Speaker 1: M Hey, everybody. Welcome to Stuff you Should Know Selects.
Speaker 1: This is Chuck here this week. It's my pick and
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go with how Willpower Works from February seven,
Speaker 1: And frankly, I'm picking this one because I need to
Speaker 1: listen to this one again because I have no willpower.
Speaker 1: That's something I need to work on, so I'm gonna
Speaker 1: check it out again. I encourage you to do the same.
Speaker 1: It's uh, it's pretty neat episode. So here we go
Speaker 1: with how Willpower Works. Welcome to Stuff you Should Know
Speaker 1: from how Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome to
Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clarkin sitting across from me putting
Speaker 1: on his Love your Mama. Um, lip ball? What what
Speaker 1: Philip Flavors? That is almond? Actually is yummy? Look at
Speaker 1: that plug right out of the gate. Uh, this is
Speaker 1: Charles W. Chuck Bryant. Hello, those are nice lips you
Speaker 1: got there, man. Wow, they're now moistified like moist blowning. Well,
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Speaker 1: front load this one. Yeah alright, All that's out of
Speaker 1: the way, right. Um, So, Chuck, you're doing good, you're
Speaker 1: feeling well. I'm not feeling great, but you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: you're ready to be done. No. I'm ready to talk
Speaker 1: about willpower though, because it is a topic that I
Speaker 1: struggle with, as do most people. I think, like you
Speaker 1: struggle with the topic, or you struggle with willpower. I
Speaker 1: think everybody struggles with willpower. Oh yeah, well, as a
Speaker 1: matter of fact, Um, I think you're absolutely right. There
Speaker 1: is a very famous guy named Plato, famous Greek philosopher Plato. Plato. Plato, yes,
Speaker 1: not Plato, right, um. And Plato decided well suggested that
Speaker 1: the entire human experience, that the sum of human existence
Speaker 1: could be basically nailed down with just this. You have
Speaker 1: a higher self and a lower self. Yeah, and your
Speaker 1: purpose for living is to overcome the usually more powerful
Speaker 1: urges of the lower self in order to fulfill the
Speaker 1: goals of the higher self. I am down without it
Speaker 1: makes uttering complete sense. I don't know about the reason
Speaker 1: for living, but the struggle man struggle or at least okay, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: like that's if you're born. You're going to face that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but you're going to face it in varying degrees because,
Speaker 1: as we found, willpower, which is what you use to
Speaker 1: get over your lower urges and pursue your higher goals. Um,
Speaker 1: it comes in differing amounts for differing people, different people. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and it and Robert Lamb wrote the original article from
Speaker 1: House Touff works from stuff to blow your mind. And
Speaker 1: he points out that we're at odds with our own
Speaker 1: uh nature, as we have evolved here on the planet
Speaker 1: because you know, we craved sugary sweet things because sugar
Speaker 1: gave us lots of energy back in the day, and
Speaker 1: back in the day they didn't have little debby cakes
Speaker 1: within hands reach at all times. So we're sort of
Speaker 1: at odds with ourselves. And he points out sexually as well, Um,
Speaker 1: we evolved to spread the seed and procreate as much
Speaker 1: as possible to ensure the survival of the species. And um,
Speaker 1: nowadays you can't really do that stuff, or if you do,
Speaker 1: you're a flander or a jerk or your spreading disease
Speaker 1: and your public health nuisance. Yeah. So um, we're at
Speaker 1: odds with ourselves, with our very existence. Yeah, and not
Speaker 1: only internally, but you make the point um as a
Speaker 1: society as well, I mean, society and evolution tussle. So
Speaker 1: you can make the case that society represents our higher
Speaker 1: self and you know, are what we are, basic instincts
Speaker 1: that we've evolved to are our lower selves. So that's
Speaker 1: what's going on, and it's will power, will power that
Speaker 1: will get us over the bumps that come along in
Speaker 1: life inevitably. Yeah, and it's I think most people relate
Speaker 1: will power to things like eating or going to the gym,
Speaker 1: or indulging in uh uh, sexual proclivities and things like that.
