1
00:00:05,760 --> 00:00:08,200
Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your mind. My name

2
00:00:08,240 --> 00:00:11,840
Speaker 1: is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and it's Saturday.

3
00:00:12,039 --> 00:00:14,200
Speaker 1: Time to go into the vault for a classic episode

4
00:00:14,200 --> 00:00:19,320
Speaker 1: of the show. This originally aired February ended. Is about

5
00:00:19,440 --> 00:00:23,239
Speaker 1: over confidence. Oh yeah, this one's interesting to look back on,

6
00:00:23,280 --> 00:00:26,119
Speaker 1: because I think when we recorded this we were, in

7
00:00:26,160 --> 00:00:28,120
Speaker 1: a way, we were a little bit overconfident. We we

8
00:00:28,440 --> 00:00:31,920
Speaker 1: imagined that we would perhaps still be recording together in

9
00:00:31,960 --> 00:00:36,000
Speaker 1: a studio um for the rest of the year, or

10
00:00:36,000 --> 00:00:38,120
Speaker 1: at least we would come back before the year ended.

11
00:00:38,159 --> 00:00:42,680
Speaker 1: And uh, that did not come to pass. The greatest

12
00:00:42,720 --> 00:00:46,880
Speaker 1: plans of podcasters and men, they all are, don't I

13
00:00:46,880 --> 00:00:51,199
Speaker 1: don't know how that saying ends. All right, well, I

14
00:00:51,240 --> 00:00:56,279
Speaker 1: know how this podcast begins. So let's jump right in.

15
00:00:56,280 --> 00:01:00,960
Speaker 1: In tedious exile now too long detained dead lists languished

16
00:01:01,000 --> 00:01:04,720
Speaker 1: for his native land. The sea foreclosed his flight. Yet

17
00:01:04,760 --> 00:01:08,199
Speaker 1: thus he said, though earth and water, in subjection laid

18
00:01:08,480 --> 00:01:12,280
Speaker 1: oh cruel minos thy dominion, B will go through air,

19
00:01:12,760 --> 00:01:16,240
Speaker 1: for sure, the air is free. Then to new arts.

20
00:01:16,319 --> 00:01:19,440
Speaker 1: His cunning thought applies, and to improve the work of

21
00:01:19,560 --> 00:01:23,520
Speaker 1: nature tries a row of quills and gradual order placed

22
00:01:24,120 --> 00:01:27,200
Speaker 1: rise by degrees in length from first to last. As

23
00:01:27,200 --> 00:01:31,240
Speaker 1: on a cliff, the ascending thicket grows or different reads

24
00:01:31,360 --> 00:01:35,120
Speaker 1: the rural pipe compose. Along the middle runs a twine

25
00:01:35,280 --> 00:01:38,959
Speaker 1: of flax. The bottom stems are joined by pliant wax,

26
00:01:39,400 --> 00:01:43,800
Speaker 1: thus well compact. A hollow bending brings the fine composure

27
00:01:43,959 --> 00:01:48,560
Speaker 1: into real wings. His boy, young Icarus, that near him stood,

28
00:01:49,080 --> 00:01:53,240
Speaker 1: unthinking of his fate, with smiles, pursued the floating feathers

29
00:01:53,520 --> 00:01:56,720
Speaker 1: which the moving air bore loosely from the ground and

30
00:01:56,840 --> 00:02:01,040
Speaker 1: wasted here and there, or with the wax, and pertinently played,

31
00:02:01,280 --> 00:02:04,960
Speaker 1: and with his childish tricks, the great design delayed the

32
00:02:05,040 --> 00:02:08,760
Speaker 1: final master stroke at last imposed, and now the neat

33
00:02:08,800 --> 00:02:13,600
Speaker 1: machine completely closed. Fitting his pinions. On a flight, he

34
00:02:13,680 --> 00:02:18,440
Speaker 1: tries and hung self balanced and the beaten skies. Then

35
00:02:18,440 --> 00:02:21,799
Speaker 1: thus instructs his child, My boy, take care to win

36
00:02:21,960 --> 00:02:25,120
Speaker 1: your course along the middle air. If low the surge

37
00:02:25,240 --> 00:02:28,280
Speaker 1: is wet your flagging plumes. If high the sun the

38
00:02:28,320 --> 00:02:32,760
Speaker 1: melting wax consumed, steer between both, nor to the northern skies,

39
00:02:33,080 --> 00:02:36,520
Speaker 1: nor south orion. Turn your giddy eyes, but follow me.

40
00:02:37,120 --> 00:02:40,640
Speaker 1: Let me before you lay rules for the flight and

41
00:02:40,760 --> 00:02:44,640
Speaker 1: mark the pathless way. Then teaching with a fond concern

42
00:02:44,800 --> 00:02:48,280
Speaker 1: his son. He took the untried wings and fixed them on,

43
00:02:48,760 --> 00:02:52,080
Speaker 1: but fixed with trembling hands, and as he speaks, the

44
00:02:52,200 --> 00:02:56,120
Speaker 1: tears rolled gently down his aged cheeks. Then kissed and

45
00:02:56,200 --> 00:02:59,720
Speaker 1: in his arms embraced him fast, but knew not this

46
00:03:00,040 --> 00:03:03,400
Speaker 1: brace must be the last. And mounting upward as he

47
00:03:03,480 --> 00:03:06,639
Speaker 1: wings his flight back on his charge, he turns an

48
00:03:06,639 --> 00:03:10,920
Speaker 1: aching sight as parent birds when their first callow care

49
00:03:11,360 --> 00:03:14,600
Speaker 1: leave the high ness to tempt the liquid air, then

50
00:03:14,760 --> 00:03:18,200
Speaker 1: cheers him on and oft with fatal art, reminds the

51
00:03:18,280 --> 00:03:21,840
Speaker 1: stripling to perform his part. These as the angler at

52
00:03:21,880 --> 00:03:25,600
Speaker 1: the silent brook, or mountain shepherd leaning on his crook,

53
00:03:26,040 --> 00:03:29,760
Speaker 1: or gaping plowman from the veil descries, they stare and

54
00:03:29,880 --> 00:03:34,080
Speaker 1: view them with religious eyes, and straight conclude them gods,

55
00:03:34,080 --> 00:03:37,600
Speaker 1: since none but they, through their own azure skies could

56
00:03:37,680 --> 00:03:41,440
Speaker 1: find a way. Now delos Paros on the left are

57
00:03:41,480 --> 00:03:45,760
Speaker 1: Scene and Samos, favored by Jove's haughty queen. Upon the

58
00:03:45,880 --> 00:03:49,520
Speaker 1: right the isle of Lebenthos named and fair Calumny for

59
00:03:49,640 --> 00:03:53,320
Speaker 1: its honey famed. When now the boy, whose childish thoughts

60
00:03:53,320 --> 00:03:57,480
Speaker 1: aspire to loftier aims and make him ramble higher, grown

61
00:03:57,560 --> 00:04:01,960
Speaker 1: wild and wanton, more emboldened flies far from his guide

62
00:04:02,200 --> 00:04:05,880
Speaker 1: and source. Among the skies, the softening wax that felt

63
00:04:05,880 --> 00:04:09,480
Speaker 1: a nearer son dissolved a pace and soon began to

64
00:04:09,600 --> 00:04:13,760
Speaker 1: run the youth in vain. His melting pinions shakes, his

65
00:04:13,840 --> 00:04:18,200
Speaker 1: feathers gone no longer air. He takes oh father, Father,

66
00:04:18,480 --> 00:04:21,200
Speaker 1: as he strove to cry down to the sea. He

67
00:04:21,320 --> 00:04:24,799
Speaker 1: tumbled from on high and found his fate, yet still

68
00:04:24,839 --> 00:04:32,480
Speaker 1: subsists by fame among those waters that retain his name.

69
00:04:33,760 --> 00:04:35,760
Speaker 1: Welcome stuff to blow your mind. A production of I

70
00:04:35,800 --> 00:04:44,320
Speaker 1: Heart Radios has to work. Hey, are you welcome to

71
00:04:44,360 --> 00:04:46,520
Speaker 1: stuff to blow your mind? My name is Robert Lamb

72
00:04:46,600 --> 00:04:49,200
Speaker 1: and I'm Joe McCormick. And that was of course from

73
00:04:49,240 --> 00:04:54,160
Speaker 1: Ovid's Metamorphoses. The Garthen Dryden translation the story of Dadalus

74
00:04:54,160 --> 00:04:57,000
Speaker 1: and Icarus one of our favorites that actually, i'd say

75
00:04:57,040 --> 00:04:59,440
Speaker 1: is a sort of recurring theme on invention as well.

76
00:05:00,279 --> 00:05:01,919
Speaker 1: It was one of our I believe we wanted to

77
00:05:01,960 --> 00:05:05,200
Speaker 1: originally call the show data lists in fact uh, and

78
00:05:05,440 --> 00:05:08,200
Speaker 1: it was decided that that was to obscure. The business

79
00:05:08,200 --> 00:05:12,560
Speaker 1: masters were like, people will not know what that is. Um,

80
00:05:12,600 --> 00:05:15,720
Speaker 1: you know, I enjoyed reading through this uh, this excerpt

81
00:05:15,839 --> 00:05:18,880
Speaker 1: from from ovid here, because even though we have talked

82
00:05:19,040 --> 00:05:22,520
Speaker 1: at length about data lists and Nichris before and or

83
00:05:22,520 --> 00:05:24,280
Speaker 1: at least in passing, you know, bringing up just sort

84
00:05:24,320 --> 00:05:26,720
Speaker 1: of the metaphor and the invention and talked we've talked

85
00:05:26,720 --> 00:05:31,080
Speaker 1: about data lists, other uh inventions and myth as well.

86
00:05:31,120 --> 00:05:34,400
Speaker 1: But this, this reading, I think is is rather nice

87
00:05:34,440 --> 00:05:38,200
Speaker 1: because it also captures the humanity of the characters. And

88
00:05:38,200 --> 00:05:42,000
Speaker 1: and certainly as a father, you know, I can certainly

89
00:05:42,000 --> 00:05:44,159
Speaker 1: relate to some of these feelings as he's trying to

90
00:05:44,160 --> 00:05:48,920
Speaker 1: prepare his boy for the challenges ahead. There's real passion,

91
00:05:49,000 --> 00:05:51,880
Speaker 1: and there's passion and the different concerns of the father

92
00:05:51,960 --> 00:05:54,919
Speaker 1: and the son. The father wants freedom, wants escape, and

93
00:05:54,920 --> 00:05:58,880
Speaker 1: he wants safety, and the son wants fun. It's basically

94
00:05:59,080 --> 00:06:03,920
Speaker 1: um catste even song, father and son, but in in

95
00:06:03,920 --> 00:06:06,040
Speaker 1: in mythic form. Now, there are a lot of themes

96
00:06:06,080 --> 00:06:08,920
Speaker 1: you could get into when discussing the story of Icarus

97
00:06:08,920 --> 00:06:11,039
Speaker 1: and Dadalus. So one of the main themes, of course,

98
00:06:11,200 --> 00:06:13,920
Speaker 1: that people draw out of this story is the theme

99
00:06:14,080 --> 00:06:19,719
Speaker 1: of over confidence and over confidence leading to disaster, right, yes,

100
00:06:19,839 --> 00:06:21,880
Speaker 1: and so that is going to be our main focus

101
00:06:21,960 --> 00:06:24,279
Speaker 1: for these episodes. We were pretty excited about it. We

102
00:06:24,320 --> 00:06:27,520
Speaker 1: did no research and and we think we can we

103
00:06:27,520 --> 00:06:29,440
Speaker 1: can probably get four or five episodes out of this,

104
00:06:29,560 --> 00:06:31,760
Speaker 1: so we can just wing it, you know, you know,

105
00:06:32,080 --> 00:06:35,080
Speaker 1: winging it. Yes, yes, that is what it is. I

106
00:06:35,160 --> 00:06:37,440
Speaker 1: think that is maybe I wonder if that's where the

107
00:06:37,440 --> 00:06:40,200
Speaker 1: phrase comes from. You're just winging it like Icarus. I

108
00:06:40,240 --> 00:06:42,440
Speaker 1: don't know. Okay, well, if you got lost in the

109
00:06:42,480 --> 00:06:46,599
Speaker 1: English couplets there of Garth and Dryden and so forth, Robert,

110
00:06:46,640 --> 00:06:48,799
Speaker 1: could you just give a brief summary of what actually

111
00:06:48,800 --> 00:06:51,360
Speaker 1: happens in the myth of Icarus and Daedalus. Yeah, yeah,

112
00:06:51,520 --> 00:06:54,719
Speaker 1: just breaking it down to the major plot points here. Um.

113
00:06:55,360 --> 00:06:59,000
Speaker 1: These these are artificial wings crafted by the master engineer Daedalus,

114
00:06:59,200 --> 00:07:02,240
Speaker 1: and then he, uh, he helps his son Icarus put

115
00:07:02,279 --> 00:07:05,560
Speaker 1: them on. They're using these to escape from Minos. He

116
00:07:05,640 --> 00:07:07,880
Speaker 1: who is the master of the Maze and the master

117
00:07:07,920 --> 00:07:11,480
Speaker 1: of the Minotaur. Um and uh so you know, he

118
00:07:11,760 --> 00:07:14,720
Speaker 1: puts these these amazing wings on him. But then Icarus

119
00:07:14,800 --> 00:07:17,000
Speaker 1: flies too close to the sun, the rays melt the

120
00:07:17,000 --> 00:07:19,480
Speaker 1: wax and he falls to his death. And he's been

121
00:07:19,520 --> 00:07:22,960
Speaker 1: specifically warned, Yeah, don't fly too close to the sun,

122
00:07:23,400 --> 00:07:25,679
Speaker 1: it's gonna melt the wax. You're gonna plummet and fall.

123
00:07:25,760 --> 00:07:29,960
Speaker 1: But he still flies too high. He flies beyond the

124
00:07:29,960 --> 00:07:34,120
Speaker 1: the his ability, flies beyond the engineering constraints of the wings,

125
00:07:34,480 --> 00:07:36,840
Speaker 1: and perishes for it. I love the word choice in

126
00:07:36,920 --> 00:07:39,680
Speaker 1: the poem in the English version. He wants to ramble higher.

