WEBVTT - Against Narrative: Are stories bad for us? Part 1 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:05.840 Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff 0:00:05.840 --> 0:00:14.360 Works dot com. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow 0:00:14.400 --> 0:00:17.360 your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick. 0:00:17.360 --> 0:00:19.040 And today I want to start with a question that 0:00:19.200 --> 0:00:21.400 might make you think I'm kind of out of my mind, 0:00:21.520 --> 0:00:24.439 but I come to this for a real reason. The 0:00:24.520 --> 0:00:29.440 question is our story is bad for us? Uh? I 0:00:29.480 --> 0:00:32.520 asked this not out of nowhere, but I was turned 0:00:32.520 --> 0:00:35.199 onto this topic because I recently came across an interview 0:00:35.200 --> 0:00:38.400 in The Verge with the philosopher who's written a book 0:00:38.440 --> 0:00:42.000 about how the drive for narrative affects the way we 0:00:42.120 --> 0:00:45.159 understand the world. And this philosopher, who will name and 0:00:45.520 --> 0:00:49.720 discuss later, concludes that on the whole, stories might do 0:00:49.960 --> 0:00:54.000 more harm than good on planet Earth. And I'm interested 0:00:54.040 --> 0:00:58.520 in this idea because I so viscerally hate it, Like 0:00:58.680 --> 0:01:00.920 I'm not sure it's wrong, but in many ways I 0:01:00.920 --> 0:01:03.640 feel that I sort of like live for stories, and 0:01:03.760 --> 0:01:06.000 if they are on the whole bad for the world, 0:01:06.160 --> 0:01:08.160 I almost don't want to know about it. But I 0:01:08.160 --> 0:01:10.559 guess that's also a sign that we kind of should 0:01:10.600 --> 0:01:13.479 take a look. Yeah, it's a difficult thing to sort 0:01:13.520 --> 0:01:18.920 of contemplate, because, as we'll discuss, stories define us in 0:01:19.000 --> 0:01:21.840 so many ways, in so many obvious ways and so 0:01:21.920 --> 0:01:25.200 many um ways that are that are a little bit 0:01:25.440 --> 0:01:29.440 elusive to really, you know, wrap our heads around. And 0:01:29.480 --> 0:01:34.319 they've they've been a part of human culture the whole time. 0:01:34.360 --> 0:01:36.600 I mean they the oldest known written stories go back 0:01:36.600 --> 0:01:40.280 to the third millennium b C. And oral storytelling goes 0:01:40.760 --> 0:01:43.200 even further back than that. I mean, we've just this 0:01:43.280 --> 0:01:45.880 is something that that is as old, is as old 0:01:45.920 --> 0:01:49.520 as human culture. And the idea that we should flee 0:01:49.560 --> 0:01:52.440 from that, or that that this is not the model 0:01:52.600 --> 0:01:55.480 on which we should be proceeding into the future. Uh, 0:01:55.800 --> 0:01:59.240 it forces us to reconsider something very basic about us 0:01:59.280 --> 0:02:01.600 as a species. Well, I mean, one of the things 0:02:01.680 --> 0:02:06.920 that we might walk away from today's episode concluding is that, Okay, 0:02:07.080 --> 0:02:10.120 maybe there's no way to get rid of stories, and 0:02:10.160 --> 0:02:13.160 in fact, we wouldn't even want to, but we should 0:02:13.200 --> 0:02:15.720 at least be able to appreciate that they can do 0:02:15.760 --> 0:02:18.000 a lot of harm, and so we should know what 0:02:18.080 --> 0:02:19.880 that kind of harm is and maybe keep an eye 0:02:19.880 --> 0:02:22.200 out for it. I mean, I might end up kind 0:02:22.200 --> 0:02:25.000 of lashing out even if you could prove that stories 0:02:25.040 --> 0:02:27.519 are on the whole bad for the world. It's like, 0:02:27.560 --> 0:02:30.160 I wouldn't want to live without them, and I don't care. 0:02:30.320 --> 0:02:33.840 I'll keep them even though they hurt. Yeah, And one 0:02:33.840 --> 0:02:35.800 of the curious things is if we try to imagine 0:02:35.840 --> 0:02:39.240 a world without stories, we have to imagine a world 0:02:39.280 --> 0:02:41.520 without stories. That meaning that we have to sort of 0:02:41.560 --> 0:02:45.280 create a story of an unstoried world, which is a 0:02:45.320 --> 0:02:48.160 bit of conundrum. But certainly you don't have to dig 0:02:48.160 --> 0:02:51.400 far to begin to sort of see where some of 0:02:51.440 --> 0:02:55.000 the strife could occur when you start comparing real life 0:02:55.040 --> 0:02:58.040 to stories. I think one example from the past year 0:02:58.200 --> 0:03:00.480 so that it's going to resonate with a lot of people, 0:03:00.600 --> 0:03:05.000 when when the the Queen movie came out, Bohemian Rhapsody. 