Speaker 1: But I think it's broader than that. In general. I
Speaker 1: think it's the will to, like Plato said, to strive to,
Speaker 1: I guess, do the right thing. Yeah, by yourself, by others,
Speaker 1: by society at large. Right. And I guess also, um,
Speaker 1: how often you come up against that? How often you
Speaker 1: have to exercise willpower because you you just hit it
Speaker 1: on the head. Will power is the act of making
Speaker 1: a decision. You're deciding to do something or not to
Speaker 1: do something. Um, how often you do that? It does
Speaker 1: depend on how you define the world around you. Yeah, Like,
Speaker 1: are these things you know? Are you surrounded by temptations
Speaker 1: that you have to ward off all the time and
Speaker 1: you're paying attention to it and they're always closing in? Uh?
Speaker 1: If you like that, then you're going to exercise your
Speaker 1: willpower a lot. If you don't see the world as temptations,
Speaker 1: you give into them all the time, you're not going
Speaker 1: to If you look at the world is something that
Speaker 1: you can handle, You're probably not gonna have to exercise
Speaker 1: your willpower too much then either. But it's all they're all.
Speaker 1: Those are three different ways of of living and they
Speaker 1: all are I guess described by willpower and how you
Speaker 1: use it. Yeah, that's a good point. Um. Robert h
Speaker 1: makes a point that has backed up somewhat by science,
Speaker 1: actually completely by science. The and he he puts in
Speaker 1: terms of a video game, which makes sense that if
Speaker 1: you were a video game and you have a willpower meter,
Speaker 1: that that willpower meter is replenished and depleted on a daily,
Speaker 1: probably hourly basis. And the more you uh use your
Speaker 1: willpower and say, you know what, I'm not going to
Speaker 1: have that little debby cake, your little willpower meter goes
Speaker 1: down and it depletes itself, so you're not going to
Speaker 1: have as much willpower maybe for the next decision. Right.
Speaker 1: It's really interesting. Yeah, that's um pretty new. Our understanding
Speaker 1: of willpower like that is very new. The first guy
Speaker 1: to really kind of put it out like that was
Speaker 1: freud Um, and he basically said, uh, you we have
Speaker 1: this thing called willpower. We have an ego. That's that's
Speaker 1: what the Freudians associate with willpowers, the ego and your
Speaker 1: ego is this finite thing. It has a finite energy reserve.
Speaker 1: It uses energy, and therefore it can be sapped. And
Speaker 1: then Freud fell out of fashion, and um, everybody just
Speaker 1: kind of stopped looking at willpower that way. And uh,
Speaker 1: it wasn't until when a Florida State University psychologist named
Speaker 1: Roy uh Baumeister. He uh, he figured out through this
Speaker 1: test using chocolate and randishes, I believe that, um, you,
Speaker 1: if you are staving off temptation using willpower, you actually
Speaker 1: do terribly on like another test of willpower. Yeah, they
Speaker 1: used persistence tests, um, basically puzzles that you have to
Speaker 1: just keep at it and keep at It's not something
Speaker 1: you could complete immediately, and offered some people chocolate chip
Speaker 1: cookies and other chocolate treats of their liking, and offered
Speaker 1: other people radishes instead, which is not a fair fight, right.
Speaker 1: I mean, he really stacked the deck like maybe a radish,
Speaker 1: a shaved radish in a salad or something. But if
Speaker 1: all you're looking at is a plate of radish, then yeah,
Speaker 1: I would take the cookie. So what he found out though,
Speaker 1: was the people who ate the radishes had more trouble
Speaker 1: completing the test. I guess because I guess the ideas
Speaker 1: they're using up all their willpower to not eat the cookie,
Speaker 1: so they don't have time for the test the persistence.
