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Speaker 1: Hey, Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. This is

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Speaker 1: Robert Land and I'm Joe McCormick in. Today's episode is

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Speaker 1: from the Vault. This one originally published on December and

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Speaker 1: it is called The Toaster Not Taken. This one is

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Speaker 1: about a classic finding in psychology that I remember getting

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Speaker 1: really obsessed with at this time, about how our choices

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Speaker 1: can later determine our actual preferences. So yeah, this one

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Speaker 1: was a lot of fun. I remember we ended up

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Speaker 1: talking a good bit about Metallica for some reason. Yes

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Speaker 1: we did. Yes, all right, Well let's let's let's dive

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Speaker 1: in Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind production of

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Speaker 1: My Heart Radio. Hey, you're welcome to Stuff to Blow

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Speaker 1: your Mind. My name is Robert Land and I'm Joe

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Speaker 1: McCormick in. Today we're gonna be talking about choices and offerences,

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Speaker 1: and I wanted to start off by looking at what

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Speaker 1: I think is one of the most commonly misunderstood poems

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Speaker 1: in English literature. It's a classic most Americans already know.

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Speaker 1: You probably read it at some point in high school

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Speaker 1: or even earlier. But it's an interesting poem because I

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Speaker 1: think it usually gets interpreted to mean the exact opposite

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Speaker 1: of what it actually means. So this is the road

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Speaker 1: not taken by Robert Frost. Are you ready to hear

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Speaker 1: it again? Yeah? Yeah, This is always a pleasure to

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Speaker 1: to hear or to read, even though it's one that

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Speaker 1: I think we're all hit with a lead, probably at

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Speaker 1: the elementary school level, you know. I I feel like

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Speaker 1: I came to a greater appreciation of just the music

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Speaker 1: of Robert Frost's poems as an adult than than I

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Speaker 1: had for them when I was in school. So I'm

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Speaker 1: not sure exactly what changed there. Maybe I became grumpier,

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Speaker 1: and he was quite a grump himself. But but here

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Speaker 1: we go. Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, and

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Speaker 1: sorry I would not travel both and be one traveler long.

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Speaker 1: I stood and looked down one as far as I

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Speaker 1: could to where it bent in the undergrowth, then took

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Speaker 1: the other, as just as fair and having perhaps the

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Speaker 1: better claim, because it was grassy and wanted, where though

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Speaker 1: as for that, the passing there had warned them really

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Speaker 1: about the same, and both that morning equally lay in

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Speaker 1: leaves no step had trodden black. Oh. I kept the

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Speaker 1: first for another day, yet, knowing how way leads onto way,

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Speaker 1: I doubted. If I should ever come back, I shall

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Speaker 1: be telling this with a sigh somewhere ages and ages.

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Speaker 1: Hence two roads diverged in a wood, and I I

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Speaker 1: took the one less traveled by, and that has made

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Speaker 1: all the difference. It's a beautiful bomb, it really is.

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Speaker 1: But one of the things that that is really funny

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Speaker 1: is that I think people usually interpret this poem as

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Speaker 1: a sort of sellabration of unique individuality and a celebration

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Speaker 1: of going your own way. It's about how if you

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Speaker 1: go boldly where others have not gone before, if you

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Speaker 1: remain your unique, authentic self and choose the stranger path,

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Speaker 1: you'll be rewarded with a life of unique meaning. But

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Speaker 1: if you read it closely, I think the poem is

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Speaker 1: meant to be a quite ironic sort of perry against

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Speaker 1: exactly that way of thinking, because what happens in it, well,

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Speaker 1: the speaker comes to a fork in the road. The

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Speaker 1: speaker evaluates the for each path for a bit, at

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Speaker 1: first thinks one is more traveled than the other, but

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Speaker 1: then ultimately realizes that they're about the same, then takes

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Speaker 1: one road rather than the other for no major reason.

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Speaker 1: They are in reality pretty much indistinguishable, then thinks about

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Speaker 1: how later in life he'll be claiming that he took

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Speaker 1: the bold, untraveled path and that it changed his life,

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Speaker 1: even though that wasn't true. Yeah, I feel like that's

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Speaker 1: something that a lot of people miss out on in

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Speaker 1: the poem, and I think a lot of it sometimes

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Speaker 1: comes down to um the discussions about what is he

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Speaker 1: actually talking about, and people get very wrapped up in that,

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Speaker 1: like what was the choice? No, no, no, not the

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Speaker 1: walk in the woods? What were you actually talking about?

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Speaker 1: Frost and and then you you kind of end up

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Speaker 1: ignoring the mechanics of it that you're talking about here. Well, yeah,

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Speaker 1: because I think this is in a way a sort

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Speaker 1: of an image poem that can be applied to many

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Speaker 1: different types of choices one makes in life. Though I

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Speaker 1: think it was literally inspired by him walking in the

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Speaker 1: woods in New England. I'm not positive about that, but

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Speaker 1: I think I've read that before. But yeah, So it's

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Speaker 1: essentially a poem about a person who chose at random

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Speaker 1: between two at the time pretty much indistinguishable options, and

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Speaker 1: then comes up later with an ex post facto justification

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Speaker 1: for his choice that it was the one made you know,

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Speaker 1: made out of daring an authentic principle and that it

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Speaker 1: was deeply meaningful. And I really like this ironic interpret

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Speaker 1: station because it raises a number of really interesting questions

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Speaker 1: about human nature. So, first of all, isn't so much

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Speaker 1: of life like this? We do make life changing decisions

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Speaker 1: without knowing what the outcome will be. That the options

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Speaker 1: in front of us might look indistinguishable. At the time

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Speaker 1: you choose between two job opportunities, you can't really tell

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Speaker 1: that one is necessarily better than the other. But then

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Speaker 1: later you you will have had much of your life

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Speaker 1: developed on the basis of whichever choice you made, and

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Speaker 1: you have to come up with a narrative of your

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Speaker 1: life story that makes sense of that choice in light

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Speaker 1: of its later unpredictable significance. And obviously, when you do

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Speaker 1: this a lot of times you're gonna end up remembering

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Speaker 1: the choice differently than it was in your mind when

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Speaker 1: you made it. But then it also raises an interesting

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Speaker 1: question about decision making. In the moment. When there are

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Speaker 1: two options that are pretty much the same, we we

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Speaker 1: often have to form a preference for one or the other. Now,

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Speaker 1: there are plenty of cases where you can quite clearly

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Speaker 1: see why you'd prefer one option over another. But in

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Speaker 1: cases where that's not true, in the absence of the

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Speaker 1: obvious superiority of one option over another, where do our

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Speaker 1: preferences arise from? Why do we decide we like the

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Speaker 1: left path rather than the right path if they look

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Speaker 1: about the same. And for the purpose of today's episode,

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Speaker 1: I want to expand beyond thinking about paths in the

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Speaker 1: woods or big life decisions when it comes to the

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Speaker 1: formation of any preferences, even extremely minor ones. You know,

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Speaker 1: you choose between two basically equivalent brands of blender at

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Speaker 1: the store. Why do we like the things that we like?

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Speaker 1: Why do we have the preferences that we have. I'm

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Speaker 1: probably gonna refer back to the Black Mirrorum episode the

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Speaker 1: Black Mirror movie Band or Snatch a lot in this one.

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Speaker 1: We did an episode about it last year, breaking down

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Speaker 1: you know, the nature of choice and free will and all.

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Speaker 1: But like I instantly think about the early stages of

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Speaker 1: Band or Snatch. Where as you do this choose your

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Speaker 1: own adventure media, you have to choose which cereal the

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Speaker 1: main character is going to have for breakfast, and you know,

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Speaker 1: ultimately it doesn't really matter in the context of that

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Speaker 1: of that story. Uh, And it's it's more about just

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Speaker 1: teaching the mechanics of choice within this um you know,

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Speaker 1: computer narrative. But but it's interesting that you still have

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Speaker 1: to exert a certain amount of mental energy to make

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Speaker 1: that choice, to decide this serial over that one. And

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Speaker 1: it's interesting how and this will tie into something we'll

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Speaker 1: talk about in just a minute here. It's interesting how,

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Speaker 1: at least for me, those early choices are kind of uncomfortable.

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Speaker 1: When you have to pick the cereal or you have

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Speaker 1: to pick the record or something, and you don't have

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Speaker 1: a natural strong preference one way or another. You've got

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Speaker 1: this kind of weird anxiety that lingers after your choice,

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Speaker 1: like I don't know that I pick the right one. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: because later on you can definitely make a call like okay,

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Speaker 1: this is the more dramatic choice, or well this is

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Speaker 1: the more this is the moral choice. But in choosing

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Speaker 1: the two cereals, aside from maybe health concerns about the

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Speaker 1: sugary cereal versus the other cereal, there's not as much

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Speaker 1: to go on, right. So one of the main things

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Speaker 1: I want to talk about in this episode today is

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Speaker 1: a really interesting fact that's been observed in a bunch

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Speaker 1: of psychology studies over the years, and I'm gonna look

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Speaker 1: at an early one from the nineteen fifties in just

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Speaker 1: a minute. Here, we often assume that our preferences are

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Speaker 1: what determine our choices. I pick this option instead of

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Speaker 1: that because I like it better. But there is also

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Speaker 1: significant evidence here's your AUNTI metaboli, that our choices determine

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Speaker 1: our preferences. I like this option because I picked it. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And one of the big early studies here, a classic

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Speaker 1: study that was in the Journal of Abnormal and Social

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Speaker 1: Psychology in nineteen fifty six by Jack W. Brim is

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Speaker 1: called post decision changes in the Desirability of Alternatives. So

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Speaker 1: so again, this is by the American psychologist Jack W. Brim.

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Speaker 1: Brim had been a student of the highly influential American

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Speaker 1: social psychologist Leon Festinger, who is probably best known for

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Speaker 1: developing the theory of cognitive dissonance. Now, this is a

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Speaker 1: term you've probably all heard before, but a lot of

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Speaker 1: people don't know the experimental history surrounding it. So the

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Speaker 1: simple version is that cognitive dissonance is the state of

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Speaker 1: holding contradictory beliefs or values, or contradictions between your beliefs

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Speaker 1: and your values and your actions observing these contradictions within

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Speaker 1: yourself simultaneously. So one example that's very often sided is

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Speaker 1: knowing that smoking cigarettes is harmful to your health, but

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Speaker 1: smoking them anyway. But there there can be all kinds

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Speaker 1: of cognitive dissonance. Our life is just full of of

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Speaker 1: of cognitive dissonance. You know, you believe that your spouse

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Speaker 1: is a good person, but you also know that they

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Speaker 1: did something wrong. You know that they stole money out

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Speaker 1: of the church collection plate or something. I think one

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Speaker 1: that's probably very common appearances. You love your child, but

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Speaker 1: you really honestly don't like something they did. You know,

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Speaker 1: you hate the way their crayon drawings look or something. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And and when you're faced with this kind of contradiction,

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Speaker 1: and of course we're faced with these kind of contradictions

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Speaker 1: all the time, Uh, there is a problem that arises.

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Speaker 1: What Festinger argued was that the state of cognitive dissonance

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Speaker 1: is experienced internally as a profound stress, and people will

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Speaker 1: do almost anything to alleviate that stress. And so this

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Speaker 1: this remedial action to to alleviate the stress can take

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Speaker 1: many forms, but it's just some finding some way to

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Speaker 1: resolve the contradiction. Really anything that reduces the internal perception

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Speaker 1: of a contradiction between beliefs and values and actions. So

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Speaker 1: if you're going back to the classic example of a

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Speaker 1: person who smokes cigarettes but who is aware of the

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Speaker 1: dangers of tobacco, they have options including they could they

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Speaker 1: could change their actions so you can actually quit smoking.

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Speaker 1: But of course that one is really hard, so a

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Speaker 1: lot of people would instead go for one of the

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Speaker 1: other options, which is change explicit beliefs. You can say, uh, yeah,

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Speaker 1: what are these doctors know? You know, doctors are wrong

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Speaker 1: about stuff all the time. I don't know, nobody ever

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Speaker 1: really proved that smoking causes cancer. That's you know, the

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Speaker 1: these studies are Can you really trust these studies? And

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Speaker 1: on and on you you can you can just say no,

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Speaker 1: I don't believe that the risks are real, or you

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Speaker 1: could change other types of beliefs, such as changing underlying

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Speaker 1: beliefs that are going unspoken, because if there's an internal conflict,

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Speaker 1: if there's cognitive dissonance arising over smoking, it relies on

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Speaker 1: the unspoken premise that you want to live as long

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Speaker 1: and be as healthy as possible. So you could relieve

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Speaker 1: cognitive dissonance by explicitly rejecting that belief. And you've probably

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Speaker 1: heard this before from people who say, like, yeah, I smoke,

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Speaker 1: Yeah it causes cancer, but hey, who wants to live forever?

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Speaker 1: That's also you know, a great example of of short

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Speaker 1: term versus long term thinking, right exactly. I mean, I

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Speaker 1: think there are ways of looking at things like. I mean,

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Speaker 1: on one hand, like you know, people are free to

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Speaker 1: to make the decisions about their own health as they choose.

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Speaker 1: But I think there is a legitimate school of thought

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Speaker 1: that would say that, uh, making statements like that is

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Speaker 1: basically a lack of compassion for your own future self. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: but statements like that can help resolve the dissonance. Uh.