127
00:07:40,400 --> 00:07:42,600
Speaker 1: He's he's having fun, he's out there. He's like, it'll

128
00:07:42,640 --> 00:07:45,320
Speaker 1: be fine. Yeah. And I think one of the key

129
00:07:45,360 --> 00:07:47,160
Speaker 1: things to keep in mind about the Smith, if we're

130
00:07:47,200 --> 00:07:50,480
Speaker 1: looking at it and focusing on over confidence, is that

131
00:07:50,880 --> 00:07:54,960
Speaker 1: Daedalus is a master uh at at creating these wings,

132
00:07:55,040 --> 00:07:58,200
Speaker 1: and Icarus is no slouch at flying with them, obviously,

133
00:07:58,520 --> 00:08:00,400
Speaker 1: So it's not a you know, an imperor his new

134
00:08:00,400 --> 00:08:05,880
Speaker 1: clothes scenario where one is confident, you know, with without

135
00:08:05,880 --> 00:08:08,840
Speaker 1: any underlying skill, Like there's plenty of skill to go

136
00:08:08,920 --> 00:08:11,440
Speaker 1: around here. But the idea is that chorus as sends

137
00:08:11,520 --> 00:08:14,360
Speaker 1: just a little too high, he he goes to that

138
00:08:14,400 --> 00:08:18,200
Speaker 1: place that he has warned two road to to avoid,

139
00:08:18,480 --> 00:08:20,600
Speaker 1: and that is his downfall. Even though there is a

140
00:08:20,640 --> 00:08:24,560
Speaker 1: real basis for confidence, the confidence in the brain exceeds

141
00:08:24,600 --> 00:08:28,240
Speaker 1: the confidence warranted by circumstances. But then that becomes the

142
00:08:28,240 --> 00:08:31,800
Speaker 1: whole focus of the myth. Right, nobody stops to admire, like, hey,

143
00:08:31,880 --> 00:08:34,800
Speaker 1: datal Is really built some amazing wings and Acharus was

144
00:08:34,840 --> 00:08:37,240
Speaker 1: really great at flying them. Now we just focus on

145
00:08:37,240 --> 00:08:39,400
Speaker 1: the fact that he dies and falls into the ocean.

146
00:08:39,679 --> 00:08:43,640
Speaker 1: And this very idea of like overconfidence, that you know,

147
00:08:43,800 --> 00:08:47,360
Speaker 1: that that meets a tragic end is such a powerful

148
00:08:47,440 --> 00:08:51,320
Speaker 1: and common theme of myths and drama throughout history. Yeah,

149
00:08:51,520 --> 00:08:54,120
Speaker 1: myths and drama and of course human histories, which of

150
00:08:54,160 --> 00:08:59,800
Speaker 1: course involved both myth making and dramatic storytelling telling. But

151
00:09:00,200 --> 00:09:02,200
Speaker 1: there's just so much of it. It's such a frequent

152
00:09:02,240 --> 00:09:04,920
Speaker 1: trope that on one hand, it's easy to just not

153
00:09:05,080 --> 00:09:07,040
Speaker 1: think about it, like this is just what happens in

154
00:09:07,080 --> 00:09:10,800
Speaker 1: our stories. So, you know, we either can't get enough

155
00:09:10,840 --> 00:09:14,800
Speaker 1: of tales of hubrists and uh and over confidence, or

156
00:09:14,840 --> 00:09:17,960
Speaker 1: it's just such a common feature of human enterprise and

157
00:09:17,960 --> 00:09:21,720
Speaker 1: ambition that is just a necessary plot point in almost

158
00:09:21,720 --> 00:09:25,040
Speaker 1: any tale worth telling. Yeah, I think it's not a

159
00:09:25,040 --> 00:09:30,040
Speaker 1: coincidence that so many figures from history display hubris and overconfidence,

160
00:09:30,200 --> 00:09:33,360
Speaker 1: because I think overconfidence is the kind of trait that,

161
00:09:33,480 --> 00:09:36,800
Speaker 1: in a lot of cases specifically is what gets you

162
00:09:36,880 --> 00:09:40,480
Speaker 1: into the history books and h and from a historical

163
00:09:40,520 --> 00:09:43,040
Speaker 1: point of view, um you know, granted, is not always

164
00:09:43,040 --> 00:09:45,320
Speaker 1: a simple matter, because you know, when you encounter the

165
00:09:45,360 --> 00:09:48,480
Speaker 1: all too frequent tales of an overconfident but a net ruler,

166
00:09:48,800 --> 00:09:51,559
Speaker 1: you have to consider that you know, uh, these you know,

167
00:09:51,600 --> 00:09:53,800
Speaker 1: the history is told by the victors, and this is

168
00:09:53,840 --> 00:09:57,240
Speaker 1: likely you know the story about about about a deposed ruler.

169
00:09:57,559 --> 00:10:00,360
Speaker 1: But sure enough, you look at any um you know

170
00:10:00,480 --> 00:10:04,880
Speaker 1: history of kings and emperors, you will inevitably find multiple

171
00:10:04,920 --> 00:10:07,920
Speaker 1: examples of someone who has pointed out for their overconfidence

172
00:10:07,960 --> 00:10:10,960
Speaker 1: like this, this ruler became too overconfident and that was

173
00:10:11,000 --> 00:10:13,920
Speaker 1: their downfall. And of course the world of mythic expression

174
00:10:14,040 --> 00:10:17,760
Speaker 1: is just full of wonderful examples to chew on. One

175
00:10:17,800 --> 00:10:20,680
Speaker 1: that certainly comes to mind in Judeo Christian traditions and

176
00:10:20,840 --> 00:10:24,680
Speaker 1: especially in Milton's literary treatment of the character, is that

177
00:10:24,760 --> 00:10:28,840
Speaker 1: of Satan, like the classic character who who you know,

178
00:10:29,000 --> 00:10:32,120
Speaker 1: was prideful enough to rebel against the all powerful creator

179
00:10:32,240 --> 00:10:34,960
Speaker 1: God and uh and then falls for it. And that

180
00:10:35,080 --> 00:10:37,559
Speaker 1: is actually a concept from the Bible itself, from the

181
00:10:37,760 --> 00:10:40,640
Speaker 1: from the Tanaka, I mean, in Proverbs sixteen eighteen, you

182
00:10:40,679 --> 00:10:43,880
Speaker 1: get pride go with before destruction, the haughty spirit before

183
00:10:43,880 --> 00:10:46,720
Speaker 1: a fall. Yeah uh, and then of course we already

184
00:10:46,720 --> 00:10:49,000
Speaker 1: talked about about Icarus. But yeah, You'll find plenty of

185
00:10:49,040 --> 00:10:53,800
Speaker 1: examples of God's smiting immortal underlings or mere mortals for

186
00:10:54,040 --> 00:10:58,839
Speaker 1: defying them. And often their central crime is basically they

187
00:10:58,520 --> 00:11:01,720
Speaker 1: that they dared to think themselves greater than they are.

188
00:11:01,760 --> 00:11:05,640
Speaker 1: They overstepped their status in place in the Grand hierarchy.

189
00:11:05,760 --> 00:11:08,320
Speaker 1: In fact, in addition to to Icarus, I think at

190
00:11:08,400 --> 00:11:11,079
Speaker 1: least two tales are worth pointing out, But these are

191
00:11:11,240 --> 00:11:15,360
Speaker 1: by far not the only stories of God's punishing mortals

192
00:11:15,360 --> 00:11:18,760
Speaker 1: and immortals for overstepping their boundaries. One of my favorites

193
00:11:18,840 --> 00:11:22,319
Speaker 1: is the Web of Arachney. So this is this is

194
00:11:22,360 --> 00:11:25,520
Speaker 1: a wonderful tale in which you have the mortal Arachney

195
00:11:25,720 --> 00:11:29,280
Speaker 1: who challenges athena goddess of wisdom and crafts, to a

196
00:11:29,280 --> 00:11:32,400
Speaker 1: weaving contest, which, of course is always a terrible thing

197
00:11:32,440 --> 00:11:36,320
Speaker 1: to do. Never challenge a god to a contest unless

198
00:11:36,360 --> 00:11:39,000
Speaker 1: it's a fiddle contest, and that God is the devil

199
00:11:39,120 --> 00:11:42,000
Speaker 1: and you're down in Georgia, right, And then yes, maybe

200
00:11:42,000 --> 00:11:43,640
Speaker 1: you can pull it off in the in that in

201
00:11:44,240 --> 00:11:48,920
Speaker 1: that specific scenario. Um but but but in this scenario,

202
00:11:49,000 --> 00:11:50,600
Speaker 1: you know, you're not dealing with the devil, You're dealing

203
00:11:50,640 --> 00:11:54,679
Speaker 1: with the goddess Athena. And so Athena, as one might expect,

204
00:11:54,880 --> 00:11:59,400
Speaker 1: crafts a perfect tapestry, resplendent and depictions of the god's

205
00:11:59,480 --> 00:12:06,599
Speaker 1: punishing mortals for their hubrists, and Arachne creates unequally awesome tapestry.

206
00:12:06,600 --> 00:12:10,160
Speaker 1: But hers depicts all the various ways that the gods

207
00:12:10,160 --> 00:12:14,199
Speaker 1: have manipulated and tormented mortals. Um, so she's getting a

208
00:12:14,200 --> 00:12:18,240
Speaker 1: little fresh. Yeah. Well, they're both putting a lot of uh,

209
00:12:18,440 --> 00:12:21,880
Speaker 1: you know, a lot of emotion into their their work

210
00:12:21,960 --> 00:12:24,080
Speaker 1: here there, and they're both kind of taunting the other

211
00:12:24,200 --> 00:12:28,000
Speaker 1: with their subject matter. The problem is Arachne is immortal

212
00:12:28,080 --> 00:12:30,680
Speaker 1: and Athena is a god. Uh. And of course the

213
00:12:30,720 --> 00:12:33,800
Speaker 1: Greek gods are not known for their reasonable demeanor, So

214
00:12:33,880 --> 00:12:36,240
Speaker 1: don't play fair, right, they don't, And so Athena doesn't

215
00:12:36,320 --> 00:12:40,760
Speaker 1: play fair. Instead, she becomes enraged, She destroys Arachne's work,

216
00:12:41,080 --> 00:12:45,080
Speaker 1: beats her, and leaves her to suicidal shame. And after

217
00:12:45,160 --> 00:12:49,000
Speaker 1: she has died, Arachne becomes the spiders of Earth. And

218
00:12:49,040 --> 00:12:51,880
Speaker 1: that's kind of the origin story for spiders and and

219
00:12:51,920 --> 00:12:56,600
Speaker 1: so forth biological ideological myth. Right, it tells why spiders weave. Yeah.

220
00:12:56,800 --> 00:12:58,720
Speaker 1: But but one of the interesting wrinkles in all of

221
00:12:58,720 --> 00:13:01,640
Speaker 1: this is that both the streets are accurate from their

222
00:13:01,679 --> 00:13:04,840
Speaker 1: creator's points of view, that the ending to this story

223
00:13:05,200 --> 00:13:08,120
Speaker 1: is either yet another example of the god's cruelty or

224
00:13:08,160 --> 00:13:12,760
Speaker 1: another example of mortals being rightfully punished for their pride. Um.

225
00:13:12,880 --> 00:13:19,120
Speaker 1: And again, much like the chorus scenario, Arachney is highly skilled,

226
00:13:19,280 --> 00:13:24,319
Speaker 1: like she crafts a work that rivals or even equals,

227
00:13:24,400 --> 00:13:28,920
Speaker 1: or or perhaps even surpasses the work of the goddess. Uh.

228
00:13:29,000 --> 00:13:32,040
Speaker 1: So she may not have have overstepped her ability, but

229
00:13:32,160 --> 00:13:35,240
Speaker 1: she certainly oversteps her place. Right, It's a different kind

230
00:13:35,240 --> 00:13:37,760
Speaker 1: of pride. She wasn't over confident, and how good of

231
00:13:37,760 --> 00:13:40,920
Speaker 1: a weaver she is, she was over confident in what

232
00:13:41,200 --> 00:13:44,760
Speaker 1: she could get away with saying yeah. And then, of course,

233
00:13:44,800 --> 00:13:47,480
Speaker 1: another example, in one that we come back to again

234
00:13:47,480 --> 00:13:50,680
Speaker 1: and again on the show, is that of Prometheus. Uh. Prometheus,

235
00:13:50,760 --> 00:13:54,800
Speaker 1: the Titan, having stolen from the gods the secret of fire,

236
00:13:55,280 --> 00:13:59,000
Speaker 1: defied them in giving this secret to the mortals. Uh.

237
00:13:59,000 --> 00:14:02,480
Speaker 1: He is then punished for all eternity for this sin. Yeah.

238
00:14:02,559 --> 00:14:04,280
Speaker 1: Another one that comes to my mind is the myth

239
00:14:04,280 --> 00:14:08,439
Speaker 1: of Feton, the son of the god Helio. So remember

240
00:14:08,440 --> 00:14:10,640
Speaker 1: he wants to pilot the chariot. He's like, I want

241
00:14:10,640 --> 00:14:13,240
Speaker 1: to get in the chariot, but uh, he's warned it

242
00:14:13,240 --> 00:14:15,240
Speaker 1: would not be a good idea, and he's like, no, no,

243
00:14:15,280 --> 00:14:17,720
Speaker 1: I can handle it. I can Yeah, I can drive.

244
00:14:18,280 --> 00:14:21,360
Speaker 1: And he gets in there and the horses, I don't

245
00:14:21,360 --> 00:14:24,240
Speaker 1: remember exactly what happens, like the horses don't recognize him

246
00:14:24,280 --> 00:14:27,520
Speaker 1: or something. They go nuts, and the chariot crashes into

247
00:14:27,560 --> 00:14:30,280
Speaker 1: the earth or something, or right there, there's general disaster.

