1
00:00:00,320 --> 00:00:02,080
I'm David Petrozowski.

2
00:00:02,480 --> 00:00:04,080
And I'm David Pinsoff.

3
00:00:04,720 --> 00:00:08,960
And uh today, what what is the name of this podcast, David?

4
00:00:09,360 --> 00:00:11,920
Evolutionary psychology, the podcast.

5
00:00:12,480 --> 00:00:14,000
Um that makes sense.

6
00:00:14,160 --> 00:00:18,000
That checks out if you look at the logo and yeah, okay, good.

7
00:00:18,080 --> 00:00:23,520
Uh oh, no, no, I'm supposed to say uh actual,

8
00:00:23,760 --> 00:00:29,210
yeah, actual actual evolutionary psychology by Actual

9
00:00:29,210 --> 00:00:30,410
Evolutionary Psychologists.

10
00:00:31,050 --> 00:00:31,210
All right.

11
00:00:31,290 --> 00:00:32,330
Hey, we did that in tandem.

12
00:00:32,410 --> 00:00:33,370
That was great.

13
00:00:44,090 --> 00:00:50,090
David, uh who uh it sounded

14
00:00:50,090 --> 00:00:51,530
like I had something and I didn't.

15
00:00:51,610 --> 00:00:55,900
Uh David, uh uh, what are we doing today?

16
00:00:56,220 --> 00:01:02,060
Uh we are talking to a really awesome guest uh by the name of Pat Barclay,

17
00:01:02,300 --> 00:01:08,220
who is fantastic and I think a super underrated, I think if you did the ratio of

18
00:01:08,220 --> 00:01:12,860
how important their work is and sort of to what extent uh do other people who are sort of

19
00:01:13,100 --> 00:01:17,750
uh not doing the work but sort of foisting it onto us as their own.

20
00:01:17,830 --> 00:01:23,110
I would say, you know, this is this is a case of Pat just being the actual sort of person

21
00:01:23,110 --> 00:01:23,750
running the show.

22
00:01:24,230 --> 00:01:29,270
Pat is one of those people who I wish would be the poster child for what evolutionary

23
00:01:29,270 --> 00:01:29,910
psychology is.

24
00:01:30,070 --> 00:01:34,710
When people ask me for like good evolutionary psychology, Pat is one of the people I point

25
00:01:34,710 --> 00:01:37,190
people to uh just because he's doing such great work.

26
00:01:37,270 --> 00:01:41,190
Uh and he does work on on one of the most interesting and important topics, which is

27
00:01:41,190 --> 00:01:47,140
cooperation, altruism, um, how we choose our social partners, how we judge our

28
00:01:47,140 --> 00:01:50,260
social partners, uh uh based on their moral character.

29
00:01:50,340 --> 00:01:52,100
Uh this is just fascinating stuff.

30
00:01:52,260 --> 00:01:55,940
He has really insightful uh uh ways of thinking about it.

31
00:01:56,020 --> 00:01:58,420
Um I I think you're you're really gonna like this conversation.

32
00:01:58,580 --> 00:02:01,620
We had a blast uh having it and I'm sure you'll have a blast listening to it.

33
00:02:01,860 --> 00:02:06,500
Yeah and just he's a a gentleman and a scholar, a wonderful man, and uh we're really lucky

34
00:02:06,500 --> 00:02:08,820
to have him in evolutionary social sciences.

35
00:02:08,900 --> 00:02:14,330
And without further ado, here is Pat Barclay um and David and I

36
00:02:19,050 --> 00:02:24,010
uh today we have Pat Barclay uh University of Guelph which is southern Ontario is that

37
00:02:24,010 --> 00:02:27,050
right Pat Yeah yeah I grew up an hour west of Toronto.

38
00:02:27,290 --> 00:02:32,970
Oh great yeah um uh yeah southern Ontario is lovely especially the when it's not dark and

39
00:02:32,970 --> 00:02:34,540
snowy but I grew up outside of Baseball.

40
00:02:34,780 --> 00:02:36,540
I would say it's more lovely when it's dark and snowy.

41
00:02:36,780 --> 00:02:37,420
Oh, that's true.

42
00:02:37,980 --> 00:02:41,340
Snow is beautiful when you, you know, you get used to wearing the layers and it's it's a

43
00:02:41,340 --> 00:02:41,900
great time of year.

44
00:02:42,140 --> 00:02:43,900
There's no bad weather, just bad clothing.

45
00:02:43,980 --> 00:02:45,900
This is something the Germans said all the time.

46
00:02:45,980 --> 00:02:47,580
And the kids were out all year round.

47
00:02:47,660 --> 00:02:50,620
And I can attest that actually they're they're generally right.

48
00:02:50,700 --> 00:02:55,420
Um, although anyway, um, so Pat, really great to uh have you on.

49
00:02:55,820 --> 00:02:59,900
Um, and I'm just gonna go through a few things that you study.

50
00:03:00,060 --> 00:03:05,730
So one is biological markets, partner choice and competitive helping, uh,

51
00:03:05,970 --> 00:03:11,410
reputational benefits for cooperative behavior, costly punishment, scales of

52
00:03:11,410 --> 00:03:16,530
competition, uh, cognitive mechanisms underlying cooperative exchange, intergroup

53
00:03:16,530 --> 00:03:18,210
competition and group threats.

54
00:03:18,370 --> 00:03:21,410
Um I like this category miscellaneous cooperation.

55
00:03:21,570 --> 00:03:23,810
You have to explain that miscellaneous cooperation.

56
00:03:24,050 --> 00:03:26,050
Everything that doesn't fit under the table above.

57
00:03:26,450 --> 00:03:32,380
Yeah, and uh exactly um so whenever we have somebody on, I sort of like to

58
00:03:32,380 --> 00:03:36,220
think about, and and maybe people don't like this, but I'll I don't know.

59
00:03:36,380 --> 00:03:37,340
People can let us know.

60
00:03:37,500 --> 00:03:40,460
Um, but I like to think about sort of what I think about them.

61
00:03:40,620 --> 00:03:45,900
And I think for me, uh, I've been listening to you give talks about

62
00:03:45,900 --> 00:03:48,460
cooperation for years.

63
00:03:48,780 --> 00:03:54,230
And my impression is, and you can tell me if this is accurate or not, is that for me, at

64
00:03:54,230 --> 00:04:00,230
least growing up in the early 2000s of the evolutionary biology of cooperation, that was

65
00:04:00,230 --> 00:04:01,510
the really hot topic.

66
00:04:01,670 --> 00:04:06,070
And even though people knew that organisms and especially people are hyper cooperative,

67
00:04:07,590 --> 00:04:13,270
there was a mystery as to how do you solve the inherent

68
00:04:13,590 --> 00:04:15,430
fragility of cooperation.

69
00:04:15,510 --> 00:04:18,710
So there's this free rider problem, and we've talked about that on past episodes.

70
00:04:18,870 --> 00:04:21,430
David has sort of elaborated on what that means.

71
00:04:22,140 --> 00:04:28,140
and I think from my perspective, you have just sort of been doing a yeoman's

72
00:04:28,140 --> 00:04:33,260
work of just chugging along and steadily solving the

73
00:04:33,580 --> 00:04:38,540
problems of cooperation with colleagues like Nikolai Rahani, and we we should have her on

74
00:04:38,620 --> 00:04:42,380
too, although she's in New Zealand, which is gonna be a tricky time difference.

75
00:04:42,860 --> 00:04:43,100
Yeah.

76
00:04:43,340 --> 00:04:48,970
But um, but so number one, do you accept that that sort of would be an e the north star

77
00:04:49,050 --> 00:04:50,330
sort of of your research?

78
00:04:50,490 --> 00:04:53,530
And and you you you don't have to be I mean, I will say this for you.

79
00:04:53,610 --> 00:04:59,610
Like I I genuinely think that you are probably the person I can think of most that has sort

80
00:04:59,610 --> 00:05:05,050
of solved this this problem of what are the mechanisms, both from an ultimate and also

81
00:05:05,050 --> 00:05:08,730
approximate perspective in terms of sort of like how do you solve the problems inherent in

82
00:05:08,730 --> 00:05:09,290
cooperation?

83
00:05:09,940 --> 00:05:15,380
Ultimate meaning the Darwinian function and proximate the What are the selective

84
00:05:15,380 --> 00:05:20,340
pressures that result in a psychology that makes us want to ever cooperate with others?

85
00:05:20,740 --> 00:05:21,060
Exactly.

86
00:05:21,140 --> 00:05:22,260
Yeah, good point.

87
00:05:22,340 --> 00:05:26,340
Yeah, we actually haven't, we should just talk about that jargon exactly.

88
00:05:26,420 --> 00:05:30,020
And just a good example would be something like if you say, well, why do parents love their

89
00:05:30,020 --> 00:05:30,260
children?

90
00:05:30,340 --> 00:05:33,620
And you say oxytocin is a hormone that makes parents love their children.

91
00:05:34,100 --> 00:05:34,260
Right.

92
00:05:34,340 --> 00:05:36,500
But then why do parents have oxytocin?

93
00:05:37,060 --> 00:05:39,610
Why does it you know, fire in these certain situations?

94
00:05:39,930 --> 00:05:40,410
Exactly.

95
00:05:40,730 --> 00:05:45,450
And and I think the cooperation literature is one of these cases where we really need to

96
00:05:45,450 --> 00:05:47,450
distinguish between these different kinds of questions.

97
00:05:47,610 --> 00:05:52,090
People will say, like, you know, you see Johnny helping Sally, and you say, Well, why is

98
00:05:52,090 --> 00:05:52,890
Johnny helping Sally?

99
00:05:53,130 --> 00:05:57,130
And one person will say, Oh, it's because Johnny feels good about helping Sally.

100
00:05:57,610 --> 00:06:01,370
Somebody else will say, Oh, well, it's because Johnny learned to help others.

101
00:06:01,530 --> 00:06:05,370
And somebody else will say, Oh, it's because Johnny is engaging in reciprocity.

102
00:06:05,540 --> 00:06:08,900
He helps Sally and makes Sally more likely to help him in return.

103
00:06:09,060 --> 00:06:13,060
And people pit these against each other as if they're competing explanations.

104
00:06:13,220 --> 00:06:17,380
Whereas really, like all three of them could be right, or all three of them could be wrong,

105
00:06:17,540 --> 00:06:17,860
right?

106
00:06:18,100 --> 00:06:20,100
Johnny feels good about helping Sally.

107
00:06:20,340 --> 00:06:21,220
Why does he feel good?

108
00:06:21,380 --> 00:06:23,860
Well, because he learned to uh uh to do so.

109
00:06:24,020 --> 00:06:25,220
Well, why did he learn that?

110
00:06:25,380 --> 00:06:28,580
Well, because when he helped people in the past, they helped him in return.

111
00:06:28,660 --> 00:06:29,780
And so he learned, right?

112
00:06:29,860 --> 00:06:34,270
But though that last question would be the kind of question that I tend to focus on the

113
00:06:34,270 --> 00:06:40,270
ultimate function what are the selective pressures that result in that you know

114
00:06:40,430 --> 00:06:44,750
helping psychology being in the head in in the in the first place so really it

115
00:06:44,830 --> 00:06:50,590
interestingly that the ultimate proximate confusion or explanation it really what you're

116
00:06:50,590 --> 00:06:54,990
saying is it lies at the heart of what had been and I think it's getting better and you can

117
00:06:54,990 --> 00:06:59,550
tell me if you agree with this a pretty confused and confusing literature.

118
00:06:59,980 --> 00:07:05,740
Yeah, I think this mix up between what's going on in the head and

119
00:07:05,740 --> 00:07:11,020
how did it get there, I mean, I think that's been a confusion in a lot of literatures.

120
00:07:11,260 --> 00:07:15,820
Um, you know, I think it's a point that we need to start driving in right from first-year

121
00:07:15,820 --> 00:07:16,620
psychology.

122
00:07:16,780 --> 00:07:20,540
Um, it's it, but it definitely comes up in a lot of the evolutionary psychology, uh, psych

123
00:07:20,700 --> 00:07:26,310
um psychological discussions where people mistake what evolutionary psychologists are

124
00:07:26,310 --> 00:07:31,350
saying and will think that an evolutionary psychologist is talking about what is going on

125
00:07:31,350 --> 00:07:36,390
in the head, whereas really they might be talking about the selection pressures that got

126
00:07:36,390 --> 00:07:37,830
that stuff in the head there.

127
00:07:37,990 --> 00:07:43,990
And yeah, the cooperation literature has been particularly prone to this uh you know to

128
00:07:43,990 --> 00:07:46,420
to this this proximate and ultimate confusion.

129
00:07:46,580 --> 00:07:50,900
Or at least it has been from my vantage point, maybe because I'm more familiar with it, but

130
00:07:50,900 --> 00:07:53,620
perhaps it has come up just as much in other areas as well.

131
00:07:54,020 --> 00:07:54,180
Right.

132
00:07:54,500 --> 00:08:00,420
Do you think it it's because we care so deeply about what's going on in the head in

133
00:08:00,420 --> 00:08:02,420
terms of our personal and social lives?

134
00:08:02,500 --> 00:08:05,380
We want to know how generous and kind other people are.

135
00:08:05,540 --> 00:08:06,980
We want to know their moral character.

136
00:08:07,140 --> 00:08:12,100
We scrutinize each other's actions and behaviors and utterances to try to gain insights

137
00:08:12,100 --> 00:08:16,210
into what kind of person they are, and we care deeply about our own reputation and

138
00:08:16,210 --> 00:08:20,130
broadcasting to others that we have a good moral character and that the stuff in our head

139
00:08:20,130 --> 00:08:21,650
is noble and praiseworthy.