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Speaker 1: There there are other things people do to People can

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Speaker 1: think of compensatory reasons that they would keep smoking. So

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Speaker 1: they might say, Okay, I I accept the fact that

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Speaker 1: smoking is bad for health. I keep doing it, but

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Speaker 1: I've got some like compensatory justification in my brain. I

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Speaker 1: need to smoke in order to stay focused at work,

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Speaker 1: or like I need to smoke in order to stay thin,

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Speaker 1: or or things like that. And so people have argued

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Speaker 1: about how best to interpret cognitive dissonance theory and and

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Speaker 1: they've argued around the margins over the years, but it

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Speaker 1: seems to me like cognitive dissonance is pretty robust and

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Speaker 1: a very lasting concept from from social psychology that explains

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Speaker 1: a lot of our behaviors and cognitive processes. There's been

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Speaker 1: a ton of different experiments that seem to support the

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Speaker 1: idea of cognitive dissonance reduction is a major pressure driving

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Speaker 1: our beliefs and behaviors. Just one I was reading about

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Speaker 1: as a study by Festinger and Carl Smith from nineteen

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Speaker 1: fifty nine that works something like this. So you have

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Speaker 1: people perform something that they believe to be the actual

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Speaker 1: bulk of the experiment. It's this like long, repetitive, extremely

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Speaker 1: boring task I don't remember exactly what it is. Is like,

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Speaker 1: you know, you put these pegs in holes for an

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Speaker 1: hour or something is mind numbingly boring, and then you

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Speaker 1: pay the subjects after they're done with the experiment to

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Speaker 1: tell the people who are going in to do it

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Speaker 1: next that it's really fun and interesting. Uh so they're

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Speaker 1: gonna be lying, They're gonna be openly saying something that

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Speaker 1: they know not to be true. And Festinger and Carl

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Speaker 1: Smith found something interesting which is that if you pay

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Speaker 1: people a larger sum of money to tell this lie,

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Speaker 1: they will they will afterwards acknowledge it as a lie. So,

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Speaker 1: you know, you give me a hundred bucks or whatever.

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Speaker 1: I think it was twenty dollars in the study, but

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Speaker 1: that was nineteen fifties money. You give me a hundred

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Speaker 1: bucks or something. I say like, yeah, you know, I

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Speaker 1: I lied to the next guy. I told him it

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Speaker 1: was going to be really fun. If you pay somebody

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Speaker 1: a pittance sum to tell the lie, you give them

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Speaker 1: just a dollar, they are more likely afterwards to report

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Speaker 1: believing that what they said was true. So you give

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Speaker 1: somebody a hundred dollars to say this is really putting

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Speaker 1: the pegs in the holes is really fun. They say, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I was lying, but hey, I gotta pay day. You

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Speaker 1: pay people a dollar to say it, and they say,

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Speaker 1: actually putting the pegs in the holes was pretty fun.

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Speaker 1: And the reasoning here is that, in the absence of

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Speaker 1: a large sum of money to internally justify the lie

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Speaker 1: in order to basically relieve the cognitive dissonance, give you

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Speaker 1: a reason and in your mind for having said it.

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Speaker 1: The easiest way for people to reduce cognitive dissonance is

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Speaker 1: to change their beliefs, change what they believe about what

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Speaker 1: they were doing, so that what they were saying actually

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Speaker 1: wasn't a lie, it was true. Yeah. But yeah, the

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Speaker 1: pigs and the holes. It's great. Yeah, I um, I

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Speaker 1: agree with what you said said earlier. I think this

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Speaker 1: helps to explain a lot of what goes on in

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Speaker 1: our heads, cognitive dissonance, both specifically as it applies to

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Speaker 1: contradictory opinions and beliefs that that we we hold at

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Speaker 1: once in our minds, as well as just more broadly

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Speaker 1: getting it the lack of a congruent self. You know, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: because I mean human life, You're you're just gonna be

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Speaker 1: full of contradictions. I mean, there is no way a

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Speaker 1: human can be consistent all the time. Uh, You're you're

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Speaker 1: going to have pressures that are acting on your mind

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Speaker 1: and going in multiple directions and and most of the

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Speaker 1: time these contradictions can exist within you without you really

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Speaker 1: being aware of them. But once you become aware of them,

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Speaker 1: I am pretty convinced that, Yeah, it does manifest as

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Speaker 1: this type of stress that you've got to do something

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Speaker 1: about it. Yeah, Like you often see people using sort

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Speaker 1: of like self defining mantras, you know, like I am

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Speaker 1: this first, this second, this third, or you know I

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Speaker 1: am this and this and this or you know, you

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Speaker 1: define yourself and your your profile on social media as

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Speaker 1: being as being this or that or the other. But

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Speaker 1: you know, ultimately, if we're being honest, a lot of

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Speaker 1: times it depends on on what time of day it is,

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Speaker 1: when we last had a little boost of sugar caffeine.

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Speaker 1: You know, how tired we are, um, how much sunlight

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Speaker 1: we've been exposed to during the day, that's sort of thing,

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Speaker 1: how much exercise we've had. Uh, those are some just

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Speaker 1: some of the factors that can influence the ranking of

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Speaker 1: those little um uh, those little phrases that we used

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Speaker 1: to define ourselves and and and even incorporating different phrases

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Speaker 1: that we might not we not not have on the list,

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Speaker 1: uh normally or certainly when we're you know, outward facing

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Speaker 1: and dealing with other people. Yeah, a lot of a

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Speaker 1: lot of our lives are concerned with trying to create

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Speaker 1: a consistent narrative about ourselves, and in fact ourselves they're

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Speaker 1: just not that consistent. Yeah, and been really now, I mean,

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Speaker 1: neither is our understanding of the past, our memory of

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Speaker 1: the past or anything. I mean, it it's just it's

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Speaker 1: it's so ridiculous the more you unravel it, Like, we

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Speaker 1: were so obsessed with our our personal narratives and where

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Speaker 1: we fit into it, when in reality, there is no past,

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Speaker 1: you know, we are we are creatures of the present,

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Speaker 1: traveling into the future. And uh and yet we end up,

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Speaker 1: you know, spending all this time fretting about things that

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Speaker 1: are essentially fiction because all we have is just this, uh,

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Speaker 1: this cople together false memory of what we were. Uh.

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Speaker 1: This ties back to previous episodes that we've done on

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Speaker 1: the phenomenon of fundamental attribution error, the tendency for people

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Speaker 1: to overestimate the role of like internal agency and character

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Speaker 1: and underestimate the role of just external situations and forces

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Speaker 1: in guiding what human behavior is. It turns out people

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Speaker 1: are more malleable and more changeable based on situations than

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Speaker 1: we normally like to think. We like to think in

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Speaker 1: terms of like, you know, consistent solid psychological storytelling where

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Speaker 1: John snow always stands for right and he just always

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Speaker 1: does what is perfectly consistent with his character and it's

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Speaker 1: explained by who he is. But in fact, what we

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Speaker 1: do a lot of times is just explained by what's

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Speaker 1: going on around us. But anyway, to come back to

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Speaker 1: the cognitive dissonance question, one implication of cognitive dissonance is that,

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Speaker 1: in fact, our beliefs are quite malleable. When beliefs are

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Speaker 1: dissonant with one another, it looks like, you know, it's

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Speaker 1: people don't want to think this about themselves, but it

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Speaker 1: seems to be true. We quite often and quite readily

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Speaker 1: just change one of our beliefs. We just believe something

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Speaker 1: different to get him in line. So anyway, the study

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Speaker 1: by Jack Brim looked at the question of whether cognitive

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Speaker 1: dissonance might be a motivator even when people are evaluating

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Speaker 1: their own preferences, their own personal desires, just likes and dislikes,

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Speaker 1: even with regards to very minor things like do you

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Speaker 1: like this appliance or not? How much do you like it?

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Speaker 1: So the basics of the study, you present people with

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Speaker 1: a selection of different household items and appliances ranging in

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Speaker 1: retail value for from fifteen dollars to thirty dollars, but

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Speaker 1: that was at the time that teen fifties dollars um

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Speaker 1: And then you asked the people to rate each of

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Speaker 1: these items in terms of desirability, how much would you

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Speaker 1: would you like to own this item on a scale

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Speaker 1: of one to ten, from extremely desirable to definitely not

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Speaker 1: desirable at all or sorry, I think I said one

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Speaker 1: to tend it's one to eight, um, so you know

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Speaker 1: you really want the eights, you don't really care about

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Speaker 1: the ones. Uh. And the items included things like an

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Speaker 1: automatic coffee maker and electric sandwich grill, a silk screen

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Speaker 1: reproduction and automatic toaster, a fluorescent desk lamp, a book

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Speaker 1: of art reproduction, a stop watch, and a portable radio.

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Speaker 1: And so, if I'm subject in this experiment, I go

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Speaker 1: down the list, I do my ratings. I might rate

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Speaker 1: the stop watch at a three out of ten, I

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Speaker 1: don't really care about that much, maybe the sandwich grill

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Speaker 1: at a five, the coffee maker at a six, etcetera.

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Speaker 1: And then after I'm finished with my ratings and they're

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Speaker 1: taken away, the experiment er tells me that as part

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Speaker 1: of my payment for participating, I'll get to take home

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Speaker 1: my choice of one of two items from the list.

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Speaker 1: But the experiment or picks what the two are. So

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Speaker 1: maybe he tells me that I can take home either

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Speaker 1: the toaster or the coffee maker, which I rated equally,

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Speaker 1: giving both a six. But I have to pick one,

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Speaker 1: so I picked the coffee maker and I reject the toaster.

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Speaker 1: Then some other conditions take place. Uh, there were various

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Speaker 1: other control conditions, but the experiment ends at some point

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Speaker 1: with ME re rating the original objects again for desirability

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Speaker 1: without being able to refer to the things I had

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Speaker 1: already made. And what the researchers found was, on average,

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Speaker 1: if I was forced to pick between two objects, my

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Speaker 1: desirability rating for the object I picked would go up,

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Speaker 1: and my rating for the object I rejected would go down.

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Speaker 1: So maybe I initially rated the toaster and the coffee

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Speaker 1: maker both as a six. But then if I'm forced

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Speaker 1: to pick between them and I picked the coffee maker, afterwards,

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Speaker 1: I might rate the coffee maker is a seven and

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Speaker 1: the toaster is a four or something like that. Now

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Speaker 1: why would that be? Yeah, this is interesting because one

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Speaker 1: of one of the possible examples that came to mind

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Speaker 1: when I was thinking about this was to go back

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Speaker 1: to a previous episode that we recorded, thinking about how,

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Speaker 1: you know, back when when I was younger, you had,

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Speaker 1: you know, like maybe twenty bucks to blow on a

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Speaker 1: CD during the course of a month, and you made

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Speaker 1: your pick, you bought it, and then even if it

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Speaker 1: wasn't that great, you kind of found found a reason

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Speaker 1: to like that album as you listen to it over

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Speaker 1: and over again, you found at least one song. But

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Speaker 1: in those cases, you have sunk cost in the situation,

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Speaker 1: like I spent money on it um in addition to time,

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Speaker 1: whereas in this scenario, uh, it's there. Their money is

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Speaker 1: not the issue. There's like I guess there's sort of

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Speaker 1: a sunk cost in time, but we don't have that

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Speaker 1: that financial aspect of the scenario, right, so the sunk

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Speaker 1: cost fallacy does seem to be real, Like we make

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Speaker 1: choice supportive, biased judgments in favor of stuff that we've

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Speaker 1: already invested time and money and all that into. But

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Speaker 1: here it's just like, well, you're gonna get one or

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Speaker 1: the other. Which one do you want? And it seems

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Speaker 1: like once you pick one out of the two, the

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Speaker 1: one you didn't pick looks like junk, and the one

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Speaker 1: you did pick, oh that's pretty great. I do find this.

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Speaker 1: I think, you know, there's just you know, me thinking

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Speaker 1: back on past experiences, But I feel like this with

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Speaker 1: ice creams sometimes, like Ultimately, most of the ice creams

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Speaker 1: at the n Ice ice cream place, you know they're

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Speaker 1: gonna be great. I'm gonna enjoy them. They're just gonna

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Speaker 1: be varying degrees of sweetness and uh, you know, complex

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Speaker 1: flay or I guess. But I'll often find myself thinking,

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Speaker 1: like you know, afterwards, I I'm there with my family,

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Speaker 1: will all, you know, sample each other's ice creams, and

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Speaker 1: I'll generally go, Yep, I made the right choice. This

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Speaker 1: is the ice cream for me. Yep. Now there could

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Speaker 1: be multiple reasons for that. One reason is extremely straightforward.

