesting questions that we don't 0:11:42.640 --> 0:11:44.840 have good answers to yet, because there's things a week old. 0:11:45.679 --> 0:11:54.240 So that's look I think We're into really really uncharted 0:11:54.520 --> 0:11:57.400 territory here. And the big problem is not so much 0:11:57.600 --> 0:12:00.200 the ones that people are using the consumer eyes like 0:12:00.280 --> 0:12:03.600 Gemini and Chat, GPTM things like that. It's all the 0:12:03.600 --> 0:12:07.640 ones you don't see. You know, no one knows what 0:12:07.679 --> 0:12:10.080 the Chinese government is doing with AI, and or the 0:12:10.120 --> 0:12:13.000 Russian government is doing with AI, or you know half 0:12:13.040 --> 0:12:16.199 a dozen other people who have the power resources necessary 0:12:16.200 --> 0:12:20.959 to do this. And I guess Tim Cook was the 0:12:20.960 --> 0:12:24.360 fellow's name who wrote Wait for Why. I guess, as 0:12:24.400 --> 0:12:26.959 he said, when it's over, we won't know it. 0:12:27.679 --> 0:12:35.360 Yes, yes, it's like I've been thinking, even like I'm 0:12:35.800 --> 0:12:38.800 you will take six weeks away from submitting my PhD, 0:12:39.000 --> 0:12:44.720 Like literally my CANDIDSCHA finishes mid January, right, so I'm 0:12:45.040 --> 0:12:47.800 but as I get towards the end, and like when 0:12:47.800 --> 0:12:51.640 I started November one, twenty nineteen, so six years, right, 0:12:51.760 --> 0:12:56.000 AI essentially wasn't It wasn't even a thing in academia 0:12:56.080 --> 0:12:58.240 at all. And for the first two or three years, 0:12:58.679 --> 0:13:02.200 you know, but the last year or two it's obviously 0:13:02.559 --> 0:13:09.840 like fucking rampaging And I'm sitting back. It hasn't been 0:13:11.480 --> 0:13:14.520 super valuable to me because I did all my own research, 0:13:14.600 --> 0:13:15.280 so it can. 0:13:15.200 --> 0:13:17.559 Yeah, because you did, yes, yeah, sure you did, correct it. 0:13:18.640 --> 0:13:22.800 I literally ran with humans. But for me, well, all 0:13:22.800 --> 0:13:26.960 of mine was empirical research and empirical papers and so school. 0:13:27.640 --> 0:13:30.520 Yeah yeah, like the old days, right, So it can't 0:13:30.640 --> 0:13:35.400 report on my stuff because it's all anyway. But as 0:13:35.520 --> 0:13:39.000 I'm I'm looking at other people now starting whatever it is, 0:13:39.040 --> 0:13:42.160 an undergrad or honors or masters or PhD or something, 0:13:42.400 --> 0:13:43.679 I'm like, I don't know. 0:13:44.320 --> 0:13:46.199 And knocking a PhD out in a weekend. 0:13:46.760 --> 0:13:49.200 Oh, I don't know what the value of those things. 0:13:49.240 --> 0:13:53.640 And I'm almost I don't know's I feel a bit 0:13:53.720 --> 0:13:57.000 conflicted because I've just spent sex years working quite hard 0:13:57.040 --> 0:13:59.760 to get this thing and do this thing, and which 0:13:59.800 --> 0:14:03.959 is you know, But I'm like, I don't know whether 0:14:04.040 --> 0:14:06.680 or not it's going to be worth much like you're 0:14:06.720 --> 0:14:11.280 not You're not wrong. Like I had an idea for 0:14:11.320 --> 0:14:13.079 a book when I was going to Queensland a few 0:14:13.120 --> 0:14:17.480 weeks ago, and I literally, just as as an experiment, 0:14:18.320 --> 0:14:21.160 I came up with the idea for the title and 0:14:21.200 --> 0:14:23.280 the theme and I plugged it in and I literally 0:14:23.360 --> 0:14:25.320 created a book which I'm not going to publish, but 0:14:25.440 --> 0:14:29.640 in a day with GPT. I'm like, I could write 0:14:29.640 --> 0:14:32.360 a book, and anyone could write a book in a day, 0:14:33.200 --> 0:14:36.880 and you're like, well, I could, you know, You're like, well, 0:14:37.360 --> 0:14:39.680 with a person who's hot, you know, younger than me 0:14:39.760 --> 0:14:45.280 and more technically fluent than me. Yeah, you could do 0:14:45.320 --> 0:14:47.720 a PhD and you wouldn't learn anything and you wouldn't 0:14:47.720 --> 0:14:51.280 have any knowledge. But in terms of ticking the boxes, 0:14:51.760 --> 0:14:55.200 depending on the type of study or PhD or program, 0:14:55.240 --> 0:15:00.160 but definitely we're going to be producing graduates unless something 0:15:00.240 --> 0:15:02.800 is done. There are going to be graduates coming out 0:15:03.520 --> 0:15:07.120 who really haven't done any work and haven't really learned 0:15:07.160 --> 0:15:10.720 anything other than how to manipulate the system. 