Speaker 1: And there was also a another kind of follow up
Speaker 1: study a few years after that by UM the the
Speaker 1: University of Iowa professor with the greatest name of all
Speaker 1: of the faculty there, Baba shiv Um and uh Dr
Speaker 1: shiv Um had a basically tested willpower by saying, this
Speaker 1: group is going to remember a two digit number, and
Speaker 1: this group is going to remember a seven digit number,
Speaker 1: and then we're gonna test their willpower UM by tempting
Speaker 1: them with chocolate cake and uh Dr Ship found that
Speaker 1: there was the people who were using their working memory
Speaker 1: their cognitive capacity to remember the seven digit number had
Speaker 1: a harder time resisting. So it basically proves that we
Speaker 1: use our working memory to resist temptation. And I guess
Speaker 1: it's something like reminding yourself, you know, at the at
Speaker 1: the forefront of your mind not to do something, you
Speaker 1: know until the temptation past. Who knows, Yeah, maybe I
Speaker 1: had that cookie yesterday, so man, I can't eat it today.
Speaker 1: Or we use our working memory to remind ourselves of
Speaker 1: our long term goals in the face of a short
Speaker 1: term reward. Well, that's one of the big keys I think. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and uh, that's something Robert hits on, which is I
Speaker 1: want that cookie now, and I know bikini seasons coming up,
Speaker 1: and you see you mean a bikini. Josh, it's not pretty.
Speaker 1: I will never get that out of my memory, working memory,
Speaker 1: or other one, that bikini. And but that's sort of
Speaker 1: what we're at odds with is the short term. I
Speaker 1: think humans as a group tend to enjoy the short,
Speaker 1: short term pleasures and if you truly learn to conquer
Speaker 1: that in in uh lieu of long term gain, that's
Speaker 1: when you're like, you're winning, is Charlie Sheen would say,
Speaker 1: right exactly, although Charlie Sheen is not exactly one who's
Speaker 1: known to exercise the willpower. No, you know, that was
Speaker 1: a really odd person to tap for that. But well
Speaker 1: I think that's the opposite he was. He thought winning
Speaker 1: was the short term game. Yeah, I guess yeah. Um,
Speaker 1: and that is so dated. Yeah, people like when you
Speaker 1: guys record this, but it's been I think today might
Speaker 1: be the very day where you could get away with it.
Speaker 1: So it was perfect right the way. Um, so from
Speaker 1: all these tests like when Baumeister Um put his study
Speaker 1: ego depletion colon is the act of self a limited resource.
Speaker 1: It just basically kicked off the slew of follow up
Speaker 1: studies from Dr Shiv and others and UM. One of
Speaker 1: the things that they found was that you can kind
Speaker 1: of watch people exercise worldpower on the old Wonder machine yeah, UM.
Speaker 1: Using m r S. They put people in and had
Speaker 1: them think about, I guess a suite or a health
Speaker 1: food and decide between them. Yeah, And they found that
Speaker 1: the ventromedial prefrontal cortex lights up when you're making that decision,
Speaker 1: when you're considering it, which made sense they I think
Speaker 1: they kind of expected that, but they were also surprised
Speaker 1: to find that the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex UM, which is
Speaker 1: located a little further back UM, that lit up as well.
Speaker 1: And they think that that has lit up for the
Speaker 1: people who made a good decision only thank you. And
Speaker 1: they think that that's maybe part of your that's part
Speaker 1: of the working memory where you're like, no, I can't
Speaker 1: eat that, because yes, that's tapping into that higher self
Speaker 1: goal pursuit. That's the dorso lateral prefrontal cortex, right, you
Speaker 1: did a nice job there by the ways. Uh So.
Speaker 1: The bomber also went on to say that, um, he could.