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Speaker 1: One reason is you just picked the one you actually

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Speaker 1: wanted most. You know what your preferences are and you

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Speaker 1: acted them out. But there could be Yeah, there could

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Speaker 1: be other things at work too, And so the underlying

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Speaker 1: explanation based on cognitive dissonance for what was observed in

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Speaker 1: the study, It goes something like this. When you evaluate

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Speaker 1: how much you want to potential possessions, you think in

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Speaker 1: a general way about the pros and cons of each,

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Speaker 1: What do you like about them? What do you dislike

431
00:23:43,119 --> 00:23:46,880
Speaker 1: about them? Then, if you are forced to choose between

432
00:23:46,920 --> 00:23:50,639
Speaker 1: two options for which you see roughly similar amounts of pros,

433
00:23:50,680 --> 00:23:54,520
Speaker 1: and cons it creates one of these mildly stressful states

434
00:23:54,560 --> 00:23:57,359
Speaker 1: of cognitive dissonance. And again that sounds funny because like,

435
00:23:57,400 --> 00:23:59,840
Speaker 1: how could that be stressful? But it looks like this

436
00:24:00,080 --> 00:24:02,639
Speaker 1: just does manifest a stress in our brains, even though

437
00:24:02,680 --> 00:24:04,600
Speaker 1: it doesn't really make a lot of sense that it would.

438
00:24:04,960 --> 00:24:08,280
Speaker 1: So you didn't choose the toaster, even though there are

439
00:24:08,359 --> 00:24:12,280
Speaker 1: things that you like about the toaster, etcetera. And this

440
00:24:12,400 --> 00:24:15,680
Speaker 1: uncomfortable state of cognitive dissonance has a name actually, when

441
00:24:15,680 --> 00:24:19,320
Speaker 1: it's applied to expensive purchases, when you've spent money on it,

442
00:24:19,320 --> 00:24:22,760
Speaker 1: it's known as buyer's remorse. Right, Okay, I need to

443
00:24:22,760 --> 00:24:24,679
Speaker 1: buy a lawnmower, But you know, what the hell do

444
00:24:24,720 --> 00:24:27,360
Speaker 1: I know about lawnmowers. I can't tell one from the other.

445
00:24:27,680 --> 00:24:30,120
Speaker 1: They cost a lot of money, but I need one,

446
00:24:30,240 --> 00:24:32,159
Speaker 1: and I can't really tell them apart. So I'm just

447
00:24:32,200 --> 00:24:33,840
Speaker 1: gonna have to pick one of these here at the

448
00:24:33,840 --> 00:24:35,800
Speaker 1: store and buy it so I can cut the grass.

449
00:24:36,800 --> 00:24:39,480
Speaker 1: But after you've made a purchase like this, okay, big

450
00:24:39,520 --> 00:24:42,040
Speaker 1: dollar item, you've spent a lot on it, you you

451
00:24:42,160 --> 00:24:46,520
Speaker 1: just picked one, people often experience a sinking feeling. This

452
00:24:46,640 --> 00:24:50,439
Speaker 1: form of stress and psychological discomfort did I buy the

453
00:24:50,520 --> 00:24:53,200
Speaker 1: right one? And you think about what might have been

454
00:24:53,240 --> 00:24:55,160
Speaker 1: good about the ones you didn't buy, and you think

455
00:24:55,200 --> 00:24:58,200
Speaker 1: about what might be wrong with the one you did buy.

456
00:24:58,320 --> 00:25:01,960
Speaker 1: So to eliminate the stress of this dissonance, the theory

457
00:25:02,000 --> 00:25:05,879
Speaker 1: goes that your brain simply changes your beliefs. You change

458
00:25:05,880 --> 00:25:08,760
Speaker 1: your beliefs about what you prefer and what you want,

459
00:25:09,280 --> 00:25:13,359
Speaker 1: emphasizing the pros and de emphasizing the cons of the

460
00:25:13,359 --> 00:25:17,159
Speaker 1: option you chose, and vice versa for the option you rejected.

461
00:25:17,560 --> 00:25:19,720
Speaker 1: And it makes sense in a weird way, right, I mean,

462
00:25:19,960 --> 00:25:22,359
Speaker 1: we often think of that our beliefs should be these

463
00:25:22,400 --> 00:25:26,000
Speaker 1: these core and just fix things about ourselves, you know.

464
00:25:26,480 --> 00:25:29,200
Speaker 1: Uh that you know, although the wind and the raging

465
00:25:29,200 --> 00:25:31,600
Speaker 1: of the world just move around. But uh, you know,

466
00:25:31,680 --> 00:25:34,679
Speaker 1: from from the mind standpoint, it's like, well, uh, this

467
00:25:34,760 --> 00:25:37,000
Speaker 1: is causing a problem. Let's let's change this circuit here

468
00:25:37,000 --> 00:25:40,199
Speaker 1: because we're getting some some feedback that that is not

469
00:25:40,240 --> 00:25:44,320
Speaker 1: optimal for the system. Right. Um. Now, I will note that,

470
00:25:44,400 --> 00:25:47,600
Speaker 1: of course, as always, these these results apply on average,

471
00:25:47,640 --> 00:25:50,280
Speaker 1: and it's interesting to think about other ways that some

472
00:25:50,320 --> 00:25:54,080
Speaker 1: people might reduce cognitive dissonance in this kind of situation

473
00:25:54,200 --> 00:25:58,960
Speaker 1: without changing their original preferences without changing their opinions about

474
00:25:58,960 --> 00:26:03,720
Speaker 1: what's desirable. I think one very common adaptive strategy is

475
00:26:03,760 --> 00:26:08,560
Speaker 1: the adaptive strategy of internally de emphasizing the importance of possessions,

476
00:26:09,000 --> 00:26:12,320
Speaker 1: which in fact, in reality, which you know moment to moment,

477
00:26:12,720 --> 00:26:18,280
Speaker 1: reduces the cognitive dissonance that arises from making choices about possessions. Yeah,

478
00:26:18,320 --> 00:26:23,199
Speaker 1: sort of realizing, well, lawnmowers don't really matter. It doesn't.

479
00:26:23,960 --> 00:26:26,240
Speaker 1: It's just the thing, and I'm going to spend a

480
00:26:26,240 --> 00:26:28,240
Speaker 1: certain amount on it. It's just I'm gonna spend what

481
00:26:28,320 --> 00:26:30,600
Speaker 1: it costs. I'm gonna get whichever one is just easiest

482
00:26:30,640 --> 00:26:33,440
Speaker 1: to obtain. In the smoking example, I think this is

483
00:26:33,520 --> 00:26:35,800
Speaker 1: kind of the This is equivalent to the like who

484
00:26:35,880 --> 00:26:39,280
Speaker 1: wants to live forever option, but thinking about you know,

485
00:26:39,440 --> 00:26:43,320
Speaker 1: consumer items instead of your life, Like, I'm not reckless

486
00:26:43,359 --> 00:26:45,400
Speaker 1: with my health, I'm just very zen about this whole

487
00:26:45,400 --> 00:26:48,119
Speaker 1: smoking thing, right, I think it makes more sense to

488
00:26:48,160 --> 00:26:52,760
Speaker 1: try to do the zen path about the lawnmower material possessions.

489
00:26:52,800 --> 00:26:55,200
Speaker 1: But hey, I mean that's hard. I mean we shouldn't

490
00:26:55,240 --> 00:26:57,560
Speaker 1: just like blithely say everybody should do that, But I

491
00:26:57,560 --> 00:27:00,439
Speaker 1: mean it's difficult to do that. People you're spending your money,

492
00:27:00,480 --> 00:27:03,360
Speaker 1: that is your labor. You're you're thinking, oh God, did

493
00:27:03,400 --> 00:27:06,280
Speaker 1: I did I get it right? Um and And the

494
00:27:06,280 --> 00:27:08,800
Speaker 1: same even manifest when you're just making a decision about

495
00:27:08,800 --> 00:27:11,040
Speaker 1: what appliance you want to take home after spending an

496
00:27:11,040 --> 00:27:14,520
Speaker 1: afternoon doing an experiment. Um and. And I should also

497
00:27:14,560 --> 00:27:17,639
Speaker 1: note that there have been some competing explanations for this phenomenon,

498
00:27:17,720 --> 00:27:20,359
Speaker 1: but it seems like cognitive dissonance is favored by the

499
00:27:20,400 --> 00:27:24,199
Speaker 1: experts and supported by a lot of other experiments. Um. So,

500
00:27:24,280 --> 00:27:26,520
Speaker 1: I wanted to note in this experiment there were a

501
00:27:26,560 --> 00:27:31,320
Speaker 1: couple of interesting control conditions and additional hypotheses tested that

502
00:27:31,480 --> 00:27:33,960
Speaker 1: ended up not receiving support from the data, So I'm

503
00:27:33,960 --> 00:27:35,680
Speaker 1: not going to get into those, but I did want

504
00:27:35,680 --> 00:27:39,760
Speaker 1: to mention one control condition, the gift condition, and this

505
00:27:39,880 --> 00:27:43,400
Speaker 1: provides an interesting variation on what they found. So there

506
00:27:43,520 --> 00:27:47,200
Speaker 1: is some indication that owning something makes people see that

507
00:27:47,280 --> 00:27:50,879
Speaker 1: thing as more desirable. So what if it was the

508
00:27:50,880 --> 00:27:54,600
Speaker 1: effect of ownership of this appliance they received that made

509
00:27:54,640 --> 00:27:58,440
Speaker 1: the difference, rather than reduction of cognitive dissonance arising from

510
00:27:58,440 --> 00:28:02,520
Speaker 1: your choices. Well, to control for that in this gift condition,

511
00:28:02,600 --> 00:28:05,359
Speaker 1: the subject did not get to choose which item they

512
00:28:05,359 --> 00:28:08,560
Speaker 1: would receive. It was just picked for them and given

513
00:28:08,600 --> 00:28:12,040
Speaker 1: as a gift by by the experiment er. And what

514
00:28:12,119 --> 00:28:15,200
Speaker 1: Brim found is that this control condition did not produce

515
00:28:15,240 --> 00:28:17,880
Speaker 1: effects to challenge the main finding. So it really did

516
00:28:17,920 --> 00:28:21,000
Speaker 1: look like, at least from this experiment, that people's ratings

517
00:28:21,080 --> 00:28:25,000
Speaker 1: were actually changed by the choices they made, and not

518
00:28:25,119 --> 00:28:29,240
Speaker 1: just by feelings associated with ownership or feelings from what

519
00:28:29,280 --> 00:28:31,600
Speaker 1: you're taking home. It wasn't the fact that you have

520
00:28:31,840 --> 00:28:34,280
Speaker 1: the coffee maker that makes it seem better. It was

521
00:28:34,320 --> 00:28:37,840
Speaker 1: the fact that you chose it. You know, when this

522
00:28:37,880 --> 00:28:40,720
Speaker 1: is this gets more complicated, and perhaps it's it's looked

523
00:28:40,720 --> 00:28:43,600
Speaker 1: at more in the appropriate literature surrounding it. But I'm

524
00:28:43,600 --> 00:28:46,600
Speaker 1: instantly reminded of some of the advertising mechanics that have

525
00:28:46,720 --> 00:28:50,440
Speaker 1: encountered recently on YouTube where I'm watching a show that

526
00:28:50,440 --> 00:28:54,360
Speaker 1: that I that we regularly watch, and then I'll instead

527
00:28:54,400 --> 00:28:56,400
Speaker 1: of just being served an ad, I get served a

528
00:28:56,400 --> 00:28:59,480
Speaker 1: little choice that says, which of the following ads would

529
00:28:59,480 --> 00:29:01,480
Speaker 1: you like to risk? Steve most I wonder if that

530
00:29:01,680 --> 00:29:05,160
Speaker 1: is a mechanic that's playing into some of this. Oh yes,

531
00:29:05,240 --> 00:29:07,320
Speaker 1: so like if you choose it, maybe the ideas you'll

532
00:29:07,360 --> 00:29:10,960
Speaker 1: actually be uh less resentful of the ad and more

533
00:29:11,000 --> 00:29:12,920
Speaker 1: likely to pay attention to it and listen all the

534
00:29:12,920 --> 00:29:16,120
Speaker 1: way through. I wonder, Yeah, maybe, because I know the

535
00:29:16,200 --> 00:29:19,360
Speaker 1: choice is never like, um, it's never a wonderful like

536
00:29:19,360 --> 00:29:21,200
Speaker 1: an easy choice. It's not like do you want to

537
00:29:21,200 --> 00:29:23,080
Speaker 1: see an ad for the new Star Wars TV show?

538
00:29:23,360 --> 00:29:25,800
Speaker 1: Or do you want to watch an insurance commercial? Now,

539
00:29:25,800 --> 00:29:30,720
Speaker 1: it's always like which insurance commercial would you like to watch? Well,

540
00:29:30,720 --> 00:29:32,640
Speaker 1: it's got to be the one with that really nice lady.

541
00:29:34,480 --> 00:29:37,600
Speaker 1: Was one with a really nice lady who's always really nice? Oh? Yeah,

542
00:29:37,680 --> 00:29:39,240
Speaker 1: I guess I like the weird ones, give me the

543
00:29:39,440 --> 00:29:42,960
Speaker 1: give me the real yeah, the gecko ones c g

544
00:29:43,080 --> 00:29:45,680
Speaker 1: I gecko, Yeah, make me not realize it was for

545
00:29:45,760 --> 00:29:48,479
Speaker 1: insurance and and never think twice about what the product

546
00:29:48,480 --> 00:29:52,400
Speaker 1: actually was. Okay, So, just to read the top line

547
00:29:52,440 --> 00:29:55,440
Speaker 1: from the conclusion of brim study quote, the results supported

548
00:29:55,440 --> 00:29:59,800
Speaker 1: the prediction that choosing between alternatives would create dissonance, and

549
00:29:59,800 --> 00:30:02,880
Speaker 1: it tempts to reduce it by making the chosen alternative

550
00:30:02,960 --> 00:30:07,480
Speaker 1: more desirable and the unchosen alternative less desirable. Yeah. This

551
00:30:07,520 --> 00:30:09,920
Speaker 1: reminds me of another paper, Joe, that I think you're

552
00:30:09,920 --> 00:30:13,120
Speaker 1: familiar with Love the one You're with by Stephen Stills

553
00:30:13,160 --> 00:30:17,640
Speaker 1: at All. Yep, when you know when you're down, when

554
00:30:17,680 --> 00:30:21,800
Speaker 1: you're confused and you don't remember how you rated the

555
00:30:21,840 --> 00:30:29,200
Speaker 1: items originally now uh more. Seriously though, I'm not sure

556
00:30:29,200 --> 00:30:32,840
Speaker 1: if this completely sticks, but I instantly looking over all this,

557
00:30:32,960 --> 00:30:37,160
Speaker 1: I started thinking about the still relevant divide over gaming systems.