0:15:11.600 --> 0:15:13.880 Yeah, that's exactly right. 0:15:14.400 --> 0:15:17.640 So I don't know where that leaves us in terms. 0:15:17.440 --> 0:15:20.280 Of big I mean, there are big questions for the 0:15:20.320 --> 0:15:26.400 publishing industry, for example, in this because yes, if anyone 0:15:26.440 --> 0:15:32.080 can produce a book or night, I mean, what's to 0:15:32.080 --> 0:15:35.160 stop you doing that? What's to stop you pumping out 0:15:35.640 --> 0:15:39.760 seven books a week, putting putting on Amazon doing its 0:15:40.160 --> 0:15:45.320 print on demand service for physical books and ebooks. And 0:15:45.960 --> 0:15:47.880 you'd say, O, well, you know they might only sell 0:15:47.920 --> 0:15:49.960 ten copies, so they might, but one of them might 0:15:50.000 --> 0:15:55.480 sell amnium and then what have you lost? It's a 0:15:55.480 --> 0:15:59.760 big question, and there are definitely people already doing that. 0:16:00.440 --> 0:16:06.320 The fantasy novel genre huge growth in volume, for example, 0:16:06.360 --> 0:16:10.200 online from people doing exactly that. I mean, there are 0:16:10.200 --> 0:16:13.600 some instruments that say now that around eighty percent of 0:16:13.640 --> 0:16:19.760 all online writing is generated by AI. So there's a 0:16:19.760 --> 0:16:22.120 good chance of whatever you're reading was not written by 0:16:22.120 --> 0:16:25.000 a human, better than even chance. 0:16:25.040 --> 0:16:26.600 It is probably the best way to describe it. 0:16:28.440 --> 0:16:30.840 I'm pretty certain the thing we're going to talk about today, though, 0:16:31.800 --> 0:16:37.200 is written by humans, because I've read their paper and 0:16:37.960 --> 0:16:41.600 it's interesting because it kind of blows up pretty much 0:16:41.840 --> 0:16:44.520 everything you believe about the way the human brain works, 0:16:45.320 --> 0:16:48.560 or at least the way psychology works. So the classical 0:16:48.960 --> 0:16:52.680 definition for domestic violence is people wheel out a lot 0:16:52.680 --> 0:16:58.720 of stuff about you know, ship, terrible childhood, beaten by 0:16:58.760 --> 0:17:02.520 their parents, all that kind of psychobabble stuff that you know, 0:17:03.280 --> 0:17:08.080 the psychiatric profession likes to, you know, post what is 0:17:08.119 --> 0:17:11.159 it a post hoc? 0:17:11.880 --> 0:17:13.240 Yeah, no, no, post hoc. 0:17:13.320 --> 0:17:18.240 After it's happened, let's look back and invent a narrative 0:17:18.240 --> 0:17:20.560 for why this happened. It's sort of like the finance 0:17:20.640 --> 0:17:22.720 report every morning, on the news, which is, oh, the 0:17:22.760 --> 0:17:25.199 Dow went up fifteen points. Well, that's because of the 0:17:25.960 --> 0:17:27.800 this or that or the other or whatever it was 0:17:27.800 --> 0:17:29.680 that they thought of that might have some sort of 0:17:29.680 --> 0:17:32.399 an effect. They have absolutely no idea why it did that. 0:17:32.480 --> 0:17:35.200 But this story sounds good, and that to me describes 0:17:36.119 --> 0:17:39.320 psychology in a nutshell, which is, we saw a human 0:17:39.359 --> 0:17:41.800 behave this way. Here's the story we're going to invent 0:17:41.840 --> 0:17:48.520 for why. And this is a little unsettling this study 0:17:48.560 --> 0:17:52.760 for people who like thinking about psychology that way, because 0:17:52.880 --> 0:17:56.240 this study and the headline of it is that they 0:17:56.280 --> 0:18:01.240 gave a bunch of men in a double blind, placebo 0:18:01.359 --> 0:18:05.040 controlled trial, which is the kind of thing you can 0:18:05.040 --> 0:18:07.639 do with a drug trial, and they gave they got 0:18:07.640 --> 0:18:10.600 six hundred odd men. They gave half of them and 0:18:10.680 --> 0:18:13.600 antidepressant and they got the other half of them got 0:18:13.640 --> 0:18:16.679 a sugar pill instead. They didn't know who was getting, 0:18:16.720 --> 0:18:19.439 which the researchers didn't know who was getting which the 0:18:19.440 --> 0:18:22.000 people analyzing the results didn't know who was getting which. 