248
00:14:30,640 --> 00:14:32,840
Speaker 1: Right yeah, that's a good one. And then then there

249
00:14:32,840 --> 00:14:35,600
Speaker 1: are various other tales as well that that we could

250
00:14:35,720 --> 00:14:38,240
Speaker 1: we could we could focus on, because again it's just

251
00:14:38,280 --> 00:14:42,480
Speaker 1: a recurring theme in Greek mythology, but but also you know,

252
00:14:42,560 --> 00:14:46,200
Speaker 1: other belief systems as well, like, for instance, just briefly,

253
00:14:46,280 --> 00:14:50,160
Speaker 1: there's a fun Chinese example of pride and punishment in

254
00:14:50,160 --> 00:14:54,000
Speaker 1: which the Yellow Emperor makes use of of ying long

255
00:14:54,120 --> 00:14:57,480
Speaker 1: that the responding dragon to execute the god of war

256
00:14:57,880 --> 00:15:01,160
Speaker 1: Chi you after we dared to a's arms against the

257
00:15:01,240 --> 00:15:03,440
Speaker 1: Yellow Emperor. So there that would be a tale of

258
00:15:03,440 --> 00:15:06,200
Speaker 1: the god of war being overconfident in his ability to

259
00:15:06,400 --> 00:15:09,240
Speaker 1: overthrow the king. Yeah, so many times you do see

260
00:15:09,240 --> 00:15:12,000
Speaker 1: a more of a militant example of this, you know,

261
00:15:12,080 --> 00:15:15,160
Speaker 1: the idea that, oh, you think you can defeat the God,

262
00:15:15,240 --> 00:15:18,040
Speaker 1: that you cannot, and you're punished for that um either,

263
00:15:18,160 --> 00:15:20,160
Speaker 1: you know, and in other times it's a contest or

264
00:15:20,240 --> 00:15:23,520
Speaker 1: something to that effect. One thing that I love in

265
00:15:23,560 --> 00:15:27,640
Speaker 1: the Greek conception of of hubris is that there was

266
00:15:27,680 --> 00:15:32,240
Speaker 1: a goddess that existed purely to splatter people who displayed

267
00:15:32,360 --> 00:15:35,640
Speaker 1: arrogance and over confidence. And this was the goddess Nemesis,

268
00:15:35,640 --> 00:15:37,960
Speaker 1: who I really think we we I wish we had

269
00:15:38,000 --> 00:15:41,600
Speaker 1: a Nemesis today. Uh So I found I was looking

270
00:15:41,600 --> 00:15:44,520
Speaker 1: around for stuff about Nemesis, and I found this amazing

271
00:15:44,600 --> 00:15:48,480
Speaker 1: thing that was a a hymn to the goddess Nemesis,

272
00:15:48,520 --> 00:15:52,160
Speaker 1: composed by somebody from ancient Greece named Mesomades. And this

273
00:15:52,240 --> 00:15:56,040
Speaker 1: is a translation by somebody named d Yelled. So I've

274
00:15:56,040 --> 00:16:00,160
Speaker 1: got to read this. This, this boiled my brain. Winged Nemesis,

275
00:16:00,360 --> 00:16:04,320
Speaker 1: turner of the scales of life, blue eyed goddess, daughter

276
00:16:04,400 --> 00:16:08,560
Speaker 1: of Justice, who with your unbending bridle dominate the vain

277
00:16:08,720 --> 00:16:13,200
Speaker 1: arrogance of men. And loathing man's fatal vanity, obliterate black

278
00:16:13,320 --> 00:16:17,440
Speaker 1: envy beneath your wheel, unstable and leaving no imprint. The

279
00:16:17,480 --> 00:16:20,800
Speaker 1: fate of men is tossed you, who come unnoticed in

280
00:16:20,840 --> 00:16:24,920
Speaker 1: an instant to subdue the insolent head. You measure life

281
00:16:24,960 --> 00:16:28,200
Speaker 1: with your hand and with frowning brows, hold the yoke.

282
00:16:28,760 --> 00:16:32,800
Speaker 1: Hail blessed, immortal Goddess, winged Nemesis, turning the scales of

283
00:16:32,880 --> 00:16:39,840
Speaker 1: life imperishable and holy Goddess Nemesis. Victory of unfurled wings. Powerful, infallible,

284
00:16:40,000 --> 00:16:43,720
Speaker 1: who shares the altar with justice and furious at human pride,

285
00:16:44,040 --> 00:16:48,080
Speaker 1: casts a man into the abyss of Tartarus. Yeah. When

286
00:16:48,080 --> 00:16:50,600
Speaker 1: I read that at home the other day, I like

287
00:16:50,800 --> 00:16:54,800
Speaker 1: literally exclaimed out loud. Um. While I'm not usually a

288
00:16:54,840 --> 00:16:57,480
Speaker 1: big like cast people into Tartarus kind of guy, you know,

289
00:16:57,520 --> 00:17:00,400
Speaker 1: I don't love like eternal torment and hell and all that,

290
00:17:00,840 --> 00:17:03,360
Speaker 1: I do kind of wish for animesis sometimes to like

291
00:17:03,560 --> 00:17:07,160
Speaker 1: fly in, scoop up the fatally vein and arrogant leaders

292
00:17:07,160 --> 00:17:10,840
Speaker 1: who you know, inflict their over confidence on everybody else

293
00:17:10,880 --> 00:17:13,760
Speaker 1: and kind of just toss him under the wheel. Yeah,

294
00:17:13,840 --> 00:17:17,000
Speaker 1: I I too love this concept of a nemesis. Uh.

295
00:17:17,000 --> 00:17:20,359
Speaker 1: It's also a frequent subject of paintings. You'll see a

296
00:17:20,359 --> 00:17:22,919
Speaker 1: lot of you know, European paintings of an nemesis that

297
00:17:23,080 --> 00:17:28,320
Speaker 1: really uh to take advantage of these angelic properties that

298
00:17:28,359 --> 00:17:32,560
Speaker 1: are described here, this winged uh female form that is

299
00:17:32,640 --> 00:17:36,359
Speaker 1: beautiful and terrifying, an embodiment of something kind of like karma,

300
00:17:36,520 --> 00:17:39,920
Speaker 1: you know, divine retribution, the goddess that comes to avenge

301
00:17:39,960 --> 00:17:42,840
Speaker 1: against you when you become too prideful. Though, I do

302
00:17:42,920 --> 00:17:45,399
Speaker 1: think it's actually more complicated than we usually think of

303
00:17:45,480 --> 00:17:48,560
Speaker 1: hubris in the modern sense, right, because like the way

304
00:17:48,600 --> 00:17:52,360
Speaker 1: we use hubris, it really does just generally mean like pride, arrogance,

305
00:17:52,400 --> 00:17:55,520
Speaker 1: and overconfidence. But I think you were looking into something

306
00:17:55,560 --> 00:17:58,560
Speaker 1: about how the ancient Greeks had a more complicated and

307
00:17:58,640 --> 00:18:03,040
Speaker 1: specific definition it gets it gets interesting. I was looking

308
00:18:03,160 --> 00:18:07,720
Speaker 1: at at the Oxford Classical Dictionary, and as N. R. E.

309
00:18:07,920 --> 00:18:13,680
Speaker 1: Fisher pointed out, it was really more of intentionally dishonoring behavior.

310
00:18:14,640 --> 00:18:17,840
Speaker 1: And the author points to Aristotle is providing a solid

311
00:18:17,920 --> 00:18:22,439
Speaker 1: understanding of Greek hubrists. So Aristotle contends that Hubrists was

312
00:18:22,520 --> 00:18:26,440
Speaker 1: quote doing and saying things at which the victim incurs shame,

313
00:18:26,880 --> 00:18:29,720
Speaker 1: not in order that one may achieve anything other than

314
00:18:29,760 --> 00:18:32,600
Speaker 1: what he's done, but simply to get pleasure from it.

315
00:18:32,920 --> 00:18:35,399
Speaker 1: For those who act in return for something do not

316
00:18:35,480 --> 00:18:39,560
Speaker 1: commit hubris, They avenge themselves. The cause of the pleasure

317
00:18:39,640 --> 00:18:43,080
Speaker 1: for those committing hubrists is that by harming people, they

318
00:18:43,080 --> 00:18:46,240
Speaker 1: think themselves superior. That is why the young and the

319
00:18:46,359 --> 00:18:49,880
Speaker 1: rich of humoristic as they think they are superior when

320
00:18:49,880 --> 00:18:54,080
Speaker 1: they commit hubris. This is so it's just sadism. Yeah, Basically,

321
00:18:54,200 --> 00:18:57,280
Speaker 1: it's just like being mean for mean sake and being

322
00:18:57,720 --> 00:19:00,400
Speaker 1: like hurting people in the dishonorable way. And I think

323
00:19:00,880 --> 00:19:04,960
Speaker 1: specifically because it makes you feel superior, right, Yeah, And

324
00:19:04,960 --> 00:19:07,000
Speaker 1: and it is also worth noting that like this is

325
00:19:07,000 --> 00:19:10,440
Speaker 1: apparently really key to the system of honor and dishonor

326
00:19:10,480 --> 00:19:13,560
Speaker 1: that which really important to Greek society. That's right, I think.

327
00:19:13,560 --> 00:19:15,880
Speaker 1: I mean, one thing that's kind of hard to understand

328
00:19:15,960 --> 00:19:18,880
Speaker 1: is like when you read ancient Greek literature, you might

329
00:19:18,920 --> 00:19:21,359
Speaker 1: notice that they seem to have a different idea of

330
00:19:21,359 --> 00:19:24,720
Speaker 1: morality than we usually do, Like for them that they're

331
00:19:24,760 --> 00:19:28,000
Speaker 1: concepts of morals often have more to do with with

332
00:19:28,119 --> 00:19:31,679
Speaker 1: things that are considered honorable versus things that are considered

333
00:19:31,880 --> 00:19:35,399
Speaker 1: say uh, for the good of others. Uh. And you

334
00:19:35,400 --> 00:19:37,560
Speaker 1: know it almost what you were just reading reminds me

335
00:19:37,640 --> 00:19:39,920
Speaker 1: of the classical Greek theory of humor, which we talked

336
00:19:39,920 --> 00:19:43,040
Speaker 1: about in our Plato sex Machina episode, so that Plato

337
00:19:43,080 --> 00:19:46,040
Speaker 1: and Aristotle basically said, this is hard to imagine because

338
00:19:46,040 --> 00:19:48,960
Speaker 1: it sounds so so hateful, But you know, these ancient

339
00:19:48,960 --> 00:19:51,920
Speaker 1: Greek philosophers are like, things are funny because they make

340
00:19:51,960 --> 00:19:56,440
Speaker 1: you realize you're superior to other people. Uh So, Plato,

341
00:19:56,520 --> 00:20:00,640
Speaker 1: in his Philibus dialogue is discussing the nature of pleasure,

342
00:20:01,000 --> 00:20:03,280
Speaker 1: and he says, you know, there are different kinds of pleasures.

343
00:20:03,280 --> 00:20:06,720
Speaker 1: He's talking about why pleasures of the mind are better

344
00:20:06,800 --> 00:20:09,760
Speaker 1: than pleasures of the flesh, of the of the body.

345
00:20:09,920 --> 00:20:12,960
Speaker 1: And he's talking about laughing at people, and he says,

346
00:20:13,000 --> 00:20:15,040
Speaker 1: you know, one of the main things that's great about

347
00:20:15,080 --> 00:20:16,840
Speaker 1: laughing at people is that you can laugh at people

348
00:20:16,840 --> 00:20:20,240
Speaker 1: who don't recognize their own misfortune. So there are people

349
00:20:20,320 --> 00:20:23,080
Speaker 1: who are stupid but they think they're smart, or there

350
00:20:23,080 --> 00:20:25,680
Speaker 1: are people who are ugly but they think they're handsome,

351
00:20:25,800 --> 00:20:28,880
Speaker 1: and that's really funny, right. Yeah. But in in in

352
00:20:28,920 --> 00:20:32,200
Speaker 1: this it gets more specifically into the use of violence

353
00:20:32,640 --> 00:20:35,760
Speaker 1: um and Hebrews was taken very seriously in Athens, as

354
00:20:35,800 --> 00:20:38,880
Speaker 1: there was a law of hubris in this context, I've

355
00:20:38,880 --> 00:20:41,600
Speaker 1: seen it define more specifically and in this kind of

356
00:20:41,680 --> 00:20:44,720
Speaker 1: this is basically what Aristotle said, but an even shorter

357
00:20:44,840 --> 00:20:48,040
Speaker 1: version would be the intentional use of violence to humiliate

358
00:20:48,119 --> 00:20:50,960
Speaker 1: or degrade again, kind of a sadism thing. It's like

359
00:20:51,200 --> 00:20:54,080
Speaker 1: I'm better than you, and I'll show you by hurting you. Yeah.

360
00:20:54,160 --> 00:20:57,160
Speaker 1: And and in Athens, unlike murder charges which could only

361
00:20:57,160 --> 00:21:00,439
Speaker 1: be brought forth by the family of the victim, charges

362
00:21:00,480 --> 00:21:04,080
Speaker 1: of hubrists, like charges of treason or impeity, could be

363
00:21:04,160 --> 00:21:07,640
Speaker 1: leveled by anyone at anyone. So it's we're talking about

364
00:21:07,680 --> 00:21:11,560
Speaker 1: shameful conduct that ultimately threatens the shame on or building

365
00:21:11,560 --> 00:21:15,240
Speaker 1: blocks of society itself. You know, I do see a connection,

366
00:21:15,280 --> 00:21:17,399
Speaker 1: even though that this is different than what we usually

367
00:21:17,440 --> 00:21:20,240
Speaker 1: think of as hubrist. I see what's going on here,

368
00:21:20,280 --> 00:21:25,320
Speaker 1: like I see the the conceptual link, the link between pride, arrogance,

369
00:21:25,359 --> 00:21:28,080
Speaker 1: over confidence on one hand and sadism on the other.

370
00:21:28,160 --> 00:21:32,160
Speaker 1: I mean, it's sadism almost seems to kind of imply

371
00:21:32,400 --> 00:21:37,080
Speaker 1: and assumed pride and arrogance and over confidence. It assumes

372
00:21:37,160 --> 00:21:40,320
Speaker 1: a world view without stating it that one is, you know, better,

373
00:21:40,480 --> 00:21:43,240
Speaker 1: more deserving than other people, and that their faiths are

374
00:21:43,240 --> 00:21:46,159
Speaker 1: subordinate to your own. Yeah, that it is. It is

375
00:21:46,240 --> 00:21:48,880
Speaker 1: weird to think of this from like a modern standard,

376
00:21:49,040 --> 00:21:52,760
Speaker 1: because you know, I can think of numerous examples of individuals,

377
00:21:52,840 --> 00:21:56,359
Speaker 1: especially like popular celebrity type individuals, where you think of

378
00:21:56,359 --> 00:21:58,400
Speaker 1: them and you think, oh, well, that person is clearly

379
00:21:59,160 --> 00:22:02,240
Speaker 1: guilty of hubre us, and yet by the Greek definition,

380
00:22:02,359 --> 00:22:05,000
Speaker 1: I don't know if they actually used violence against someone.