140
00:08:21,810 --> 00:08:27,330
And so might it be that because we're so obsessed with what's going on in the head, that

141
00:08:27,330 --> 00:08:31,010
this creates this confusion between proximate and ultimate levels that as soon as you start

142
00:08:31,010 --> 00:08:35,330
talking about how the stuff in the head got there, we instantly, you know, jump to this

143
00:08:35,330 --> 00:08:39,810
place that we're all too familiar with, which is judging other people and in showing off

144
00:08:39,810 --> 00:08:41,040
the our moral character.

145
00:08:41,200 --> 00:08:44,560
Do you do you buy that that might be that that's a really interesting idea?

146
00:08:44,640 --> 00:08:46,000
I'd never thought about it that way.

147
00:08:46,080 --> 00:08:51,040
I always had thought about it just more in terms of some people are naturally attracted to

148
00:08:51,040 --> 00:08:51,840
how questions.

149
00:08:52,000 --> 00:08:53,440
How does this thing work?

150
00:08:53,680 --> 00:08:58,160
Whereas other people are naturally attracted to why questions, like why are things this way

151
00:08:58,240 --> 00:08:59,680
as opposed to something else?

152
00:08:59,890 --> 00:09:00,130
right?

153
00:09:00,210 --> 00:09:03,890
And when I was going through high school, I always thought, oh, you know, the sciences are

154
00:09:03,890 --> 00:09:07,730
great for answering the how questions, but they're not good at answering the why questions.

155
00:09:07,810 --> 00:09:08,770
Why is it this way?

156
00:09:08,930 --> 00:09:12,690
And then when I found evolution, that just blew my mind because it was like, oh, wait a

157
00:09:12,690 --> 00:09:13,090
second.

158
00:09:13,250 --> 00:09:15,970
Now science can answer these why questions.

159
00:09:16,210 --> 00:09:19,010
Why is it this way as opposed to some other way?

160
00:09:19,410 --> 00:09:20,610
So that would make sense.

161
00:09:20,770 --> 00:09:25,410
So I had always thought about some people wanting to investigate the how, you know, how

162
00:09:25,410 --> 00:09:26,610
does the mind work?

163
00:09:27,010 --> 00:09:31,760
Um, And other people liking the why questions of well, why is the mind that way as opposed

164
00:09:31,760 --> 00:09:32,800
to some other way?

165
00:09:32,960 --> 00:09:36,400
And that just being the result, the cause of that confusion.

166
00:09:36,640 --> 00:09:39,600
People not realizing that people were asking a different question.

167
00:09:39,760 --> 00:09:45,680
But David, your uh your hypothesis is really intriguing that instead,

168
00:09:46,080 --> 00:09:50,560
because we yeah, we're trying to read each other's minds, their intentions, figuring out

169
00:09:50,560 --> 00:09:54,770
what their character is like, can we predict are is that person going to cooperate with me?

170
00:09:54,850 --> 00:09:56,290
Are they going to screw me over?

171
00:09:56,450 --> 00:10:02,370
Um, that you know, we're um that might be why uh people are looking at those kind of uh

172
00:10:02,450 --> 00:10:03,730
the why questions.

173
00:10:03,970 --> 00:10:07,170
There's a potential signaling uh argument here, too.

174
00:10:07,410 --> 00:10:13,170
People might be hesitant to accept these functional questions for altruism.

175
00:10:13,570 --> 00:10:19,570
Because if I say people are nice because niceness pays off, right,

176
00:10:20,400 --> 00:10:25,040
What are you going to interpret about my actions?

177
00:10:25,440 --> 00:10:30,560
Suddenly, if I'm nice to you, you're gonna be like, What's in it for you?

178
00:10:30,800 --> 00:10:32,720
Why are you helping me?

179
00:10:33,040 --> 00:10:38,800
Um, so there's a signaling element where people might want to you know

180
00:10:39,040 --> 00:10:41,600
not promote this functionalist logic.

181
00:10:42,050 --> 00:10:46,130
Or, you know, so I think maybe the same thing when it comes to aggression, right?

182
00:10:46,210 --> 00:10:49,010
You know, aggression sometimes brings benefits.

183
00:10:49,170 --> 00:10:52,290
You have resources, yoink, they're mine.

184
00:10:52,610 --> 00:10:58,210
Um, you know, but if you if you talk about, well, organisms will sometimes fight for

185
00:10:58,210 --> 00:11:02,770
resources because it's their main means of getting resources cheaper sometimes than

186
00:11:02,770 --> 00:11:07,730
gathering it themselves, people start being like, wait a second, are you that kind of

187
00:11:07,730 --> 00:11:09,890
person who's going to take my stuff?

188
00:11:10,050 --> 00:11:12,320
Uh so there may be a signaling aspect.

189
00:11:12,400 --> 00:11:14,400
And I mean maybe we should start testing this.

190
00:11:14,560 --> 00:11:20,400
Are people more likely to reject functionalist approaches when others are watching

191
00:11:20,400 --> 00:11:25,680
and potentially judging them for uh for espousing a functionalist view?

192
00:11:25,920 --> 00:11:29,680
No, that's and do, and do they actually have, do they get judged?

193
00:11:29,760 --> 00:11:34,640
So if I espouse a Darwinian functionalist explanation for altruism, are people going to

194
00:11:34,640 --> 00:11:38,550
judge me as a less altruistic and caring, compassionate person.

195
00:11:38,950 --> 00:11:40,950
That would also be really interesting to test empirically.

196
00:11:41,190 --> 00:11:43,990
I suspect, I mean, I I have a hunch that it's probably correct.

197
00:11:44,470 --> 00:11:49,750
Um but it's it's a question that I've been increasingly interested in is to is you know

198
00:11:49,990 --> 00:11:55,270
why um why is there this conflict between the functional Darwinian level of

199
00:11:55,270 --> 00:12:01,240
analysis and the uh the level of analysis that we use to judge each other and

200
00:12:01,240 --> 00:12:03,320
try to shape how others judge us.

201
00:12:03,480 --> 00:12:08,600
So why why couldn't I just say that the reason that I'm helping you is because

202
00:12:09,240 --> 00:12:14,440
uh I I want to you know be seen as a good cooperative partner, or I want you to

203
00:12:14,440 --> 00:12:18,520
reciprocate, or I have a stake in in your welfare and I want to make sure that you can

204
00:12:18,520 --> 00:12:20,520
cooperate with me in the future.

205
00:12:21,560 --> 00:12:26,610
Why, when I say those things, would that license the negative inference about me, as

206
00:12:26,610 --> 00:12:31,010
opposed to me just saying that I'm doing it, you know, just because it's it's intrinsically

207
00:12:31,010 --> 00:12:33,330
fulfilling or rewarding or something like that.

208
00:12:33,730 --> 00:12:39,170
I well, I I think it's because we're we're trying to predict others' likelihood of

209
00:12:39,170 --> 00:12:40,130
cooperation.

210
00:12:40,370 --> 00:12:46,370
But that includes how likely are you to cooperate with me when it's not

211
00:12:46,370 --> 00:12:49,250
in your immediate interest to do so.

212
00:12:50,460 --> 00:12:54,700
And so, like a lot of the work I do is on reputation and people gaining a reputation for

213
00:12:54,700 --> 00:12:56,220
cooper for cooperation.

214
00:12:56,460 --> 00:13:02,380
What we're ultimately trying to assess is how competent are you, uh like how able

215
00:13:02,380 --> 00:13:07,980
are you to produce benefits for me or for others, but also how willing are you to produce

216
00:13:07,980 --> 00:13:08,780
those benefits?

217
00:13:08,940 --> 00:13:13,710
And I think that's that's you know, with a there's signaling behind both of them.

218
00:13:13,870 --> 00:13:18,910
But when you're talking about um, you know, I am helping because I will get a good

219
00:13:18,910 --> 00:13:24,830
reputation for doing so, that indicates to you that I'm not doing it because I

220
00:13:24,830 --> 00:13:25,630
value you.

221
00:13:25,790 --> 00:13:28,190
I'm doing it just because I'm watched.

222
00:13:28,510 --> 00:13:33,150
And if I'm not watched, I'm not going to do it.

223
00:13:33,760 --> 00:13:39,200
Whereas if I genuinely value your welfare, I will

224
00:13:39,200 --> 00:13:42,400
help you whether people are watching or not.

225
00:13:43,200 --> 00:13:43,840
Right?

226
00:13:44,640 --> 00:13:49,200
The most common example in humans would be parents and their kids.

227
00:13:49,440 --> 00:13:52,160
You know, Dave, I'm I'm sure you can relate to this.

228
00:13:52,320 --> 00:13:55,170
The shit that you do for your kid is intense.

229
00:13:55,250 --> 00:13:57,890
It's David has a younger child.

230
00:13:57,970 --> 00:13:58,130
Yeah.

231
00:13:58,290 --> 00:13:59,330
So yeah, we've both true.

232
00:13:59,650 --> 00:14:01,650
David has also even a younger daughter than Oh wow.

233
00:14:01,730 --> 00:14:01,810
Okay.

234
00:14:01,890 --> 00:14:02,130
So yeah.

235
00:14:02,210 --> 00:14:03,490
So you're both more in this.

236
00:14:03,730 --> 00:14:05,570
You are even more investing.

237
00:14:05,730 --> 00:14:05,970
Yeah.

238
00:14:06,210 --> 00:14:09,650
And they won't even remember those first five years.

239
00:14:10,290 --> 00:14:10,610
Right?

240
00:14:10,850 --> 00:14:16,130
Um, you you will help your child, even if nobody is watching, because you love that little

241
00:14:16,130 --> 00:14:16,610
bastard.

242
00:14:16,850 --> 00:14:17,330
Yeah, I love it.

243
00:14:17,730 --> 00:14:18,610
It's the best thing ever.

244
00:14:18,690 --> 00:14:19,890
Just hook it to my veins.

245
00:14:19,970 --> 00:14:20,610
That is the best.

246
00:14:21,090 --> 00:14:21,330
Yeah.

247
00:14:21,490 --> 00:14:27,380
And that's you'll you that's a very powerful motivator to be so concerned for somebody's

248
00:14:27,380 --> 00:14:32,820
welfare that you'll help them even if it doesn't seem to pay off now, even if nobody is

249
00:14:32,820 --> 00:14:33,460
watching.

250
00:14:33,700 --> 00:14:35,700
Um, and it'd be the same with our friends.

251
00:14:35,780 --> 00:14:41,380
Like if you if you think for a second about your really close friends, is there a

252
00:14:41,380 --> 00:14:47,170
friend who you know if they were suddenly at risk of dying, you would

253
00:14:47,170 --> 00:14:52,450
help them even if you were sworn to secrecy and no one would ever know that you would help

254
00:14:52,450 --> 00:14:52,610
them.

255
00:14:52,770 --> 00:14:56,530
Is there anybody in your life where you would where you would do that for?

256
00:14:57,010 --> 00:15:01,730
And I think many of us would probably be like, yeah, there are some people where I would

257
00:15:01,730 --> 00:15:04,290
save them even if nobody would ever know.

258
00:15:04,450 --> 00:15:08,130
And it's because we genuinely value them as friends.

259
00:15:08,290 --> 00:15:11,400
And that's yeah, that's that's a powerful thing.

260
00:15:11,560 --> 00:15:15,160
That to care for somebody that deeply, that's what's going on in the brain.

261
00:15:15,320 --> 00:15:18,760
What I would want to know was why does that get into the brain in the first place?

262
00:15:19,160 --> 00:15:25,080
Um, and then, but then if you can communicate that, if you can somehow signal, hey man,

263
00:15:25,400 --> 00:15:28,680
I'll you know, I love your brother and I will get your back no matter what.

264
00:15:28,840 --> 00:15:34,520
Like that's a very powerful thing to communicate, makes one a valuable uh partner, but at

265
00:15:34,520 --> 00:15:38,520
the same time, you know, is you know, it's gonna be hard to fake.

266
00:15:38,910 --> 00:15:43,710
And if somebody is saying, Oh, I'm just doing this because I look good, what that tells me

267
00:15:43,710 --> 00:15:46,670
is they don't actually value my well-being.

268
00:15:46,830 --> 00:15:49,390
They don't really have a stake in my welfare.

269
00:15:49,470 --> 00:15:51,470
They just have a stake in appearing nice.

270
00:15:51,710 --> 00:15:51,870
Right.

271
00:15:52,030 --> 00:15:57,310
If I if I can sort of let me make sure I can sort of translate um or say it in a different

272
00:15:57,310 --> 00:16:02,750
way to make sure everyone's understanding, um, including myself, which is that um

273
00:16:03,420 --> 00:16:08,780
the our evolved psychology is by default interpreting

274
00:16:08,780 --> 00:16:14,060
explanations for cooperation as descriptions of underlying motivations.

275
00:16:14,700 --> 00:16:20,540
And so a scientist who comes along and who distinguishes between proximate

276
00:16:20,540 --> 00:16:26,300
and ultimate, when they start talking about the evolutionary

277
00:16:26,300 --> 00:16:32,150
reasons why something's happening, which requires talking about fitness benefits

278
00:16:32,150 --> 00:16:37,750
by definition, because that's all we're allowed to postulate in terms of like what we know

279
00:16:37,750 --> 00:16:43,750
about how biological complexity occurs, given the logic of differential reproductive

280
00:16:43,750 --> 00:16:44,150
success.