0:03:05.160 --> 0:03:07.000 Oh yeah, did you see it? I haven't seen it yet. 0:03:07.040 --> 0:03:10.560 I'm excited to see it because everybody seemed to most 0:03:10.560 --> 0:03:12.680 people that I talked to seem to love it. And 0:03:12.720 --> 0:03:15.160 we have quite an immortal love for Queen on this show. 0:03:15.200 --> 0:03:18.200 Oh yeah, I love Queen. But you did see some 0:03:18.240 --> 0:03:21.000 criticism where people were saying, okay, well, you you know, 0:03:21.080 --> 0:03:23.080 you took things out of sequence, you put things, you 0:03:23.160 --> 0:03:26.960 rearrange things to make a better story, and I do 0:03:27.040 --> 0:03:29.120 think that you see that with a lot of biopictures, 0:03:29.120 --> 0:03:34.120 because ultimately it's rare for an individual's life to be 0:03:34.800 --> 0:03:37.640 story shaped. Um. You know. I often go back to 0:03:38.120 --> 0:03:42.800 Neil Gaiman's excellent short story collection Fragile Things, which has 0:03:42.840 --> 0:03:45.200 some some wonderful tales in it, but in the introduction 0:03:45.240 --> 0:03:48.400 he discusses this, this desire for story shaped things in 0:03:48.400 --> 0:03:52.160 our lives, despite the fact that life itself is not 0:03:52.360 --> 0:03:56.360 story shaped, or at least it rarely is. Um And 0:03:56.400 --> 0:04:00.760 when we turned to myths, comedies, dramas, and and tragedies, 0:04:00.960 --> 0:04:03.320 we we often do so in orders to sort of 0:04:03.360 --> 0:04:05.600 make sense of our life, to to give sort of 0:04:05.640 --> 0:04:10.760 a shape that we can squeeze our life into, even 0:04:10.800 --> 0:04:13.720 though again real life rarely matches the beats and the 0:04:13.800 --> 0:04:16.440 rhythm of narrative. It reminds me a bit of the 0:04:16.800 --> 0:04:21.080 Chinese notion of of a U n which is uh 0:04:21.360 --> 0:04:24.920 structural completeness. And generally this is used to talk about 0:04:24.960 --> 0:04:28.200 the desired structural completeness in in the family, in the 0:04:28.240 --> 0:04:30.560 family structure, but I think we can we can also 0:04:30.640 --> 0:04:34.479 sort of look at narrative. Structural completeness in life is 0:04:34.520 --> 0:04:37.640 something that we we find ourselves longing for maybe not 0:04:37.720 --> 0:04:41.360 even you know, consciously, but subconsciously, and then we rarely 0:04:41.400 --> 0:04:44.080 find it. Well, yeah, there's a we have a clear, 0:04:44.200 --> 0:04:47.679 strong desire to impose an aesthetic order on events, which 0:04:47.960 --> 0:04:50.800 in many ways, if you just like sample the moment 0:04:50.839 --> 0:04:54.400 to moment are quite random or structured in a way 0:04:54.440 --> 0:04:57.680 where things do not have emotional drive and significance. I mean, 0:04:57.839 --> 0:05:01.000 one of the problems is like defining what is a story. 0:05:01.279 --> 0:05:03.640 You know, people might differ on that, but I would 0:05:03.640 --> 0:05:07.280 say it's probably something like it involves characters, So some 0:05:07.360 --> 0:05:09.200 forms of people. They don't have to be humans, but 0:05:09.240 --> 0:05:12.479 they've got minds. They's got characters with minds that have 0:05:12.720 --> 0:05:17.000 desires and goals, and you engage with them emotionally as 0:05:17.040 --> 0:05:21.200 they struggle to achieve their goals and face obstacles along 0:05:21.200 --> 0:05:25.320 the way. Right, And depending on what sort of story 0:05:25.400 --> 0:05:28.000 this is, and you know, from what tradition it arises, 0:05:28.240 --> 0:05:32.280 that individual may ultimately, uh you know, rise up from 0:05:32.320 --> 0:05:35.280 the abyss and and claim their reward, or they fall 0:05:35.320 --> 0:05:38.320 tragically short of claiming the