381
00:22:05,080 --> 00:22:07,840
Speaker 1: Like one of the examples, a political example that was

382
00:22:07,880 --> 00:22:11,800
Speaker 1: brought up was like if if one politician struck another

383
00:22:12,119 --> 00:22:15,520
Speaker 1: during a speech, like that's but I don't know. In

384
00:22:15,560 --> 00:22:17,479
Speaker 1: ancient Greece, maybe that was that was an easier thing

385
00:22:17,520 --> 00:22:19,280
Speaker 1: to occur in Certainly they're examples of things like that

386
00:22:19,320 --> 00:22:23,280
Speaker 1: occurring in American political history, but uh, I mean not

387
00:22:23,440 --> 00:22:27,680
Speaker 1: recently so but well no, but I mean I think, yes,

388
00:22:27,760 --> 00:22:30,359
Speaker 1: you're not coming to physical violence. But I could say

389
00:22:30,400 --> 00:22:33,119
Speaker 1: that that's an extension of the impulse you see, and

390
00:22:33,280 --> 00:22:36,800
Speaker 1: just sort of like bullying and blatant disrespect and all that,

391
00:22:36,840 --> 00:22:41,080
Speaker 1: where you're you are assuming a position of superiority that

392
00:22:41,240 --> 00:22:43,840
Speaker 1: denies that you would even have to to speak on

393
00:22:43,880 --> 00:22:47,200
Speaker 1: another person's terms. Yeah, so I think we see plenty

394
00:22:47,240 --> 00:22:50,400
Speaker 1: of examples of things that are certainly in the spirit

395
00:22:50,680 --> 00:22:54,440
Speaker 1: of of Greek Cubrists, but not the definition of actual

396
00:22:54,440 --> 00:22:57,760
Speaker 1: physical violence. They fall short of that, but perhaps not

397
00:22:57,800 --> 00:22:59,800
Speaker 1: by much. All Right, on that note, we're going to

398
00:22:59,840 --> 00:23:02,239
Speaker 1: say our first break. But when we come back, we

399
00:23:02,280 --> 00:23:04,880
Speaker 1: will will get further into this question of over confidence,

400
00:23:04,880 --> 00:23:09,040
Speaker 1: and we'll start we'll start looking at it beyond mythology

401
00:23:09,119 --> 00:23:12,919
Speaker 1: and history and more at our actual daily lives, in

402
00:23:12,960 --> 00:23:19,600
Speaker 1: our actual inner world. Thank, alright, we're back. Okay, So

403
00:23:19,640 --> 00:23:22,439
Speaker 1: we all think we know what over confidence is. We

404
00:23:22,520 --> 00:23:25,159
Speaker 1: know when we see it. It's a common enough character

405
00:23:25,240 --> 00:23:28,840
Speaker 1: flaw that there are millennia old strains of drama and

406
00:23:28,920 --> 00:23:32,560
Speaker 1: comedy that basically just exists to punish it over and

407
00:23:32,600 --> 00:23:36,280
Speaker 1: over again for our amusement and entertainment. Yeah, and of

408
00:23:36,359 --> 00:23:38,080
Speaker 1: course we always have to remember with tales like that,

409
00:23:38,400 --> 00:23:40,320
Speaker 1: this is not just about the subject of the tale,

410
00:23:40,320 --> 00:23:42,080
Speaker 1: but it's about the consumer of the tale. You know,

411
00:23:42,359 --> 00:23:45,760
Speaker 1: a lot of times we're we're taking in these tales

412
00:23:45,800 --> 00:23:49,520
Speaker 1: of Hubrists not only to relish in the downfall of

413
00:23:49,680 --> 00:23:53,640
Speaker 1: these various villains in our lives and in our histories

414
00:23:53,800 --> 00:23:57,399
Speaker 1: and in our our our world. But also is is

415
00:23:57,440 --> 00:24:02,400
Speaker 1: cautionary tales, you know, like again warnings not to ascend

416
00:24:02,480 --> 00:24:05,679
Speaker 1: too high towards the sun, that sort of thing. Right. Uh,

417
00:24:05,800 --> 00:24:08,320
Speaker 1: So we know over confidence means, of course, having too

418
00:24:08,359 --> 00:24:10,560
Speaker 1: much confidence, but you gotta go one level down from

419
00:24:10,560 --> 00:24:13,760
Speaker 1: that to understand the idea. Try to define confidence, and

420
00:24:13,800 --> 00:24:15,760
Speaker 1: when you do that, I think you do run into

421
00:24:15,800 --> 00:24:19,320
Speaker 1: problems because you discover confidence can mean a number of

422
00:24:19,480 --> 00:24:23,080
Speaker 1: sort of different things that are related but separate. So

423
00:24:23,119 --> 00:24:25,560
Speaker 1: I was looking at a few just Dictionary definitions to

424
00:24:25,560 --> 00:24:27,720
Speaker 1: help get these, uh in order, and I think the

425
00:24:27,760 --> 00:24:30,280
Speaker 1: Miriam Webster ones capture it pretty well. So one is

426
00:24:30,840 --> 00:24:34,119
Speaker 1: a feeling or consciousness of one's powers or of reliance

427
00:24:34,200 --> 00:24:37,719
Speaker 1: on one's circumstances. So applied to the self, that's basically

428
00:24:37,800 --> 00:24:41,240
Speaker 1: the statement I can do this, and that confidence could

429
00:24:41,280 --> 00:24:44,240
Speaker 1: be well founded or not well founded. Um. The next

430
00:24:44,280 --> 00:24:47,240
Speaker 1: one would be faith or belief that one will act

431
00:24:47,280 --> 00:24:50,440
Speaker 1: in a right, proper or effective way. That one's a

432
00:24:50,480 --> 00:24:53,040
Speaker 1: little more complicated, so that that's not just I can

433
00:24:53,119 --> 00:24:56,159
Speaker 1: do it, but I will do the right thing. Like

434
00:24:56,280 --> 00:24:58,800
Speaker 1: an example of this that I run into every now

435
00:24:58,800 --> 00:25:00,960
Speaker 1: and then its discussions of will happen if I win

436
00:25:01,000 --> 00:25:03,760
Speaker 1: the lottery? You will not be able to handle all

437
00:25:03,880 --> 00:25:06,640
Speaker 1: that money coming into your life, and you're not prepared

438
00:25:06,680 --> 00:25:08,760
Speaker 1: for what it's going to do to your your your

439
00:25:08,800 --> 00:25:12,080
Speaker 1: social world. But then you think, I don't know, I

440
00:25:12,080 --> 00:25:14,399
Speaker 1: think I can handle it though I think I'm the exception.

441
00:25:14,600 --> 00:25:16,359
Speaker 1: I think I'd be able to put that money to

442
00:25:16,400 --> 00:25:18,280
Speaker 1: good use, and I don't think wealth will change me

443
00:25:18,320 --> 00:25:22,680
Speaker 1: at all. Right, You're like, I'll give it all to charity. Sure, Yeah.

444
00:25:22,720 --> 00:25:24,920
Speaker 1: And then there there, of course, is the third one,

445
00:25:24,920 --> 00:25:27,639
Speaker 1: which is the quality or state of being certain. And

446
00:25:27,680 --> 00:25:29,480
Speaker 1: this is sort of different from the others, but I

447
00:25:29,480 --> 00:25:35,080
Speaker 1: guess it's related. It's like trusting yourself to discern things correctly.

448
00:25:35,200 --> 00:25:37,560
Speaker 1: It's I know what's correct, I know what's right. My

449
00:25:37,640 --> 00:25:41,119
Speaker 1: beliefs are solid. Yeah. And of course this division can

450
00:25:41,160 --> 00:25:43,800
Speaker 1: present a problem for researchers. You have to study different

451
00:25:43,800 --> 00:25:48,159
Speaker 1: types of overconfidence differently to really understand the spectrum of

452
00:25:48,200 --> 00:25:50,360
Speaker 1: ways that it affects human life. And we'll come back

453
00:25:50,400 --> 00:25:52,679
Speaker 1: to that with especially one of the studies that we

454
00:25:52,720 --> 00:25:55,080
Speaker 1: look at in this pair of episodes. Right, Because if

455
00:25:55,080 --> 00:25:58,040
Speaker 1: we were just to divide confidence up into these three categories.

456
00:25:58,240 --> 00:26:01,160
Speaker 1: Like as above, you can easily have people all over

457
00:26:01,200 --> 00:26:04,720
Speaker 1: the spectrum. Someone could be completely overconfident in their ability

458
00:26:04,760 --> 00:26:07,480
Speaker 1: to do something and then also be have a very

459
00:26:07,520 --> 00:26:10,119
Speaker 1: reasonable expectation of, you know, whether or not they do

460
00:26:10,160 --> 00:26:13,119
Speaker 1: the right thing. They might say, Oh, I don't know

461
00:26:13,119 --> 00:26:15,880
Speaker 1: if I can if I can actually make it across

462
00:26:15,920 --> 00:26:19,280
Speaker 1: this tight rope. But when I when I, when I

463
00:26:19,320 --> 00:26:22,320
Speaker 1: fall off, I'm definitely going to soil my breeches, you know.

464
00:26:23,200 --> 00:26:25,720
Speaker 1: And I think there is ah, there's evidence that there's

465
00:26:25,760 --> 00:26:30,200
Speaker 1: a pretty big difference in how confidence in your abilities

466
00:26:30,200 --> 00:26:34,280
Speaker 1: and performance manifests versus how confidence in your the correctness

467
00:26:34,320 --> 00:26:38,240
Speaker 1: of your beliefs manifests. Um. But if we zoom in

468
00:26:38,280 --> 00:26:41,560
Speaker 1: on specific types of overconfidence, we can find some of

469
00:26:41,600 --> 00:26:45,240
Speaker 1: the best supported effects in all of psychology. Really, and

470
00:26:45,320 --> 00:26:48,120
Speaker 1: so one very recent paper that we wanted to look

471
00:26:48,119 --> 00:26:52,280
Speaker 1: at was published just this year in Psychological Bulletin by

472
00:26:52,359 --> 00:26:56,880
Speaker 1: Ethan Zell, Jason E. Strickhauser, Constantine set Akidas, and Mark

473
00:26:56,960 --> 00:27:00,000
Speaker 1: d Alika, and it's called the Better than Average Effect

474
00:27:00,200 --> 00:27:05,040
Speaker 1: in Comparative Self Evaluation. A Comprehensive Review and meta analysis. Uh.

475
00:27:05,080 --> 00:27:09,200
Speaker 1: And so this was a huge survey of existing published

476
00:27:09,240 --> 00:27:13,040
Speaker 1: research on something called the better than average effect, which

477
00:27:13,119 --> 00:27:17,880
Speaker 1: is the tendency for people to perceive their abilities, attributes,

478
00:27:18,000 --> 00:27:23,080
Speaker 1: and personality traits as superior compared to their average peer.

479
00:27:23,760 --> 00:27:27,240
Speaker 1: So what would that actually mean. Here's an example. Almost

480
00:27:27,400 --> 00:27:31,359
Speaker 1: everybody thinks that they are a much better than average driver.

481
00:27:32,480 --> 00:27:37,000
Speaker 1: Good drivers correctly think this, bad drivers incorrectly think this.

482
00:27:37,480 --> 00:27:40,800
Speaker 1: Few people actually think I am a bad driver, or

483
00:27:40,840 --> 00:27:44,000
Speaker 1: even I am an average driver. But of course, if

484
00:27:44,040 --> 00:27:45,960
Speaker 1: you just go by the media, which is how this

485
00:27:46,080 --> 00:27:48,280
Speaker 1: question is phrased in the studies that look at it,

486
00:27:48,760 --> 00:27:52,040
Speaker 1: half of drivers are by definition worse than the media

487
00:27:52,119 --> 00:27:55,720
Speaker 1: at driving skill, and yet ninety something percent think they're

488
00:27:55,760 --> 00:27:58,320
Speaker 1: above the median. Oh that's a great stat I wish

489
00:27:58,320 --> 00:28:01,359
Speaker 1: we'd had that to bust out in our October episode

490
00:28:01,440 --> 00:28:05,919
Speaker 1: on driving and the Psychology of driving, because I'm I'm

491
00:28:05,960 --> 00:28:08,760
Speaker 1: reminded of one of the facts that the researchers of

492
00:28:08,800 --> 00:28:11,919
Speaker 1: one paper pointed out, and that was that, you know,

493
00:28:12,480 --> 00:28:16,359
Speaker 1: driving is this cognitively demanding task, and yet most of

494
00:28:16,440 --> 00:28:19,680
Speaker 1: us are able to acquire what you could consider mastery

495
00:28:19,800 --> 00:28:23,280
Speaker 1: of vehicle. Yeah, yeah, that's interesting, Like it's something that

496
00:28:23,480 --> 00:28:26,560
Speaker 1: is inherently hard, but we do it. Enough that it

497
00:28:26,640 --> 00:28:29,560
Speaker 1: becomes easy within the context of human life, and then

498
00:28:29,600 --> 00:28:31,840
Speaker 1: we we think that we are truly better than most

499
00:28:32,080 --> 00:28:34,439
Speaker 1: everyone else at it. It's kind of like how playing

500
00:28:34,680 --> 00:28:38,280
Speaker 1: video games is actually inherently hard as a task, but

501
00:28:38,640 --> 00:28:41,440
Speaker 1: just if you do it enough for recreation, it's it's

502
00:28:41,680 --> 00:28:44,520
Speaker 1: second nature. It's totally easy. Yeah, but it does make

503
00:28:44,560 --> 00:28:46,320
Speaker 1: me think about like, say, the people who don't use

504
00:28:46,320 --> 00:28:51,120
Speaker 1: turn signals, are they approaching it from the standpoint of

505
00:28:51,240 --> 00:28:53,360
Speaker 1: I am such a great driver, I do not need

506
00:28:53,600 --> 00:28:57,360
Speaker 1: to use turn signals because they very likely are. Because

507
00:28:57,400 --> 00:29:00,240
Speaker 1: this strikes me as like a true a true of

508
00:29:00,320 --> 00:29:05,040
Speaker 1: humorists that demands Nemesis come forth and and smite them

509
00:29:05,080 --> 00:29:07,760
Speaker 1: in the highway before me, and I guess sometimes that's