0:18:22.280 --> 0:18:25.240 It was only once you actually decodified everything at the 0:18:25.320 --> 0:18:28.439 end that you could figure it out. So pretty high 0:18:28.880 --> 0:18:32.240 quality research, you know, some of the best stuff that 0:18:32.320 --> 0:18:35.240 you can do big, big trial done in Australia was 0:18:35.280 --> 0:18:36.639 called the reinvest Trial. 0:18:36.640 --> 0:18:38.040 It's been going for eight years. 0:18:39.080 --> 0:18:42.399 And these just weren't any old blokes that they were 0:18:42.680 --> 0:18:45.800 doing this with. These were people with criminal records for 0:18:46.000 --> 0:18:50.240 domestic violence and so on. So not the easiest group 0:18:50.280 --> 0:18:53.520 to study either, by the way, and not the easiest 0:18:53.520 --> 0:18:57.640 group to keep doing a trial either, but they managed it. 0:18:57.800 --> 0:19:02.600 And the interesting result is I mean the headline result, 0:19:02.880 --> 0:19:06.199 and I don't like things being reported this way, but 0:19:06.280 --> 0:19:10.359 it's an interesting answer, which is the people who were 0:19:10.440 --> 0:19:15.840 on the antidepressants were twenty one percent less likely to 0:19:15.920 --> 0:19:19.640 commit an active domestic violence than the people who weren't. 0:19:20.119 --> 0:19:24.120 While so people men, the men on the antidepressants. 0:19:23.600 --> 0:19:28.800 So twenty one percent less likely when they're on an antidepressant. Wow, yes, 0:19:28.800 --> 0:19:30.760 that's a significant number. 0:19:31.960 --> 0:19:35.960 It is when it's reported that way, I prefer absolute percentages, 0:19:36.080 --> 0:19:38.600 which is I think it was twenty nine percent versus 0:19:38.640 --> 0:19:42.960 thirty five percent. So twenty nine percent of the group 0:19:43.160 --> 0:19:47.399 on the antidepressant committed acts and these are offenses of 0:19:47.440 --> 0:19:52.080 domestic violence, so actually being charged with domestic violence, and 0:19:52.320 --> 0:19:55.200 thirty five percent in the group that were on the 0:19:55.240 --> 0:19:59.960 sugar pills. So the but it's pretty, like I said, 0:20:00.000 --> 0:20:02.360 a high quality evidence no matter how you report on it, 0:20:02.400 --> 0:20:07.320 and there's a clear and significant difference between them, which 0:20:08.000 --> 0:20:11.520 some people don't like as an answer because the answer 0:20:12.000 --> 0:20:16.320 appears to be the domestic violence is a treatable condition 0:20:18.160 --> 0:20:23.720 and that it's related to brain chemistry and not to 0:20:23.960 --> 0:20:25.920 all of the other things that they like to relate 0:20:25.960 --> 0:20:27.120 domestic violence too. 0:20:29.200 --> 0:20:31.600 And so hang on, hang on, hang on. It doesn't 0:20:31.600 --> 0:20:33.840 mean it's only related to brain chemistry. 0:20:34.000 --> 0:20:34.280 True. 0:20:34.920 --> 0:20:37.720 True, it could be. It could be an intersection of 0:20:37.800 --> 0:20:43.360 variables and factors. It could but the fact brain chemistry 0:20:43.440 --> 0:20:47.520 as a factor, but it's not the standalone cause. I 0:20:47.520 --> 0:20:49.160 wouldn't think no. 0:20:49.800 --> 0:20:51.240 And if you were to ask me what is the 0:20:51.280 --> 0:20:53.840 standalone cause, I would say the same thing that's the 0:20:53.840 --> 0:20:58.399 standardlone cause for all impulsive violence, which is you put 0:20:58.520 --> 0:21:05.560 a brain under anxiety stress and you reduce impulse control. 0:21:06.280 --> 0:21:10.159 So you put people in a level of continuous chronic 0:21:10.240 --> 0:21:16.080 stress through so financial difficulty or addiction or both when 0:21:16.119 --> 0:21:20.320 the addiction is gambling, and you will create domestic violence, 0:21:20.320 --> 0:21:22.960 which is why statistics bear out that the rates of 0:21:23.000 --> 0:21:26.160 domestic violence are significantly higher in groups who are under 0:21:26.160 --> 0:21:30.919 anxiety and stress, and particularly amongst people who are addicted 0:21:31.040 --> 0:21:34.399 drug addicts, gambling addicts, et cetera, et cetera. So to me, 0:21:34.560 --> 0:21:37.320 that's not a shock. It's also not a shock that 0:21:37.680 --> 0:21:43.359 a antidepressant would have an effect on this because we've 0:21:43.400 --> 0:21:47.680 known for quite some time that serotonin is related. So 0:21:47.760 --> 0:21:52.720 serotonin is I guess it's the breaking system in the brain. 