281
00:16:44,310 --> 00:16:50,260
So, given that, when that scientist starts talking about benefits, it's

282
00:16:50,260 --> 00:16:56,180
read by our intuitive evolved psychology as a motivation that

283
00:16:56,180 --> 00:17:02,100
detracts from quote unquote genuine uh cooperation

284
00:17:02,100 --> 00:17:02,980
or altruism.

285
00:17:03,060 --> 00:17:08,900
And it's misunderstood as indicating that this a person will be

286
00:17:08,900 --> 00:17:13,270
less likely to be altruistic in the in the sense in which

287
00:17:14,230 --> 00:17:19,910
they'll be uh less likely to provide benefits or cooperate or more likely to free ride

288
00:17:19,910 --> 00:17:21,510
under certain circumstances.

289
00:17:21,750 --> 00:17:24,070
So it was a really long, complicated sentence.

290
00:17:24,150 --> 00:17:28,870
So I'm not sure I did any translating, but um, but the bottom line thing is it would be

291
00:17:28,870 --> 00:17:34,390
sort of the example of an evolutionary expect uh explanation makes it sound like you're

292
00:17:34,390 --> 00:17:40,200
saying somebody has an ulterior motive as opposed to know

293
00:17:40,360 --> 00:17:45,880
their evolved psychology is going to do all the things you would expect them to do when

294
00:17:45,880 --> 00:17:49,640
they're genuinely feeling altruistic and cooperative.

295
00:17:49,800 --> 00:17:51,960
I'm not saying they're going to do any less.

296
00:17:52,120 --> 00:17:56,840
I'm just explaining why they have that intrinsic motivation.

297
00:17:57,320 --> 00:17:57,640
Yeah.

298
00:17:57,800 --> 00:18:01,960
I I think that's a good that's a good translation of all of that.

299
00:18:02,120 --> 00:18:06,520
So you have us, you know, wanting to detect other people's motivations and why they're

300
00:18:06,520 --> 00:18:07,400
doing stuff.

301
00:18:07,640 --> 00:18:13,410
Um and highlighting those uh selective benefits makes it

302
00:18:13,410 --> 00:18:15,250
sound like ulterior motives.

303
00:18:15,410 --> 00:18:17,170
And so you know you're right.

304
00:18:17,330 --> 00:18:23,250
Perhaps people who who say that, who highlight those will be viewed as more Machiavellian,

305
00:18:23,730 --> 00:18:26,210
more uh you know, likely to defect.

306
00:18:26,290 --> 00:18:30,210
That's a great hypothesis that hey, like let's let's let's go test this as soon as this

307
00:18:30,210 --> 00:18:31,010
podcast is over.

308
00:18:31,170 --> 00:18:34,850
We'll design some uh some studies to to test that hypothesis.

309
00:18:35,090 --> 00:18:38,480
Um But yeah, that's that that's I think a good summary.

310
00:18:38,800 --> 00:18:43,840
Could could I could I take a different, slightly different angle on what might be going on

311
00:18:43,840 --> 00:18:44,080
here?

312
00:18:44,480 --> 00:18:49,840
So uh uh Pat, you've done wonderful work trying to solve this this Darwinian problem of

313
00:18:49,840 --> 00:18:50,560
altruism.

314
00:18:50,720 --> 00:18:55,440
Why do do organisms ever help other uh organisms?

315
00:18:55,680 --> 00:19:00,720
Um and you know, one explanation is is what's known as kin selection, where organisms uh

316
00:19:00,720 --> 00:19:06,230
help their genetic relatives because the gene for helping uh is often in the organism that

317
00:19:06,230 --> 00:19:07,030
is helped.

318
00:19:07,190 --> 00:19:11,910
Um, and then other explanations involve reciprocity, the helper is is likely to get helped

319
00:19:11,910 --> 00:19:13,190
in return, reputation.

320
00:19:13,270 --> 00:19:17,510
If you're helped, you're seen as a good helper and you're more likely to be helped and to

321
00:19:17,510 --> 00:19:20,550
uh be chosen uh as a relationship partner.

322
00:19:21,190 --> 00:19:25,590
Um so there are all these beautiful uh explanations, and there's one more recent and more

323
00:19:25,590 --> 00:19:30,180
interesting explanation for altruism, which is what we might call stakeholder altruism,

324
00:19:30,580 --> 00:19:34,180
where you're not helping to because they're genetically related, you're not helping to get

325
00:19:34,180 --> 00:19:37,220
reciprocated, you're not helping for reputational benefits.

326
00:19:37,380 --> 00:19:42,500
You're helping because you have an intrinsic stake in the person's well-being, because

327
00:19:42,500 --> 00:19:47,940
their mere existence, their mere survival and flourishing uh is correlated with your

328
00:19:47,940 --> 00:19:49,060
biological fitness.

329
00:19:49,220 --> 00:19:53,350
So the healthier and the and the more well off they are, the better able they're they're

330
00:19:53,350 --> 00:19:57,270
going to uh the better able they'll be to help you and provide benefits to you and

331
00:19:57,270 --> 00:19:58,230
cooperate with you.

332
00:19:58,390 --> 00:20:02,150
Their their mere existence uh is a is a boost for your fitness.

333
00:20:02,310 --> 00:20:04,230
So you you have a genuine stake in them.

334
00:20:04,390 --> 00:20:09,030
So the best example of of stakeholder altruism would be helping uh you know your children,

335
00:20:09,110 --> 00:20:09,670
for example.

336
00:20:09,830 --> 00:20:14,580
Uh in that case the stake would be uh uh uh uh genetic Uh but there are other kinds of

337
00:20:14,580 --> 00:20:16,500
stakeholder uh altruism.

338
00:20:16,740 --> 00:20:21,700
Um if you have some talent that is irreplaceable and that nobody else has, if you're the

339
00:20:21,700 --> 00:20:26,180
only person who knows which mushrooms are poisonous or whatever, um if you die then all

340
00:20:26,260 --> 00:20:27,140
that knowledge is lost.

341
00:20:27,220 --> 00:20:31,700
And so I have a reason to keep you alive just to gain access to that that knowledge.

342
00:20:32,340 --> 00:20:34,180
So that's a different kind of stakeholder altruism.

343
00:20:34,340 --> 00:20:38,510
So that's a long winded way of getting to what I think might be going on, is that there are

344
00:20:38,510 --> 00:20:40,830
different candidate explanations for altruism.

345
00:20:41,230 --> 00:20:46,910
And uh we often have an interest in trying to paint our altruism or frame our

346
00:20:46,910 --> 00:20:50,830
altruism as stakeholder altruism, even when it might not be.

347
00:20:51,150 --> 00:20:55,950
And so uh and because because it it's it's in our interest to to describe it that way.

348
00:20:56,030 --> 00:21:00,240
It's it's better if you think that I have a stake in you, then that's then you're going to

349
00:21:00,240 --> 00:21:03,760
be more disposed to help me, you're going, and you're going to have a stake in my welfare

350
00:21:03,920 --> 00:21:04,400
in return.

351
00:21:04,640 --> 00:21:10,640
And so there might be an incentive to try to deceptively or strategically

352
00:21:11,040 --> 00:21:13,920
frame our motives as as as stakeholder motives.

353
00:21:14,480 --> 00:21:18,560
When in reality they might be motivated by say reputational concerns or reciprocity

354
00:21:18,560 --> 00:21:21,120
concerns or or or or something else.

355
00:21:21,840 --> 00:21:27,430
And so what might be going on is that when we give a

356
00:21:27,430 --> 00:21:31,830
Darwinian explanation of the fitness benefits in terms of reciprocity or reputation, uh

357
00:21:31,990 --> 00:21:36,150
we're giving a diff it seems like we're giving a different proximate explanation for the

358
00:21:36,150 --> 00:21:40,870
behavior that is that is less desirable than the the pure stakeholder reason.

359
00:21:41,110 --> 00:21:46,070
And so I I might expect that if we explain a person's behavior uh in Darwinian terms in

360
00:21:46,070 --> 00:21:50,230
terms of stakeholder altruism, that you actually might not get those those adverse

361
00:21:50,230 --> 00:21:52,500
inferences about the person's character.

362
00:21:52,660 --> 00:21:56,420
It's only those other kinds of Darwinian explanations relating to reciprocity and

363
00:21:56,420 --> 00:22:00,340
reputation that you might start to get uh those adverse inferences.

364
00:22:00,420 --> 00:22:01,300
What do you think about that?

365
00:22:01,620 --> 00:22:02,580
Uh that's really interesting.

366
00:22:02,740 --> 00:22:06,740
I I mean I'll have to uh I'll have to check whether people's reactions to when I speak

367
00:22:06,740 --> 00:22:10,980
about this start to change now that I'm looking more at this stakeholder altruism rather

368
00:22:10,980 --> 00:22:14,420
than the reputation base and whether people start looking, you know, stop looking at the at

369
00:22:14,420 --> 00:22:17,540
me skeptically, uh, you know, when I'm talking about stake.

370
00:22:17,700 --> 00:22:18,970
Um, but that's possibly it.

371
00:22:19,050 --> 00:22:24,970
I mean, I I I agree that there's this benefit to um framing one's interest in

372
00:22:24,970 --> 00:22:26,170
uh in terms of stake.

373
00:22:26,330 --> 00:22:30,490
And just you know, uh to back up for people who aren't uh as familiar with this with this

374
00:22:30,490 --> 00:22:35,210
idea of having a stake in somebody's welfare, uh you describe it as though it's a new

375
00:22:35,210 --> 00:22:36,810
thing, but it really isn't.

376
00:22:36,970 --> 00:22:40,170
Um I mean, people have been talking about this for almost forty years.

377
00:22:40,730 --> 00:22:41,770
Mutualisms mutualism.

378
00:22:41,930 --> 00:22:42,090
Sorry?

379
00:22:42,170 --> 00:22:44,570
Yeah, mutualism mutualisms.

380
00:22:44,810 --> 00:22:46,560
Um talking about it.

381
00:22:47,040 --> 00:22:48,400
Pseudo-reciprocity.

382
00:22:48,480 --> 00:22:48,720
Yeah.

383
00:22:49,120 --> 00:22:53,840
John Tube and Lita Cosmides had a great paper in 96 on irreplaceability.

384
00:22:54,320 --> 00:22:56,560
You know, where they call it solving the bankers' paradox.

385
00:22:56,640 --> 00:22:58,160
So people have been talking about this idea for a while.

386
00:22:58,480 --> 00:23:00,560
Banger paper Stevens says banger paper.

387
00:23:01,040 --> 00:23:01,520
Wonderful paper, yeah.

388
00:23:01,920 --> 00:23:02,320
Good paper.

389
00:23:02,880 --> 00:23:05,200
It calls good papers bangers, which I think is hilarious.

390
00:23:05,920 --> 00:23:06,880
This is one of my favorite words.

391
00:23:06,960 --> 00:23:07,840
Anyway, continuing.

392
00:23:08,080 --> 00:23:08,720
Sorry, Pat.

393
00:23:10,290 --> 00:23:15,330
Um, but yeah, like it there's there's at least five or six different names for this same

394
00:23:15,330 --> 00:23:19,410
phenomena that different people have come up with, but it hasn't really coalesced into it.

395
00:23:19,490 --> 00:23:23,810
I I prefer Gilbert Roberts' phrase of stake and and and stakeholder because I think that

396
00:23:23,810 --> 00:23:25,010
sums it up nicely.

397
00:23:25,410 --> 00:23:29,330
Um but yeah, the idea that you can have a vested interest in somebody else.

398
00:23:29,570 --> 00:23:35,570
The the example that I like to use best is imagine there is a tree that gives you

399
00:23:35,570 --> 00:23:36,210
shade.

400
00:23:37,380 --> 00:23:38,980
And you really need that shade.

401
00:23:39,140 --> 00:23:41,940
Well, you have an interest in watering that tree.

402
00:23:42,100 --> 00:23:46,980
You have an interest in protecting that tree from herbivores and from pests so that it can

403
00:23:46,980 --> 00:23:50,580
continue to in to produce the shade that you need.

404
00:23:57,140 --> 00:23:58,660
The tree is just doing its thing.

405
00:23:58,820 --> 00:23:59,140
Right.

406
00:23:59,540 --> 00:24:05,410
But because its thing benefits you, there should be selection on you to look out

407
00:24:05,410 --> 00:24:09,170
for that tree so it can continue to do things to benefit you.

408
00:24:09,330 --> 00:24:14,770
You know, selection for you to be altruistic towards that tree so that it can continue to

409
00:24:15,330 --> 00:24:15,650
exist.

410
00:24:16,130 --> 00:24:19,090
Um, and we can have all sorts of stake in other individuals.

411
00:24:19,250 --> 00:24:23,170
So if one person's a good hunter who tends to bring home a lot of food for the rest of the

412
00:24:23,170 --> 00:24:27,200
group, Well, everybody else has a vested interest in that person remaining healthy.

413
00:24:27,360 --> 00:24:31,440
If they get injured, everybody else has a vested interest in making sure they're fed so

414
00:24:31,440 --> 00:24:34,080
they can get back out there and keep producing food.

415
00:24:34,240 --> 00:24:39,120
Somebody has useful knowledge, again, yeah, you you benefit from them being around and in

416
00:24:39,120 --> 00:24:41,440
good enough condition to share that.

417
00:24:41,680 --> 00:24:45,200
If you and I have a reciprocal relationship, right?

418
00:24:45,440 --> 00:24:49,040
You are selling stuff to me that I am then selling elsewhere, right?