510
00:29:07,760 --> 00:29:11,240
Speaker 1: exactly what happens. But the point don't be that Nemesis,

511
00:29:11,360 --> 00:29:14,080
Speaker 1: you are not the godown Nemesis. Your road rage doesn't

512
00:29:14,120 --> 00:29:15,960
Speaker 1: solve the problem. And I think that is one of

513
00:29:15,960 --> 00:29:19,440
Speaker 1: the key aspects of a belief, and something like Nemesis

514
00:29:19,560 --> 00:29:22,959
Speaker 1: is ultimately to to keep people from acting out as

515
00:29:23,000 --> 00:29:25,920
Speaker 1: Nemesis themselves. You know, the idea there must be some

516
00:29:26,000 --> 00:29:30,040
Speaker 1: sort of divine retribution for you know, um, you know

517
00:29:30,720 --> 00:29:34,320
Speaker 1: the individual who who engages in this kind of classical

518
00:29:34,400 --> 00:29:38,840
Speaker 1: huberists like, therefore, it's not for me to intervene unless

519
00:29:38,840 --> 00:29:42,160
Speaker 1: I'm gonna actually accused them of such in a legal

520
00:29:42,200 --> 00:29:44,719
Speaker 1: sense right now. Of course, the driving thing is just

521
00:29:44,800 --> 00:29:47,400
Speaker 1: one example, but it's a great example, and there are

522
00:29:47,440 --> 00:29:50,760
Speaker 1: tons of things like this that the better than average

523
00:29:50,760 --> 00:29:54,640
Speaker 1: effect says that, you know, for traits, for abilities, for

524
00:29:54,920 --> 00:29:58,320
Speaker 1: attributes that are perceived as positive, almost all of us

525
00:29:58,320 --> 00:30:00,840
Speaker 1: tend to think we're better than average, John, whatever that

526
00:30:00,880 --> 00:30:04,760
Speaker 1: metric is. Uh. And and of course that can't be

527
00:30:04,840 --> 00:30:06,560
Speaker 1: the case. You know, half of us are going to

528
00:30:06,600 --> 00:30:08,800
Speaker 1: be below average. A lot of us are probably gonna

529
00:30:08,800 --> 00:30:12,480
Speaker 1: be clustered somewhere around average, given what the skill is

530
00:30:12,600 --> 00:30:14,560
Speaker 1: or what the trade is. And so the question this

531
00:30:14,600 --> 00:30:17,200
Speaker 1: study was looking at was, Okay, how strong is this effect?

532
00:30:17,200 --> 00:30:20,600
Speaker 1: How robust is it? You know? So this review includes

533
00:30:20,680 --> 00:30:24,000
Speaker 1: quote a comprehensive meta analysis of better than average studies,

534
00:30:24,480 --> 00:30:27,600
Speaker 1: including data from a hundred and twenty four published articles,

535
00:30:27,600 --> 00:30:32,520
Speaker 1: two independent samples in more than nine fifty thousand participants.

536
00:30:32,560 --> 00:30:35,520
Speaker 1: And what it found is that, unlike some classic effects

537
00:30:35,560 --> 00:30:38,560
Speaker 1: in psychology, which in recent years have been undermined by

538
00:30:38,560 --> 00:30:43,040
Speaker 1: failed replications and fragility revealed by meta analysis, the basic

539
00:30:43,120 --> 00:30:45,120
Speaker 1: version of the better than average effect is found to

540
00:30:45,120 --> 00:30:49,200
Speaker 1: be extremely solid. It is super robust across studies, and

541
00:30:49,280 --> 00:30:52,760
Speaker 1: there's little evidence of publication bias. So the better than

542
00:30:52,800 --> 00:30:56,680
Speaker 1: average effect is definitely a real fact about human brains.

543
00:30:56,960 --> 00:30:59,360
Speaker 1: But that doesn't mean it always works the same for

544
00:30:59,400 --> 00:31:02,200
Speaker 1: all people are all types of evaluations. There are tons

545
00:31:02,240 --> 00:31:06,440
Speaker 1: of interesting little complications revealed here, uh and discussed in

546
00:31:06,480 --> 00:31:07,960
Speaker 1: the review, and I think we can come back to

547
00:31:08,000 --> 00:31:09,920
Speaker 1: them in a bit. So. A minute ago, we were

548
00:31:09,920 --> 00:31:14,160
Speaker 1: talking about how overconfidence has actually different manifestations that are

549
00:31:14,200 --> 00:31:17,520
Speaker 1: not the same, and you might need to study them separately. Uh,

550
00:31:17,520 --> 00:31:20,120
Speaker 1: and I came across a couple of interesting papers, both

551
00:31:20,200 --> 00:31:24,000
Speaker 1: of which had the Berkeley professor Don A. Moore as

552
00:31:24,040 --> 00:31:25,920
Speaker 1: an author. One from two thousand and eight with co

553
00:31:26,040 --> 00:31:29,960
Speaker 1: author Paul J. Heally called The Trouble with Overconfidence published

554
00:31:30,000 --> 00:31:34,200
Speaker 1: in Psychological Review, and one from ten with Derek Shots

555
00:31:34,280 --> 00:31:38,520
Speaker 1: called the Three Faces of Overconfidence, published in Social Impersonality

556
00:31:38,520 --> 00:31:42,560
Speaker 1: Psychology Compass. Now, both of these papers explore the idea

557
00:31:42,640 --> 00:31:46,960
Speaker 1: that there are actually three importantly different kinds of overconfidence

558
00:31:47,240 --> 00:31:50,880
Speaker 1: which are sometimes lumped together in in people talking about

559
00:31:50,960 --> 00:31:55,000
Speaker 1: the psychological overconfidence bias, and they're pointing out that they

560
00:31:55,040 --> 00:31:58,960
Speaker 1: need to be treated independently, studied independently whenever possible. And

561
00:31:59,000 --> 00:32:01,640
Speaker 1: I think this is a really helpful place to further

562
00:32:01,800 --> 00:32:04,880
Speaker 1: categorize types of over confidence for the rest of our discussion.

563
00:32:05,360 --> 00:32:08,680
Speaker 1: So are you ready for the three types, let's jump in. Okay,

564
00:32:08,720 --> 00:32:13,400
Speaker 1: So the three types they highlight our overestimation, over placement,

565
00:32:13,680 --> 00:32:19,480
Speaker 1: and over precision. Now, overestimation is thinking that you're better

566
00:32:19,520 --> 00:32:23,080
Speaker 1: than you are, and specifically, this is an overconfidence in

567
00:32:23,120 --> 00:32:26,800
Speaker 1: your own qualities in an objective sense, just out there

568
00:32:26,800 --> 00:32:28,920
Speaker 1: and you know, floating in the void or compared to

569
00:32:29,000 --> 00:32:32,000
Speaker 1: some objective measure. So if you think you have five

570
00:32:32,080 --> 00:32:34,880
Speaker 1: hundred dollars in the bank, but you really have three hundred,

571
00:32:35,000 --> 00:32:39,080
Speaker 1: that's overestimation. If you think you're taller than you are.

572
00:32:39,560 --> 00:32:42,440
Speaker 1: If you think that you never spell words wrong, but

573
00:32:42,520 --> 00:32:45,200
Speaker 1: in reality you actually do spell words wrong all the time.

574
00:32:45,600 --> 00:32:48,040
Speaker 1: If you think you can run a mile in six minutes,

575
00:32:48,040 --> 00:32:50,920
Speaker 1: but actually it will take you fourteen minutes. These are

576
00:32:50,960 --> 00:32:54,040
Speaker 1: all cases of overestimation. These are the sort of things

577
00:32:54,080 --> 00:32:58,960
Speaker 1: that other people or life itself will will call you on. Yeah,

578
00:32:59,600 --> 00:33:02,440
Speaker 1: typic play uh, And then This one's interesting because it's

579
00:33:02,520 --> 00:33:05,680
Speaker 1: it kind of has it runs a spectrum from just

580
00:33:06,000 --> 00:33:08,680
Speaker 1: pure self delusion, like you could if you were just

581
00:33:08,720 --> 00:33:10,760
Speaker 1: think I have a million dollars and you do not

582
00:33:10,800 --> 00:33:12,760
Speaker 1: have a million dollars. That's right. Thing. I mean, most

583
00:33:12,760 --> 00:33:15,120
Speaker 1: of the time people don't overestimate to that extent, but

584
00:33:15,160 --> 00:33:17,520
Speaker 1: they might overestimate how much money they've got in the

585
00:33:17,560 --> 00:33:20,360
Speaker 1: bank to a small extent, right, or you know, or

586
00:33:20,480 --> 00:33:25,120
Speaker 1: or I'm certainly thinking of smaller examples that that fit

587
00:33:25,200 --> 00:33:28,960
Speaker 1: into my life, like, for instance, me overestimating, uh, the

588
00:33:29,000 --> 00:33:31,160
Speaker 1: amount of time I have before I need to pick

589
00:33:31,200 --> 00:33:34,480
Speaker 1: my son up from school, or overestimating the amount of

590
00:33:34,480 --> 00:33:36,760
Speaker 1: free time I'll have to say, you know, watch a

591
00:33:36,880 --> 00:33:39,680
Speaker 1: terrible B movie during a work week. This is very

592
00:33:39,760 --> 00:33:42,400
Speaker 1: perceptive of you, Robert, because actually we'll come back to

593
00:33:42,440 --> 00:33:44,600
Speaker 1: this later on, I think probably in the second episode

594
00:33:45,040 --> 00:33:48,920
Speaker 1: that exact thing you mentioned. The planning fallacy is one

595
00:33:48,920 --> 00:33:53,080
Speaker 1: of the most common and most robustly demonstrated types of overestimation.

596
00:33:53,360 --> 00:33:56,680
Speaker 1: People regularly think that they will have they will be

597
00:33:56,760 --> 00:33:59,960
Speaker 1: able to accomplish more in less time than they actually

598
00:34:00,080 --> 00:34:03,800
Speaker 1: we can. Yeah, another example would be, you know, when

599
00:34:03,800 --> 00:34:07,240
Speaker 1: we pack books to bring on say, vacations. Oftentimes you

600
00:34:07,280 --> 00:34:11,120
Speaker 1: can be a little overconfident in either are our reading

601
00:34:11,160 --> 00:34:13,960
Speaker 1: speed or the amount of time will have to to

602
00:34:13,960 --> 00:34:16,759
Speaker 1: to spend with those books. I know that feeling. Yeah,

603
00:34:16,760 --> 00:34:19,120
Speaker 1: when I'm when I'm traveling, I'm going on an airplane

604
00:34:19,200 --> 00:34:21,440
Speaker 1: or something, I bring like four books with me and

605
00:34:21,680 --> 00:34:25,080
Speaker 1: I end up reading like three pages of one of them.

606
00:34:25,120 --> 00:34:26,680
Speaker 1: All Right, So that's one that we can I think

607
00:34:26,680 --> 00:34:29,000
Speaker 1: we can all relate to for sure. Okay, Now the

608
00:34:29,040 --> 00:34:32,799
Speaker 1: next one, that's overestimation. The next one is called overplacement,

609
00:34:33,400 --> 00:34:36,480
Speaker 1: and this is similar but a little bit different. Overplacement

610
00:34:36,600 --> 00:34:41,080
Speaker 1: is the exaggerated belief that you are better than others.

611
00:34:41,160 --> 00:34:45,600
Speaker 1: So it's similar to overestimation. Accepted involves judging yourself relative

612
00:34:45,719 --> 00:34:48,759
Speaker 1: to other people instead of just judging yourself kind of

613
00:34:48,760 --> 00:34:51,560
Speaker 1: floating in the void or relative to some objective measure.

614
00:34:52,000 --> 00:34:55,919
Speaker 1: So this would be like, you know, Jeff thinks, okay,

615
00:34:56,040 --> 00:34:58,640
Speaker 1: if we rated all the guys in the office in

616
00:34:58,640 --> 00:35:01,440
Speaker 1: in order of handsomeness, I would be in first place.

617
00:35:01,520 --> 00:35:03,239
Speaker 1: But in fact, if you did that, he would be

618
00:35:03,280 --> 00:35:06,680
Speaker 1: in sixth place. Uh, he's rating himself relative to the

619
00:35:06,719 --> 00:35:09,640
Speaker 1: other people in the office. Or Jeff thinks he is

620
00:35:09,680 --> 00:35:12,440
Speaker 1: smarter than all of his siblings, but actually he is not.