558
00:30:37,840 --> 00:30:40,720
Speaker 1: So back when I was a kid, Like the first

559
00:30:41,160 --> 00:30:43,800
Speaker 1: major choice I think I had to make because I

560
00:30:43,840 --> 00:30:45,760
Speaker 1: was an ne Ne Ne s kid, and then came the

561
00:30:46,080 --> 00:30:50,080
Speaker 1: choice Super a ne S or Saga Genesis, and then

562
00:30:50,120 --> 00:30:52,960
Speaker 1: eventually later comes to PlayStation Xbox Divide, and I think

563
00:30:52,960 --> 00:30:56,640
Speaker 1: that's that's still very much alive today. But but basically,

564
00:30:56,960 --> 00:30:58,720
Speaker 1: you know, one often has to make a choice which

565
00:30:58,760 --> 00:31:01,640
Speaker 1: prices system they're going to vest in. And this also

566
00:31:01,720 --> 00:31:05,440
Speaker 1: impacts certain console exclusives, right like, if you're a Nintendo White,

567
00:31:05,720 --> 00:31:08,280
Speaker 1: then you're gonna get Mario and so you can end

568
00:31:08,360 --> 00:31:11,760
Speaker 1: up on Team Mario. If you're a Sagatarian, then you're

569
00:31:11,760 --> 00:31:13,920
Speaker 1: gonna you're gonna be a follower of Saint Sonic the

570
00:31:13,920 --> 00:31:17,960
Speaker 1: Hedgehog and may you know, maybe Saint Alter Beast. Xbox

571
00:31:17,960 --> 00:31:20,120
Speaker 1: you're gonna get Gears of War in Halo PlayStation, you're

572
00:31:20,160 --> 00:31:23,360
Speaker 1: gonna get Gods of War and or God of War

573
00:31:23,520 --> 00:31:27,320
Speaker 1: whatever it was, and the last Office so um. You know,

574
00:31:27,360 --> 00:31:29,560
Speaker 1: on on one level, on like a very rational level,

575
00:31:29,600 --> 00:31:33,360
Speaker 1: you engage with in some decision making You're like, well, uh,

576
00:31:33,640 --> 00:31:36,080
Speaker 1: I know this franchise as a console exclusive, I'm gonna

577
00:31:36,080 --> 00:31:41,080
Speaker 1: go this direction. But in other cases I do looking back,

578
00:31:41,120 --> 00:31:43,760
Speaker 1: I do find myself having engaged in some of that,

579
00:31:43,880 --> 00:31:48,280
Speaker 1: you know, like I didn't really have a huge opinion

580
00:31:48,320 --> 00:31:51,520
Speaker 1: on the whole Mario Sonic divide, and yet I found

581
00:31:51,520 --> 00:31:55,520
Speaker 1: at times someone like today we'll bring up Mario and

582
00:31:55,560 --> 00:31:57,680
Speaker 1: Sonic can be like, oh, well, you know, Mario was cool,

583
00:31:57,680 --> 00:31:59,360
Speaker 1: but Sonic was a bit lame. Sonic was a bit

584
00:31:59,400 --> 00:32:03,360
Speaker 1: a bit of a poo a Pucci, and I realistically

585
00:32:03,360 --> 00:32:05,600
Speaker 1: have to agree with them. But I have this impulse

586
00:32:05,840 --> 00:32:09,160
Speaker 1: to defend Sonic because I was a Saga player, because

587
00:32:09,200 --> 00:32:11,040
Speaker 1: I had the Saga Genesis, and even though I didn't

588
00:32:11,080 --> 00:32:14,360
Speaker 1: really love Sonic the Hedgehog like he was, still I

589
00:32:14,400 --> 00:32:16,640
Speaker 1: was still on that team, you know. So I'm still

590
00:32:16,640 --> 00:32:18,960
Speaker 1: reeling from Sonic being a Pucci, which I think is

591
00:32:19,000 --> 00:32:22,440
Speaker 1: highly accurate. I'm sorry it is, no I I agree,

592
00:32:22,480 --> 00:32:26,720
Speaker 1: I rationally agree with you, but I have this irrational response,

593
00:32:26,800 --> 00:32:29,920
Speaker 1: this knee jerk reaction to defend him for some reason,

594
00:32:30,200 --> 00:32:32,680
Speaker 1: even though I I never completed a Sonic game and

595
00:32:32,760 --> 00:32:36,440
Speaker 1: ultimately don't have a real strong opinion on Sonic versus Mario.

596
00:32:36,480 --> 00:32:38,520
Speaker 1: I didn't. I played both of them at some point

597
00:32:38,600 --> 00:32:41,520
Speaker 1: or another, and I didn't particularly you know, I don't

598
00:32:41,560 --> 00:32:45,120
Speaker 1: really rationally love one more than the other. Yeah, I mean,

599
00:32:45,480 --> 00:32:49,160
Speaker 1: I think ideas like which video game console you buy

600
00:32:49,160 --> 00:32:50,840
Speaker 1: that that goes in the same direction as a lot

601
00:32:50,880 --> 00:32:54,000
Speaker 1: of these sort of like consumer options that people choose between.

602
00:32:54,040 --> 00:32:57,760
Speaker 1: We're I think clearly like both kinds of considerations are

603
00:32:57,760 --> 00:32:59,600
Speaker 1: going to be feeding in. Like there are some just

604
00:32:59,720 --> 00:33:02,320
Speaker 1: gin you and preference differences, like you can look at

605
00:33:02,360 --> 00:33:04,160
Speaker 1: like which games you can get on each one and

606
00:33:04,200 --> 00:33:06,680
Speaker 1: have a genuine desire to play one more than the other.

607
00:33:07,040 --> 00:33:10,640
Speaker 1: But then there's also probably some choice supportive bias kicking

608
00:33:10,680 --> 00:33:13,600
Speaker 1: in and how you retrospectively think about making the choice

609
00:33:13,640 --> 00:33:16,600
Speaker 1: and which one you'd like better. And I guess I

610
00:33:16,600 --> 00:33:20,160
Speaker 1: should say that a less favored but also possibly viable

611
00:33:20,160 --> 00:33:24,800
Speaker 1: explanation for for this phenomenon um, like observed in brim study,

612
00:33:24,880 --> 00:33:28,680
Speaker 1: is known as self perception theory. Basically, this is an

613
00:33:28,680 --> 00:33:31,960
Speaker 1: alternative to cognitive dissonance theory that comes down to the

614
00:33:31,960 --> 00:33:36,760
Speaker 1: principle that people form their internal perceptions of the self

615
00:33:37,040 --> 00:33:41,800
Speaker 1: by observing external actions. So how do you decide what

616
00:33:41,920 --> 00:33:45,480
Speaker 1: your preferences are? Will you actually decide them by observing

617
00:33:45,560 --> 00:33:49,719
Speaker 1: what you choose? And so if this were the correct interpretation,

618
00:33:49,800 --> 00:33:53,520
Speaker 1: this would also explain choice induced preference change, which is

619
00:33:53,560 --> 00:33:55,920
Speaker 1: what the phenomenon would come to be known as choice

620
00:33:56,000 --> 00:33:59,920
Speaker 1: induced preference change. You make the choice and that changes

621
00:34:00,080 --> 00:34:04,280
Speaker 1: is retrospectively what you think your preferences are. And Brim's

622
00:34:04,360 --> 00:34:08,480
Speaker 1: results have been replicated many times across many studies. Uh,

623
00:34:08,719 --> 00:34:11,120
Speaker 1: there are there are some disagreements, but it appears to

624
00:34:11,160 --> 00:34:14,319
Speaker 1: me to be a pretty solid conclusion that not only

625
00:34:14,360 --> 00:34:17,520
Speaker 1: do our preferences influence our choices, but our choices really

626
00:34:17,560 --> 00:34:21,680
Speaker 1: do influence our preferences. And this probably happens in both

627
00:34:21,800 --> 00:34:24,840
Speaker 1: positive and negative directions. So again, just like in that

628
00:34:24,920 --> 00:34:29,719
Speaker 1: first study, our preferences for options that we choose increase

629
00:34:29,880 --> 00:34:34,120
Speaker 1: and our preferences for options that we reject decrease. And

630
00:34:34,160 --> 00:34:37,760
Speaker 1: I think the second condition is especially interesting. It explains

631
00:34:37,760 --> 00:34:42,120
Speaker 1: something that I've often observed anecdotally that so many things

632
00:34:42,200 --> 00:34:47,200
Speaker 1: in life are once discarded despised. Almost as soon as

633
00:34:47,280 --> 00:34:51,360
Speaker 1: you have committed to rejecting an option, you can suddenly

634
00:34:51,400 --> 00:34:54,680
Speaker 1: think of all kinds of reasons why that option was bad. Anyway,

635
00:34:54,840 --> 00:34:58,359
Speaker 1: The cons just boil up into your brain. Yeah, this

636
00:34:58,440 --> 00:35:01,360
Speaker 1: is interesting. Um. I thought about this in terms of

637
00:35:01,440 --> 00:35:03,359
Speaker 1: video games, but then I think I thought of an

638
00:35:03,360 --> 00:35:07,600
Speaker 1: even better example, and that is, um, the music of Metallica.

639
00:35:08,200 --> 00:35:12,239
Speaker 1: So so I'm I'm I. I always try to be

640
00:35:12,280 --> 00:35:14,960
Speaker 1: a polite person about things that I like and what

641
00:35:15,239 --> 00:35:18,120
Speaker 1: things other people like. So you know, if at any

642
00:35:18,160 --> 00:35:20,200
Speaker 1: point someone was to come up to me and be like, hey,

643
00:35:20,200 --> 00:35:22,920
Speaker 1: I'm really excited about Metallica or you know, I'm listening

644
00:35:22,920 --> 00:35:24,560
Speaker 1: to this old Metallic album where I'm trying to have

645
00:35:24,600 --> 00:35:27,640
Speaker 1: this new Metallic album, I would probably be like, oh, yeah, yeah,

646
00:35:27,680 --> 00:35:31,480
Speaker 1: Metallica is cool. But if I if I'm being if

647
00:35:31,480 --> 00:35:33,839
Speaker 1: I'm being honest, like there was there was a time

648
00:35:33,880 --> 00:35:36,239
Speaker 1: in my life where I was super into Metallica. I

649
00:35:36,280 --> 00:35:38,840
Speaker 1: was like, you know, discovering those those albums for the

650
00:35:38,880 --> 00:35:41,520
Speaker 1: first time, you know, you know, you know, Ride the

651
00:35:41,600 --> 00:35:45,759
Speaker 1: Lightning and so forth. For me. Eighth ninth grade for me,

652
00:35:45,880 --> 00:35:49,319
Speaker 1: that was like Metallica City. Yeah, yeah, it was. I

653
00:35:49,320 --> 00:35:51,960
Speaker 1: think I was. I was maybe just starting college or

654
00:35:51,960 --> 00:35:54,040
Speaker 1: maybe I was finishing high school when I really started

655
00:35:54,040 --> 00:35:55,840
Speaker 1: getting into them. But it was like, you know, everything

656
00:35:55,840 --> 00:35:58,680
Speaker 1: from the Black album prior. I was like, this is

657
00:35:58,680 --> 00:36:03,319
Speaker 1: amazing and um, and then at some point I was like, uh,

658
00:36:04,600 --> 00:36:07,279
Speaker 1: basically I less. I stopped listening to them for a

659
00:36:07,360 --> 00:36:10,280
Speaker 1: very long time, and then more recently I've started listening

660
00:36:10,320 --> 00:36:13,480
Speaker 1: to them again and and that's like the realistic read

661
00:36:13,520 --> 00:36:16,080
Speaker 1: on it. But on some level, I do feel like

662
00:36:16,280 --> 00:36:19,359
Speaker 1: when I discarded Metallica, I was like, yeah, Metallica kind

663
00:36:19,360 --> 00:36:21,839
Speaker 1: of sucks, Like those guys are jerks. Uh, they're newer

664
00:36:21,840 --> 00:36:24,000
Speaker 1: stuff is not any good? You know, all these various

665
00:36:24,040 --> 00:36:26,719
Speaker 1: things you kind of heap onto the pile, which is

666
00:36:26,840 --> 00:36:30,440
Speaker 1: ridiculous because hey, I used to really like them, and

667
00:36:30,480 --> 00:36:34,160
Speaker 1: then I would have to like current me would have

668
00:36:34,200 --> 00:36:36,120
Speaker 1: to point out to then me, you're going to like

669
00:36:36,239 --> 00:36:38,279
Speaker 1: them again. There's gonna be a come of time in

670
00:36:39,160 --> 00:36:41,600
Speaker 1: where you suddenly start streaming a bunch of old Metallica

671
00:36:41,600 --> 00:36:45,240
Speaker 1: albums again, and uh, and it's not gonna make sense

672
00:36:45,239 --> 00:36:47,880
Speaker 1: with this current rejection of them is a is a

673
00:36:48,080 --> 00:36:50,800
Speaker 1: is a is a musical entity. This is really funny

674
00:36:50,800 --> 00:36:53,279
Speaker 1: because just this week I started listening to their first

675
00:36:53,320 --> 00:36:56,360
Speaker 1: two albums again. Oh cool. I wonder why that happened.