419
00:24:49,210 --> 00:24:51,450
You know, this is a purely economic exchange.

420
00:24:51,530 --> 00:24:54,410
But if something happens to you, there goes my business.

421
00:24:54,570 --> 00:25:00,410
Therefore, I have an incentive to help you and keep you well so that my business

422
00:25:00,410 --> 00:25:01,130
can continue.

423
00:25:01,290 --> 00:25:05,050
So, you know, I benefit from keeping you around.

424
00:25:05,290 --> 00:25:08,650
Um, and so you know that that's very beneficial.

425
00:25:08,890 --> 00:25:14,860
But I think, David, you're right with that I also have an interest in

426
00:25:14,860 --> 00:25:18,380
conveying to you, hey man, I do need you.

427
00:25:18,620 --> 00:25:20,060
I do benefit from you.

428
00:25:20,300 --> 00:25:23,660
And I am going to get your back if you need it.

429
00:25:24,140 --> 00:25:24,620
Why?

430
00:25:24,860 --> 00:25:30,460
Because then if you see that and you know that I'm going to get your back, now

431
00:25:30,700 --> 00:25:34,380
you have a have a higher interest in my well being.

432
00:25:34,700 --> 00:25:39,730
Because if I'm going to be there when you need it, you want to make sure that I'm around

433
00:25:39,730 --> 00:25:41,570
and able and willing to help.

434
00:25:41,970 --> 00:25:42,130
Right.

435
00:25:42,290 --> 00:25:42,770
That makes sense.

436
00:25:42,850 --> 00:25:44,850
And that's also why people are so sensitive.

437
00:25:45,010 --> 00:25:46,290
I mean, Pat, do you have data on this?

438
00:25:46,370 --> 00:25:50,210
Of like, I mean, especially for David and I, you know, we're interested in like polyaddic,

439
00:25:50,450 --> 00:25:51,730
like three or more.

440
00:25:51,970 --> 00:25:57,890
So it's one thing Pat to say this, but you know, if if you say that to David,

441
00:25:58,210 --> 00:26:01,660
um, what you just said, when we should just record that and play it back.

442
00:26:01,740 --> 00:26:02,460
I got your back.

443
00:26:02,540 --> 00:26:05,820
Like it's just like um uh it's lovely to hear.

444
00:26:05,900 --> 00:26:11,660
But um uh but if if you say that to David, but then you me and David get together

445
00:26:11,740 --> 00:26:17,420
and then you take my side because David and I are having a fight, you know, like that that

446
00:26:17,420 --> 00:26:21,260
should really be b that should be something that David should be really vigilant for.

447
00:26:21,340 --> 00:26:23,180
It should be really uncomfortable.

448
00:26:23,580 --> 00:26:25,180
Is is there data on that?

449
00:26:25,740 --> 00:26:31,670
So um let me just see I mean, what you would expect, it's hard to

450
00:26:31,670 --> 00:26:36,950
say if I am helping genuinely, is that because I value people in general?

451
00:26:37,190 --> 00:26:42,870
And so, to what extent does my helping towards David predict my helping

452
00:26:42,870 --> 00:26:43,750
towards Dave?

453
00:26:44,150 --> 00:26:45,190
You, the other day.

454
00:26:45,430 --> 00:26:50,950
Um, and if I just value other people really well, or I don't value myself that much,

455
00:26:51,270 --> 00:26:56,870
then yes, my helping of you will predict my helping of somebody else.

456
00:26:57,510 --> 00:27:03,440
But if there's a conflict scenario where the two of you are in conflict with each other,

457
00:27:04,080 --> 00:27:09,760
then my helping of one of you is not going to predict, is going to be a negative

458
00:27:09,760 --> 00:27:12,240
predictor of my willingness to help somebody else.

459
00:27:12,400 --> 00:27:18,080
So it's always hard to distinguish between is this a general helping or is this tailored

460
00:27:18,080 --> 00:27:19,790
towards a specific person.

461
00:27:20,190 --> 00:27:20,350
Right.

462
00:27:20,510 --> 00:27:24,670
Like just as an example, like I like every listener to imagine that like their political

463
00:27:24,670 --> 00:27:29,470
outgroup and then imagine like Pat helping somebody who's a member of that political

464
00:27:29,470 --> 00:27:34,110
outgroup versus Pat helping somebody who's just neutral or a member of your political

465
00:27:34,110 --> 00:27:34,590
in-group.

466
00:27:34,750 --> 00:27:39,070
The valent the the way that that colors that's colored emotionally is very different for

467
00:27:39,070 --> 00:27:40,830
exactly for the reason you just said.

468
00:27:42,200 --> 00:27:42,760
it's interesting.

469
00:27:42,920 --> 00:27:47,480
Um so there are basically two approaches to friendship that exist.

470
00:27:47,880 --> 00:27:51,800
Um one is is what you just talked about, the bankers' paradox, stakeholder altruism, that

471
00:27:51,800 --> 00:27:55,800
friends are people who have a a stake in each other's well being.

472
00:27:55,960 --> 00:28:00,520
Uh and the other approach is called the alliance hypothesis, uh pioneered by Peter Dioli,

473
00:28:00,680 --> 00:28:05,160
which he argues that friends are there to sort of take our side uh in conflicts and have

474
00:28:05,160 --> 00:28:08,550
our back uh against others should should conflict erupt.

475
00:28:08,710 --> 00:28:11,510
And it seems like what you're saying is that there might not actually be a difference

476
00:28:11,510 --> 00:28:12,870
between those two approaches.

477
00:28:12,950 --> 00:28:18,550
Um, because if I have a higher stake in Pat than Dave, uh, then I'm

478
00:28:18,550 --> 00:28:23,430
automatically going to take Pat's side if if if Pat gets into a conflict with Dave.

479
00:28:23,590 --> 00:28:29,030
Um, so this stakeholder idea, presum uh assuming that my stake and everyone isn't equal, uh

480
00:28:29,110 --> 00:28:33,190
which is it's you know, then then automatically it's it's the same thing as saying that the

481
00:28:33,190 --> 00:28:37,100
people for whom I have a stake in their welfare are going to be my allies, you know, by

482
00:28:37,100 --> 00:28:37,660
definition.

483
00:28:37,900 --> 00:28:38,140
Yeah.

484
00:28:38,300 --> 00:28:43,980
I I don't see these as as you know uh conflicting explanations and and never did.

485
00:28:44,060 --> 00:28:49,660
Even before we start we started talking about stakeholder, um, you know, you could describe

486
00:28:49,660 --> 00:28:51,660
some of this just in terms of reciprocity.

487
00:28:51,740 --> 00:28:56,860
Yeah right like you know I help you you help me I share food with you you share food with

488
00:28:56,860 --> 00:28:57,100
me.

489
00:28:57,260 --> 00:29:02,220
Well one of the other ways that we reciprocate help is I help you in you

490
00:29:02,590 --> 00:29:05,950
coalitional conflict, you help me in coalitional conflict.

491
00:29:06,190 --> 00:29:12,190
So we've long talked about this in terms of reciprocity and how much you scratch

492
00:29:12,190 --> 00:29:15,390
my back, I scratch your back is uh is important.

493
00:29:15,870 --> 00:29:21,630
And I think um, you know, I think that underlies this this coalitional support model too,

494
00:29:21,790 --> 00:29:23,550
is a lot about reciprocity.

495
00:29:23,710 --> 00:29:27,240
Um, you know, and I don't think Peter Dioli would disagree.

496
00:29:27,320 --> 00:29:31,880
I I suspect he would he would he would agree with this that it is based on reciprocity as

497
00:29:31,880 --> 00:29:34,600
opposed to some you know some other phenomenon.

498
00:29:34,920 --> 00:29:40,920
Um I think what's what's new is that we're looking at that it's not just

499
00:29:40,920 --> 00:29:46,920
about making sure that person sees that you help, but some helping you'd be willing

500
00:29:46,920 --> 00:29:51,630
to do even if they don't, even if they don't see because you benefit from their existence.

501
00:29:51,870 --> 00:29:57,550
But uh I I think this this is an exciting new direction to take this in is to look at

502
00:29:57,710 --> 00:30:03,630
well if I have a different differential stake in each of you to what extent does

503
00:30:03,630 --> 00:30:08,910
that predict which of you I'm going to support in a uh in a conflict?

504
00:30:09,070 --> 00:30:15,070
Um and it should depend not just on my stake in you but it may also depend upon

505
00:30:15,950 --> 00:30:17,550
your outside options.

506
00:30:18,040 --> 00:30:18,280
Right.

507
00:30:18,440 --> 00:30:20,040
And this gets into the market idea.

508
00:30:20,440 --> 00:30:21,880
This is where we get into the markets.

509
00:30:22,280 --> 00:30:22,440
Yeah.

510
00:30:22,760 --> 00:30:25,560
Is if I'm your only friend.

511
00:30:27,000 --> 00:30:31,560
Well, even if I if I get that other person's back against you, if you got no one else you

512
00:30:31,560 --> 00:30:37,400
can ask for for help, you might still, you know, value me just because

513
00:30:37,400 --> 00:30:38,520
you have no other options.

514
00:30:38,600 --> 00:30:42,200
And we we see stuff like this in other species.

515
00:30:42,280 --> 00:30:47,110
So there's some great work by Redwan Bashari among the clean uh cleaner fish.

516
00:30:47,270 --> 00:30:51,910
So you saw there's cleaner fish which go up and they clean the mucus off uh host fishes.

517
00:30:52,070 --> 00:30:55,670
Um they go inside the mouth, so they're right inside the mouth, yeah, yeah.

518
00:30:55,910 --> 00:30:59,190
They're like they can easily get eaten by this bigger fish because the bigger fish is have

519
00:30:59,190 --> 00:31:01,110
to close its mouth and even have a free punch.

520
00:31:01,590 --> 00:31:06,230
But but but the cleaner fish, they can also cheat because instead of eating the parasites

521
00:31:06,230 --> 00:31:11,400
from inside of the mouth, they can eat the host's mucus, which it doesn't like and the

522
00:31:11,400 --> 00:31:15,880
whole like jolts, and and you know doesn't like that and will sometimes chase the cleaner.

523
00:31:16,040 --> 00:31:16,360
Right.

524
00:31:16,520 --> 00:31:22,200
So um, but then you you can look at red ones looked at well, who are these

525
00:31:22,200 --> 00:31:25,000
cleaner fish giving good service to?

526
00:31:25,720 --> 00:31:30,280
Um, and not only are they giving better service when there's another fish, you know, client

527
00:31:30,360 --> 00:31:32,520
waiting, uh waiting in line, right?

528
00:31:32,680 --> 00:31:36,920
Because if they give bad service and their, you know, their client jolts, well, the

529
00:31:36,920 --> 00:31:40,090
observer might just say, all right, I'm getting bad service here.

530
00:31:40,170 --> 00:31:41,050
Let's go somewhere else.

531
00:31:41,210 --> 00:31:45,290
Um, but they'll also, um, depending on whether that, you know, the person, uh, the other

532
00:31:45,450 --> 00:31:48,170
sorry, the person, ha ha ha, anthropomorphism right there.

533
00:31:48,330 --> 00:31:53,530
Um, the the other fish who's watching, what are its outside options?

534
00:31:53,930 --> 00:31:58,650
If that's if that if that is of a species that is like that one is only on my territory,

535
00:31:58,810 --> 00:32:00,490
nah, you can wait.

536
00:32:00,720 --> 00:32:03,200
I'll make you wait and I'll service this other guy first.

537
00:32:03,360 --> 00:32:07,440
But if that other guy has lots of territories it could go to, oh, you know what?

538
00:32:07,520 --> 00:32:08,720
Yes, coming right up, sir.

539
00:32:08,800 --> 00:32:10,400
I will service you right away, sir.

540
00:32:10,560 --> 00:32:12,320
Uh they are much faster.

541
00:32:12,560 --> 00:32:18,560
So uh you know the extent to which somebody's gonna be nice is gonna depend not just on

542
00:32:18,560 --> 00:32:22,720
how much stake they have, but what that other individual's outside options are.

543
00:32:23,050 --> 00:32:23,610
It's so interesting.

544
00:32:23,690 --> 00:32:23,850
Yeah.

545
00:32:23,930 --> 00:32:24,490
And so this idea.

546
00:32:24,810 --> 00:32:27,370
If you want to talk about Machiavellianism, right there, holy crap, I sound

547
00:32:27,370 --> 00:32:29,130
Machiavellianism when I'm describing that.

548
00:32:29,210 --> 00:32:32,890
So anybody listening is to this is going to be like, wow, that Barkley dude, I don't trust

549
00:32:32,890 --> 00:32:34,330
him as far as I can throw him.

550
00:32:34,810 --> 00:32:37,690
Which is ironic because I would actually, well, I don't know.

551
00:32:37,770 --> 00:32:43,450
I I don't know if I want to go so far, but I think peeling back the layers of sort of the

552
00:32:43,450 --> 00:32:44,490
logic for this.

553
00:32:44,650 --> 00:32:47,530
I mean, with this, this came up, I think we were talking to Chris von Ruden.

554
00:32:47,930 --> 00:32:51,820
We were talking about, I think this is important to say again, because you can't

555
00:32:51,820 --> 00:32:53,260
overemphasize this.

556
00:32:53,500 --> 00:32:57,260
We want people to like, you know, give to kids who are dying around the world, right?

557
00:32:57,340 --> 00:33:01,580
Like we nobody thinks that like people who have more than enough shouldn't be giving to

558
00:33:01,580 --> 00:33:02,220
kids, right?