reward, or they you know, 0:05:38.400 --> 0:05:41.520 are they go mad after seeing an elder god. That's 0:05:41.520 --> 0:05:43.760 sort of thing, right, And whether the structure of your 0:05:43.760 --> 0:05:47.040 story is comedy or tragedy or elder che horror, and 0:05:47.120 --> 0:05:49.000 no matter what it is, there is sort of like 0:05:49.160 --> 0:05:51.919 a structural format that we come to expect and we 0:05:52.040 --> 0:05:55.280 get pleasure from seeing that format repeated. And when you're 0:05:55.279 --> 0:05:58.200 trying to adapt real events into this story shaped whole, 0:05:58.320 --> 0:06:01.200 you you end up kind of fun ing things a lot, right, 0:06:01.240 --> 0:06:03.680 You move things around in time, you leave out a 0:06:03.720 --> 0:06:06.800 whole lot. You just focus on the parts that are important. 0:06:07.120 --> 0:06:09.799 But the funny thing is putting things in a story 0:06:09.839 --> 0:06:13.560 shaped hole can in fact dictate to us what parts 0:06:13.600 --> 0:06:16.400 of a sequence of events we think are important, when 0:06:16.400 --> 0:06:18.799 in fact they might not actually be the important parts. 0:06:19.000 --> 0:06:22.159 If we're trying to say, uh, trying to imagine what 0:06:22.320 --> 0:06:26.359 actually caused an outcome in a real world series of events, 0:06:26.760 --> 0:06:29.040 that might be very different than the things you'd focus 0:06:29.040 --> 0:06:33.719 on if you're trying to tell an entertaining, emotionally engaging story. Yeah, 0:06:33.760 --> 0:06:35.359 that's an important thing to keep in mind as we 0:06:35.400 --> 0:06:37.960 go forward here, because we certainly have the more pure 0:06:38.080 --> 0:06:40.360 versions of narrative that I imagine most people were thinking 0:06:40.360 --> 0:06:42.599 of when we first brought this up, and that is 0:06:42.839 --> 0:06:46.800 the novels we read the myths we tell each other, uh, 0:06:46.839 --> 0:06:49.240 you know, often out of amusement, but sometimes to see 0:06:49.279 --> 0:06:51.880 some sort of a you know, model of life. But 0:06:51.920 --> 0:06:54.920 then there are the narratives and the stories that we 0:06:55.240 --> 0:07:02.120 use to um to put a certain shape on the past, 0:07:02.200 --> 0:07:05.159 to put a certain shape on the present, and even 0:07:05.200 --> 0:07:09.600 on ourselves that are that can be a little bit 0:07:09.640 --> 0:07:14.200 more problematic. Yeah, so absolutely, stories can can perhaps distort 0:07:14.360 --> 0:07:18.040 our appreciation of how and why things really happen. Another 0:07:18.040 --> 0:07:22.080 reason people might oppose stories or more literature more broadly, 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:25.280 let's say, might be that they just take issue with 0:07:25.320 --> 0:07:28.960 what effects it seems to have. Like one great example 0:07:29.000 --> 0:07:31.520 would be Plato. You know, the Greek philosophers. They had 0:07:31.600 --> 0:07:36.680 so many bad takes. Arguably one of Plato's most unpopular 0:07:36.760 --> 0:07:39.960 takes is in the Republic when he um you know, 0:07:40.080 --> 0:07:43.360 he in many ways in Vase against the power of poetry. 0:07:43.400 --> 0:07:47.160 Like Plato thinks poetry should be viewed with extreme suspicion. 0:07:47.320 --> 0:07:50.160 He's he's not quite sure about poets and their role 0:07:50.240 --> 0:07:55.560 in the republic because poetry uses language to encourage antisocial sentiments, 0:07:55.720 --> 0:07:58.960 and it can't be rationally argued against. It's not rational. 0:07:59.000 --> 0:08:02.880 It's appealing to you emotionally and sometimes the appeals it makes. 