676
00:36:56,440 --> 00:36:58,920
Speaker 1: Is there something in common that did this come up

677
00:36:58,920 --> 00:37:01,239
Speaker 1: in a previous talk we had at I don't think

678
00:37:01,239 --> 00:37:04,080
Speaker 1: we've really talked about Metauga recently. I mean it comes

679
00:37:04,160 --> 00:37:08,520
Speaker 1: up time to time, metal serendipity. I I find very

680
00:37:08,560 --> 00:37:12,200
Speaker 1: interesting that I love the stupid ideology of their early albums,

681
00:37:12,239 --> 00:37:15,480
Speaker 1: which there is presumed to be some kind of great

682
00:37:15,560 --> 00:37:19,719
Speaker 1: conflict over the concept of metal. And one of the

683
00:37:19,719 --> 00:37:24,160
Speaker 1: things that's great about early early albums within a genre

684
00:37:24,560 --> 00:37:27,359
Speaker 1: is that they're often very much about the genre. So like,

685
00:37:27,480 --> 00:37:29,839
Speaker 1: you know, like early rock music is all about what

686
00:37:30,040 --> 00:37:33,719
Speaker 1: rocking is and instructing you to rock. Uh. They're like

687
00:37:33,800 --> 00:37:36,640
Speaker 1: early rap songs that are about rapping and about and

688
00:37:36,680 --> 00:37:39,400
Speaker 1: telling people how to wrap. And they're early metal albums

689
00:37:39,400 --> 00:37:42,600
Speaker 1: that are very much all about metal, and Metallica's early

690
00:37:42,680 --> 00:37:45,400
Speaker 1: albums are are all about the concept of metal and

691
00:37:45,440 --> 00:37:48,239
Speaker 1: what it means to fight in the metal wars. I

692
00:37:48,280 --> 00:37:51,520
Speaker 1: love this, Yeah, I have a big I really love

693
00:37:51,600 --> 00:37:53,759
Speaker 1: house music as well. And of course there's so many

694
00:37:53,760 --> 00:37:56,120
Speaker 1: different types of house music, so listen to but I

695
00:37:56,400 --> 00:37:59,840
Speaker 1: still have a very warm place for house music that

696
00:38:00,320 --> 00:38:02,719
Speaker 1: informs you that this is house music. We have a

697
00:38:02,760 --> 00:38:05,440
Speaker 1: voice telling you you are listening to house music, and

698
00:38:05,480 --> 00:38:07,920
Speaker 1: I'm like, that's great. I don't get enough music that

699
00:38:08,360 --> 00:38:11,000
Speaker 1: is very explicit about the genre that I'm listening to.

700
00:38:11,280 --> 00:38:15,400
Speaker 1: That's excellent. I wonder what age a genre mostly stops

701
00:38:15,520 --> 00:38:18,800
Speaker 1: being about the concept of itself as a genre is,

702
00:38:18,920 --> 00:38:22,040
Speaker 1: Like metal today isn't usually very much about the concept

703
00:38:22,040 --> 00:38:25,319
Speaker 1: of metal, like early thresh metal was. Yeah, I don't know.

704
00:38:25,360 --> 00:38:29,040
Speaker 1: I guess it just evolves to a certain certain point. Um. Now,

705
00:38:29,040 --> 00:38:31,000
Speaker 1: of course, in all of this, you know not to

706
00:38:31,000 --> 00:38:32,760
Speaker 1: get too far off the point here. I think also,

707
00:38:32,960 --> 00:38:35,799
Speaker 1: you have that kind of like evan flow of nostalgia, right,

708
00:38:35,800 --> 00:38:37,320
Speaker 1: So the thing you're into, then you get out of,

709
00:38:37,320 --> 00:38:38,920
Speaker 1: and then you can reach a point where you look

710
00:38:38,960 --> 00:38:40,960
Speaker 1: back on it fondly and get back into it at

711
00:38:41,000 --> 00:38:43,600
Speaker 1: least some degree. But it's funny because I went through

712
00:38:43,600 --> 00:38:47,680
Speaker 1: a cycle that exactly mirrors yours. Like I liked them

713
00:38:47,680 --> 00:38:50,960
Speaker 1: when I was younger, and then after once I stopped

714
00:38:51,000 --> 00:38:53,080
Speaker 1: listening to them. Wasn't a deliberate choice. I just kind

715
00:38:53,080 --> 00:38:55,359
Speaker 1: of moved on to other things, and then I look

716
00:38:55,440 --> 00:38:57,480
Speaker 1: back on music that I used to listen to and

717
00:38:57,480 --> 00:39:01,040
Speaker 1: don't listen to anymore, and often feel this, uh, this

718
00:39:01,040 --> 00:39:04,080
Speaker 1: this kind of sting, this thing like Okay, I mean,

719
00:39:04,120 --> 00:39:06,680
Speaker 1: I guess what's probably very much going on is I

720
00:39:06,719 --> 00:39:09,640
Speaker 1: don't listen to it. I'm supporting that choice to not

721
00:39:09,760 --> 00:39:12,839
Speaker 1: listen to it by changing my beliefs about it and

722
00:39:12,880 --> 00:39:22,319
Speaker 1: deciding that it's dumb. Anyway, thank you, thank you. Now,

723
00:39:22,360 --> 00:39:25,200
Speaker 1: following up from Brim's original study in the fifties, like

724
00:39:25,200 --> 00:39:27,120
Speaker 1: I said, there have been a bunch of replications, but

725
00:39:27,440 --> 00:39:30,600
Speaker 1: there have also been some interesting questions. Like one study

726
00:39:30,640 --> 00:39:34,120
Speaker 1: I was looking at investigated something about the methodology of

727
00:39:34,160 --> 00:39:36,439
Speaker 1: the test, so it was it was trying to see

728
00:39:36,480 --> 00:39:40,880
Speaker 1: if the results stand up to challenges to Brim's original method.

729
00:39:41,040 --> 00:39:43,160
Speaker 1: And the paper I was looking at here was by

730
00:39:43,320 --> 00:39:48,160
Speaker 1: Tally Shiro, Christina M. Velasquez, and Raymond J. Dolan, published

731
00:39:48,160 --> 00:39:52,080
Speaker 1: in Psychological Science in two thousand ten called do Decisions

732
00:39:52,120 --> 00:39:57,040
Speaker 1: Shape Preference? Evidence from Blind Choice? Now, this was pretty interesting.

733
00:39:57,080 --> 00:40:00,239
Speaker 1: So the authors here begin by noting some papers all

734
00:40:00,280 --> 00:40:02,799
Speaker 1: the ones I saw were associated with their researcher named

735
00:40:02,920 --> 00:40:07,120
Speaker 1: mk Chen that noticed a potential problem with Brem's method

736
00:40:07,600 --> 00:40:10,399
Speaker 1: such that it could be telling us something different than

737
00:40:10,440 --> 00:40:13,160
Speaker 1: what we think it does. And the critique goes like

738
00:40:13,239 --> 00:40:16,800
Speaker 1: this in Uh, in the author's chirou at all's words

739
00:40:16,800 --> 00:40:21,880
Speaker 1: here quote, people's preferences cannot be measured perfectly and are

740
00:40:21,920 --> 00:40:27,160
Speaker 1: subject to rating noise. Okay, true, As participants gain experience

741
00:40:27,200 --> 00:40:31,320
Speaker 1: with the rating scale, they will provide more accurate ratings,

742
00:40:31,360 --> 00:40:35,640
Speaker 1: such that post choice shifts in ratings simply reflect the

743
00:40:35,840 --> 00:40:40,640
Speaker 1: unmasking of the participants initial preferences, which can be predicted

744
00:40:40,719 --> 00:40:44,759
Speaker 1: by their choices, rather than reflecting any changes in preference

745
00:40:45,120 --> 00:40:48,920
Speaker 1: induced by the choice. Uh So does that make sense? Basically?

746
00:40:48,920 --> 00:40:51,720
Speaker 1: I think what they're saying is that maybe when people

747
00:40:51,880 --> 00:40:55,320
Speaker 1: change their desirability ratings of two things that are initially

748
00:40:55,400 --> 00:40:57,839
Speaker 1: similar after being forced to pick one or the other,

749
00:40:58,480 --> 00:41:02,360
Speaker 1: what's happening is not an ex post facto reevaluation of

750
00:41:02,400 --> 00:41:06,080
Speaker 1: their preferences. But people are just getting better with successive

751
00:41:06,080 --> 00:41:10,680
Speaker 1: tries at expressing their genuine, pre existing preferences on the

752
00:41:10,760 --> 00:41:13,560
Speaker 1: rating scale used in the experiment. It seems like a

753
00:41:13,600 --> 00:41:16,919
Speaker 1: reasonable critique that that would be worth looking into. Yeah. Yeah,

754
00:41:17,040 --> 00:41:19,640
Speaker 1: and I think we can all see examples of that

755
00:41:19,719 --> 00:41:21,520
Speaker 1: or find examples of that where you're just like, well,

756
00:41:21,560 --> 00:41:23,520
Speaker 1: I was trying out this one musical genre, it turns

757
00:41:23,520 --> 00:41:25,879
Speaker 1: out they just won my thing. Or like I think

758
00:41:25,880 --> 00:41:28,440
Speaker 1: back on video games and I'm like, yeah, I eventually

759
00:41:28,480 --> 00:41:31,439
Speaker 1: realized I'm just not good at real time strategy games.

760
00:41:31,440 --> 00:41:33,600
Speaker 1: I just don't like them as much they don't. It's

761
00:41:33,600 --> 00:41:36,040
Speaker 1: just not my deal, right, So it would be that

762
00:41:36,000 --> 00:41:40,200
Speaker 1: the actual preferences in the beginning were what was revealed

763
00:41:40,239 --> 00:41:42,600
Speaker 1: in the second rating, and you're just getting better at

764
00:41:42,680 --> 00:41:46,880
Speaker 1: expressing them rather than changing them. So the authors of

765
00:41:46,920 --> 00:41:49,800
Speaker 1: this two thousands ten studies tried to design an experiment

766
00:41:49,840 --> 00:41:53,080
Speaker 1: that couldn't be subject to that problem, and what they

767
00:41:53,120 --> 00:41:55,720
Speaker 1: came up with was what they called a blind choice

768
00:41:55,800 --> 00:41:58,879
Speaker 1: model as opposed to a free choice model. So what's

769
00:41:58,920 --> 00:42:01,360
Speaker 1: the difference. Well, in a free choice model, again, remember

770
00:42:01,480 --> 00:42:04,600
Speaker 1: you would rate a number of options according to your preference.

771
00:42:04,920 --> 00:42:08,520
Speaker 1: Then you'd be forced to choose between some subset of them.

772
00:42:08,640 --> 00:42:12,120
Speaker 1: Then later you rate the options again. In this study,

773
00:42:12,160 --> 00:42:15,080
Speaker 1: what was different was that people didn't know what two

774
00:42:15,160 --> 00:42:18,600
Speaker 1: options from the list they were choosing between until they

775
00:42:18,640 --> 00:42:22,480
Speaker 1: had made their choice. So you're given a hypothetical list

776
00:42:22,520 --> 00:42:25,520
Speaker 1: of vacation destinations, and you rate them in terms of

777
00:42:25,560 --> 00:42:27,640
Speaker 1: how much you'd like to go there for a vacation,

778
00:42:27,719 --> 00:42:32,040
Speaker 1: so you know, Rome, Cairo, et cetera. Then after the

779
00:42:32,120 --> 00:42:35,720
Speaker 1: initial rating task, you are asked to choose blindly between

780
00:42:35,719 --> 00:42:39,520
Speaker 1: a binary subset for a hypothetical vacation, but you can't

781
00:42:39,520 --> 00:42:41,400
Speaker 1: see what they are. Is you have option A and

782
00:42:41,440 --> 00:42:45,319
Speaker 1: option B, but the actual locations are hidden, and you

783
00:42:45,400 --> 00:42:48,640
Speaker 1: choose one. Once you choose between them, the options are

784
00:42:48,680 --> 00:42:51,080
Speaker 1: then revealed, so it's like, oh, so it seems you've

785
00:42:51,120 --> 00:42:55,080
Speaker 1: picked Making instead of Tuscany or whatever. Uh, And and

786
00:42:55,120 --> 00:42:57,160
Speaker 1: then once it's all over, you will be asked to

787
00:42:57,239 --> 00:43:00,480
Speaker 1: rate the options again. So so does that makes sense

788
00:43:00,480 --> 00:43:02,719
Speaker 1: that you can't see what the options are. You're just

789
00:43:02,840 --> 00:43:05,200
Speaker 1: making a choice without any information at all. It is

790
00:43:05,280 --> 00:43:08,600
Speaker 1: complete blind choice. And they also included a couple of

791
00:43:08,640 --> 00:43:12,160
Speaker 1: control conditions where a computer made the decision for people,

792
00:43:12,200 --> 00:43:13,719
Speaker 1: so you don't get to make a choice at all,

793
00:43:14,400 --> 00:43:17,920
Speaker 1: to see if the perception of personal agency was important

794
00:43:17,960 --> 00:43:20,799
Speaker 1: even though the choice was made blind. And it's not

795
00:43:20,840 --> 00:43:23,600
Speaker 1: just a case of like picking a door and then

796
00:43:23,640 --> 00:43:25,799
Speaker 1: what's behind door number three? Because at least in that

797
00:43:25,840 --> 00:43:28,400
Speaker 1: scenario you picked three but in this there's like a

798
00:43:28,520 --> 00:43:31,040
Speaker 1: robot game show host that as you walk up and

799
00:43:31,040 --> 00:43:33,480
Speaker 1: then it just says you're getting a toaster, right, you

800
00:43:33,600 --> 00:43:36,360
Speaker 1: get what's behind door number three? Uh, that that's the

801
00:43:36,400 --> 00:43:39,520
Speaker 1: difference there. And so what did the study find? Quote,

802
00:43:39,760 --> 00:43:43,560
Speaker 1: We found that preferences were altered after participants made a

803
00:43:43,600 --> 00:43:48,560
Speaker 1: blind choice, but not when a computer instructed the participants decision.