559
00:33:02,300 --> 00:33:02,780
Who are dying.

560
00:33:02,860 --> 00:33:04,220
And that's a horrible thing.

561
00:33:04,540 --> 00:33:09,340
But if we want to think, if we want to actually help as many kids as possible, we need to

562
00:33:09,340 --> 00:33:13,070
be accurate about why, what's the approximate motivation?

563
00:33:13,310 --> 00:33:13,550
Yes.

564
00:33:13,870 --> 00:33:18,510
And how do we how do we get that proximate motivation activated as much as possible?

565
00:33:18,670 --> 00:33:23,470
And it might feel good to just say, well, it's just altruistic for the reasons we already

566
00:33:23,470 --> 00:33:24,030
talked about.

567
00:33:24,190 --> 00:33:30,030
But if that, if if the science or ways that we try to get

568
00:33:30,350 --> 00:33:36,350
people to help other people assume that that's the motivation or the Q structure of the

569
00:33:36,350 --> 00:33:41,960
proximate psychology, and that's wrong, We're allowing wanting to feel good about

570
00:33:41,960 --> 00:33:47,240
ourselves and signal that we're all nice people, getting in the way of helping actual

571
00:33:47,240 --> 00:33:49,400
people, actual kids who are like dying.

572
00:33:49,480 --> 00:33:55,320
So I think it's really important to say that there is virtue in talking

573
00:33:55,320 --> 00:33:59,480
about what the logic is and why there's benefits.

574
00:33:59,720 --> 00:34:02,200
And I don't and I I totally yes, you're right.

575
00:34:02,280 --> 00:34:07,630
And it's it's a it's it's funny, but also like genuinely I do think that it's a really good

576
00:34:07,630 --> 00:34:08,110
habit.

577
00:34:08,270 --> 00:34:11,710
I mean, even for myself, like, why am I doing what I'm doing?

578
00:34:11,870 --> 00:34:15,310
As a sort of check on does it make sense or not?

579
00:34:15,390 --> 00:34:17,230
Like, you know, I know I'm helping my son.

580
00:34:17,390 --> 00:34:20,430
I love helping my son, even when it's a huge cost to me.

581
00:34:20,750 --> 00:34:23,070
I know why I'm doing it, and that's all cool, right?

582
00:34:23,230 --> 00:34:27,150
But there might be other situations where I think about why I'm doing something.

583
00:34:27,310 --> 00:34:28,190
It feels good.

584
00:34:28,270 --> 00:34:33,160
Like I always use the example of like, you know, like just like derogating an outgroup that

585
00:34:33,160 --> 00:34:38,360
may or may not even really exist, you know, like what consequence is that having on my on

586
00:34:38,360 --> 00:34:38,840
the world?

587
00:34:39,000 --> 00:34:40,360
And is it a bet good consequence?

588
00:34:40,520 --> 00:34:43,640
So I think thinking about the actual costs and benefits is helpful.

589
00:34:43,960 --> 00:34:44,840
I I I agree.

590
00:34:44,920 --> 00:34:50,120
And I I that's I think one of the most useful perspective uh points about a functional

591
00:34:50,120 --> 00:34:55,430
perspective, and looking at, well, what would select for this behavior is to understand

592
00:34:55,590 --> 00:34:59,670
what are the the deep, you know, the I don't want to say motivations because it makes it

593
00:34:59,670 --> 00:35:00,950
sound like people are actually thinking about that.

594
00:35:01,190 --> 00:35:01,270
Right.

595
00:35:01,430 --> 00:35:02,470
But the relationships in the world.

596
00:35:02,550 --> 00:35:04,230
Like what outcomes does it cause in the world?

597
00:35:04,710 --> 00:35:07,270
What are the selective pressures that result in this behavior?

598
00:35:07,510 --> 00:35:13,270
It allows us to tailor any um any you know, any policies to

599
00:35:13,270 --> 00:35:17,910
actually hit the right, the the right thing as opposed to hitting the wrong thing.

600
00:35:18,100 --> 00:35:18,260
Right.

601
00:35:18,820 --> 00:35:18,900
Right.

602
00:35:19,060 --> 00:35:24,980
And I think your your example of loving your child is a is a great example of that.

603
00:35:25,220 --> 00:35:30,420
So say for example, you were to find evidence that

604
00:35:32,580 --> 00:35:36,020
I guess going back to some some of the work done by my PhD advisors, Martin Daly, Margot

605
00:35:36,100 --> 00:35:41,780
Wilson, then when they're when they're looking at parental love and step parents.

606
00:35:41,970 --> 00:35:42,210
Right.

607
00:35:42,370 --> 00:35:42,690
Right.

608
00:35:42,850 --> 00:35:47,890
And uh, you know, an evolutionary perspective would say that people are going to love their

609
00:35:47,890 --> 00:35:50,930
children more than other people's children.

610
00:35:51,010 --> 00:35:51,170
Right.

611
00:35:51,330 --> 00:35:51,490
Right.

612
00:35:51,570 --> 00:35:53,170
I have a genetic stake in this child.

613
00:35:53,330 --> 00:35:54,770
I don't have a genetic stake in that child.

614
00:35:54,850 --> 00:35:57,970
I'm going to love my child much more and do much more for them.

615
00:35:58,130 --> 00:36:02,500
As a consequence, you know, people are going to be not as careful about other people's

616
00:36:02,500 --> 00:36:08,340
kids, including stepchildren, not as careful and not as restrained and willing to put up

617
00:36:08,340 --> 00:36:11,700
with the bullshit that kids drive us through if it's somebody else's kid.

618
00:36:12,020 --> 00:36:17,380
So if you were to find different rates of neglect or abuse or something else towards

619
00:36:17,380 --> 00:36:23,290
stepchildren, um one perspective would be to say, oh, it's

620
00:36:23,290 --> 00:36:27,850
because the step parental script has not been correctly identified.

621
00:36:28,010 --> 00:36:33,930
And we need to like really define this social role a lot more so that step

622
00:36:33,930 --> 00:36:39,130
parents know that they sh that it's okay for them to invest deeply in

623
00:36:39,130 --> 00:36:44,330
stepchildren and to sacrifice just as much as a parent does.

624
00:36:44,880 --> 00:36:50,880
However, another perspective that views parental investment as very costly, and

625
00:36:50,880 --> 00:36:51,840
I love my children.

626
00:36:51,920 --> 00:36:52,560
And you know what?

627
00:36:52,720 --> 00:36:57,920
I'm sorry, your kid's nice, but I don't, you know, I'm not going to take a bullet for them

628
00:36:57,920 --> 00:36:59,280
like I would for my own kid.

629
00:36:59,760 --> 00:37:02,080
Um, that perspective might say, okay, yeah, you know what?

630
00:37:02,160 --> 00:37:08,080
If you start dumping too many expectations on somebody else, that might actually exacerbate

631
00:37:08,080 --> 00:37:08,560
the problem.

632
00:37:08,750 --> 00:37:08,910
Right.

633
00:37:09,150 --> 00:37:10,590
Because part of it is a conflict.

634
00:37:10,670 --> 00:37:13,870
I'm expected to invest so much in this kid who is not mine.

635
00:37:14,030 --> 00:37:19,070
And oh, now you're asking the social role, you're expecting me to do much more, that'll

636
00:37:19,070 --> 00:37:20,270
actually make the problem worse.

637
00:37:20,430 --> 00:37:20,750
Right.

638
00:37:21,470 --> 00:37:27,470
So it's an example of where instead, maybe instead of define redefining the role, we

639
00:37:27,470 --> 00:37:32,120
should be more like, okay, clarifying and say, okay, you know what, it's okay if I'm nice

640
00:37:32,120 --> 00:37:35,320
towards this kid, but I'm I'm not gonna I'm not gonna take a bullet for them.

641
00:37:35,400 --> 00:37:38,200
And I'm I'm sorry, but that's what heal.

642
00:37:38,440 --> 00:37:39,080
Yeah, it's a great example.

643
00:37:39,560 --> 00:37:42,840
That might help reduce the level of conflict within those relationships.

644
00:37:43,080 --> 00:37:43,240
Right.

645
00:37:43,320 --> 00:37:44,360
It's a great great example.

646
00:37:44,440 --> 00:37:46,440
I'm glad you brought up Martin and Margot too.

647
00:37:46,520 --> 00:37:50,440
We we should talk a little bit about them because I think you're the first person from that

648
00:37:50,520 --> 00:37:54,200
um uh f academic family we've had on so far.

649
00:37:54,360 --> 00:37:59,150
But um uh but it's a it's a really good example too because it sounds you could you could,

650
00:37:59,390 --> 00:38:04,350
I am sure this happened too, and I think it did, of people pushing back against this idea

651
00:38:04,510 --> 00:38:08,030
because it makes it sound like, well, all step parents are going to be abusive, which is of

652
00:38:08,030 --> 00:38:09,950
not at all what it's saying, right?

653
00:38:10,110 --> 00:38:11,070
Um correct.

654
00:38:11,230 --> 00:38:16,670
Yeah, that isn't it is not what it's saying, but that is how many people have interpreted

655
00:38:17,230 --> 00:38:18,030
what they have said.

656
00:38:18,270 --> 00:38:18,430
Right.

657
00:38:18,510 --> 00:38:22,750
And it's it's almost the opposite in the sense of it's sort of just being clear-eyed about,

658
00:38:23,040 --> 00:38:27,360
as you said, all kids, it's just a lot of uh it's a lot of cost.

659
00:38:27,440 --> 00:38:32,800
And so at the the the the threshold at which any human will lose their temper, it's just

660
00:38:32,800 --> 00:38:38,400
going to be a design feature that that threshold is going to be further back for if the

661
00:38:38,400 --> 00:38:41,680
psychology is getting a cue that this is your own kid versus someone else's.

662
00:38:42,160 --> 00:38:46,320
So it's just accepting that actually the people who are step parents are doing this

663
00:38:46,320 --> 00:38:47,200
incredible thing.

664
00:38:47,430 --> 00:38:47,670
Yes.

665
00:38:47,830 --> 00:38:52,310
They're actually taking on more cost and they're more likely to feel more frustrated at all

666
00:38:52,310 --> 00:38:52,950
else equal.

667
00:38:53,030 --> 00:38:57,270
And so number one, we should just be aware of that individually and also socially.

668
00:38:57,350 --> 00:39:00,630
Like maybe we should provide more support to step parents or like whatever you think, but

669
00:39:00,710 --> 00:39:06,630
like just being aware that like, you know, not not blaming step parents for being more

670
00:39:06,630 --> 00:39:09,830
frustrated, either themselves or structurally providing them something.

671
00:39:09,910 --> 00:39:14,180
So we're just aware and sober that it's hard to raise kids.

672
00:39:14,340 --> 00:39:19,780
And if you're not related to the kid, it's gonna feel harder and you're gonna um the the

673
00:39:19,860 --> 00:39:23,060
that threshold is gonna just get tripped quicker, um, for sure.

674
00:39:23,140 --> 00:39:23,380
Yeah.

675
00:39:23,620 --> 00:39:23,860
Yeah.

676
00:39:24,100 --> 00:39:29,860
I mean, we we will put up with more crap from our kin than we would from a you know

677
00:39:30,020 --> 00:39:34,100
any a non-family member with whom we have like an equivalent relationship.

678
00:39:34,260 --> 00:39:39,090
Like, yes, our siblings might frustrate us at times, but imagine you were stuck in the

679
00:39:39,090 --> 00:39:42,770
house with some other random person, you know, just like imagine a first year university.

680
00:39:42,930 --> 00:39:46,850
Sometimes you and you're thrown in a residence, sometimes you get along really well, but

681
00:39:46,850 --> 00:39:48,210
sometimes you really don't.

682
00:39:48,450 --> 00:39:51,890
Um, and you know, to what extent do you keep in touch with somebody?

683
00:39:52,050 --> 00:39:55,730
You know, we're uh given the level of contact, we're we're we're much you know more

684
00:39:55,730 --> 00:39:59,010
favorably uh disposed towards towards our our kin.

685
00:39:59,090 --> 00:40:03,570
And so we're gonna be more favorably disposed to our our our own children as well.

686
00:40:03,730 --> 00:40:05,650
So it's part of the same, part of the same phenomenon.

687
00:40:05,890 --> 00:40:07,170
Yeah, also equal, yeah.

688
00:40:07,420 --> 00:40:11,020
Actually, it's it's it's worth just a brief digression if you if you did want to hear more

689
00:40:11,020 --> 00:40:11,980
about Martin Amargo.

690
00:40:12,300 --> 00:40:12,860
Oh, we'd love to.

691
00:40:13,340 --> 00:40:18,780
This is one of these great cases of uh an evolutionary perspective sometimes

692
00:40:18,940 --> 00:40:20,140
being twisted.

693
00:40:20,300 --> 00:40:22,300
The story gets twisted as it goes along.

694
00:40:22,460 --> 00:40:26,380
You know, the perspective always being people are gonna love their own kids more than other

695
00:40:26,380 --> 00:40:27,420
people's kids.

696
00:40:28,290 --> 00:40:33,330
But then you hear how it gets talked about in the popular press, and you hear stories about

697
00:40:33,330 --> 00:40:35,810
like lions killing cubs and all this other stuff.

698
00:40:35,970 --> 00:40:40,690
You hear people saying, oh, well, human parents' stepparents have evolved to kill their

699
00:40:40,690 --> 00:40:41,250
stepkids.

700
00:40:41,410 --> 00:40:45,410
But when you go back and read the original Martin Daly Margot Wilson, not only have they

701
00:40:45,410 --> 00:40:49,700
never said that, but they have always explicitly argued against it.