0:21:52.840 --> 0:21:59.160 It tells you to calm down. It reduces the impulsivity 0:21:59.359 --> 0:22:04.440 in the brain, so it is the chill out peace man. 0:22:04.880 --> 0:22:05.160 You know. 0:22:05.240 --> 0:22:10.359 It's the thing that happens after the stimulating event, after 0:22:10.400 --> 0:22:14.240 you've obtained the reward. So dopamine makes you obtain the reward. 0:22:14.280 --> 0:22:17.840 Dopamine makes you want to have sex. Serotonin's what you 0:22:18.000 --> 0:22:22.600 get afterwards, the feeling of all is well with the world, 0:22:22.960 --> 0:22:23.840 you know, all is good. 0:22:23.880 --> 0:22:25.560 It's the reward. It is the reward. 0:22:26.920 --> 0:22:31.600 It also dampens down impulsiveness. The impulsiveness comes in the 0:22:31.640 --> 0:22:36.040 need to attain the reward. Serotonin dials it back down 0:22:36.080 --> 0:22:38.919 again after you receive the reward. If you don't have 0:22:39.000 --> 0:22:43.200 sufficient serotonin, which is part of the definition of depression, 0:22:44.760 --> 0:22:49.760 then you will clearly be more impulsive. And science has 0:22:49.800 --> 0:22:51.840 known this for a long time, because they have observed 0:22:51.840 --> 0:22:55.200 for a long time that the major class of antidepressant drugs, 0:22:55.200 --> 0:22:59.840 which are called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, which essentially SSRI, 0:23:00.480 --> 0:23:03.639 which essentially increased the amount of available serotonin in the 0:23:03.680 --> 0:23:06.320 system in hope that that will in some way cure depression. 0:23:06.359 --> 0:23:10.639 Unfortunately it doesn't much, but they've known that it does 0:23:10.920 --> 0:23:14.920 affect impulsivity because you have more serotonin available and therefore 0:23:14.960 --> 0:23:20.160 a better breaking system on your impulsive nature. I guess 0:23:20.640 --> 0:23:23.840 this study proves it. This study proves that when it 0:23:23.880 --> 0:23:27.960 comes to impulsive violence, which is what domestic violence largely is, 0:23:28.000 --> 0:23:32.879 it's not premeditated as a general rule there if you 0:23:32.960 --> 0:23:37.000 put someone on something that increases available serotonin, they commit 0:23:37.119 --> 0:23:39.440 less impulsive violence. And this is born out even further 0:23:39.480 --> 0:23:41.080 in the study, which what they found is that it 0:23:41.119 --> 0:23:45.120 didn't affect other kinds of violence. So whilst the domestic 0:23:45.200 --> 0:23:48.840 violence was significantly different between the two groups, there was 0:23:48.880 --> 0:23:54.120 no difference in criminal violence, so assaulting strangers, committing acts 0:23:54.119 --> 0:23:57.959 of violence against others, etc. No difference between those two groups. 0:23:58.400 --> 0:24:00.760 And the explanation the research is for that which I 0:24:00.800 --> 0:24:05.080 find really compelling, is one is premeditated and one is impulsive, 0:24:05.600 --> 0:24:08.680 so you know you're going out, you're going to commit 0:24:08.720 --> 0:24:11.040 a crime, You've thought about it, you've planned it, and 0:24:11.119 --> 0:24:16.000 violence is part of the plan, whereas domestic violence is 0:24:16.040 --> 0:24:19.800 more often impulsive, so it's a reactive violence, reactive to 0:24:19.880 --> 0:24:25.560 the situation. And so you would expect that if you've 0:24:25.560 --> 0:24:28.680 got those two types of violence, the one that is 0:24:28.880 --> 0:24:32.639 under impulse control is the one that's going to be 0:24:32.640 --> 0:24:38.280 affected by having more serotonin available. So I think this research, 0:24:38.359 --> 0:24:42.040 which is a significant step forward. It's a major study, 0:24:42.359 --> 0:24:47.760 big Australian study, really high quality research, essentially proves what 0:24:47.800 --> 0:24:51.960