Speaker 1: He compares the willpower, your own willpower to a muscle
Speaker 1: or something like a muscle, and you can deplete it,
Speaker 1: Like you said, if you overwork your muscles, you're just
Speaker 1: going to deplete your muscles and be worn out at
Speaker 1: the end of the day. Or you can exercise that
Speaker 1: muscle in a in a healthy way and make it
Speaker 1: stronger in the long term. Um do you do this?
Speaker 1: After reading this is sord to realize that I actually
Speaker 1: kind of exercised willpower all the time. What you I
Speaker 1: think you especially do so, like, for example, I have
Speaker 1: a mail key that I used to go get the mail,
Speaker 1: right and we keep it in our car, And I
Speaker 1: had to go to the car and get the mail
Speaker 1: key and then go get the mail. And it was
Speaker 1: cold out yesterday, and then on the way back, I
Speaker 1: could have just taken the mail key inside with me
Speaker 1: and taking it back to the car, and the next
Speaker 1: time I went to the car again it was very cold.
Speaker 1: But instead I walked up a flight of stairs, put
Speaker 1: the mail key into the car, and then went back home.
Speaker 1: So you're you're you made that decision and you struggled
Speaker 1: with it, even in a minor way. Yes, I did
Speaker 1: it specifically because there was no reason whatsoever for me
Speaker 1: to do that rationally and as far as common sense,
Speaker 1: when there was no there's no purpose to it. But
Speaker 1: by doing it, I basically just exercise my willpower. It
Speaker 1: was something I didn't really want to do, but it
Speaker 1: wasn't a big deal, but it was I could like.
Speaker 1: Doing that accumulates. Yeah, I think I think you and
Speaker 1: I are really different in that way. I see you
Speaker 1: as someone who actively works that muscle a lot on
Speaker 1: a daily basis, and I don't enough. And not that
Speaker 1: I just have no willpower, but I don't give it,
Speaker 1: give decisions like that enough consideration. Does that make sense completely?
Speaker 1: I was like, yeah, I'll just go upstairs and throw
Speaker 1: the key on the coffee table, which a sane person
Speaker 1: she kind of has that that thought. I think that
Speaker 1: puts you in the same camp. But that doesn't ensure
Speaker 1: that I'm making good decisions for my life, you know.
Speaker 1: But I mean, I don't think you're making bad ones.
Speaker 1: But it's good to self reflect, you know, Yeah, I
Speaker 1: do kind of. It's kind of fun, you know, it's
Speaker 1: like a game. Yeah, I want to you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's like how Ramrod Street can I stayd you know,
Speaker 1: That's what I'm building towards. Uh So. Another thing Robert
Speaker 1: points out from the science side of things is as
Speaker 1: far as giving into the short term in favor of
Speaker 1: the long term, is glucose plays a big part in that.
Speaker 1: And I think they found that a quick um shot
Speaker 1: of sugar I don't think a whole lot can sometimes
Speaker 1: stave off or build up that willpower reserve in the
Speaker 1: short term. Yeah, it's like, ah, you you were talking
Speaker 1: about how we have like a um willpower bar and
Speaker 1: every time we were this temptation is depleted a little
Speaker 1: more and more. They found that a shot of glucose
Speaker 1: replenishes that willpower bar. So is that in lieu of like,
Speaker 1: hey boy, I really want that cupcake, but let me
Speaker 1: have the juice box instead. That's the irony of it,
Speaker 1: is giving into that cupcake may help you exercise you
Speaker 1: wild power with other stuff later further on. Didn't that weird?
Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean if you had something healthier, that
Speaker 1: would be the better choice. But the point is is
Speaker 1: like any kind of shot of gluco this has been
Speaker 1: shown to UM to to re up your your willpower.
Speaker 1: And this was very much poop pooed at first, this idea, UM,
Speaker 1: I think Baumeister. This is really great article by John
Speaker 1: Tierney in New York Times magazine. It's from UM the
Speaker 1: August before last. It's called do You Suffer from Decision Fatigue?
Speaker 1: Our buddy Chad loves this proselytized this article. Remember, okay,
Speaker 1: this is the one, so I strongly recommend everybody to read.