702
00:40:49,860 --> 00:40:52,580
Like human beings are not like lions.

703
00:40:52,740 --> 00:40:58,420
Here's why we would not expect stepparents to kill their children uh you know

704
00:40:58,580 --> 00:40:59,300
habitually.

705
00:40:59,460 --> 00:41:04,340
And and most, you know, most times many step parent relationships are perfectly warm and

706
00:41:04,340 --> 00:41:04,660
lovely.

707
00:41:04,740 --> 00:41:05,780
And they point that out.

708
00:41:05,940 --> 00:41:11,060
But it's always twisted as though it's this adaptations for step parental homicide,

709
00:41:11,300 --> 00:41:16,430
sometimes even by members within the evolutionary psychology community who are, you know

710
00:41:16,670 --> 00:41:21,710
citing them, trying to do so favorably, but they're not always reading the original.

711
00:41:21,790 --> 00:41:26,830
And they're citing this research as saying something it's not, saying that there are

712
00:41:26,830 --> 00:41:32,670
adaptations to kill specific individuals that is just not supported by the

713
00:41:32,670 --> 00:41:32,910
data.

714
00:41:33,230 --> 00:41:33,470
Yeah.

715
00:41:33,550 --> 00:41:33,790
Yeah.

716
00:41:34,030 --> 00:41:38,190
I mean, that's there's yeah, and we we've talked a lot about on this so far that it's

717
00:41:38,190 --> 00:41:42,560
really, I mean, thinking about design, proximate design, and what we talked about, you

718
00:41:42,560 --> 00:41:45,040
know, like a setting on a threshold, all else equal, right?

719
00:41:45,120 --> 00:41:48,480
So it's not even just that like you love your siblings more than anyone else.

720
00:41:48,560 --> 00:41:53,440
It's just like if you imagine the way your tr siblings interact with you versus you imagine

721
00:41:53,440 --> 00:41:57,840
the same person interacting with you in the exact same way, but they're not your sibling,

722
00:41:58,000 --> 00:42:03,210
which is not possible, but like that's the theory, is that you're gonna like be cool with

723
00:42:03,210 --> 00:42:07,130
your sibling more than that random person, all else equal, right?

724
00:42:07,210 --> 00:42:08,090
Like that's that's the idea.

725
00:42:08,170 --> 00:42:11,930
And so like this idea of a threshold or like thinking about design, yeah, it's hard for

726
00:42:11,930 --> 00:42:12,170
people.

727
00:42:12,250 --> 00:42:17,370
I think one of the themes we're talking about is that um if you don't get some training and

728
00:42:17,370 --> 00:42:22,890
thinking about uh we're talking about design and aspects on the design, and this comes back

729
00:42:22,890 --> 00:42:25,370
to the cooperation thing, not about a behavior.

730
00:42:25,530 --> 00:42:29,930
Um, then it's hard for people to place sort of like, well, where do I put free rider?

731
00:42:30,170 --> 00:42:31,370
Where do I put a benefit?

732
00:42:31,620 --> 00:42:37,060
Where do I put the um that you're gonna like this threshold, you know, like

733
00:42:37,220 --> 00:42:38,900
non-kin a little bit less?

734
00:42:39,060 --> 00:42:43,620
And then it just gets put in one of the folk psychological entries, like, well, it's just

735
00:42:43,620 --> 00:42:46,340
gonna be behavior or it's an underlying ulterior motive.

736
00:42:46,500 --> 00:42:50,900
Um, so it's I'm not surprised people are confused about about these things.

737
00:43:09,710 --> 00:43:14,510
So let's let's let's take the um the example of you know donating to starving kids on the

738
00:43:14,510 --> 00:43:15,070
other side of the world.

739
00:43:15,150 --> 00:43:16,830
Let's say I'm you know donating to Oxfam.

740
00:43:17,230 --> 00:43:19,390
Um let's assume for Santa B.

741
00:43:19,550 --> 00:43:22,180
Oh no, uh uh sorry uh uh Oxfam.

742
00:43:22,420 --> 00:43:25,060
Uh I thought uh no we can cut that out.

743
00:43:25,220 --> 00:43:29,060
There's something that's in Santa Barbara, um but it's not Oxfam, it's something else.

744
00:43:29,140 --> 00:43:30,340
But yeah, it's a great example of the colour.

745
00:43:31,380 --> 00:43:32,740
Oxfam is a great charity, yes.

746
00:43:32,900 --> 00:43:32,980
Great.

747
00:43:33,460 --> 00:43:35,140
If you're listening, please donate to Oxfam.

748
00:43:35,300 --> 00:43:36,100
That's what it's commercial.

749
00:43:36,420 --> 00:43:37,140
We have no commercials.

750
00:43:38,660 --> 00:43:40,820
Maybe we should do a commercial for a charity every episode.

751
00:43:41,300 --> 00:43:46,580
Uh but let's let's assume for the sake of argument that I am donating to Oxfam um

752
00:43:46,900 --> 00:43:49,350
mostly uh for reputational reasons.

753
00:43:49,510 --> 00:43:53,670
That I want to show others that I'm a really kind and generous person.

754
00:43:53,830 --> 00:43:58,390
I want to try to signal that I have a stake in everyone's welfare, even people's welfare

755
00:43:58,550 --> 00:44:00,390
who are on the other side of the world who I don't know.

756
00:44:00,550 --> 00:44:04,870
That's just how big my heart is, that I just you know, I just have a stake in everyone.

757
00:44:04,950 --> 00:44:06,870
And that makes me a really attractive social partner.

758
00:44:06,950 --> 00:44:12,390
So let's assume for the sake of argument that that's my goal uh in in in donating to Oxfam.

759
00:44:12,920 --> 00:44:18,040
Well, if you come along and say, well, no, actually probably your motive is is uh mostly

760
00:44:18,040 --> 00:44:22,440
reputational, um, that you're trying to signal that you're that you're a good cooperative

761
00:44:22,440 --> 00:44:27,160
partner, well, all of a sudden I lose the benefits uh of of of my signal because people are

762
00:44:27,160 --> 00:44:31,320
no longer going to view that as a sign that I have a stake in in in those kids' welfare.

763
00:44:31,480 --> 00:44:33,800
They're gonna view it as me trying to look good.

764
00:44:33,960 --> 00:44:38,120
Um and so the the mere awareness that I'm trying to look good makes me not look good.

765
00:44:38,280 --> 00:44:42,150
And if I if you come all come along and point out the fact that actually I'm just trying to

766
00:44:42,150 --> 00:44:44,790
look good, well, you're gonna ruin my chances of looking good.

767
00:44:45,430 --> 00:44:50,310
Um and if we create common knowledge of of self interested motives, well that could that

768
00:44:50,310 --> 00:44:56,230
could uh destroy the social in incentives necessary to produce the the pro social behavior.

769
00:44:56,390 --> 00:45:01,030
And so that it it may be that the that the pushback against these kinds of explanations are

770
00:45:01,030 --> 00:45:03,110
coming from a strategic place.

771
00:45:03,660 --> 00:45:04,380
What do you think about that?

772
00:45:05,180 --> 00:45:06,220
I absolutely agree with that.

773
00:45:06,700 --> 00:45:11,580
So I I put this uh I wrote a paper uh a while back um looking at what are some of what are

774
00:45:11,580 --> 00:45:17,020
some of the limits um strengths and limits of harnessing uh you know a rep a reputation and

775
00:45:17,020 --> 00:45:21,340
one of them was that if you highlight what the reputational benefits are that might

776
00:45:21,340 --> 00:45:26,060
decrease the reputational benefits again saying exactly what what you just said and then um

777
00:45:26,300 --> 00:45:31,890
uh other other researchers have came at the same idea and showing that if you show that

778
00:45:31,890 --> 00:45:37,890
somebody benefits from their generosity, people will then judge that person not

779
00:45:37,890 --> 00:45:38,530
as well.

780
00:45:39,250 --> 00:45:45,090
So one person acts nicely and nothing particular happens, and another person

781
00:45:45,090 --> 00:45:47,330
acts nicely and gets rewarded for it.

782
00:45:47,490 --> 00:45:50,850
Okay, well, what do you think about that first person or that second person?

783
00:45:51,090 --> 00:45:54,820
You know, people they don't like the second one as much, the one who who got something out

784
00:45:54,820 --> 00:45:55,140
of it.

785
00:45:55,300 --> 00:45:59,220
We tend to infer um, you know, ulterior motives.

786
00:45:59,380 --> 00:46:04,580
Um, and so you know, whether this is because we uh infer our ulterior motives or you know,

787
00:46:04,740 --> 00:46:07,700
whether it's some like law of conservation of benefits or something.

788
00:46:07,860 --> 00:46:08,980
Oh, they've already benefited.

789
00:46:09,060 --> 00:46:13,140
Okay, in that case, you know, I'm not gonna uh I'm not gonna reward them more.

790
00:46:13,460 --> 00:46:19,090
Um either way, once we start highlighting that, you're absolutely right, that might

791
00:46:19,090 --> 00:46:24,930
decrease the benefits, which then gives an incentive to anybody who

792
00:46:24,930 --> 00:46:30,930
does do e you know the these the public uh you know publicly cooperative acts, it gives

793
00:46:30,930 --> 00:46:36,370
them an incentive to disavow such reputational benefits and saying, no, no, no, no,

794
00:46:36,530 --> 00:46:38,050
that's not what happens.

795
00:46:38,290 --> 00:46:38,530
Yeah.

796
00:46:38,770 --> 00:46:43,010
Whether they're doing it for signaling or whether they're genuine, it doesn't, it doesn't

797
00:46:43,010 --> 00:46:43,330
matter.

798
00:46:43,570 --> 00:46:43,730
Right.

799
00:46:44,360 --> 00:46:47,720
They have a vested interest in in saying that no, that's that's not the reason.

800
00:46:48,040 --> 00:46:48,200
Right.

801
00:46:48,360 --> 00:46:53,240
It also implies that if we want to increase the incentive for, say, giving to charity of

802
00:46:53,240 --> 00:46:57,160
charity, then we should disavow the reputational benefits of giving to charity, even if

803
00:46:57,160 --> 00:46:58,040
they truly exist.

804
00:46:58,280 --> 00:46:58,680
Yeah, yeah.

805
00:46:59,960 --> 00:47:05,960
Or educate everybody about this so that the the the there's not common knowledge that

806
00:47:05,960 --> 00:47:09,880
audiences will look poorly on it if everybody realizes that the reason why we're all doing

807
00:47:09,880 --> 00:47:15,590
it is for uh or uh the uh ultimate reason is reputational benefit and in fact if you give

808
00:47:15,590 --> 00:47:20,550
enough people that information they might say actually i'm disincentivizing giving if i

809
00:47:20,550 --> 00:47:24,870
criticize reputational benefits and it's a uh i mean i mean one of the things i like about

810
00:47:24,870 --> 00:47:28,310
an evolutionary approach is we're not allowed to say like we don't like ulterior motives

811
00:47:28,390 --> 00:47:33,350
like the reason why like that's approximate description the ultimate reason would be that

812
00:47:33,350 --> 00:47:37,300
if it is yoked to a particular benefit, it's exactly what Pat said earlier.

813
00:47:37,460 --> 00:47:42,260
It predicts in the future, unless that benefit is somehow baked into the structure of the

814
00:47:42,260 --> 00:47:46,820
world, which it kind of isn't, then it's not a good predictor of future benefits.

815
00:47:46,980 --> 00:47:52,500
So for example, the only reason Pat benefited me was because it was going to be a

816
00:47:52,500 --> 00:47:55,380
reputational benefit in this one particular thing.

817
00:47:55,620 --> 00:48:00,580
If that same benefit isn't going to hold for you, David, or somebody else, then it's just

818
00:48:00,660 --> 00:48:06,270
you're going to, Pat is, it's less likely that Pat is a uh in a locus of

819
00:48:06,270 --> 00:48:08,910
benefits to others, right?

820
00:48:08,990 --> 00:48:14,670
So like the prediction is that ulterior motive version of Pat who got a benefit

821
00:48:14,910 --> 00:48:19,950
is going to be less generous than intrinsically generous Pat.

822
00:48:20,350 --> 00:48:22,350
It's coming back to what we talked about earlier.

823
00:48:22,430 --> 00:48:26,510
And people don't like that second version as much, all else equal, right?

824
00:48:27,230 --> 00:48:33,060
Yeah, but if if the reputational benefit itself comes from the perception that Pat is

825
00:48:33,060 --> 00:48:34,100
intrinsically motivated.

826
00:48:34,340 --> 00:48:34,660
Exactly.

827
00:48:34,740 --> 00:48:35,300
No, I hear you.

828
00:48:35,940 --> 00:48:36,660
No, no, no.

829
00:48:36,740 --> 00:48:37,700
It's like we can either be able to do that.

830
00:48:43,060 --> 00:48:44,740
So no, I David, I totally agree.

831
00:48:44,900 --> 00:48:46,260
There's two stable equilibriums.

832
00:48:46,420 --> 00:48:50,340
Either everybody understands the ultimate proximate thing, or we don't talk about the

833
00:48:50,340 --> 00:48:51,380
ultimate thing.

834
00:48:51,540 --> 00:48:53,220
Is basically what we're saying.

835
00:48:54,190 --> 00:48:58,830
mean there's there's definitely I I I I'm aware of this irony of uh you know saying, hey,

836
00:48:58,910 --> 00:49:02,590
we need to make sure people are aware of the reputational benefits, but also, oh crap, that

837
00:49:02,590 --> 00:49:04,670
might undermine the whole the whole endeavor.