0:08:02.920 --> 0:08:05.080 He says, are are things that are not good for 0:08:05.120 --> 0:08:07.120 the state, you know. He he wants a state to 0:08:07.120 --> 0:08:10.880 be a place where everybody acts selflessly and courageously. And 0:08:10.920 --> 0:08:14.320 so he attacks Homer who tells these stories of characters 0:08:14.320 --> 0:08:17.480 who fear death and try to avoid being sent to hades, 0:08:17.840 --> 0:08:19.840 you know, and Plato thinks, well, this is terrible. These 0:08:19.880 --> 0:08:22.760 stories just train us to suck at courage and have 0:08:22.880 --> 0:08:24.560 the kind you know, they train us not to have 0:08:24.600 --> 0:08:28.360 the kind of selflessness necessary for a strong state. Now 0:08:28.400 --> 0:08:31.640 that's Plato's kind of tyrannical, micromanaging idea of how a 0:08:31.680 --> 0:08:33.840 state should be. But you can see other examples, and 0:08:33.880 --> 0:08:36.600 we do see them all the time with people protesting 0:08:36.640 --> 0:08:39.880 the idea that hey, stories are out there showing showing 0:08:39.920 --> 0:08:44.160 people ways to live that are maybe not good. Yeah. Absolutely. 0:08:44.160 --> 0:08:46.679 I mean at the very basis of this mentioning the Hades, 0:08:46.720 --> 0:08:49.080 thing you could you could frame this is like, Okay, 0:08:49.120 --> 0:08:51.839 here's a popular story that people are drawn to for 0:08:51.880 --> 0:08:55.880 a number of reasons, and it's pushing health theology. It's 0:08:55.880 --> 0:08:58.240 pushing this idea that that that we we must act 0:08:58.520 --> 0:09:01.520 of a certain way in this life to avoid something 0:09:01.520 --> 0:09:03.520 in the next Yeah. Well, I mean, I guess the 0:09:03.520 --> 0:09:06.480 hades vision being somewhat different there, because that's just where 0:09:06.520 --> 0:09:09.000 pretty much everybody goes. But I absolutely see what your 0:09:09.040 --> 0:09:11.839 thing is saying, especially with like ideas of like h 0:09:12.080 --> 0:09:15.439 narratives that reinforce the idea of a punishment in the afterlife. 0:09:15.640 --> 0:09:18.000 And this is a big part of another thing narratives 0:09:18.040 --> 0:09:21.560 due for us is we get to experience vicarious justice 0:09:21.640 --> 0:09:24.920 through them. Do you ever notice how people who don't 0:09:25.040 --> 0:09:29.680 believe in, say revenge or the death penalty or anything 0:09:29.720 --> 0:09:31.720 like that in real life they don't want to see 0:09:31.760 --> 0:09:36.200 people actually corporally bodily violently punished for the things they've 0:09:36.240 --> 0:09:38.680 done wrong. They still want to see it in narrative. 0:09:38.960 --> 0:09:40.959 You still want to at least see the villain get 0:09:40.960 --> 0:09:47.520 there come upance. Yeah, that's still is richly satisfying. Um Granted, 0:09:47.559 --> 0:09:49.599 I think in these cases you might maybe want a 0:09:49.679 --> 0:09:53.840 more um organic come upance, you know. Yeah, but still, 0:09:54.000 --> 0:09:56.080 well that's the payoff you desire. Well. One of the 0:09:56.080 --> 0:09:59.520 beauties of fictional narrative is that it can be contrived. So, 0:09:59.600 --> 0:10:03.280 for examp, when the villain does something bad, uh, and 0:10:03.440 --> 0:10:05.800 and you want to see the villain punished. In a story, 0:10:06.280 --> 0:10:08.880 you in fact can contrive it so the hero doesn't 0:10:08.920 --> 0:10:11.959 have to kill the villain. Maybe the villain like does 0:10:12.000 --> 0:10:14.720 something bad and seals their own fate. They end up 0:10:14.800 --> 0:10:17.640 falling off a cliff in the last attempt to you know, 0:10:17.720 --> 0:10:19.840 stab the hero in the back or something like that. 0:10:19.920 --> 0:10:21.400 This is one of my favor Yeah, one of my 0:10:21.400 --> 0:10:24.959 favorite tropes that you see in particularly, It's been used 0:10:24.960 --> 0:10:27.559 in one Pixar film of note. I'm not going to 0:10:27.600 --> 0:10:30.000 mention it just in case someone hasn't seen it. But 0:10:30.040 --> 0:10:31.800 then they have to pull off this exact same thing. 