804
00:43:49,040 --> 00:43:52,960
Speaker 1: The results suggests that just as preferences form choices, choices

805
00:43:53,040 --> 00:43:57,680
Speaker 1: shape preferences. So this is confirming to some degree Brem's

806
00:43:57,719 --> 00:44:00,680
Speaker 1: original results. It looks like, yes, these atias have not

807
00:44:00,880 --> 00:44:04,560
Speaker 1: merely been tracking how people get better at assigning ratings

808
00:44:04,560 --> 00:44:08,240
Speaker 1: to their pre existing preferences. What people want and prefer

809
00:44:08,400 --> 00:44:11,080
Speaker 1: really does seem to change so that it falls in

810
00:44:11,120 --> 00:44:14,080
Speaker 1: line with what they have already chosen. And this study

811
00:44:14,120 --> 00:44:18,880
Speaker 1: also reveals this very interesting wrinkle. Choice induced preference change

812
00:44:18,920 --> 00:44:22,600
Speaker 1: can happen even when we are not making an informed choice,

813
00:44:22,880 --> 00:44:27,480
Speaker 1: but just choosing randomly between two options that are temporarily hidden,

814
00:44:28,080 --> 00:44:30,640
Speaker 1: which which is very interesting. So there's some part of

815
00:44:30,719 --> 00:44:33,920
Speaker 1: us that, again, if the if the cognitive dissonance interpretation

816
00:44:33,960 --> 00:44:37,120
Speaker 1: of this phenomenon is correct, there's some part of us

817
00:44:37,200 --> 00:44:40,239
Speaker 1: that feels a kind of agency that needs to be

818
00:44:40,280 --> 00:44:43,440
Speaker 1: accounted for in what you chose, even if you didn't

819
00:44:43,480 --> 00:44:45,800
Speaker 1: know what you were choosing, Even if you're just choosing

820
00:44:45,840 --> 00:44:48,200
Speaker 1: you know, hats and you can't see what's inside them,

821
00:44:48,280 --> 00:44:50,920
Speaker 1: or or yeah, door number three, you still feel like

822
00:44:51,000 --> 00:44:55,800
Speaker 1: I picked that and I need to justify that decision internally. Huh, yeah,

823
00:44:55,840 --> 00:44:59,200
Speaker 1: that that is That is interesting. I'm surprised we we

824
00:44:59,280 --> 00:45:03,960
Speaker 1: don't see more of this utilized in online advertising. You know,

825
00:45:04,000 --> 00:45:06,600
Speaker 1: like maybe there's a version of that YouTube scenarios describing

826
00:45:06,640 --> 00:45:09,560
Speaker 1: earlier where instead of giving you a choice of specific as,

827
00:45:09,600 --> 00:45:11,120
Speaker 1: it says, what do you want AD number one or

828
00:45:11,120 --> 00:45:14,600
Speaker 1: add number two? And maybe it's a completely false choice.

829
00:45:14,640 --> 00:45:16,400
Speaker 1: You know you're always going to get the same ad,

830
00:45:16,400 --> 00:45:19,000
Speaker 1: but they are going to give you the provide this

831
00:45:19,080 --> 00:45:21,920
Speaker 1: illusion that you had to say. Well, this is interesting

832
00:45:21,960 --> 00:45:25,080
Speaker 1: because when people do not have the illusion that they

833
00:45:25,120 --> 00:45:27,960
Speaker 1: have a say, then apparently the effect does not hold

834
00:45:28,040 --> 00:45:31,759
Speaker 1: because again, thing back to the computer condition. At least

835
00:45:31,760 --> 00:45:35,200
Speaker 1: in this study, choice induced preference change only seems to

836
00:45:35,239 --> 00:45:39,040
Speaker 1: apply if you think it's really you making the choice,

837
00:45:39,080 --> 00:45:41,960
Speaker 1: not if some someone or something else chooses for you.

838
00:45:42,200 --> 00:45:44,680
Speaker 1: And this mirror is what brim found in the gift condition.

839
00:45:44,719 --> 00:45:47,520
Speaker 1: If you're given three options and then the computer says, Okay,

840
00:45:47,520 --> 00:45:51,560
Speaker 1: of these three options, you get number three. It doesn't

841
00:45:51,600 --> 00:45:55,920
Speaker 1: have you don't change your evaluations afterwards. Now to come

842
00:45:55,960 --> 00:45:59,560
Speaker 1: back to the Black Mirror Bandersnatch episode, which again is

843
00:45:59,600 --> 00:46:02,600
Speaker 1: a a choose your own adventure type episode where you

844
00:46:02,600 --> 00:46:05,440
Speaker 1: make choices when you watch it in Netflix. Um, I

845
00:46:05,440 --> 00:46:08,320
Speaker 1: remember when I rewatched it last year for our episode.

846
00:46:08,400 --> 00:46:10,319
Speaker 1: I ended up being really pleased with the way it

847
00:46:10,360 --> 00:46:13,880
Speaker 1: came together based on my choices. But it was because

848
00:46:14,120 --> 00:46:16,040
Speaker 1: what was it? Because I actually hit on a good

849
00:46:16,080 --> 00:46:19,400
Speaker 1: combo of narrative branches and this choose your own adventure

850
00:46:19,440 --> 00:46:22,799
Speaker 1: world or or was it this? You know, because to

851
00:46:22,800 --> 00:46:26,360
Speaker 1: a certain extent there are aspects of of of of

852
00:46:26,400 --> 00:46:28,279
Speaker 1: all this, and in the blind test, you know, you

853
00:46:28,280 --> 00:46:31,200
Speaker 1: don't necessarily know how the choices you make will impact

854
00:46:31,280 --> 00:46:33,680
Speaker 1: the overall shape of the narrative by the time you're

855
00:46:33,719 --> 00:46:36,319
Speaker 1: done with it. That's a really good comparison. I mean,

856
00:46:37,120 --> 00:46:41,640
Speaker 1: I feel well, I mean thinking about how I interacted

857
00:46:41,640 --> 00:46:44,160
Speaker 1: with Bandersnatch or with Choose your Own Adventure books when

858
00:46:44,200 --> 00:46:47,360
Speaker 1: I was a kid. It's funny how we feel some

859
00:46:47,440 --> 00:46:50,680
Speaker 1: amount of angst and personal accountability, or at least I

860
00:46:50,719 --> 00:46:53,479
Speaker 1: did for how the band or snatch or to choose

861
00:46:53,520 --> 00:46:57,080
Speaker 1: your own adventure choices turn out, even though there's usually

862
00:46:57,080 --> 00:47:00,600
Speaker 1: no way you could have predicted the ways that they

863
00:47:00,640 --> 00:47:04,480
Speaker 1: will actually play out in narrative. Merely the suggestion that

864
00:47:04,520 --> 00:47:07,840
Speaker 1: you're in control seems to be enough to conjure the

865
00:47:07,880 --> 00:47:11,000
Speaker 1: shadow of personal agency over the direction of the narrative,

866
00:47:11,400 --> 00:47:13,800
Speaker 1: and thus I think enough to bring in the feeling

867
00:47:13,880 --> 00:47:16,879
Speaker 1: of cognitive dissonance when you choose a path that goes

868
00:47:16,960 --> 00:47:19,960
Speaker 1: somewhere you don't like or that feels bad or increases

869
00:47:19,960 --> 00:47:24,040
Speaker 1: the tension. Yeah. So there's another study and an older

870
00:47:24,040 --> 00:47:26,879
Speaker 1: study that I wanted to mention briefly, and this one

871
00:47:27,040 --> 00:47:29,719
Speaker 1: is from the year two thousand ten that looks at

872
00:47:29,800 --> 00:47:34,600
Speaker 1: choice induced preference change in children and non human animals.

873
00:47:34,640 --> 00:47:37,200
Speaker 1: And I thought that this was very interesting because this

874
00:47:37,239 --> 00:47:39,680
Speaker 1: seems to get to because you could wonder, like, Okay,

875
00:47:39,680 --> 00:47:42,600
Speaker 1: so it seems like this choice induced preference change thing,

876
00:47:42,640 --> 00:47:44,840
Speaker 1: it really does go on. But is this a function

877
00:47:44,880 --> 00:47:49,160
Speaker 1: of like like adult cognition, you know, adult pictures of

878
00:47:49,160 --> 00:47:52,040
Speaker 1: the self, or would this happen at a more primal

879
00:47:52,160 --> 00:47:54,760
Speaker 1: level that you would see even in you know, uh,

880
00:47:54,800 --> 00:47:57,680
Speaker 1: even in four year old children and in monkeys and

881
00:47:57,719 --> 00:47:59,800
Speaker 1: stuff and it, and it looks like the answer is

882
00:47:59,840 --> 00:48:03,200
Speaker 1: basically yes, you do see this even in four year

883
00:48:03,200 --> 00:48:06,839
Speaker 1: old children and capuchin monkeys. Now you might wonder how

884
00:48:07,120 --> 00:48:09,920
Speaker 1: you could how you could create the test conditions there,

885
00:48:09,960 --> 00:48:12,520
Speaker 1: because you can't like ask them to to like rate

886
00:48:12,560 --> 00:48:16,239
Speaker 1: a list of appliances or something. Right, um So, the

887
00:48:16,280 --> 00:48:18,840
Speaker 1: study design here for for human children. It's kind of

888
00:48:18,880 --> 00:48:21,120
Speaker 1: complicated to explain, but once I read it, I thought

889
00:48:21,160 --> 00:48:23,560
Speaker 1: it was actually very elegant and ingenious. So if you

890
00:48:23,560 --> 00:48:25,680
Speaker 1: don't mind, I just want to read their description of

891
00:48:25,800 --> 00:48:28,399
Speaker 1: their experimental set up here. Oh and sorry, I don't

892
00:48:28,440 --> 00:48:31,400
Speaker 1: think I said that. This. This paper is by Luisa

893
00:48:31,480 --> 00:48:35,080
Speaker 1: see Egan, Paul Bloom, and Laurie are Santos in the

894
00:48:35,160 --> 00:48:39,120
Speaker 1: Journal of Experimental Social Psychology in two thousand ten. Um So,

895
00:48:39,160 --> 00:48:43,200
Speaker 1: to read from their their methodology with the test condition

896
00:48:43,280 --> 00:48:47,520
Speaker 1: involving human children, quote, the experiment are first displayed an

897
00:48:47,560 --> 00:48:52,400
Speaker 1: opaque gray stocking to the child and sequentially extracted three

898
00:48:52,560 --> 00:48:56,680
Speaker 1: toys described as some of the experimenter's favorite things, which

899
00:48:56,680 --> 00:49:00,360
Speaker 1: were really fun, but you have to be creative with them.

900
00:49:00,400 --> 00:49:03,840
Speaker 1: The toys distended the stockings such that the contours of

901
00:49:03,840 --> 00:49:07,080
Speaker 1: each could be seen, but the color could not be discerned.

902
00:49:07,640 --> 00:49:10,759
Speaker 1: The experiment are extracted and displayed the three toys to

903
00:49:10,800 --> 00:49:14,120
Speaker 1: the child, described them as some of her favorite things,

904
00:49:14,400 --> 00:49:17,520
Speaker 1: then shuffled them as she lifted them behind an occluder,

905
00:49:17,840 --> 00:49:21,120
Speaker 1: and announced that she would hide the toys. She removed

906
00:49:21,160 --> 00:49:25,680
Speaker 1: the occluder to display two stockings, one dotted and one argyle.