838
00:49:04,830 --> 00:49:09,790
Um, you know, maybe we uh get it out there, but that that idea out there, but uh at least

839
00:49:09,790 --> 00:49:14,990
so people start creating more opportunities um for people to others to benefit from

840
00:49:14,990 --> 00:49:20,830
reputation, but without really stressing that uh oh, everybody does does benefit from this.

841
00:49:21,070 --> 00:49:27,020
Because I mean, you know, I think we do want a lot to be you know more uh more public,

842
00:49:27,100 --> 00:49:27,260
right?

843
00:49:27,660 --> 00:49:31,020
You know, shed some light in order to decrease bad behavior.

844
00:49:31,180 --> 00:49:37,020
Um, you know, because people are much more assholes when they're anonymous, you know, and I

845
00:49:37,020 --> 00:49:40,060
think, you know, I think the internet is a fantastic example of that.

846
00:49:40,300 --> 00:49:45,430
Um, you know, uh, but but you know, because basically any domain we've looked at, people

847
00:49:45,430 --> 00:49:49,510
are nicer when others uh people are nicer when they're watched than when they're not.

848
00:49:49,590 --> 00:49:54,550
So we want to to create more uh opportunities for people to benefit from having a good

849
00:49:54,550 --> 00:49:55,350
reputation.

850
00:49:55,510 --> 00:50:00,470
And we want people to know that, hey, maybe we should create such opportunities, but

851
00:50:00,470 --> 00:50:05,750
perhaps we, you know, we don't want to highlight that uh, you know, oh, this person who's

852
00:50:05,750 --> 00:50:08,710
being nice is just doing so in order to be nice.

853
00:50:08,870 --> 00:50:08,950
Right.

854
00:50:09,260 --> 00:50:10,860
Because you're yeah, that would undermine it.

855
00:50:11,020 --> 00:50:11,100
Yeah.

856
00:50:11,180 --> 00:50:15,420
And I think there's also sort of structural issues that run up against the stakeholder

857
00:50:15,420 --> 00:50:16,940
evolved psychology too.

858
00:50:17,340 --> 00:50:22,860
So like this idea that sort of like your the the stakeholder idea that we had earlier is

859
00:50:22,860 --> 00:50:27,660
sort of, you know, like why I care about this tree because it's providing something to me.

860
00:50:27,820 --> 00:50:33,180
That also I think even runs within the exploitation uh like whatever whatever the the trade

861
00:50:33,260 --> 00:50:36,700
off is, it can be a benefit but can also be a reason for me to not be exploitative.

862
00:50:36,940 --> 00:50:42,290
So for example, yes, if we're all in a village, you know, people have this naive idea that

863
00:50:42,370 --> 00:50:46,450
um, you know, nature is sort of red tooth and claw in it, it is in some ways, but like, you

864
00:50:46,450 --> 00:50:50,610
know, why why wouldn't it be evolutionarily beneficial for me to just take all of Pat's

865
00:50:50,610 --> 00:50:50,930
stuff?

866
00:50:51,090 --> 00:50:51,330
Yeah.

867
00:50:51,410 --> 00:50:51,650
Right.

868
00:50:51,730 --> 00:50:53,170
Like every time he got something.

869
00:50:53,330 --> 00:50:56,930
And it's because Pat is evolved to to not like that.

870
00:50:57,090 --> 00:50:59,780
And so it's gonna make Pat belligerent, right?

871
00:51:00,020 --> 00:51:04,980
And so even if he doesn't know who took his stuff, he's gonna be grumpier more belligerent

872
00:51:05,060 --> 00:51:06,580
and might kind of come back to me.

873
00:51:06,740 --> 00:51:12,660
And so, sort of the idea that we're all gonna sort of like monitor and be okay

874
00:51:13,700 --> 00:51:19,540
with uh that people are sort of okay and not feeling really, really exploited would be

875
00:51:19,540 --> 00:51:21,060
something that would be selected for.

876
00:51:21,140 --> 00:51:26,430
I mean, there's other dynamics related to that, but I think that um a lot of sort of modern

877
00:51:26,430 --> 00:51:31,550
life and especially like advertising, like there's uh I've been looking recently um because

878
00:51:31,550 --> 00:51:36,830
I'm teaching intro psych and like the the effects of advertising, and there's sort of a lot

879
00:51:36,830 --> 00:51:42,750
of institutional selection pressures on advertising to sort of motivate people to sort

880
00:51:42,750 --> 00:51:43,950
of get resources.

881
00:51:44,190 --> 00:51:49,980
And so the one way to do that is to make people insecure, but it's also to hide like

882
00:51:50,220 --> 00:51:54,380
of the resources they do have, but it's also to sort of hide the costs that those getting

883
00:51:54,380 --> 00:51:56,860
those things um pose on other people.

884
00:51:57,020 --> 00:52:02,540
So for example, you know, my my iPhone, nobody's gonna sort of advertise the

885
00:52:02,540 --> 00:52:04,460
working conditions of the workers.

886
00:52:04,540 --> 00:52:06,780
I'm not I don't I don't know what those are recently.

887
00:52:06,940 --> 00:52:12,010
I I know there's been uh talk of that, but like that's an example of you know, the

888
00:52:12,010 --> 00:52:17,130
institutional structure is not going to be at all telling me about how my actions are going

889
00:52:17,130 --> 00:52:18,170
to exploit people.

890
00:52:18,330 --> 00:52:24,090
It's only going to tell me the things that are going to motivate me to do to get

891
00:52:24,090 --> 00:52:24,970
stuff, right?

892
00:52:25,370 --> 00:52:30,970
And so that's an example of our natural evolved psychology might worry about

893
00:52:30,970 --> 00:52:36,330
exploiting people and have this sort of stakeholder psychology, but that we have this

894
00:52:36,330 --> 00:52:42,180
institutional structure of like advertising that's sort of by design, and it's nobody's

895
00:52:42,260 --> 00:52:44,420
in nobody's pernicious motivation.

896
00:52:44,500 --> 00:52:47,380
It's just what kind of advertising gets selected for.

897
00:52:47,540 --> 00:52:51,220
Um is sort of filtering out a lot of stakeholder cues.

898
00:52:51,380 --> 00:52:54,980
So one example might be, and you know, I think charities do this is sort of the opposite,

899
00:52:55,060 --> 00:52:59,540
which is sort of say, look, there's this person, and you're better off if they're better

900
00:52:59,540 --> 00:53:00,020
off, right?

901
00:53:00,180 --> 00:53:02,820
Like they're not gonna um that's one idea.

902
00:53:02,980 --> 00:53:03,460
Yeah.

903
00:53:03,860 --> 00:53:04,180
Yeah.

904
00:53:04,340 --> 00:53:10,010
I I I mean, I think uh having an interest in somebody else's welfare, you're absolutely

905
00:53:10,010 --> 00:53:13,210
right, will will make people less e exploitative, right?

906
00:53:13,290 --> 00:53:18,410
I mean, one of the reasons you don't just come and take my stuff is not just because I

907
00:53:18,410 --> 00:53:23,770
might retaliate, but you know, if you benefit from my presence in in some way, even if it's

908
00:53:23,770 --> 00:53:27,690
just like I'm another set of eyes who's watching for predators and outgroups.

909
00:53:27,850 --> 00:53:28,090
Right.

910
00:53:28,250 --> 00:53:30,720
Um, you know, and you see this in other other species, right?

911
00:53:30,800 --> 00:53:35,040
Like where um, you know, you benefit from having an extra group member because that's

912
00:53:35,040 --> 00:53:40,240
somebody else who might find a bonanza of food, or somebody else who uh can can watch for

913
00:53:40,320 --> 00:53:40,960
for predators.

914
00:53:41,040 --> 00:53:45,840
And so you'll you'll show uh you know cooperation towards other group members simply

915
00:53:45,840 --> 00:53:50,000
because, hey, I benefit from you know uh being part of this larger herd.

916
00:53:50,570 --> 00:53:53,370
And so that could that can work in humans too.

917
00:53:54,170 --> 00:53:56,330
You benefit from having a group size of a certain amount.

918
00:53:56,410 --> 00:53:58,570
And so you have some stake in somebody else's welfare.

919
00:53:59,370 --> 00:54:05,210
Whether or not we can harness that in order to get people to feel more concerned

920
00:54:05,210 --> 00:54:08,730
about people in different political groups.

921
00:54:12,040 --> 00:54:17,000
our party and their party, it's all of us versus you know them, or all of humanity versus

922
00:54:17,000 --> 00:54:18,200
the Martians or whatever, right?

923
00:54:18,280 --> 00:54:21,400
You know, we all now have a stake in each other's well being.

924
00:54:21,640 --> 00:54:26,680
Um, some people have argued that this is one of the beneficial effects of trade.

925
00:54:26,840 --> 00:54:29,400
Um, you know, international trade.

926
00:54:29,640 --> 00:54:35,400
Uh now suddenly we have a vested interest in the people in that other country

927
00:54:35,640 --> 00:54:39,240
because they are producing the thing that we are trading for.

928
00:54:39,400 --> 00:54:45,270
Um, and so if we want our uh cheap, bountiful lifestyle, uh, you know, we've got to

929
00:54:45,270 --> 00:54:50,390
keep the people in that country uh in a good enough condition to continue to trade with

930
00:54:50,390 --> 00:54:50,550
them.

931
00:54:50,710 --> 00:54:56,710
And we have less incentive to exploit them and go to war against them if

932
00:54:56,790 --> 00:54:59,430
uh you know if we are trading with them.

933
00:54:59,670 --> 00:55:04,310
Because if we do, well, whatever it is we were getting from them, we ain't getting anymore.

934
00:55:04,550 --> 00:55:10,380
So uh yeah, the the these are ways to perhaps foster uh you know the the

935
00:55:10,460 --> 00:55:15,260
the the stakeholder idea and use it to get people to be more cooperative and less uh less

936
00:55:15,260 --> 00:55:20,460
exploitative towards others, even across traditional group boundaries, uh across countries

937
00:55:20,460 --> 00:55:21,100
or whatnot.

938
00:55:21,340 --> 00:55:21,580
Yeah.

939
00:55:21,740 --> 00:55:27,100
I think a good maybe bottom line thing is sort of be skeptical of anything that tries to

940
00:55:27,100 --> 00:55:30,300
suggest to you that like certain people aren't stakeholders, right?

941
00:55:30,540 --> 00:55:36,350
Like it suggests that they're maybe trying to um sell you something or there's

942
00:55:36,350 --> 00:55:37,870
exploitation going on.

943
00:55:38,350 --> 00:55:43,310
Yes, people may try to exploit you into helping them exploit somebody else.

944
00:55:43,710 --> 00:55:44,190
Exactly.

945
00:55:44,430 --> 00:55:44,670
Yeah.

946
00:55:44,830 --> 00:55:44,990
Yeah.

947
00:55:45,150 --> 00:55:50,190
There's a lot of um to sort of loop back to so at the beginning we talked about, although

948
00:55:50,270 --> 00:55:53,630
you've got all this work on evolution of cooperation.

949
00:55:54,270 --> 00:56:00,120
Um do you agree that I mean you're you're a humble person, I I would say, uh uh, but do

950
00:56:00,120 --> 00:56:04,520
you agree that sort of you've really um I don't know how to ask this question without it

951
00:56:04,520 --> 00:56:10,040
sounding like uh uh uh I I I won't know how to answer it without sounding yeah exactly.

952
00:56:10,360 --> 00:56:10,600
Exactly.

953
00:56:10,680 --> 00:56:14,920
So maybe well so I'll just say it like I think, you know, can you characterize for people

954
00:56:15,480 --> 00:56:19,480
how these solutions so like I'm sure p some people are wondering like, well, what's the

955
00:56:19,480 --> 00:56:20,760
problem with cooperation?

956
00:56:20,930 --> 00:56:21,250
right?

957
00:56:21,570 --> 00:56:24,370
And so what can you talk a little bit about?

958
00:56:24,530 --> 00:56:29,730
Because we're not going to go into all of the work you've done, but let's just assume that

959
00:56:29,730 --> 00:56:34,210
Pat Barclay has sort of single handedly, roughly solved the problems of cooperation with

960
00:56:34,210 --> 00:56:34,690
colleagues.

961
00:56:35,570 --> 00:56:37,410
I'm not even going to go too far off honestly.

962
00:56:37,730 --> 00:56:37,970
Exactly.

963
00:56:38,210 --> 00:56:38,530
Exactly.

964
00:56:38,770 --> 00:56:44,260
Uh okay, so so peep people have been looking at the problem of cooperation for uh, you

965
00:56:44,260 --> 00:56:49,700
know, I don't know what year to in 2025, let's say uh, you know, what a hundred and uh how

966
00:56:49,700 --> 00:56:51,780
long since origin of the species, 1859?

967
00:56:52,020 --> 00:56:55,940
So we're you know, we're talking you know, 165 years, uh 66 years.

968
00:56:56,180 --> 00:57:02,020
Um so the the idea uh like of why one organism might

969
00:57:02,020 --> 00:57:06,340
incur a cost on itself in order to confer a benefit on another organism.

970
00:57:06,500 --> 00:57:08,500
I mean, people have been studying this for ages.

971
00:57:08,580 --> 00:57:13,210
Like Darwin pointed out this idea when he's like, you know, these bees are frustrating me.

972
00:57:13,290 --> 00:57:16,970
Why are they helping, you know, sacrificing themselves for the hive?