0:10:32.120 --> 0:10:35.440 The villain is spared, but now the villain really wants 0:10:35.480 --> 0:10:38.520 to do something awful and then they act and then 0:10:38.559 --> 0:10:42.200 they die for their efforts. Yeah. Disney type films do 0:10:42.240 --> 0:10:43.920 this all the time. I mean, it's a great way 0:10:43.920 --> 0:10:45.680 to have it, have your cake and eat it too. 0:10:46.120 --> 0:10:48.480 Get to watch the villain get punished and die, but 0:10:48.640 --> 0:10:52.320 the hero doesn't have to do something vengeful and violent. Yeah, 0:10:52.360 --> 0:10:55.040 or the hero gives them their second chance. Yeah. Um. 0:10:55.200 --> 0:10:58.160 I should also point out if if if you're into 0:10:58.240 --> 0:11:02.640 this discussion, a definitely check out our episode on masked 0:11:03.200 --> 0:11:06.000 killers in horror movies. October, because we spent a lot 0:11:06.040 --> 0:11:08.400 of time talking about this, uh at this sort of 0:11:08.400 --> 0:11:11.400 thing is that concerns Jason Vorhees, right though I think 0:11:11.440 --> 0:11:15.640 in that context in a much seedier type of desire 0:11:15.679 --> 0:11:18.080 to see punishment of others, maybe less having to do 0:11:18.160 --> 0:11:21.680 with them actually committing crimes. Right, But I mean the 0:11:21.760 --> 0:11:24.160 Jason Vorhees story is is a reminder that it's like, 0:11:24.200 --> 0:11:27.600 when we're talking about stories that resonate, they're not all 0:11:27.880 --> 0:11:30.880 the Iliad. You know, granted there's a lot of bloody 0:11:30.880 --> 0:11:32.720 stuff that goes on. They're not all picks are They're 0:11:32.720 --> 0:11:36.960 not all picks are They're not all of refined works. Uh, 0:11:37.320 --> 0:11:39.360 they don't have to be. They can to to resonate 0:11:39.480 --> 0:11:41.480 with a culture. Well, let's get back to what these 0:11:41.520 --> 0:11:44.000 experts we're gonna be talking about today have actually said 0:11:44.040 --> 0:11:46.240 about the power of stories. I guess for good and 0:11:46.320 --> 0:11:49.680 for ill. But specifically, we all know the goodness about stories. 0:11:49.720 --> 0:11:51.120 I mean, we hear about that all the time, we 0:11:51.160 --> 0:11:53.360 think about it all the time. What's really novel is 0:11:53.440 --> 0:11:55.840 to think that there could be some way that stories 0:11:55.880 --> 0:11:59.280 are really messing us up. Cool. Yeah, well, let's yea, 0:11:59.320 --> 0:12:01.560 let's get into it. Your um First, I want to 0:12:01.600 --> 0:12:06.480 mention uh a professor of anthropology history in Tibetan Studies 0:12:06.559 --> 0:12:10.600 at the University of Colorado, Carol McGranahan. She was one 0:12:10.640 --> 0:12:14.960 of several different individuals that appeared on an episode of 0:12:15.640 --> 0:12:18.960 Ideas with Paul Kennedy, a CBC radio show. That's one 0:12:18.960 --> 0:12:22.480 of your favorites. Yeah, yeah, this episode aired several months back. 0:12:22.600 --> 0:12:24.040 You should be able to find out on their website 0:12:24.400 --> 0:12:27.439 relatively easily. It's titled Have I Got a Story for You? 0:12:28.080 --> 0:12:31.640 And in that she she discusses the power of certainly 0:12:31.720 --> 0:12:36.000 having a story, but also the detriment of being denied 0:12:36.080 --> 0:12:39.680 your story. Uh, the empowerment of finally having a story 0:12:39.720 --> 0:12:42.040 to tell or more telling, and you know, for your 0:12:42.080 --> 0:12:44.800 story to suddenly have value in society, to be permitted 0:12:44.840 --> 0:12:48.439 at all. And one of the examples there are various 0:12:48.440 --> 0:12:52.000 examples you can turn to with as various groups, demographics, 0:12:52.000 --> 0:12:56.480 whole genders have been denied their story over the course 0:12:56.520 --> 0:12:59.280 of history. But she also points out to Me Too 0:12:59.320 --> 0:13:03.240 movement as as a contemporary example of this of example 0:13:03.320 --> 0:13:06.960 where people felt, you know, we're finally emboldened to share 0:13:07.160 --> 0:13:10.640 these stories that were not permitted to be to be 0:13:10.720 --> 0:13:13.680 to be shared previously, be at an overt you can't 0:13:13.720 --> 0:13:16.000 talk about that, or just kind of a the societal 0:13:16.679 --> 0:13:20.800 cultural pressure of this story is not appropriate or not valued. 