907
00:49:26,320 --> 00:49:29,600
Speaker 1: The experimenter pointed out that the outlines of two toys

908
00:49:29,600 --> 00:49:32,279
Speaker 1: were visible within one of the stockings, and that the

909
00:49:32,360 --> 00:49:35,680
Speaker 1: outline of the third toy was visible in the second stocking.

910
00:49:36,040 --> 00:49:38,759
Speaker 1: In the choice condition, the experiment are held up the

911
00:49:38,840 --> 00:49:41,680
Speaker 1: stocking with two toys and asked the child to reach

912
00:49:41,760 --> 00:49:45,120
Speaker 1: in without peeking and choose a toy. In the no

913
00:49:45,360 --> 00:49:49,600
Speaker 1: choice condition, the experimenter reached into the stocking with two toys,

914
00:49:49,840 --> 00:49:52,760
Speaker 1: pulled one closer to the mouth of the stocking, held

915
00:49:52,840 --> 00:49:55,480
Speaker 1: up the stocking, and asked the child to remove the

916
00:49:55,560 --> 00:49:59,759
Speaker 1: toy on top, again without peaking. In phase two, a

917
00:50:00,000 --> 00:50:04,360
Speaker 1: second experiment or blind to which stocking originally contained two toys,

918
00:50:04,760 --> 00:50:07,880
Speaker 1: indicated the two stockings and asked the child to choose

919
00:50:07,880 --> 00:50:11,360
Speaker 1: a toy to play with. Children were instructed not to

920
00:50:11,440 --> 00:50:15,960
Speaker 1: peak before making their selection. So what were the results here? Well,

921
00:50:16,000 --> 00:50:20,239
Speaker 1: in the choice condition, children strongly preferred the toy in

922
00:50:20,320 --> 00:50:23,319
Speaker 1: the second stocking, meaning the toy that they had not

923
00:50:23,520 --> 00:50:27,359
Speaker 1: had a chance to reject from the first stocking. Uh

924
00:50:27,400 --> 00:50:30,480
Speaker 1: And and they preferred sixty six point seven percent of

925
00:50:30,560 --> 00:50:33,759
Speaker 1: children in the choice condition went for the new toy

926
00:50:33,880 --> 00:50:36,359
Speaker 1: in the second stocking instead of the one that they

927
00:50:36,400 --> 00:50:40,480
Speaker 1: hadn't grabbed from from the first stocking. But in the

928
00:50:40,640 --> 00:50:43,040
Speaker 1: no choice condition, remember this is the one where the

929
00:50:43,040 --> 00:50:45,520
Speaker 1: experiment or picks for the kid. The kid doesn't get

930
00:50:45,520 --> 00:50:49,600
Speaker 1: to pick themselves, the effect vanished. In fact, in the

931
00:50:49,640 --> 00:50:52,879
Speaker 1: condition where the toy was chosen for them, kids did

932
00:50:52,920 --> 00:50:55,920
Speaker 1: the opposite, with the majority wanting to reach into the

933
00:50:55,960 --> 00:51:00,680
Speaker 1: first stocking again and get the other toy. And remember

934
00:51:00,719 --> 00:51:04,880
Speaker 1: that this is despite them fishing the toys out at random. Uh.

935
00:51:04,920 --> 00:51:07,800
Speaker 1: And there was also a similar test on capuchin monkeys.

936
00:51:07,800 --> 00:51:09,400
Speaker 1: I'm not going to go into as much detail, and

937
00:51:09,400 --> 00:51:12,320
Speaker 1: that one it involves skittles instead of toys, and it

938
00:51:12,440 --> 00:51:15,719
Speaker 1: found the same thing. When monkeys were tricked into believing

939
00:51:15,760 --> 00:51:19,319
Speaker 1: that they had a choice between two initial candies and

940
00:51:19,360 --> 00:51:22,080
Speaker 1: then they were given the option to choose between the

941
00:51:22,160 --> 00:51:25,600
Speaker 1: previously rejected candy of the first two and a new

942
00:51:25,680 --> 00:51:30,799
Speaker 1: third alternative. They overwhelmingly preferred the new alternative instead of

943
00:51:30,840 --> 00:51:33,680
Speaker 1: the one that they had not chosen in the previous choice.

944
00:51:34,040 --> 00:51:37,480
Speaker 1: So again, it looks kind of like once discarded, now despised.

945
00:51:38,719 --> 00:51:41,239
Speaker 1: But as with human children, this was only true if

946
00:51:41,280 --> 00:51:43,680
Speaker 1: the monkeys were made to think they had a free

947
00:51:43,800 --> 00:51:47,000
Speaker 1: choice between the first two. If the choice was clearly

948
00:51:47,080 --> 00:51:49,879
Speaker 1: made for them and they didn't get to pick, they

949
00:51:49,920 --> 00:51:52,759
Speaker 1: no longer seemed to devalue the other option from the

950
00:51:52,800 --> 00:51:57,160
Speaker 1: first pair of candies. Uh. That that's very interesting to me.

951
00:51:57,200 --> 00:52:00,319
Speaker 1: And it's interesting that if this man of us in

952
00:52:00,440 --> 00:52:04,320
Speaker 1: children and monkeys, it seems like choice induced preference change

953
00:52:04,680 --> 00:52:08,080
Speaker 1: obviously doesn't depend on any sort of like adult sense

954
00:52:08,120 --> 00:52:12,520
Speaker 1: of self image or sophisticated logic logical reasoning. Based on

955
00:52:12,640 --> 00:52:15,080
Speaker 1: this study, if this holds up, it appears that our

956
00:52:15,160 --> 00:52:19,440
Speaker 1: choices may influence our preferences at a fairly primal level.

957
00:52:20,040 --> 00:52:22,640
Speaker 1: And I want to read from a section that from

958
00:52:22,680 --> 00:52:24,680
Speaker 1: their conclusion that picks up on one of the things

959
00:52:24,719 --> 00:52:30,280
Speaker 1: I noted about the children's no choice condition. So quote, curiously,

960
00:52:30,360 --> 00:52:33,600
Speaker 1: we observed a marginally significant effect in which children in

961
00:52:33,600 --> 00:52:36,080
Speaker 1: the no choice condition. Remember that this one where they

962
00:52:36,120 --> 00:52:38,520
Speaker 1: didn't get to pick the experiment or picked for them

963
00:52:38,520 --> 00:52:41,799
Speaker 1: out of the first stocking, they preferred the toy that

964
00:52:41,840 --> 00:52:45,080
Speaker 1: the experiment or did not give them. Although we had

965
00:52:45,080 --> 00:52:48,920
Speaker 1: originally hypothesized that children would be at chance on this condition,

966
00:52:49,239 --> 00:52:52,680
Speaker 1: the observed pattern of performance hence that children's preferences may

967
00:52:52,760 --> 00:52:56,160
Speaker 1: change not merely because of their choices, but also because

968
00:52:56,200 --> 00:53:00,840
Speaker 1: of their lack of choices. Consistent with Brims nineteen sixty

969
00:53:00,920 --> 00:53:04,239
Speaker 1: six reactance theory and Brim and Wine Troubes research on

970
00:53:04,360 --> 00:53:08,800
Speaker 1: reactants and two year olds, children's preferences may reflect psychological

971
00:53:08,960 --> 00:53:14,319
Speaker 1: reactants when choice freedom is denied. So and the possibility

972
00:53:14,600 --> 00:53:17,080
Speaker 1: uh here is that the effect is not only not

973
00:53:17,280 --> 00:53:20,760
Speaker 1: present when you perceive somebody else's denying you a free choice,

974
00:53:21,040 --> 00:53:24,839
Speaker 1: there could be a reverse effect. Once one of two

975
00:53:24,880 --> 00:53:28,480
Speaker 1: options is denied you by an outside force. The denied

976
00:53:28,520 --> 00:53:32,680
Speaker 1: option is not only not despised, it's coveted. You want

977
00:53:32,760 --> 00:53:35,759
Speaker 1: that thing that you were told you couldn't have. Yeah,

978
00:53:35,760 --> 00:53:37,560
Speaker 1: I imagine we can a lot of us can imagine.

979
00:53:37,840 --> 00:53:41,520
Speaker 1: Remember childhood examples of this, you know, like the the

980
00:53:42,320 --> 00:53:45,720
Speaker 1: toy you were not permitted to have, the the book

981
00:53:45,760 --> 00:53:49,960
Speaker 1: that was denied to you, that sort of thing. Yeah. Now, now,

982
00:53:50,000 --> 00:53:51,960
Speaker 1: of course there are always gonna be reasons for this

983
00:53:52,080 --> 00:53:53,919
Speaker 1: that make it makes sense in your brain, like they're

984
00:53:53,960 --> 00:53:56,800
Speaker 1: intrinsic qualities to that toy or that book or something

985
00:53:56,840 --> 00:53:59,160
Speaker 1: that seemed like that's why I really wanted. But it

986
00:53:59,200 --> 00:54:03,399
Speaker 1: seems like even among toys that are identical, there there

987
00:54:03,520 --> 00:54:07,520
Speaker 1: is this preference that arises from Uh. It seems like

988
00:54:07,920 --> 00:54:10,600
Speaker 1: if we have had the option to pick something and

989
00:54:10,640 --> 00:54:13,600
Speaker 1: we didn't pick it, afterwards, it's it becomes far less

990
00:54:13,640 --> 00:54:15,439
Speaker 1: interesting to us. We don't really want it at all.

991
00:54:15,719 --> 00:54:18,760
Speaker 1: But if we were presented with something as a possible

992
00:54:18,760 --> 00:54:22,120
Speaker 1: option and we're not given the opportunity to get it,

993
00:54:22,200 --> 00:54:25,440
Speaker 1: then we really wanted. So anyway, I was looking around

994
00:54:25,440 --> 00:54:29,440
Speaker 1: for some challenges to the to the choice induce preference

995
00:54:29,560 --> 00:54:31,920
Speaker 1: change phenomenon, and I was trying to find if there

996
00:54:31,920 --> 00:54:34,600
Speaker 1: are any studies that found the opposite. There are a few.

997
00:54:34,880 --> 00:54:38,640
Speaker 1: For example, I found this paper which criticizes the interpretation

998
00:54:38,640 --> 00:54:42,960
Speaker 1: of Brim's original findings and the replications UM and it

999
00:54:43,040 --> 00:54:45,920
Speaker 1: attempts a modified replication of its own. So this was

1000
00:54:45,960 --> 00:54:51,200
Speaker 1: by Steiner Holden Pol in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology.

1001
00:54:51,360 --> 00:54:55,239
Speaker 1: Do choices affect preferences? Some doubts and new evidence, and

1002
00:54:55,320 --> 00:54:58,120
Speaker 1: the author here says quote, I find no evidence of

1003
00:54:58,200 --> 00:55:01,600
Speaker 1: choice induced changes in prefer says after a choice between

1004
00:55:01,640 --> 00:55:05,120
Speaker 1: items where one was viewed as more attractive than the other,

1005
00:55:05,560 --> 00:55:09,359
Speaker 1: but potentially some weak evidence of changes in preferences after

1006
00:55:09,400 --> 00:55:13,439
Speaker 1: a choice between items viewed as equally attractive. So that's

1007
00:55:13,440 --> 00:55:16,600
Speaker 1: worth keeping in mind. There are some challenges to this phenomenon,

1008
00:55:16,680 --> 00:55:19,160
Speaker 1: and in its robustness that this does appear to be

1009
00:55:19,200 --> 00:55:22,839
Speaker 1: a minority finding, and in fact it doesn't fully contradict

1010
00:55:22,840 --> 00:55:26,000
Speaker 1: to the other results, it only partially contradicts them. But

1011
00:55:26,080 --> 00:55:28,400
Speaker 1: then finally I wanted to get to one last study

1012
00:55:28,440 --> 00:55:29,880
Speaker 1: I was reading. This was actually the one I was

1013
00:55:29,920 --> 00:55:31,840
Speaker 1: reading about that made me want to do this episode

1014
00:55:31,840 --> 00:55:34,120
Speaker 1: in the first place. It's a very recent study on

1015
00:55:34,280 --> 00:55:38,600
Speaker 1: choice induced preference change, this time in human babies in

1016
00:55:38,760 --> 00:55:42,400
Speaker 1: in pre verbal human infants, published just this year. So

1017
00:55:42,480 --> 00:55:46,960
Speaker 1: this is by Alex M. Silver, Amy, E. Stall Rita Loyaltial,

1018
00:55:47,480 --> 00:55:52,760
Speaker 1: Alexis S. Smith Flores, and Lisa Feigenson. When not choosing

1019
00:55:52,840 --> 00:55:56,360
Speaker 1: leads to not liking choice, induced preference in infancy published

1020
00:55:56,400 --> 00:55:59,560
Speaker 1: in Psychological Science this year. Some of the authors were

1021
00:55:59,560 --> 00:56:03,480
Speaker 1: Affilly did with Johns Hopkins University, the University of Pittsburgh,

1022
00:56:03,520 --> 00:56:06,640
Speaker 1: and the College of New Jersey, and again they tested

1023
00:56:06,640 --> 00:56:10,480
Speaker 1: for choice induced preference change in pre verbal infants across

1024
00:56:10,520 --> 00:56:15,120
Speaker 1: seven studies with the methodology that's uh somewhat similar to

1025
00:56:15,280 --> 00:56:17,440
Speaker 1: one of the ones we looked at earlier, with the

1026
00:56:17,480 --> 00:56:21,600
Speaker 1: ones testing with four year olds and capuchin monkeys and UH.