Speaker 1: It's a good one. But UM and and it it
Speaker 1: talks about Baumeister like thinking that you know glucose has
Speaker 1: something to do with this UM and it was poop
Speaker 1: pooed at first, because everybody knows the brain uses the
Speaker 1: same amount of energy pretty much all day long. So
Speaker 1: that didn't make any sense. Like if you're if you're
Speaker 1: ego depleted and you're you're suffering from some sort of
Speaker 1: willpower fatigue, but your brain still using the same amount
Speaker 1: of energy, those two don't jibe. Again with the m
Speaker 1: r I. What they found was somebody suffering from ego
Speaker 1: depletion from willpower fatigue who took a shot of gluco
Speaker 1: or whatever UM their brains lit up in areas that
Speaker 1: had to do with exercising will power. So while your
Speaker 1: brain was using the same amount of energy, it was
Speaker 1: using them in different places when your willpower was fatigued.
Speaker 1: And that glutecast basically was like spinach to popeye for
Speaker 1: that part of your brain that's charged with exercising willpower.
Speaker 1: Isn't that? Yeah? So what do you carry on a
Speaker 1: packet sugar with you at all times? Come on still
Speaker 1: with sugar right now? Um? Also, uh, the in that
Speaker 1: same article they talk about this, uh, this kind of
Speaker 1: landmark study of an Israeli parole board, and um, they
Speaker 1: found that you if you were a parole e and
Speaker 1: you came to them after it had been a while
Speaker 1: since a break or lunch or breakfast, your chances of
Speaker 1: being paroled dropped by like fifty or sixt oh if
Speaker 1: the parole board had not had breakfast, yes or no.
Speaker 1: If they if you came to them like right after
Speaker 1: things got started after breakfast or after lunch, your chances
Speaker 1: of being paroled were like fifty to fifty greater than
Speaker 1: people who came to them for identical crimes like a
Speaker 1: couple of hours later. I'm sure that makes the criminals
Speaker 1: of the world feel pretty great. Yeah, exactly, so arbitrary.
Speaker 1: And they what they found is it's not laziness. It's
Speaker 1: not like physical fatigue, where like you can tell you're tired.
Speaker 1: What our brains do is they employ the strategy where
Speaker 1: you you are, you become risk averse, like you don't
Speaker 1: want to make a decision, so you say, you know what,
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna put this off. You're gonna go back
Speaker 1: to jail. I'm not going to grant your parole because
Speaker 1: that's risky behavior to let you back out in the world.
Speaker 1: And I'm just I've made too many decisions today. But
Speaker 1: you're not thinking this. They just say parole to nine
Speaker 1: and you have no idea why. It just makes sense
Speaker 1: to you at the time. But if you had had
Speaker 1: some glucoset that same instance, you may you may be like, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think you're you're ready to come back out in society.
Speaker 1: That reminds me of the band Rush, Yes, that we
Speaker 1: talked about before. I remember this from when I was
Speaker 1: a teenager. You know the lyric um Man, what song
Speaker 1: is it? If you choose not to decide, you still
Speaker 1: have made a choice free will. Oh yeah, that's from
Speaker 1: that song of course. I think on the original album
Speaker 1: jacket it says if you choose not to decide, you
Speaker 1: cannot have made a choice. Is there. Yeah, my brother
Speaker 1: and I used to laugh that. I think Neil Perd
Speaker 1: actually wrote a lot of the lyrics back then that
Speaker 1: Getty Lee justlike you know, edged it out with events.
Speaker 1: But it's the complete opposite meanings. So it's interesting that
Speaker 1: at some point Rush I guess that maybe a band
Speaker 1: argument or something. I'm glad Getty Lee one, Yeah, you
Speaker 1: have made a choice. No, you cannot have made a choice.