621
00:35:13,120 --> 00:35:15,640
Speaker 1: Or this is a very common one. I think Jeff

622
00:35:15,680 --> 00:35:18,600
Speaker 1: thinks he works harder than other people in the country

623
00:35:18,640 --> 00:35:21,359
Speaker 1: he lives in, but in reality he works fewer than

624
00:35:21,400 --> 00:35:24,360
Speaker 1: the average number of hours. So to use a direct

625
00:35:24,440 --> 00:35:28,200
Speaker 1: comparison to differentiate between the two, overestimation would be thinking

626
00:35:28,239 --> 00:35:32,040
Speaker 1: you're five nine when you're actually five eight. Overplacement would

627
00:35:32,040 --> 00:35:34,880
Speaker 1: be thinking you're taller than Doug when Doug is actually

628
00:35:34,880 --> 00:35:39,759
Speaker 1: taller than you. So overplacement really entails a broad spectrum

629
00:35:39,800 --> 00:35:43,680
Speaker 1: of of potentially subjective measures, you know who, because who's

630
00:35:43,760 --> 00:35:45,960
Speaker 1: deciding who is the most handsome at the office, Like

631
00:35:46,000 --> 00:35:51,040
Speaker 1: what is the judging body for this? Subjectivity I think

632
00:35:51,040 --> 00:35:54,640
Speaker 1: plays a very important role in what types of overconfidence

633
00:35:54,640 --> 00:35:57,279
Speaker 1: were most susceptible to. Right, And we can talk more

634
00:35:57,280 --> 00:35:59,160
Speaker 1: about that as we go on. But yeah, I think

635
00:35:59,200 --> 00:36:01,680
Speaker 1: you're exactly right about that. Though you can frame it

636
00:36:01,719 --> 00:36:05,719
Speaker 1: in terms of objective measures like imagining who your coworkers

637
00:36:05,800 --> 00:36:08,480
Speaker 1: would rank or something like that, Like you could actually

638
00:36:08,480 --> 00:36:12,759
Speaker 1: do it and you could guess about how it would go. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

639
00:36:12,760 --> 00:36:14,319
Speaker 1: I can. I can see that, But it's still it's

640
00:36:14,400 --> 00:36:15,920
Speaker 1: you know, you're getting into questions of like, what are

641
00:36:15,920 --> 00:36:19,239
Speaker 1: the criteria you know, for for judging Jeff's appearance or

642
00:36:19,320 --> 00:36:22,080
Speaker 1: Jeff's intelligence. That's one too, even though we have we

643
00:36:22,200 --> 00:36:25,320
Speaker 1: have various uh, you know, tests and ways of measuring

644
00:36:25,360 --> 00:36:28,399
Speaker 1: these things, but they're not without controversy, they're not without

645
00:36:28,400 --> 00:36:31,200
Speaker 1: some disagreement. And then we get into different types of intelligence,

646
00:36:31,239 --> 00:36:34,200
Speaker 1: you know. Um, and as far as work goes, is

647
00:36:34,239 --> 00:36:37,120
Speaker 1: it possible that Jeff works incredibly hard during an average

648
00:36:37,200 --> 00:36:40,600
Speaker 1: number of hours? You know? Or should we perhaps shame

649
00:36:40,680 --> 00:36:44,440
Speaker 1: Jeff's workplace for encouraging an oppressive work atmosphere where it's

650
00:36:44,480 --> 00:36:47,040
Speaker 1: just about how many extra hours you pour into the

651
00:36:47,120 --> 00:36:50,359
Speaker 1: day and how attractive you are. Yeah, and yeah, and uh,

652
00:36:51,560 --> 00:36:57,040
Speaker 1: it's so, you know, overplacement, definitions of overconfidence really can

653
00:36:57,040 --> 00:37:01,920
Speaker 1: get into this akey territory. I feel like classism, racism, sexism, uh,

654
00:37:02,080 --> 00:37:05,439
Speaker 1: meritocracy and and other systems that revolve around putting you

655
00:37:05,520 --> 00:37:08,239
Speaker 1: in your place and telling you exactly what you can

656
00:37:08,280 --> 00:37:10,440
Speaker 1: be and what you can accomplish. And it can it

657
00:37:10,480 --> 00:37:13,160
Speaker 1: can actually itself be a form of of sort of

658
00:37:13,200 --> 00:37:17,319
Speaker 1: the very form of hubrists that Nemesis would have punished. Yes,

659
00:37:17,360 --> 00:37:19,759
Speaker 1: I think exactly right. Yeah, that even that form of

660
00:37:19,800 --> 00:37:22,200
Speaker 1: hubrists we were talking about earlier, that's like the you know,

661
00:37:22,280 --> 00:37:26,440
Speaker 1: the cruelty to other people to show your superiority to them,

662
00:37:26,480 --> 00:37:30,440
Speaker 1: that clearly assumes an overplacement that like you, you are

663
00:37:30,520 --> 00:37:34,480
Speaker 1: just naturally assuming that you are better, more worthy, more

664
00:37:34,560 --> 00:37:37,879
Speaker 1: deserving of high status and superiority than other people are.

665
00:37:38,320 --> 00:37:41,399
Speaker 1: It's it's a relative judgment between you and some other

666
00:37:41,640 --> 00:37:44,920
Speaker 1: you know, the victim of whatever cruelty you're showing. But again,

667
00:37:45,080 --> 00:37:47,360
Speaker 1: the evidence is that we do a lot of this

668
00:37:47,440 --> 00:37:49,480
Speaker 1: kind of thing, and lots of it are are obviously

669
00:37:49,520 --> 00:37:51,880
Speaker 1: not evil and cruel like that a lot of it

670
00:37:51,920 --> 00:37:54,000
Speaker 1: just might be like, oh, yeah, I think I probably

671
00:37:54,040 --> 00:37:57,040
Speaker 1: work harder than than most of the people in my workplace,

672
00:37:57,040 --> 00:38:00,520
Speaker 1: but actually you don't. Yeah, I know, I just see,

673
00:38:00,880 --> 00:38:04,160
Speaker 1: I feel like there's a tremendous potential for cruelty and

674
00:38:04,200 --> 00:38:06,680
Speaker 1: this of course, and and to the to the extent

675
00:38:06,800 --> 00:38:10,000
Speaker 1: that like even even more moderate versions of it are

676
00:38:10,040 --> 00:38:12,719
Speaker 1: a kind of the you know, the tip of the

677
00:38:13,040 --> 00:38:16,040
Speaker 1: talent on the overall beast. You know. Well, I mean

678
00:38:16,160 --> 00:38:19,759
Speaker 1: it's definitely the case with with the driving example, you know,

679
00:38:19,840 --> 00:38:22,080
Speaker 1: so the better than average effect that I mentioned earlier,

680
00:38:22,120 --> 00:38:24,839
Speaker 1: that there's great, great evidence for this would be an

681
00:38:24,840 --> 00:38:27,960
Speaker 1: example of overplacement, right, because you're comparing yourself to other

682
00:38:28,000 --> 00:38:30,919
Speaker 1: people in general. You're saying, like, no, I'm a better

683
00:38:31,000 --> 00:38:35,280
Speaker 1: than average driver, but nineties something percent of drivers think that. Yeah, Okay,

684
00:38:35,320 --> 00:38:37,360
Speaker 1: well we can we can come back to a discussion

685
00:38:37,400 --> 00:38:39,000
Speaker 1: on this. But let's get to the third one. Okay,

686
00:38:39,000 --> 00:38:42,000
Speaker 1: the third one is a little different than the other two.

687
00:38:42,120 --> 00:38:45,400
Speaker 1: The third one is over precision, and this is one

688
00:38:45,440 --> 00:38:47,359
Speaker 1: of the definitions that we talked about, you know, from

689
00:38:47,400 --> 00:38:51,439
Speaker 1: the More Everyday Dictionary understanding over precision is being too

690
00:38:51,480 --> 00:38:53,640
Speaker 1: sure that you know the truth. This is what we

691
00:38:53,719 --> 00:38:57,640
Speaker 1: might also call epistemic over confidence. It's being overly certain

692
00:38:57,719 --> 00:39:01,200
Speaker 1: that your beliefs are correct. So, uh, to go back

693
00:39:01,239 --> 00:39:04,480
Speaker 1: to Jeff, Jeff is a hundred percent sure that Vincent

694
00:39:04,520 --> 00:39:08,239
Speaker 1: Price was in Transformers Age of Extinction, Like, definitely, he

695
00:39:08,320 --> 00:39:10,360
Speaker 1: was the voice of one of the robots. He wasn't.

696
00:39:10,400 --> 00:39:12,640
Speaker 1: But Jeff will argue with you about this. He's like, no,

697
00:39:12,760 --> 00:39:15,160
Speaker 1: I'm sure I've looked it up before he was in there.

698
00:39:15,200 --> 00:39:18,640
Speaker 1: I'm positive. Or you ever done a trivia night, you've

699
00:39:18,640 --> 00:39:21,080
Speaker 1: been on the team with somebody like Jeff who's very

700
00:39:21,120 --> 00:39:23,880
Speaker 1: confident about all of his answers. You know, he's positive,

701
00:39:23,920 --> 00:39:27,359
Speaker 1: write it down. He keeps getting stuff wrong. I don't

702
00:39:27,360 --> 00:39:29,320
Speaker 1: go to a lot of trivia nights, but but I

703
00:39:29,360 --> 00:39:32,080
Speaker 1: can imagine it. I used to do trivia night. Uh.

704
00:39:32,440 --> 00:39:35,279
Speaker 1: It's so it's it's horrible to have somebody like that

705
00:39:35,360 --> 00:39:38,560
Speaker 1: on your team who's consistently that way. But I also

706
00:39:38,640 --> 00:39:41,640
Speaker 1: recall the feeling of being like that on an individual

707
00:39:41,719 --> 00:39:44,280
Speaker 1: question and then getting it wrong, and like it hurts

708
00:39:44,280 --> 00:39:47,799
Speaker 1: worse than anything. It's the most embarrassing thing ever. Oh yeah,

709
00:39:47,800 --> 00:39:49,960
Speaker 1: I guess I do kind of remember some of that.

710
00:39:50,640 --> 00:39:53,240
Speaker 1: I don't know. I also value Jeff for just pushing

711
00:39:53,280 --> 00:39:56,360
Speaker 1: the conversation along and let's go. Let's go ahead and

712
00:39:56,360 --> 00:39:58,759
Speaker 1: select something and move on, so we can we can

713
00:39:58,760 --> 00:40:00,799
Speaker 1: be done with this question. Right, if you don't care

714
00:40:00,840 --> 00:40:03,319
Speaker 1: about the trivia part, Yeah, well, I mean it's like

715
00:40:03,480 --> 00:40:05,719
Speaker 1: the trivia part is just a reason to be there

716
00:40:05,719 --> 00:40:07,600
Speaker 1: in a bar, right, I mean depends on what the

717
00:40:07,640 --> 00:40:10,120
Speaker 1: prize money is. The prize money is generally like but

718
00:40:10,480 --> 00:40:16,160
Speaker 1: you know, yeah, now, of course we know that the

719
00:40:16,400 --> 00:40:20,799
Speaker 1: over precision is hugely relevant in in real world context,

720
00:40:20,920 --> 00:40:24,279
Speaker 1: and you know, in all kinds of everyday stuff conversations

721
00:40:24,320 --> 00:40:25,960
Speaker 1: you have with your friends, all the way up to

722
00:40:26,080 --> 00:40:29,720
Speaker 1: business in politics. Yeah, yeah, I was. This is interesting,

723
00:40:29,800 --> 00:40:33,279
Speaker 1: especially on the political um uh question. I was looking

724
00:40:33,280 --> 00:40:36,240
Speaker 1: at a two thousand eighteen University of Notre Dame study

725
00:40:36,480 --> 00:40:39,160
Speaker 1: on over confidence, and it pointed out that in order

726
00:40:39,200 --> 00:40:42,840
Speaker 1: to avoid the social punishment of over confidence, you know,

727
00:40:42,920 --> 00:40:47,279
Speaker 1: essentially being being called on on your your false uh

728
00:40:47,440 --> 00:40:50,960
Speaker 1: you know, understanding of transformer movies or you know, the

729
00:40:51,239 --> 00:40:54,360
Speaker 1: future of the economy, whatever it happens to be. The

730
00:40:54,360 --> 00:40:57,680
Speaker 1: authors argue that it helps to engage in plausible deniability.

731
00:40:58,120 --> 00:41:01,759
Speaker 1: So examples include claims that cannot be proven wrong in

732
00:41:01,800 --> 00:41:05,319
Speaker 1: the moment, though they may be proven wrong later, or

733
00:41:05,600 --> 00:41:10,040
Speaker 1: more importantly, using terminology that is not subject to close scrutiny,

734
00:41:10,120 --> 00:41:13,040
Speaker 1: so saying a particular war will be a cake walk,

735
00:41:13,280 --> 00:41:15,480
Speaker 1: for one example they bring up because ultimately, like what's

736
00:41:15,480 --> 00:41:17,520
Speaker 1: a cake walk? You know, you can you can make

737
00:41:17,560 --> 00:41:20,120
Speaker 1: the argument that, Okay, one person died, that's not a

738
00:41:20,120 --> 00:41:22,360
Speaker 1: cake walk and one life is important, or if you

739
00:41:22,400 --> 00:41:24,320
Speaker 1: could bump that, you could you know, it's totally in

740
00:41:24,600 --> 00:41:28,040
Speaker 1: the either the holder. Another example would be saying that

741
00:41:28,160 --> 00:41:30,360
Speaker 1: something will be made great. What does it mean to

742
00:41:30,400 --> 00:41:32,960
Speaker 1: make it great? What is what is great? Put up?

743
00:41:32,960 --> 00:41:34,960
Speaker 1: Put a number value on great. But you don't want

744
00:41:35,000 --> 00:41:36,880
Speaker 1: to put a number value on it because then you

745
00:41:36,920 --> 00:41:39,160
Speaker 1: could be shown to be wrong. So like the more

746
00:41:39,360 --> 00:41:42,400
Speaker 1: vague you are with your predictions, the harder it is

747
00:41:42,440 --> 00:41:44,440
Speaker 1: for somebody to later come along and show that you

748
00:41:44,480 --> 00:41:47,520
Speaker 1: were wrong. Right. And this is why the I think

749
00:41:47,560 --> 00:41:50,560
Speaker 1: the the trivia example, it's a it's a perfect example

750
00:41:50,600 --> 00:41:53,400
Speaker 1: to to bring out because it is a semi artificial

751
00:41:53,880 --> 00:41:56,960
Speaker 1: situation in which you're really putting your knowledge on the

752
00:41:57,040 --> 00:41:59,960
Speaker 1: line and just you know, and and and stating, yeah,

753
00:42:00,239 --> 00:42:02,279
Speaker 1: this is what I believe, this is the fact, and

754
00:42:02,320 --> 00:42:06,120
Speaker 1: then you're you're gonna be immediately uh called on it

755
00:42:06,160 --> 00:42:08,279
Speaker 1: if you're wrong. Well, I think you know one great

756
00:42:08,280 --> 00:42:10,760
Speaker 1: example we're talking about politics. You talked about like making

757
00:42:10,800 --> 00:42:13,680
Speaker 1: an economy better in the future, Like you know, politicians

758
00:42:13,680 --> 00:42:15,600
Speaker 1: would always claim to be able to do and they've

759
00:42:15,600 --> 00:42:18,480
Speaker 1: got different ways that they claim that will happen. I mean,

760
00:42:18,520 --> 00:42:20,920
Speaker 1: I think what people just have to admit in reality.

761
00:42:21,000 --> 00:42:24,400
Speaker 1: So there's a huge amount of uncertainty in economics and

762
00:42:24,480 --> 00:42:27,560
Speaker 1: political economics, like you can't actually predict what's going to

763
00:42:27,640 --> 00:42:31,400
Speaker 1: happen in the future. Economy You can make some very broad,

764
00:42:31,600 --> 00:42:34,960
Speaker 1: vague generalizations, but you know, you're not gonna know when

765
00:42:35,000 --> 00:42:37,040
Speaker 1: the recession is going to happen. You're not gonna know

766
00:42:37,160 --> 00:42:40,040
Speaker 1: exactly what effect the new tax or budget bill is

767
00:42:40,040 --> 00:42:42,120
Speaker 1: going to have. You can generalize, but you know, it's

768
00:42:42,160 --> 00:42:44,520
Speaker 1: hard to know for sure. There's tons of uncertainty, right,

769
00:42:44,560 --> 00:42:46,279
Speaker 1: But that's all. But at the same time, it's a

770
00:42:46,320 --> 00:42:50,200
Speaker 1: horrible campaign slogan, right, Yeah, we'll do our best, but

771
00:42:50,320 --> 00:42:53,680
Speaker 1: you know you can't be certain. Yeah. Yeah, so people

772
00:42:53,719 --> 00:42:56,680
Speaker 1: are going to continue to gravitate towards these statements, especially

773
00:42:56,719 --> 00:43:02,000
Speaker 1: these vague statements that protect the liar in question. Yeah.