1027
00:56:21,800 --> 00:56:24,680
Speaker 1: From from their conclusion and discussion, they say, quote our

1028
00:56:24,719 --> 00:56:28,320
Speaker 1: findings suggests that choice induced preference change does not require

1029
00:56:28,360 --> 00:56:32,480
Speaker 1: extensive experience making choices, nor does it rely on advanced

1030
00:56:32,560 --> 00:56:37,160
Speaker 1: metacognitive ability or developed sense of self, because they found

1031
00:56:37,200 --> 00:56:40,919
Speaker 1: this in pre verbal infants. If pre verbal infants are

1032
00:56:41,360 --> 00:56:44,759
Speaker 1: changing their their preferences based on what they've chosen, it

1033
00:56:44,800 --> 00:56:47,600
Speaker 1: seems like it really would not require any of those things.

1034
00:56:47,640 --> 00:56:51,480
Speaker 1: It's happening at some lower level in the brain. And

1035
00:56:51,560 --> 00:56:56,240
Speaker 1: it also raises interesting questions about how preferences get formed

1036
00:56:56,600 --> 00:57:00,520
Speaker 1: very early in life, if they might stem from choices

1037
00:57:00,640 --> 00:57:04,640
Speaker 1: made at random in some sense when you're a baby. Uh,

1038
00:57:04,880 --> 00:57:07,920
Speaker 1: Like they say, quote, our findings add to our understanding

1039
00:57:07,920 --> 00:57:10,760
Speaker 1: of the role of choice in infancy, showing that infants

1040
00:57:10,880 --> 00:57:13,960
Speaker 1: use their own choices to shape their preferences. This work

1041
00:57:14,040 --> 00:57:17,160
Speaker 1: raises the question of whether other aspects of the psychology

1042
00:57:17,160 --> 00:57:21,439
Speaker 1: of decision making also have their roots in very early life. So, yeah,

1043
00:57:21,440 --> 00:57:23,680
Speaker 1: that doesn't make me wonder if, like, there are things

1044
00:57:23,720 --> 00:57:26,920
Speaker 1: that adults are still carrying trying to keep a consistent

1045
00:57:27,040 --> 00:57:31,080
Speaker 1: narrative about their preferences, their likes and dislikes that may

1046
00:57:31,200 --> 00:57:34,160
Speaker 1: have their roots may have emerged at some point when

1047
00:57:34,160 --> 00:57:38,320
Speaker 1: they made some basically random decision as a pre verbal infant.

1048
00:57:38,560 --> 00:57:42,200
Speaker 1: Isn't that weird? That is weird. Yeah, yeah, it's like

1049
00:57:42,240 --> 00:57:43,960
Speaker 1: you don't want to dwell on the past and to

1050
00:57:44,080 --> 00:57:46,320
Speaker 1: think that you know choices in your past to find you.

1051
00:57:46,360 --> 00:57:48,440
Speaker 1: But what if those are baby choices? What if it

1052
00:57:48,480 --> 00:57:51,400
Speaker 1: all rides down to baby choices? Right? What if things

1053
00:57:51,440 --> 00:57:53,720
Speaker 1: that you think of as fundamental to your you know,

1054
00:57:53,840 --> 00:57:58,560
Speaker 1: your own idiosyncrasies, your your view of yourself, are rooted

1055
00:57:58,560 --> 00:58:02,200
Speaker 1: in you just trying to stay consistent with something that

1056
00:58:02,320 --> 00:58:06,240
Speaker 1: happened when you were two or one, even I mean,

1057
00:58:07,600 --> 00:58:10,560
Speaker 1: you know, I picked I picked the yellow block instead

1058
00:58:10,600 --> 00:58:14,040
Speaker 1: of the red block, and and ever since then, yellow

1059
00:58:14,080 --> 00:58:20,560
Speaker 1: has been my preferred color interesting. Um, I had a

1060
00:58:20,600 --> 00:58:22,080
Speaker 1: I had a scenario in my head. I'm not I

1061
00:58:22,120 --> 00:58:26,360
Speaker 1: don't think this one necessarily applies, but perhaps you have.

1062
00:58:27,560 --> 00:58:29,000
Speaker 1: You have an opinion on it based on what we've

1063
00:58:29,040 --> 00:58:32,720
Speaker 1: discussed so far. In the movie A Christmas Story, Okay,

1064
00:58:33,280 --> 00:58:36,320
Speaker 1: the old man receives a major award, which of course

1065
00:58:36,320 --> 00:58:38,000
Speaker 1: turns out to be a lamp that looks like a

1066
00:58:38,000 --> 00:58:45,560
Speaker 1: woman's leg. Um, how would you um interpret his attachment

1067
00:58:45,920 --> 00:58:49,760
Speaker 1: to the major award? Well, clearly he he is suffering

1068
00:58:49,800 --> 00:58:52,520
Speaker 1: from a kind of preference bias about the major award.

1069
00:58:52,600 --> 00:58:56,040
Speaker 1: That's like a self flattering bias of some kind. I'm

1070
00:58:56,080 --> 00:58:58,520
Speaker 1: not sure best how to categorize it. I don't think

1071
00:58:58,520 --> 00:59:00,760
Speaker 1: it would be choice induced prefer its changed because he

1072
00:59:00,760 --> 00:59:03,600
Speaker 1: didn't pick the leg lamp. It was picked for him,

1073
00:59:03,640 --> 00:59:05,680
Speaker 1: and the studies have showed that when things are picked

1074
00:59:05,720 --> 00:59:10,320
Speaker 1: for you, this effect does not manifest. But I think

1075
00:59:10,320 --> 00:59:12,600
Speaker 1: he's doing a different kind of thing, which is Um,

1076
00:59:13,080 --> 00:59:16,720
Speaker 1: the leg lamp is a symbol of his intellectual prowess

1077
00:59:16,720 --> 00:59:19,840
Speaker 1: and victory, and thus the leg lamp is itself beautiful

1078
00:59:19,920 --> 00:59:22,760
Speaker 1: and good. Yes, all right? And then of course there's

1079
00:59:22,760 --> 00:59:26,560
Speaker 1: the added wrinkle that his wife does not like the

1080
00:59:26,600 --> 00:59:28,800
Speaker 1: award and does not think it should be in the

1081
00:59:28,800 --> 00:59:31,640
Speaker 1: front of the house, which he regards as a personal

1082
00:59:31,720 --> 00:59:35,120
Speaker 1: insult because he has so deeply associated this lamp with

1083
00:59:35,200 --> 00:59:41,080
Speaker 1: his with his personal intellectual abilities mind power. Uh. This

1084
00:59:41,160 --> 00:59:44,280
Speaker 1: all also made me think of another great work, um,

1085
00:59:44,400 --> 00:59:48,360
Speaker 1: that would be a Paradise Lost by by Milton. We

1086
00:59:48,480 --> 00:59:51,360
Speaker 1: have that line from Satan the mind is its own

1087
00:59:51,400 --> 00:59:54,520
Speaker 1: place and in itself can make a heaven of hell

1088
00:59:55,040 --> 00:59:59,360
Speaker 1: a hell of heaven. That's yeah, that's that's really good

1089
00:59:59,360 --> 01:00:02,360
Speaker 1: because I've never or interpreted this line in that way

1090
01:00:02,440 --> 01:00:05,959
Speaker 1: as like a reflection of an ex post facto justification

1091
01:00:06,000 --> 01:00:09,400
Speaker 1: to reduce cognitive dissonance. But you could absolutely read it

1092
01:00:09,440 --> 01:00:12,240
Speaker 1: that way. You can totally see it like that. I mean,

1093
01:00:12,320 --> 01:00:16,440
Speaker 1: I've always interpreted it I guess as um, you know,

1094
01:00:16,560 --> 01:00:18,760
Speaker 1: just a statement about like, you know, the power to,

1095
01:00:18,960 --> 01:00:21,600
Speaker 1: like Satan is asserting that he can make what he

1096
01:00:21,640 --> 01:00:24,840
Speaker 1: will of any situation. But yeah, you could interpret that

1097
01:00:24,920 --> 01:00:29,840
Speaker 1: much more in a cognitive bias way where he's saying like, well,

1098
01:00:29,920 --> 01:00:32,760
Speaker 1: you know, I made my decisions, and my decisions led

1099
01:00:32,840 --> 01:00:35,800
Speaker 1: me to hell, and thus I will engage in choice

1100
01:00:35,840 --> 01:00:39,040
Speaker 1: supportive biased reasoning that makes me think actually, actually Hell

1101
01:00:39,200 --> 01:00:43,200
Speaker 1: is good. It's good, you know, you know, uh, and

1102
01:00:43,240 --> 01:00:48,200
Speaker 1: that reduces the cognitive dissonance within Satan's soul. What if

1103
01:00:48,240 --> 01:00:50,680
Speaker 1: you just had a vision of hell where everybody's in

1104
01:00:50,720 --> 01:00:52,840
Speaker 1: that where people are they're just all setting around, you know,

1105
01:00:53,280 --> 01:00:56,080
Speaker 1: being tortured or torturing each other, like this place is great,

1106
01:00:56,400 --> 01:00:59,480
Speaker 1: this is great. I don't Yeah, I wouldn't to be

1107
01:00:59,480 --> 01:01:04,120
Speaker 1: in heaven. Yeah, yeah, I think that's a fantastic image

1108
01:01:04,200 --> 01:01:07,360
Speaker 1: in with Yeah, we ended by justifying the ways of

1109
01:01:07,400 --> 01:01:10,280
Speaker 1: God demands, so it's generally what we seek to do

1110
01:01:10,320 --> 01:01:13,440
Speaker 1: in this uh this podcast. Wait, no, aren't we justifying

1111
01:01:13,440 --> 01:01:15,680
Speaker 1: the ways of Satan demand? I think that's what we did.

1112
01:01:16,000 --> 01:01:19,160
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I guess that's all what we're doing here. Yeah,

1113
01:01:19,200 --> 01:01:23,360
Speaker 1: even better. Yeah, A lesser go, a lower go. All right,

1114
01:01:23,440 --> 01:01:25,120
Speaker 1: well we'll go and close this one out. I think

1115
01:01:25,120 --> 01:01:27,400
Speaker 1: this will be a fun one for listeners to reflect on,

1116
01:01:27,560 --> 01:01:30,120
Speaker 1: especially since I think we actually had a stocking based

1117
01:01:30,160 --> 01:01:33,120
Speaker 1: experiment there. Maybe you can reflect on on on on

1118
01:01:33,400 --> 01:01:37,160
Speaker 1: gift giving and stockings and and so forth with the

1119
01:01:37,440 --> 01:01:40,840
Speaker 1: holiday season that we're passing through at the moment. Uh,

1120
01:01:41,000 --> 01:01:43,880
Speaker 1: certainly everybody can relate on some level to some of

1121
01:01:43,920 --> 01:01:47,720
Speaker 1: the mental mechanics that we're discussing here in this episode.

1122
01:01:48,280 --> 01:01:49,880
Speaker 1: In the meantime, if you would like to listen to

1123
01:01:49,920 --> 01:01:51,720
Speaker 1: other episodes of Stuff to Blow Your Mind, you'll find

1124
01:01:51,760 --> 01:01:53,720
Speaker 1: them wherever you get your podcasts and wherever that happens

1125
01:01:53,760 --> 01:01:56,400
Speaker 1: to be. Just rate, review and subscribe. That helps us out.

1126
01:01:56,520 --> 01:01:57,640
Speaker 1: If you want to go to Stuff to Blow your

1127
01:01:57,640 --> 01:02:00,160
Speaker 1: Mind dot com, that will take you over to I

1128
01:02:00,240 --> 01:02:02,240
Speaker 1: Heart Listening for this page, and there's a place you

1129
01:02:02,240 --> 01:02:04,439
Speaker 1: can click on there for our store if you wanted

1130
01:02:04,440 --> 01:02:06,280
Speaker 1: to get a shirt or a stick or something with

1131
01:02:06,320 --> 01:02:09,440
Speaker 1: our logo or a monster on it. I believe by

1132
01:02:09,440 --> 01:02:10,640
Speaker 1: the time you listen to this there should be a

1133
01:02:10,680 --> 01:02:13,320
Speaker 1: couple of different user created designs that are pretty cool.

1134
01:02:13,640 --> 01:02:16,280
Speaker 1: Huge thanks as always to our excellent audio producer Seth

1135
01:02:16,360 --> 01:02:18,640
Speaker 1: Nicholas Johnson. If you would like to get in touch

1136
01:02:18,680 --> 01:02:20,760
Speaker 1: with us with feedback on this episode or any other

1137
01:02:20,800 --> 01:02:23,320
Speaker 1: to suggest topic for the future, just say hi. You

1138
01:02:23,320 --> 01:02:26,240
Speaker 1: can email us at contact Stuff to Blow your Mind

1139
01:02:26,400 --> 01:02:36,240
Speaker 1: dot com. Stuff to Blow your Mind is production of

1140
01:02:36,280 --> 01:02:38,920
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio. For more podcasts for my Heart Radio,

1141
01:02:39,120 --> 01:02:41,800
Speaker 1: visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever

1142
01:02:41,840 --> 01:03:00,240
Speaker 1: you're listening to your favorite shows. No