Speaker 1: Just shut up, play drums. Your voice is weird. I
Speaker 1: remember hearing that the first time. I was like, oh man,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, blew me away? Yeah yeah, free will I
Speaker 1: can't believe I didn't remember the name. And you're like,
Speaker 1: I can't think of the name of this song, but
Speaker 1: it's about free will? Yeah? Was it Red bar Chetta?
Speaker 1: All right? Oh? I didn't really fully get the um
Speaker 1: the Stanford UH psychologist Walton and Dweck and then is Dweck.
Speaker 1: It sounds like saying direct wrong. Um. I didn't fully
Speaker 1: get that that they they said that people UH who
Speaker 1: have will fund willpower fatigue tend to slack off when
Speaker 1: they felt their resolve wavering, but then people who felt
Speaker 1: their resolve was limitless pressed on. I like that, just
Speaker 1: I don't get the point there. It seems like a
Speaker 1: no brainer. So yeah, I think I think it is.
Speaker 1: You may just be looking too deeply. It was like
Speaker 1: what I was talking about earlier at the beginning, where like,
Speaker 1: depending on how you see the world, like do you
Speaker 1: see the world is like, like you have willpower, so
Speaker 1: you can overcome any temptation. You're going to last longer
Speaker 1: on tests of will power than somebody who is like, um,
Speaker 1: I'm feeling kind of weak today, you know, and then
Speaker 1: you're just gonna give in. Okay, So it is pretty simple. Yeah,
Speaker 1: all right, I thought it was a dummy. Not only
Speaker 1: is it simple, I managed to make it more complex
Speaker 1: and talk about it at length. Uh. They do know
Speaker 1: that people, generally there is some genetic component involved, Like
Speaker 1: if your parents are super self disciplined, then you were
Speaker 1: more likely to turn out that way. I found that
Speaker 1: to be true from friends of mine whose parents were
Speaker 1: like super self discipline and their kids kind of turned
Speaker 1: out that way too. Yeah, but I wonder, and Robert
Speaker 1: makes a point in the article like is it genetic
Speaker 1: or epigenetic. Yeah, I don't know, probably both would be
Speaker 1: my guests. We just chose not to decide. We cannot
Speaker 1: have made a choice. Uh. And then the old marshmallow
Speaker 1: experiment this uh Stanford, not the prison experiment, but the
Speaker 1: marshmallow experiment from the nineteen sixties, very famous one where
Speaker 1: they placed these uh tortured these kids basically by placing
Speaker 1: a marshmallow in front of them and saying, if you
Speaker 1: hold off on eating that marshmallow in fifteen minutes, you
Speaker 1: will have too. And of course not many of the
Speaker 1: kids could hold out, but they found that the ones
Speaker 1: who did hold out of the second marshmallow went on
Speaker 1: in life to greater successes, at least if you count
Speaker 1: s a T scores as a measure of success, two
Speaker 1: points higher than the ones who chowed down on the marshmallow.
Speaker 1: And the ones who ate the marshmallow later on had
Speaker 1: struggles with relationships and stress and uh attention. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: I wonder if that has even do with like you know,
Speaker 1: O c D. I wonder as well, I wonder how
Speaker 1: much um of our modern problems are really just crises
Speaker 1: of willpower? I wonder, um. There was a follow up
Speaker 1: to that sixties experiment. There's been a bunch, but there
Speaker 1: was one in at the University of Rochester that was
Speaker 1: carried out last year that um found we are more
Speaker 1: willing to exercise willpower if we think that what we're
Speaker 1: holding out for is actually going to happen, you know. Uh,
Speaker 1: And they did that by this is hilarious. It's funny.
Speaker 1: Studies with kids are always they're so cruel and funny,
Speaker 1: I mean not the really truly cruel ones that any
Speaker 1: psychic logical study that has new kids almost invariably has
Speaker 1: some cruel aspect to it, and this one was no, uh,
Speaker 1: was no exception. Basically, Uh, they said, here's the control group,
Speaker 1: here's here's the experimental group, and the control group. We
Speaker 1: want to give you some extra art supplies. Let us
Speaker 1: go get them. And they came back with some extra
Speaker 1: art supplies. The experimental group. They said, hey, we're gonna
Speaker 1: get you some more art supplies. We'll be right back.