774
00:43:02,160 --> 00:43:04,880
Speaker 1: So I mentioned these two papers that both had Donna

775
00:43:05,000 --> 00:43:07,680
Speaker 1: Moore is one of the authors, and they both of

776
00:43:07,719 --> 00:43:12,560
Speaker 1: them looked at what percentage of the existing papers in

777
00:43:12,600 --> 00:43:16,680
Speaker 1: the scientific literature on over confidence. We're looking at each

778
00:43:16,719 --> 00:43:19,840
Speaker 1: type of overconfidence, And so the two thousand eight study

779
00:43:20,160 --> 00:43:24,239
Speaker 1: found that forty six percent of papers were looking at overestimation, uh,

780
00:43:24,239 --> 00:43:27,759
Speaker 1: thirty two percent were overplacement, and twenty two percent were

781
00:43:27,800 --> 00:43:31,200
Speaker 1: over precision. And then they looked at it again on

782
00:43:31,280 --> 00:43:35,240
Speaker 1: papers that had come out since that one in the paper,

783
00:43:35,719 --> 00:43:39,799
Speaker 1: and they found that sixty percent were overestimation, overplacement, and

784
00:43:39,880 --> 00:43:42,879
Speaker 1: ninetent on over precision. One of the main ones we're

785
00:43:42,880 --> 00:43:45,759
Speaker 1: gonna keep looking at in this episode series is about overplacement.

786
00:43:45,760 --> 00:43:47,960
Speaker 1: It's about the better and better than average effect. But

787
00:43:48,000 --> 00:43:50,480
Speaker 1: I'm struck by the fact that in both of these analyzes,

788
00:43:50,719 --> 00:43:53,600
Speaker 1: the least attention is going to over precision, which seems

789
00:43:53,640 --> 00:43:57,800
Speaker 1: like perhaps the most important of these effects to study. Yeah,

790
00:43:57,840 --> 00:44:00,840
Speaker 1: I mean, maybe it's one where we know, you know,

791
00:44:00,880 --> 00:44:02,799
Speaker 1: certainly that you know the study I mentioned is not

792
00:44:03,320 --> 00:44:07,480
Speaker 1: is not really presenting something that is not already intrinsically understood,

793
00:44:07,840 --> 00:44:12,680
Speaker 1: you know, lying and inflating estimation, basically playing the social game.

794
00:44:13,080 --> 00:44:15,319
Speaker 1: I mean, that's what humans do. So maybe we're just

795
00:44:15,600 --> 00:44:20,560
Speaker 1: we have a built in a tendency to safeguard ourselves again,

796
00:44:20,600 --> 00:44:25,360
Speaker 1: except in semi artificial situations like tests and trivia nights.

797
00:44:25,680 --> 00:44:27,960
Speaker 1: I mean, that's a big problem. This is of course

798
00:44:27,960 --> 00:44:30,680
Speaker 1: a problem in all kinds of arenas of psychology research,

799
00:44:30,760 --> 00:44:34,160
Speaker 1: but it's definitely a big problem in studying over confidence because,

800
00:44:34,160 --> 00:44:36,200
Speaker 1: as several of the authors have been reading have pointed out,

801
00:44:36,239 --> 00:44:41,040
Speaker 1: it can be really hard to recreate the types of

802
00:44:41,160 --> 00:44:44,720
Speaker 1: over confidence projection scenarios that occur in the real world

803
00:44:44,920 --> 00:44:47,279
Speaker 1: in the lab. All right, on that note, we're gonna

804
00:44:47,280 --> 00:44:53,240
Speaker 1: take one more break, but we'll be right back. Than alright,

805
00:44:53,239 --> 00:44:55,480
Speaker 1: we're back, Okay. So I wanted to go back to

806
00:44:55,719 --> 00:44:58,080
Speaker 1: that paper that I mentioned earlier in the episode, the

807
00:44:58,080 --> 00:45:00,040
Speaker 1: one that just came out this year in Psychological a

808
00:45:00,160 --> 00:45:04,239
Speaker 1: bulletin the the comprehensive review and meta analysis of the

809
00:45:04,280 --> 00:45:07,799
Speaker 1: existing research on the better than average effect, the thing

810
00:45:07,840 --> 00:45:10,440
Speaker 1: where people just tend to think that, you know, they

811
00:45:10,440 --> 00:45:13,560
Speaker 1: evaluate themselves as better than average on all different kinds

812
00:45:13,560 --> 00:45:17,359
Speaker 1: of qualities. So the researchers themselves in this paper from

813
00:45:18,040 --> 00:45:21,400
Speaker 1: and again that was zel at all. Uh. They define

814
00:45:21,440 --> 00:45:24,200
Speaker 1: it thus Lee, They say, b t a e is

815
00:45:24,239 --> 00:45:28,279
Speaker 1: the proclivity to rate one's current abilities, attributes, or personality

816
00:45:28,320 --> 00:45:32,759
Speaker 1: traits more favorably than those of the average peer. Now

817
00:45:32,760 --> 00:45:34,719
Speaker 1: there's a ton of stuff in this paper, but I

818
00:45:34,760 --> 00:45:36,680
Speaker 1: wanted to talk just briefly about a few of its

819
00:45:36,800 --> 00:45:39,960
Speaker 1: major findings. Of Course, as we mentioned earlier, the paper

820
00:45:40,040 --> 00:45:44,800
Speaker 1: found robust, highly replicable evidence for the better than average effects.

821
00:45:44,800 --> 00:45:48,719
Speaker 1: They did find different effect sizes given different scenarios, but

822
00:45:48,800 --> 00:45:51,759
Speaker 1: generally the effect is there. It is really how our

823
00:45:51,800 --> 00:45:54,640
Speaker 1: brains tend to work most of the time. So one

824
00:45:54,719 --> 00:45:56,879
Speaker 1: thing that I thought was very interesting, and I think

825
00:45:56,960 --> 00:45:59,600
Speaker 1: this ties into some of the vagueness that you were

826
00:45:59,640 --> 00:46:04,680
Speaker 1: just taking king about Robert. Abilities versus traits. The researchers

827
00:46:04,719 --> 00:46:08,320
Speaker 1: here found that the better than average effect is significantly

828
00:46:08,400 --> 00:46:13,000
Speaker 1: stronger for personality traits than it is for abilities. So,

829
00:46:13,080 --> 00:46:17,040
Speaker 1: for example, people on average are more likely to overplace

830
00:46:17,160 --> 00:46:22,279
Speaker 1: themselves for semi fixed personal traits like intelligence, honesty, or

831
00:46:22,360 --> 00:46:26,080
Speaker 1: attractiveness or sense of humor than they are to overplace

832
00:46:26,160 --> 00:46:30,160
Speaker 1: themselves on specific abilities like how well will I do

833
00:46:30,200 --> 00:46:32,680
Speaker 1: on this math test? You know, though they show the

834
00:46:32,680 --> 00:46:35,640
Speaker 1: better than average effect for both, the effect is stronger

835
00:46:35,680 --> 00:46:40,719
Speaker 1: for traits than it is for abilities. Does that make sense? Yes? Yeah,

836
00:46:40,760 --> 00:46:43,239
Speaker 1: and again yeah. Again. It comes back to something that

837
00:46:43,760 --> 00:46:45,880
Speaker 1: is easily proven and easily put into the put to

838
00:46:45,920 --> 00:46:49,360
Speaker 1: the task, like say your ability shooting what free throws

839
00:46:49,360 --> 00:46:52,759
Speaker 1: in basketball? Uh, you know, versus something that is far

840
00:46:52,800 --> 00:46:55,839
Speaker 1: more subjective. Yeah. And the authors they agree they think

841
00:46:55,840 --> 00:46:59,640
Speaker 1: this is quote likely because personality traits are more abstract

842
00:47:00,080 --> 00:47:04,120
Speaker 1: and less subject to external verification than abilities. And I

843
00:47:04,120 --> 00:47:06,760
Speaker 1: think that's not just like in the moment you're making

844
00:47:06,800 --> 00:47:09,480
Speaker 1: the prediction about yourself, you know, not just because you

845
00:47:09,520 --> 00:47:13,560
Speaker 1: fear embarrassment. I think your estimation of your own abilities

846
00:47:13,680 --> 00:47:17,919
Speaker 1: is probably generally more truly accurate because you have more

847
00:47:18,120 --> 00:47:21,640
Speaker 1: chances in your life to have your your self impressions

848
00:47:21,640 --> 00:47:26,640
Speaker 1: adjusted by meeting obstacles and you know, being regulated by them.

849
00:47:26,719 --> 00:47:29,759
Speaker 1: You actually very rarely run into scenarios in your life

850
00:47:29,760 --> 00:47:31,880
Speaker 1: where somebody can say you're not as smart as you

851
00:47:31,920 --> 00:47:34,000
Speaker 1: think you are, or if they can say that you

852
00:47:34,000 --> 00:47:36,680
Speaker 1: know you just like it's easy to dismiss. Yeah, I

853
00:47:36,719 --> 00:47:38,879
Speaker 1: guess I get the sense that you know, certainly as

854
00:47:38,920 --> 00:47:42,640
Speaker 1: you as you age, there's more of an erosion of

855
00:47:41,719 --> 00:47:46,000
Speaker 1: those tendencies as opposed to just you know, uh, you know,

856
00:47:45,840 --> 00:47:48,960
Speaker 1: you know, a sharp impact on them. Well, that's another

857
00:47:48,960 --> 00:47:51,319
Speaker 1: funny thing. There is a role of age in this.

858
00:47:51,480 --> 00:47:54,280
Speaker 1: The meta analysis revealed that the better than average effect

859
00:47:54,560 --> 00:47:59,320
Speaker 1: was negatively correlated across lifespan, So on average, the younger

860
00:47:59,400 --> 00:48:02,640
Speaker 1: you are, the more likely you are to overplace yourself

861
00:48:02,680 --> 00:48:06,640
Speaker 1: relative to peers. Younger people show more better than average

862
00:48:06,640 --> 00:48:10,040
Speaker 1: effects than older people. Just like Aristotle told us again,

863
00:48:10,080 --> 00:48:12,560
Speaker 1: he pointed out that the young and the rich are

864
00:48:12,560 --> 00:48:15,280
Speaker 1: the ones most likely to suffer from hubris. That's funny

865
00:48:15,280 --> 00:48:17,920
Speaker 1: I wonder what exactly explains that. Could it be that

866
00:48:18,160 --> 00:48:21,480
Speaker 1: throughout life you're literally just getting more information, like you're

867
00:48:21,600 --> 00:48:24,960
Speaker 1: learning more about your own limitations, and that tempers your

868
00:48:25,080 --> 00:48:28,480
Speaker 1: over overplacement about your own abilities. Could be I mean,

869
00:48:28,880 --> 00:48:31,080
Speaker 1: I mean again, we're kind of getting into two tropes

870
00:48:31,160 --> 00:48:34,840
Speaker 1: here that to varying degrees, uh, you know, can be

871
00:48:34,880 --> 00:48:37,840
Speaker 1: applied to to actual real life individuals. But there is

872
00:48:37,880 --> 00:48:41,600
Speaker 1: that idea of the of the the the prideful, rich

873
00:48:41,680 --> 00:48:44,880
Speaker 1: individual as being kind of like a man baby that

874
00:48:44,920 --> 00:48:48,520
Speaker 1: that has never never had to really be proven wrong,

875
00:48:48,640 --> 00:48:51,160
Speaker 1: that has just been surrounded by yes men for example,

876
00:48:51,239 --> 00:48:53,719
Speaker 1: that sort of thing. Yeah, but I I also do

877
00:48:53,760 --> 00:48:55,680
Speaker 1: want to admit, I mean, we don't really know. It's

878
00:48:55,719 --> 00:48:58,120
Speaker 1: possible that it doesn't have anything to do with getting

879
00:48:58,160 --> 00:49:01,160
Speaker 1: extra information. It could just be psycho logical facts about

880
00:49:01,160 --> 00:49:02,919
Speaker 1: the young versus the old. Well, I mean it could

881
00:49:02,920 --> 00:49:06,600
Speaker 1: it could tie into just the basic the difference different

882
00:49:06,600 --> 00:49:10,080
Speaker 1: psychology of of a young person who is who is

883
00:49:10,120 --> 00:49:12,840
Speaker 1: like an arrow leaving the bow, you know, Like the

884
00:49:12,880 --> 00:49:15,320
Speaker 1: whole idea is that you know, when you're young, you're bold,

885
00:49:15,400 --> 00:49:17,879
Speaker 1: you want to break away from your family because that's

886
00:49:17,960 --> 00:49:21,520
Speaker 1: ultimately how you're going you're you're just obeying the genetic

887
00:49:21,560 --> 00:49:24,160
Speaker 1: mission of the organism. That's true. It could It could

888
00:49:24,200 --> 00:49:27,480
Speaker 1: be that there are stronger pressures in favor of inflated

889
00:49:27,560 --> 00:49:31,040
Speaker 1: confidence in a younger brain. Here is another interesting one,

890
00:49:31,680 --> 00:49:35,360
Speaker 1: negative better than average effect versus positive better than average

891
00:49:35,360 --> 00:49:39,280
Speaker 1: effect the author's right quote. When examining thirty six matched

892
00:49:39,320 --> 00:49:42,359
Speaker 1: comparisons in which other variables were held constant, the better

893
00:49:42,360 --> 00:49:46,839
Speaker 1: than average effect was larger for positive dimensions the negative dimensions,

894
00:49:47,280 --> 00:49:51,040
Speaker 1: which suggests that the motive to self enhance or exaggerate

895
00:49:51,080 --> 00:49:54,560
Speaker 1: one's positive qualities may be more pronounced than the motive

896
00:49:54,640 --> 00:49:58,960
Speaker 1: to self protect or minimize one's negative qualities. Okay, so

897
00:49:59,040 --> 00:50:01,800
Speaker 1: if I give you a chance to rate yourself compared

898
00:50:01,800 --> 00:50:03,719
Speaker 1: to others, I say, you know, how would you rate

899
00:50:03,719 --> 00:50:07,839
Speaker 1: yourself in terms of your honesty? Versus I say, how

900
00:50:07,880 --> 00:50:11,719
Speaker 1: would you rate yourself in terms of deceptiveness? That's sort

901
00:50:11,760 --> 00:50:13,920
Speaker 1: of asking the same question. It seems the better than

902
00:50:13,960 --> 00:50:16,959
Speaker 1: average effect manifests in both like that you're more likely

903
00:50:17,000 --> 00:50:22,000
Speaker 1: to overestimate your honesty underestimate your deceptive nous. But the

904
00:50:22,040 --> 00:50:26,080
Speaker 1: effect is stronger for exaggerating the good trait than it

905
00:50:26,160 --> 00:50:30,600
Speaker 1: is for minimizing the negative trait. I wonder why that is. Yeah,

906
00:50:30,640 --> 00:50:33,120
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess it. You know, in a broad sense,

907
00:50:33,160 --> 00:50:35,200
Speaker 1: it just kind of comes back to playing the social game,

908
00:50:35,360 --> 00:50:39,160
Speaker 1: right of just of presenting yourself to your fellow humans.