0:13:21.720 --> 0:13:25.280 So I think in this we we definitely see an 0:13:25.280 --> 0:13:27.920 example of sort of the pros and cons of stories. Yes, 0:13:27.960 --> 0:13:30.839 it can be it can be empowering to tell your 0:13:30.880 --> 0:13:33.600 story or to and certainly to be able to turn 0:13:33.679 --> 0:13:37.640 to stories in culture that match your own and give you, 0:13:37.640 --> 0:13:41.360 you know, strength, But then also we can see the 0:13:41.360 --> 0:13:43.760 the negative of that. If if you are not allowed 0:13:43.800 --> 0:13:46.400 to tell your story, or you don't see your story 0:13:46.440 --> 0:13:51.200 reflected and say the popular storytelling in your culture, then 0:13:51.559 --> 0:13:53.600 then yeah, that can have a detrimental effect. You know. 0:13:53.640 --> 0:13:56.280 It's interesting in this kind of context all the different 0:13:56.520 --> 0:13:59.000 things that the idea of a story or a narrative 0:13:59.040 --> 0:14:01.520 comes to mean. I mean, like in some cases it 0:14:01.520 --> 0:14:05.240 means literally like a chronology of events with main characters 0:14:05.280 --> 0:14:07.760 that face frustrations and this could I mean, in the 0:14:07.760 --> 0:14:10.760 case we're talking about here, these are true stories. Um so, 0:14:10.840 --> 0:14:13.600 like telling the story of your life. You're singling out 0:14:13.600 --> 0:14:16.520 the things that you think we're significant, talking about the 0:14:16.520 --> 0:14:19.760 struggles you faced and all that. But we also in 0:14:19.880 --> 0:14:23.000 a public context we use words like narrative and stories 0:14:23.040 --> 0:14:24.840 to mean all kinds of things. You know, we use 0:14:24.880 --> 0:14:29.160 it to mean sometimes just like, um uh, your narrative 0:14:29.280 --> 0:14:32.560 might mean like the things you believe, or might just 0:14:32.640 --> 0:14:35.240 mean like a set of facts that you have in hand. 0:14:36.000 --> 0:14:39.640 Or sometimes narrative comes to mean like like a worldview. 0:14:39.760 --> 0:14:43.600 It's like, you know, it's like your set of starting assumptions. Yeah, 0:14:43.640 --> 0:14:46.080 and I think this is all valid. On the other hand, 0:14:46.360 --> 0:14:48.720 I do agree with some of the sentiments. We're gonna 0:14:48.760 --> 0:14:52.120 explore later that the narrative is the word narrative. The 0:14:52.120 --> 0:14:57.680 classification of narrative is probably a bit overused currently. Yeah, um, 0:14:57.720 --> 0:15:01.960 it's I saw it to day, looking unfortunately at Twitter 0:15:02.000 --> 0:15:06.000 comments on somebody else's post. Immediately the criticism was, oh, 0:15:06.080 --> 0:15:09.640 you're pushing this narrative, this is your narrative. Um. And 0:15:09.680 --> 0:15:12.800 of course, the the implication in that is always that 0:15:13.280 --> 0:15:17.480 I am dealing with objective truth. I've got facts, You've 0:15:17.520 --> 0:15:20.040 got a story. You have story, Yeah, you have a narrative. 0:15:20.120 --> 0:15:23.440 You're the one pushing every win and reality. I mean, 0:15:23.480 --> 0:15:25.760 we're all playing with narratives. Well, but the funny thing 0:15:25.800 --> 0:15:28.280 about even that usage, I mean, whether or not it's legitimate. 0:15:28.320 --> 0:15:32.160 I think that's probably often lobbed unfairly. But even if 0:15:32.320 --> 0:15:35.560 whether you're right or wrong, it suggests that we intuitively 0:15:35.640 --> 0:15:40.000 since that maybe there's something that's not always quite right 0:15:40.040 --> 0:15:42.720 about using a story to view the world through. Right, 0:15:43.040 --> 0:15:46.560 You know that that we're sensing intuitively that maybe sometimes 0:15:46.600 --> 0:15:50.920 people use stories to get excuse view of reality. It 0:15:51.000 --> 0:15:53.240 makes me think that did you ever watch Jim Henson's 0:15:53.280 --> 0:15:57.520 The Storyteller with the John Hurt I actually have not. Oh, 0:15:57.600 --> 0:16:01.440 it's a tremendous series, and there is a sense in 0:16:01.440 --> 0:16:05.480 that show, especially in one episode, that the Storyteller is, 0:16:05.880 --> 0:16:08.720 you know, a character to be distrusted by the powers 0:16:08.760 --> 0:16:12.520 that be because he's traveling around amongst the people and 0:16:12.640 --> 0:16:15.400 uh and and telling these tales. Oh well, as we'll 0:16:15.400 --> 0:16:18.160 go on to explore, I mean, narrative is quite powerful 0:16:18.200 --> 0:16:20.880 