Speaker 1: And they came back. They're like, we don't have any
Speaker 1: more art supplies. We know you were really excited, but sorry,
Speaker 1: you're gonna have to make do with that old red pen.
Speaker 1: And then they tested them with the marshmallow experiment and
Speaker 1: found that the ones who had gotten the art supplies
Speaker 1: the promise hadn't been broken. Sure, uh, they held out
Speaker 1: longer than the ones who have been lied to. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're like, screw that, you're not bringing me to marshmallows.
Speaker 1: I don't in this marshmallow right now. Exactly, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: kick you in the ship afterwards too, I'll show you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's not cruel on the level. What was that one?
Speaker 1: The one kid, remember the that we talked about that
Speaker 1: was tested on like oh, kept in a closet. No,
Speaker 1: they tested fear conditioning and extinction and the kid it
Speaker 1: was a little Albert where they like they would put
Speaker 1: a bunny in his lap and then bang the bar
Speaker 1: of metal with a hammer and scare the Jesus out
Speaker 1: of him. And it came to like fear rabbits, Like
Speaker 1: there was a search for him, right, and they eventually
Speaker 1: found him, they thought, I think, so, I don't remember
Speaker 1: I wrote a blog post that I'll have to republish
Speaker 1: or whatever because it's been a while. I don't remember.
Speaker 1: But yeah, they figured out who it was pretty much.
Speaker 1: So this isn't on that level. No, no, no, this
Speaker 1: is just marshmallows. Yes. Um. So oh, there was one
Speaker 1: other point I wanted to bring up that I thought
Speaker 1: was pretty interesting and horrible from that John Tierney article.
Speaker 1: Um where with with decision fatigue, with exercising willpower disproportionately
Speaker 1: affects the poor and they think that possibly now, uh,
Speaker 1: that poverty exists in a cycle because is if you're
Speaker 1: a poor person, you have to exercise willpower. You have
Speaker 1: to make more decisions than somebody who has more resources,
Speaker 1: more money. Like say you're walking through the grocery store. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, I want the soap and this food. If
Speaker 1: you're poor, you might have to say I want both,
Speaker 1: but I have to just buy one. I don't have
Speaker 1: enough for both. So how much is it going to be?
Speaker 1: And their willpower there there there, their resources of of
Speaker 1: willpower of decision making become fatigued a lot faster because
Speaker 1: they have to exercise it a lot more and they
Speaker 1: don't have the uh, the resources to get themselves out
Speaker 1: of poverty, to indulge or to like study or do
Speaker 1: you know, do more. That they already have the deck
Speaker 1: stecked against them resource wise, But then you throw in
Speaker 1: this this idea of willpower, possibly that's that makes it
Speaker 1: even more difficult. I never really thought about that. It's
Speaker 1: pretty interesting stuff. It makes you, It makes me, you know,
Speaker 1: you feel for him even more. Yeah, and it makes
Speaker 1: me feel bad when say, do I want the peanut
Speaker 1: butter ganosh cupcake or chocolate? You know what? Just go
Speaker 1: ahead and give me both, right, exactly, Well, you can
Speaker 1: buy both and then just take one to somebody who's
Speaker 1: struggling in the grocery store trying to figure out they're
Speaker 1: gonna buy soap for food. It's a good idea. Yeah, uh,
Speaker 1: you got anything else? Man? No, this is this is
Speaker 1: a good one. Yeah. I like wildpower. It's fun. Go
Speaker 1: out and exercise it in little ways. It's fun. Or
Speaker 1: don't either that or um strap of car battery to
Speaker 1: your inner thighs. It's just fun. Uh okay. Well, if
Speaker 1: you want to learn more about willpower and made this
Speaker 1: good article by Robert Lamb, you can type in willpower
Speaker 1: in the search bar at how stuff works dot com
Speaker 1: and it will bring it up. And I said search bar.