909
00:50:39,480 --> 00:50:41,799
Speaker 1: I wonder if it plays into our our sense of

910
00:50:41,840 --> 00:50:46,520
Speaker 1: like having a rich personality, that we would imagine ourselves

911
00:50:46,600 --> 00:50:50,400
Speaker 1: as having strong positive qualities and allowing some negative qualities

912
00:50:50,440 --> 00:50:53,160
Speaker 1: as opposed to you know, just uh, not really getting

913
00:50:53,160 --> 00:50:58,440
Speaker 1: to adventurous with strong positive qualities but denying negative qualities. Yeah,

914
00:50:58,600 --> 00:51:01,600
Speaker 1: perhaps so this study also, they looked at gender. They

915
00:51:01,640 --> 00:51:04,760
Speaker 1: found no gender association. Men and women were equally likely

916
00:51:04,880 --> 00:51:07,719
Speaker 1: to engage in the better than average effect. They looked

917
00:51:07,719 --> 00:51:10,800
Speaker 1: at culture, and through some types of analysis they didn't

918
00:51:10,840 --> 00:51:14,400
Speaker 1: find much difference between cultures. But they said, to quote,

919
00:51:14,400 --> 00:51:18,000
Speaker 1: an analysis of eleven matched comparisons yielded a significantly larger

920
00:51:18,040 --> 00:51:20,759
Speaker 1: b T a E in the case of European Americans

921
00:51:20,800 --> 00:51:24,040
Speaker 1: than East Asians. It's possible that the better than average

922
00:51:24,040 --> 00:51:27,560
Speaker 1: effect was larger among European Americans because the dimensions were

923
00:51:27,560 --> 00:51:30,759
Speaker 1: of greater cultural importance to them. So, like the specific

924
00:51:30,800 --> 00:51:34,960
Speaker 1: traits being measured in that test might have been phrases

925
00:51:35,080 --> 00:51:38,000
Speaker 1: or traits that were considered more important in European American

926
00:51:38,040 --> 00:51:42,080
Speaker 1: culture as possible. Um. But then they also say, indeed,

927
00:51:42,120 --> 00:51:46,080
Speaker 1: the three studies that considered dimension importance found that European

928
00:51:46,080 --> 00:51:50,799
Speaker 1: Americans exhibited a larger better than average effect on individualistic traits,

929
00:51:50,840 --> 00:51:55,640
Speaker 1: but there was no difference between cultural groups on collectivistic traits. Moreover,

930
00:51:55,760 --> 00:51:58,600
Speaker 1: although the better than average effect varied by culture, it

931
00:51:58,760 --> 00:52:02,320
Speaker 1: was generally robust in both European Americans and East Asians,

932
00:52:02,360 --> 00:52:06,440
Speaker 1: which supports the position that self enhancement as universal. You know,

933
00:52:06,600 --> 00:52:09,719
Speaker 1: did these findings do remind me of our previous discussions

934
00:52:09,760 --> 00:52:14,600
Speaker 1: on how the how, how how the East and West

935
00:52:14,680 --> 00:52:18,319
Speaker 1: differ to certain degrees in how we view, you know,

936
00:52:18,360 --> 00:52:21,040
Speaker 1: the nature of character, whether it is something that emerges

937
00:52:21,080 --> 00:52:24,600
Speaker 1: internally or it is subject to the in the forces

938
00:52:24,640 --> 00:52:28,360
Speaker 1: of environment and culture. Yes, uh, yeah, the the greater

939
00:52:28,440 --> 00:52:32,800
Speaker 1: emphasis on context, and this also seems to tie into actually,

940
00:52:32,840 --> 00:52:35,680
Speaker 1: I think this was the context in which that discussion happened,

941
00:52:36,040 --> 00:52:39,319
Speaker 1: was when we were talking about fundamental attribution error, uh,

942
00:52:39,360 --> 00:52:42,520
Speaker 1: and the fact that it seemed like by some measures,

943
00:52:42,680 --> 00:52:46,360
Speaker 1: East Asian cultures were less prone to the fundamental attribution

944
00:52:46,480 --> 00:52:49,799
Speaker 1: error than like European Americans were right, Yeah, though they

945
00:52:49,800 --> 00:52:52,080
Speaker 1: were still prone to it. It just basically the numbers

946
00:52:52,080 --> 00:52:54,040
Speaker 1: were a little different between East and West, and that

947
00:52:54,080 --> 00:52:56,279
Speaker 1: seems to be the case here too, Like both are

948
00:52:56,320 --> 00:52:58,480
Speaker 1: prone to the better than average effect, but by some

949
00:52:58,560 --> 00:53:02,920
Speaker 1: measures it's a little strong younger among European Americans, especially

950
00:53:02,960 --> 00:53:06,960
Speaker 1: on individualistic traits. Here's one more that I thought was interesting.

951
00:53:07,400 --> 00:53:11,040
Speaker 1: They found that there was a medium sized positive association

952
00:53:11,120 --> 00:53:14,720
Speaker 1: between the better than average effect and both self esteem

953
00:53:14,960 --> 00:53:20,040
Speaker 1: and life satisfaction quote as anticipated, Therefore, the tendency to

954
00:53:20,080 --> 00:53:23,640
Speaker 1: perceive oneself as above average was associated with greater self

955
00:53:23,760 --> 00:53:27,480
Speaker 1: esteem and happiness. However, the moderate size of these associations

956
00:53:27,520 --> 00:53:30,319
Speaker 1: indicates that the better than average effect is not redundant

957
00:53:30,360 --> 00:53:33,359
Speaker 1: with self esteem and happiness. So they're saying, it's it's

958
00:53:33,400 --> 00:53:35,799
Speaker 1: clearly not the case that just like self esteem and

959
00:53:35,800 --> 00:53:38,680
Speaker 1: happiness are the better than average effects. It's not just

960
00:53:38,719 --> 00:53:41,879
Speaker 1: a one for one thing, but there is a correlation. Yeah.

961
00:53:41,920 --> 00:53:44,920
Speaker 1: I imagine that that some listeners might might have already

962
00:53:44,920 --> 00:53:47,680
Speaker 1: been been thinking on this a little bit, because we

963
00:53:47,800 --> 00:53:50,520
Speaker 1: spent a fair amount of tough time here in this episode,

964
00:53:50,920 --> 00:53:53,560
Speaker 1: sort of driving home the fact that you're probably not

965
00:53:53,600 --> 00:53:55,920
Speaker 1: as good as you think you are. Well, you might

966
00:53:55,960 --> 00:53:59,239
Speaker 1: be about some things not some things, but uh, you

967
00:53:59,280 --> 00:54:02,640
Speaker 1: know the ULTI that message is kind of depressing. You know,

968
00:54:02,719 --> 00:54:05,680
Speaker 1: it's kind of like, oh, well, I I thought I

969
00:54:06,080 --> 00:54:08,080
Speaker 1: was an honest person, but I don't know. Joe said,

970
00:54:08,080 --> 00:54:10,400
Speaker 1: I'm not. So I didn't say, I guess I should

971
00:54:10,400 --> 00:54:15,080
Speaker 1: feel bad about myself. Come on, But that is not

972
00:54:15,160 --> 00:54:17,239
Speaker 1: the message of this episode. No, I think it's still

973
00:54:17,239 --> 00:54:21,640
Speaker 1: like it's to be wary about positive self impressions. Is

974
00:54:21,680 --> 00:54:24,640
Speaker 1: not that you know you are actually really bad. It's

975
00:54:24,680 --> 00:54:27,960
Speaker 1: that our brains, on average, have a tendency to inflate

976
00:54:28,080 --> 00:54:30,520
Speaker 1: positive self impressions, especially when it comes to things like

977
00:54:30,600 --> 00:54:34,160
Speaker 1: personality traits. It's worth being aware of that fact about

978
00:54:34,160 --> 00:54:36,480
Speaker 1: ourselves and as it applies to others. Obviously, it's not

979
00:54:36,560 --> 00:54:38,520
Speaker 1: something that applies just to you. This is something that

980
00:54:38,600 --> 00:54:41,319
Speaker 1: appears to apply to human beings, right, Yeah, So I

981
00:54:41,320 --> 00:54:42,879
Speaker 1: guess one way to look at it would be, say,

982
00:54:42,880 --> 00:54:46,520
Speaker 1: on the subject of generosity, like, it's not to say, okay,

983
00:54:46,760 --> 00:54:48,520
Speaker 1: Joe said, I'm not as generous as I as I

984
00:54:48,560 --> 00:54:50,680
Speaker 1: think I am, and I should feel depressed over this,

985
00:54:50,719 --> 00:54:53,440
Speaker 1: but more we should realize that, Okay, if we value

986
00:54:53,440 --> 00:54:58,360
Speaker 1: our generosity. That's that's great. We may very well be

987
00:54:58,520 --> 00:55:02,960
Speaker 1: overestimating our generosity, and therefore that's just a reason to

988
00:55:03,080 --> 00:55:07,000
Speaker 1: lean into the thing you value. Yeah. Another way to

989
00:55:07,000 --> 00:55:10,440
Speaker 1: do it is to is to make yourself perception of

990
00:55:10,480 --> 00:55:16,080
Speaker 1: your positive traits uh dependent on real world performance. Uh. So,

991
00:55:16,239 --> 00:55:18,960
Speaker 1: for example, if you want to think I'm a generous person,

992
00:55:19,040 --> 00:55:22,600
Speaker 1: don't just trust your gut about these free floating positive qualities.

993
00:55:22,920 --> 00:55:25,680
Speaker 1: Prove it to yourself, right, you have to do things

994
00:55:25,719 --> 00:55:28,440
Speaker 1: that make it true. Yeah, what would a generous person

995
00:55:28,520 --> 00:55:31,719
Speaker 1: do in this scenario? And then do it? Yeah? All right, Well,

996
00:55:31,719 --> 00:55:34,279
Speaker 1: we're gonna go ahead and cut this episode off here,

997
00:55:34,520 --> 00:55:36,759
Speaker 1: but we will be back in the next episode to

998
00:55:36,880 --> 00:55:40,239
Speaker 1: continue discussions of over confidence. Uh you know what it

999
00:55:40,280 --> 00:55:43,040
Speaker 1: means from a psychological standpoint. Will also get into a

1000
00:55:43,080 --> 00:55:47,160
Speaker 1: little bit into the business scenario here, which is which

1001
00:55:47,239 --> 00:55:48,960
Speaker 1: I have to say, is a lot more interesting than

1002
00:55:49,000 --> 00:55:52,120
Speaker 1: it sounds. Well, you're you saying there's over confidence in

1003
00:55:52,200 --> 00:55:55,680
Speaker 1: business even or not believe it or not there is,

1004
00:55:56,239 --> 00:55:58,279
Speaker 1: uh So, Well we'll discuss that as well in the

1005
00:55:58,280 --> 00:56:01,440
Speaker 1: next episode. In the meantime, if you want to check

1006
00:56:01,440 --> 00:56:03,960
Speaker 1: out other episodes of stuff to blow your mind, such

1007
00:56:03,960 --> 00:56:05,720
Speaker 1: as you know some of these episodes we've been referring

1008
00:56:05,760 --> 00:56:08,920
Speaker 1: back to here, or if you want to check out Invention,

1009
00:56:09,000 --> 00:56:11,600
Speaker 1: our other show, you can find them both wherever you

1010
00:56:11,640 --> 00:56:13,919
Speaker 1: get your podcasts. If you got to Stuff to Blow

1011
00:56:13,960 --> 00:56:15,840
Speaker 1: your Mind dot com, that will shoot you over to

1012
00:56:15,920 --> 00:56:18,480
Speaker 1: the I Heart listing for this show, but you can

1013
00:56:18,480 --> 00:56:20,880
Speaker 1: find us anywhere and wherever that happens to be. Just

1014
00:56:20,960 --> 00:56:25,200
Speaker 1: make sure you rate, review, and subscribe because those actions

1015
00:56:25,360 --> 00:56:27,560
Speaker 1: really help us out in the long run. Huge thanks

1016
00:56:27,600 --> 00:56:30,760
Speaker 1: as always to our excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson.

1017
00:56:31,040 --> 00:56:32,560
Speaker 1: If you would like to get in touch with us

1018
00:56:32,560 --> 00:56:35,040
Speaker 1: with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest

1019
00:56:35,040 --> 00:56:37,160
Speaker 1: a topic for the future, or just to say hi,

1020
00:56:37,280 --> 00:56:40,200
Speaker 1: you can email us at contact at stuff to Blow

1021
00:56:40,239 --> 00:56:50,759
Speaker 1: your Mind dot com. Stuff to Blow Your Mind is

1022
00:56:50,760 --> 00:56:53,120
Speaker 1: a production of iHeart Radios. How stuff works For more

1023
00:56:53,120 --> 00:56:55,520
Speaker 1: podcasts from my Heart Radio is the iHeart Radio app,

1024
00:56:55,680 --> 00:57:04,800
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

1025
00:57:05,640 --> 00:57:14,520
Speaker 1: I think four F four far far f