and it can motivate action. I do want to throw 0:16:20.920 --> 0:16:24.440 in one more bit from McGranahan here, and that is 0:16:24.480 --> 0:16:27.200 that that she drives home that stories and even memories 0:16:27.960 --> 0:16:31.320 by necessity exist within a social context. So I think 0:16:31.320 --> 0:16:34.400 that's key to keep in mind here. You know that 0:16:34.400 --> 0:16:36.840 that connection is always going to be in place. Well, 0:16:36.920 --> 0:16:39.560 of course, I mean one clear example of this. Has 0:16:39.560 --> 0:16:42.720 you ever noticed how some stories really transcend to cultures 0:16:42.720 --> 0:16:45.520 and others really don't. You know, some really don't You 0:16:45.680 --> 0:16:48.080 just you feel like I'm not part of the culture 0:16:48.080 --> 0:16:50.800 that produced this or the time that produced this, and 0:16:50.840 --> 0:16:53.040 thus I don't get it. Sometimes you look at some 0:16:53.440 --> 0:16:56.480 works of ancient literature and they don't feel like a 0:16:56.560 --> 0:17:00.480 story to you, right, yeah, or even if it's some 0:17:00.520 --> 0:17:04.119 sort of international cinema or they're also I think there 0:17:04.119 --> 0:17:07.920 are those cases where we only get you only get 0:17:07.920 --> 0:17:09.560 half of it. There's so much that's of course either 0:17:10.240 --> 0:17:13.800 obviously lost to translation itself, or we're just not you know, 0:17:14.000 --> 0:17:15.960 just not getting the nuance of of what it should 0:17:16.000 --> 0:17:21.120 mean culturally. I've mentioned this before regarding various Chinese ghost stories, 0:17:21.920 --> 0:17:25.000 where yeah, you you you lose something when you lose 0:17:25.080 --> 0:17:28.000 the language. You lose something when you lose certainly like 0:17:28.040 --> 0:17:31.520 the literary references, you're still left with in many cases 0:17:31.560 --> 0:17:35.200 a really cool ghost story, a really cool monster encounter. 0:17:36.040 --> 0:17:38.720 But but you're missing all the other things as well. 0:17:38.960 --> 0:17:40.680 And uh, and I think that's going to happen, or 0:17:40.880 --> 0:17:44.119 there's a there's a potential for that to happen. Anytime 0:17:44.200 --> 0:17:46.200 you take a story out of one culture and place 0:17:46.240 --> 0:17:48.040 it into another. All right, let's take a quick break 0:17:48.040 --> 0:17:50.200 and when we come back, we will discuss more about 0:17:50.320 --> 0:17:55.399 stories than all right, we're back. So, as I mentioned 0:17:55.400 --> 0:17:58.000 at the top, I was inspired to talk about this 0:17:58.080 --> 0:18:00.680 today when I saw an interview published at Verge with 0:18:00.800 --> 0:18:04.280 a Duke University professor and philosopher of science who has 0:18:04.280 --> 0:18:08.200 written a book about the use of narratives in understanding history. 0:18:08.200 --> 0:18:11.640 And this philosopher is named Alex Rosenberg. I wasn't familiar 0:18:11.640 --> 0:18:14.360 with him otherwise. In this book is called How History 0:18:14.440 --> 0:18:18.320 Gets Things Wrong, The Neuroscience of Our Addiction to Stories. 0:18:18.359 --> 0:18:21.160 Now I'm to understand I wasn't actually able to listen 0:18:21.680 --> 0:18:25.360 to that Ideas episode. But Rosenberg's on that episode. Oh yes, yeah, 0:18:25.359 --> 0:18:28.080 he's one of three individuals that that they chat with 0:18:28.240 --> 0:18:31.000 and and he's extremely well spoken on all of this, 0:18:31.240 --> 0:18:36.560 uh and and very and humorous too, um because one 0:18:36.560 --> 0:18:38.280 of the things, like we we don't want to make 0:18:38.320 --> 0:18:41.639 it sound as if he is like railing against narrative, 0:18:42.359 --> 0:18:45.240 like he himself is a novelist as well. Oh yeah, 0:18:45.280 --> 0:18:47.880 he's written multiple historical novels. And he makes the point 0:18:47.880 --> 0:18:50.040 that you know, he thinks stories are wonderful. Like, there's 0:18:50.040 --> 0:18:53.400 no denying that they bring us joy, they enrich our lives, 0:18:53.760 --> 0:18:56.159 and there's also little doubt that they're one of the most, 0:18:56.240 --> 0:18:59.280 if not the single most powerful ways of changing people's 0:18:59.280 --> 0:19:02.960 minds about things and motivating action. Uh though of course, 0:19:03.040 --> 0:19:06.760 maybe this isn't always for good, right, And one of 0:19:06.800 --> 0:19:09.679 the things that he talks about at length, especially on 0:19:09.760 --> 0:19:13.640 the Ideas episode, is is the idea of self narrative, 0:19:14.440 --> 0:19:18.600 the idea of viewing our life as a story and 0:19:18.640 --> 0:19:22.280 ourselves as a character in that story, and indeed turning 0:19:22.359 --> 0:19:27.040 to uh exterior narrated narratives be at a you know, novel, movie, 0:19:27.840 --> 0:19:31.320 myth and then using that as sort of a a 0:19:31.400 --> 0:19:34.639 guide by which we might interpret our own life and 0:19:34.640 --> 0:19:38.159 our own identity. But before we get to get to that, 0:19:38.240 --> 0:19:41.560 really like, there's like the idea of where narrative comes from, 0:19:42.280 --> 0:19:45.240 and and Rosenberg says that he sees self narrative is 0:19:45.280 --> 0:19:49.800 one of the oldest among various human adaptations that enabled 0:19:49.880 --> 0:19:54.240 us to survive the prehistoric world, to deal with predatory threats, 0:19:54.280 --> 0:19:56.920 and then work our way up the food chain. Yeah, 0:19:56.960 --> 0:19:59.440 I mean, I think you can clearly see self narrative 0:19:59.520 --> 0:20:02.760 as some variation on the same kind of adaptive value 0:20:02.800 --> 0:20:06.879 as imagination. What is imagination good for You can like 0:20:07.040 --> 0:20:11.160 simulate something that might be dangerous before you actually try it, 0:20:11.800 --> 0:20:13.960 and turn it over in your brain and see if 0:20:14.000 --> 0:20:17.240 you can sort of practice without actually putting yourself at risk. 0:20:17.600 --> 0:20:19.800 And this is a lot of what narrative is too. 0:20:19.960 --> 0:20:24.119 You know, you're imagining ways stories in which characters face obstacles, 0:20:24.160 --> 0:20:27.560 maybe like obstacles you might face, but you don't have 0:20:27.600 --> 0:20:29.879 to actually face them yet, and it's sort of mental 0:20:29.920 --> 0:20:32.800 practice runs. But then when you apply that to yourself, 0:20:32.840 --> 0:20:35.720 it has all these other interesting properties and valances. You 0:20:35.720 --> 0:20:38.479 can go, uh, you can mess around with time in 0:20:38.480 --> 0:20:40.800 your life exactly. And yet time, I think is one 0:20:40.840 --> 0:20:44.159 of the key lands mental time travel or chronesthesia, the 0:20:44.160 --> 0:20:46.719 ability to think, all, right, what what will happen if 0:20:46.760 --> 0:20:50.439 this occurs? And of course that's more overtly visible in 0:20:50.480 --> 0:20:52.880 things like science fiction what will the future be? Like, Well, 0:20:52.920 --> 0:20:55.320 here's one version, it'll be Blade Runner right now, that 0:20:55.400 --> 0:20:57.760 sort of thing. But but also we we see that 0:20:57.800 --> 0:21:01.320 in like if you see a movie about uh, individuals 0:21:01.359 --> 0:21:04.680 dealing with say, um, oh, I don't know a tornado, 0:21:04.720 --> 0:21:08.240 you watch twister. Twister is on some level a chronoesthetic 0:21:08.800 --> 0:21:13.280 um exercise in storm preparation, Like you're thinking, what might 0:21:13.320 --> 0:21:15.880 actually happen to you next year when the big when 0:21:15.920 --> 0:21:18.600 the big twister comes down the down the field. Yeah, yeah, 0:21:18.640 --> 0:21:22.000 sort of. But but then again, more to Rosenberg's point here, 0:21:22.000 --> 0:21:23.960 a lot of this comes back to theory of mind, 0:21:24.160 --> 0:21:26.960 that ability we have to create a rough simulation of 0:21:27.000 --> 0:21:32.440 another individual's mind state, their history, their goals, their ideas, etcetera. 0:21:32.560 --> 0:21:34.680 All those things that you know, if you've ever taken 0:21:34.720 --> 0:21:36.960 a writing course, the creative writing course with someone says, 0:21:36.960 --> 0:21:39.480 all right, here's a list of questions about your protagonists. 0:21:39.520 --> 0:21:42.200