Speaker 1: So it's time for a listener mail, yeah, Josh. Quickly,
Speaker 1: before we do that, we need to say a special
Speaker 1: thank you to a fan of ours who helped us
Speaker 1: out with our Wikipedia page. Oh nice, thank you, And
Speaker 1: he was very cool and and his name and he's
Speaker 1: been mentioned on tech stuff evidently too. Oh wow, this
Speaker 1: guy's a star and we're not gonna hold that against him.
Speaker 1: And this is how he His name is spelled A
Speaker 1: N T R I K s h yadaf y A
Speaker 1: d A B. And he says, you pronounce it won trick.
Speaker 1: The t is soft though, as in math Son tri trip.
Speaker 1: Yeah there you go, he he phonetically spelled out. He
Speaker 1: told you what it sounded like. And I still can't
Speaker 1: quite do it. So we just want to say thanks
Speaker 1: a lot for helping us with the Wikipedia page. And
Speaker 1: now a listener mail that I'm gonna call That's why
Speaker 1: sk can help you get ladies. This from Todd in
Speaker 1: Oklahoma City. Guys and Jerry. I've come to the conclusion
Speaker 1: that I may owe you a big thank you. Your
Speaker 1: podcast has created the impression, whether fiction or reality, that
Speaker 1: I am somehow a guy who knows about stuff with
Speaker 1: the ladies. My new girlfriend, in fact, mentions as one
Speaker 1: of my winning traits that I'm often saying interesting things.
Speaker 1: And this really interested me, so I asked her for
Speaker 1: some examples of things that I say, and it was
Speaker 1: notable that every example that she cided was something that
Speaker 1: I learned listening to your podcast at work. So it
Speaker 1: is quite possible, Sirs, that you and your podcast made
Speaker 1: my baby fall in love with me. I'd like to
Speaker 1: shake your hands. Every single guy should listen to your
Speaker 1: podcast because it may at least get you a second date.
Speaker 1: And that is Todd from Oklahoma City, who is banking
Speaker 1: on our knowledge to woo women, and I guess he
Speaker 1: got a girlfriend of it. Good going, Todd. Good for you.
Speaker 1: We're glad we could help. Man. We're married, dude, so
Speaker 1: we we live vicariously through these emails. That's not true. Well, no,
Speaker 1: I think it's great. I'm happy for Todd. I don't
Speaker 1: mean I live vicariously and said I wish. No. No,
Speaker 1: I just mean like, that's great. I'm glad someone out
Speaker 1: there is getting a date because of this. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: love helping people find love connections. Yeah, as a matter
Speaker 1: of fact, we should do a speed dating episode. I
Speaker 1: wrote an article on it once and it's pretty neat. Yeah,
Speaker 1: my friend p J. You met p J. He uh,
Speaker 1: he just texted me yesterday and said, Hey, this girl
Speaker 1: he does a lot of online dating. He said part
Speaker 1: of her profiles that she's like a huge fan of
Speaker 1: you guys, And I said data. Yeah, well I don't
Speaker 1: know data. There you go. You're doing it all over
Speaker 1: the place. Man's right. Um, let's see if we have
Speaker 1: affected your life positive lee. Um, we want to hear
Speaker 1: about it, not negatively, just positively. You can tweet to
Speaker 1: us at s y ESK podcast. You can join us
Speaker 1: on Facebook dot com, slash stuff you Should Know. You
Speaker 1: can send us an email to Stuff Podcast at Discovery
Speaker 1: dot com, and you can always find us hanging out
Speaker 1: at our home on the web, Stuff you Should Know
Speaker 1: dot com. For more on this and thousands of other topics,
Speaker 1: visit how Stuff Works dot com.