973
00:57:17,050 --> 00:57:18,810
This, you know, this doesn't make sense.

974
00:57:18,890 --> 00:57:24,090
Uh he even said if one organ, you know, founded when an organism were to sacrifice itself

975
00:57:24,090 --> 00:57:27,850
solely for a member of another species, this would this would destroy my theory.

976
00:57:27,930 --> 00:57:30,010
Or I, you know, I think is something he he said, right?

977
00:57:30,090 --> 00:57:32,650
You know, great conditions for falsification right there.

978
00:57:32,890 --> 00:57:38,560
Um but um because you on the surface, this helping

979
00:57:38,560 --> 00:57:41,920
others would seem to be maladaptive.

980
00:57:42,080 --> 00:57:47,200
You are incurring a cost, which means, well, that's effort, time and effort and resources

981
00:57:47,200 --> 00:57:50,000
that you're not putting into your own survival.

982
00:57:50,080 --> 00:57:54,080
You're not putting into your reproduction and the proliferation of your genes.

983
00:57:54,240 --> 00:57:59,970
And so if there were somebody else who were not doing that, who were getting a free

984
00:57:59,970 --> 00:58:05,570
ride on your cooperation, who were defecting on this social contract, well, they would be

985
00:58:05,570 --> 00:58:06,450
saving the cost.

986
00:58:06,610 --> 00:58:08,690
Therefore, they would be having more offspring.

987
00:58:08,930 --> 00:58:14,370
Therefore, their genes for selfishness would proliferate at the expense of your cooperative

988
00:58:14,370 --> 00:58:14,770
genes.

989
00:58:14,850 --> 00:58:20,290
So that's the basic, uh, you know, the basic puzzle that everybody is trying to address.

990
00:58:20,920 --> 00:58:24,840
And different researchers over the decades have come up with different explanations.

991
00:58:25,000 --> 00:58:28,840
So, you know, David, you mentioned kin selection being a big one.

992
00:58:29,320 --> 00:58:35,160
You know, one of biologists William Hamilton's great insights is the idea that if there

993
00:58:35,160 --> 00:58:41,160
were a gene or set of genes that influenced altruistic behavior, well, towards

994
00:58:41,250 --> 00:58:46,690
relatives, those relatives are statistically likely to carry a copy of the same genes or

995
00:58:46,690 --> 00:58:47,090
set of genes.

996
00:58:47,170 --> 00:58:52,530
Okay, so we've got kin selection there, and that's how gene or set of genes for altruism

997
00:58:52,530 --> 00:58:53,810
could could proliferate.

998
00:58:53,970 --> 00:58:59,730
People came along a little bit later and started looking at reciprocity, where if you and I

999
00:58:59,730 --> 00:59:05,700
take turns helping each other, I help you, you help me, I

1000
00:59:05,700 --> 00:59:10,260
scratch your back, I pick all the parasites off your back, and you pick all the parasites

1001
00:59:10,260 --> 00:59:10,900
off my back.

1002
00:59:11,060 --> 00:59:12,660
Well, we both benefit from that.

1003
00:59:12,820 --> 00:59:16,100
We now have both of us have now have fewer parasites than anybody else.

1004
00:59:16,500 --> 00:59:19,780
And so that can that can be selected for.

1005
00:59:20,820 --> 00:59:26,500
And, you know, the idea put forward by Robert Trivers in 1971, some great early work on

1006
00:59:26,500 --> 00:59:32,340
that using computer simulations to show that in a world where organisms can do that

1007
00:59:32,340 --> 00:59:37,110
and can take turns of reciprocating, but at the same time

1008
00:59:37,350 --> 00:59:41,590
discriminating against defectors, against those who don't cooperate.

1009
00:59:41,750 --> 00:59:47,430
Well, those sort of cooperative strategies can do really, really well because they get into

1010
00:59:47,510 --> 00:59:50,470
long-term mutually beneficial relationships.

1011
00:59:50,550 --> 00:59:54,390
Um, and at the same time, they don't get taken advantage of for long.

1012
00:59:54,550 --> 00:59:59,420
And so, you know, people who are familiar with uh with with um with this will recognize I'm

1013
00:59:59,420 --> 01:00:04,140
talking about Robert Axel Sortrod's work on the prisoner's dilemma and the tit for tat

1014
01:00:04,300 --> 01:00:08,860
strategy of I will cooperate and then I will just afterwards I'll do whatever you did.

1015
01:00:08,940 --> 01:00:10,940
If you cooperate with me, I'll cooperate with you.

1016
01:00:11,100 --> 01:00:13,340
If you defect on me, I'll defect on you.

1017
01:00:13,500 --> 01:00:16,620
And that sort of behavior evolves by natural selection.

1018
01:00:16,780 --> 01:00:19,340
And like that's what got me into this stuff in the first place.

1019
01:00:19,420 --> 01:00:23,980
Like I was uh I was a psychology student, and you know, I uh this is somewhat interesting,

1020
01:00:24,060 --> 01:00:26,690
but you know, you know, I was also taking biology.

1021
01:00:26,930 --> 01:00:32,450
And then I, you know, I heard about this computer simulation where cooperation starts

1022
01:00:32,450 --> 01:00:34,290
winning and starts evolving.

1023
01:00:34,370 --> 01:00:37,250
And here we have like nice guys finishing first.

1024
01:00:37,650 --> 01:00:42,290
And I heard that and just holy fuck, evolution is cool.

1025
01:00:42,690 --> 01:00:45,330
Um, and put that on the t-shirt.

1026
01:00:45,490 --> 01:00:46,930
Yeah, exactly.

1027
01:00:47,170 --> 01:00:49,650
Holy fuck, evolution is cool.

1028
01:00:51,160 --> 01:00:55,560
Yeah, I mean that's what got me uh it just blew my mind as an as an undergrad.

1029
01:00:55,640 --> 01:01:00,600
And I was like, uh I love uh wow, I love evolution, but I also like psychology.

1030
01:01:00,760 --> 01:01:05,800
Can I can I combine them into some sort of, I don't know, evolutionary psychology?

1031
01:01:06,040 --> 01:01:08,040
Um, you know, turns out the field already existed.

1032
01:01:08,120 --> 01:01:09,560
I'm like, all right, I might as well join then.

1033
01:01:09,800 --> 01:01:13,960
How did you uh at the risk of uh doing an origin story, how did you discover?

1034
01:01:14,170 --> 01:01:16,890
So you just said you you you came across the Axlrod.

1035
01:01:17,130 --> 01:01:19,050
Did you already know about Martin Margo or Lita?

1036
01:01:19,530 --> 01:01:22,810
No, like I I came across them afterwards when I was just looking through for graduate

1037
01:01:22,810 --> 01:01:23,530
graduate school.

1038
01:01:23,690 --> 01:01:24,010
Okay.

1039
01:01:24,490 --> 01:01:30,090
Um, and uh their stuff you know seemed r really interested and their stuff came

1040
01:01:30,090 --> 01:01:34,410
recommended, like you know, Richard Dawkins had like, you know, his interviews of five

1041
01:01:34,410 --> 01:01:35,930
different, you know, evolutionists or whatever.

1042
01:01:36,010 --> 01:01:38,970
Or no, so somebody else did an interview of five different evolutionists, one of which was

1043
01:01:38,970 --> 01:01:41,480
Dawkins is like, what do you think of evolutionary psychology?

1044
01:01:41,640 --> 01:01:45,160
It's like, I think it's got good promise, especially the stuff by Martin Daly and Margot

1045
01:01:45,160 --> 01:01:45,400
Wilson.

1046
01:01:45,480 --> 01:01:45,880
Oh, that's good.

1047
01:01:45,960 --> 01:01:50,520
Oh, well, it's been recommended by the guy who created this video of Nice Guys Finish First

1048
01:01:50,600 --> 01:01:52,040
that got me into this shit.

1049
01:01:52,200 --> 01:01:56,520
And then I started reading their stuff and was getting frustrated because I couldn't poke

1050
01:01:56,520 --> 01:01:56,920
holes in it.

1051
01:01:57,000 --> 01:01:58,680
I'm like, aha, they didn't think about this.

1052
01:01:58,760 --> 01:02:00,600
And oh wait, two paragraphs later they did.

1053
01:02:00,760 --> 01:02:01,800
Aha, well, what about this?

1054
01:02:01,880 --> 01:02:03,960
Oh, wait, two paragraphs later they resolved that.

1055
01:02:04,120 --> 01:02:06,520
And I'm like, oh wow, this is actually really good.

1056
01:02:06,680 --> 01:02:11,170
Like, I want to work with somebody who's really careful who deals with alternative

1057
01:02:11,170 --> 01:02:11,650
explanations.

1058
01:02:11,730 --> 01:02:12,930
So I went to went to work with them.

1059
01:02:13,250 --> 01:02:15,490
So that's that's my origin story in a in a in a nutshell.

1060
01:02:15,730 --> 01:02:17,170
Wow we I think we got that in three minutes.

1061
01:02:17,650 --> 01:02:17,970
There we go.

1062
01:02:18,050 --> 01:02:20,930
See it is we addressed Kiki's criticism.

1063
01:02:21,570 --> 01:02:25,330
We we'll have to figure out a way to make it so people understand what that yeah we can

1064
01:02:25,410 --> 01:02:25,970
we'll link to that.

1065
01:02:26,050 --> 01:02:26,690
Yeah exactly.

1066
01:02:26,770 --> 01:02:27,330
That was great.

1067
01:02:27,490 --> 01:02:32,200
Um so but what what I'm hearing is that you had had um I'm gonna take it away because I'm

1068
01:02:32,200 --> 01:02:37,720
gonna stay on this for a second, but you had had an experience of reading stuff where you

1069
01:02:37,720 --> 01:02:42,440
felt like it was not thorough or whole there were you were finding holes in it.

1070
01:02:42,600 --> 01:02:44,680
And and this was one of the first times where that wasn't.

1071
01:02:44,920 --> 01:02:45,560
Is that true?

1072
01:02:45,960 --> 01:02:46,520
Yeah, yeah.

1073
01:02:46,600 --> 01:02:51,560
So I mean I as as an undergrad uh you know would be reading articles and be like, ah well

1074
01:02:51,640 --> 01:02:54,760
they need to deal to do this next or you know here's a crucial control change.

1075
01:02:55,240 --> 01:02:57,080
And I'm not talking within evolutionary psychology.

1076
01:02:57,160 --> 01:02:59,710
I'm talking within psychology in general.

1077
01:02:59,870 --> 01:03:04,590
And that's you know, not trying to slag psychology in general, you know, I mean, because

1078
01:03:04,590 --> 01:03:08,030
there's there's great work and there's not so great work everywhere, right?

1079
01:03:08,510 --> 01:03:13,550
Um, and so you know, I guess I was exposed to you know some stuff that I I thought you know

1080
01:03:13,710 --> 01:03:15,310
could have gone a little bit deeper.

1081
01:03:15,470 --> 01:03:18,590
And this was some of the first work that I thought I read that I thought was really

1082
01:03:18,590 --> 01:03:19,630
careful, right?

1083
01:03:19,710 --> 01:03:23,100
Um, and really addressed you know potential confounds.

1084
01:03:23,180 --> 01:03:26,860
And you know, I couldn't think of uh any control conditions they had missed.

1085
01:03:26,940 --> 01:03:27,180
Yeah.

1086
01:03:27,340 --> 01:03:30,860
Um and that I I thought was very inspiring.

1087
01:03:31,020 --> 01:03:36,460
Um and that, you know, realized that that's how to do good, solid science

1088
01:03:37,020 --> 01:03:41,260
that's that that's going to make sure it addresses all that confound uh those confounds and

1089
01:03:41,260 --> 01:03:42,220
has a meaningful impact.

1090
01:03:42,510 --> 01:03:44,910
That's really cool because that, I mean, there's two things to say.

1091
01:03:44,990 --> 01:03:49,230
One is that if you are listening and you're a scientist, you should do thorough control

1092
01:03:49,230 --> 01:03:52,590
conditions because that will attract students like Pat who also do that.

1093
01:03:52,670 --> 01:03:58,350
Um and uh and two, I mean, it makes sense that you really the the literature, I can't

1094
01:03:58,350 --> 01:04:01,230
overemphasize how confusing it was.

1095
01:04:01,790 --> 01:04:07,780
And I think people, you are a a group of people, um sort of bringing clarity

1096
01:04:07,860 --> 01:04:13,700
um to that and i'm really glad that somebody who has this disposition to sort of see the

1097
01:04:13,860 --> 01:04:18,500
to to think deeply and sort of see the problems or what control conditions are necessary

1098
01:04:18,660 --> 01:04:24,420
that's super needed in the cooperation literature especially early 2000s yeah i would say

1099
01:04:24,740 --> 01:04:29,830
yeah yeah there was definitely a lot of confusion in the early 2000s, a lot of confusion

1100
01:04:29,830 --> 01:04:32,150
over proximate ultimate causes.

1101
01:04:32,470 --> 01:04:37,590
Um, you know, led to some particular viewpoints coming around where people would see

1102
01:04:38,150 --> 01:04:42,630
humans doing behaving cooperatively in anonymous situations.

1103
01:04:42,950 --> 01:04:43,430
Right.

1104
01:04:43,670 --> 01:04:48,870
And people would say, wait a second, people are behaving cooperatively when they're

1105
01:04:48,870 --> 01:04:49,910
anonymous.

1106
01:04:50,380 --> 01:04:55,980
Therefore, we can't explain that with traditional explanations like kin

1107
01:04:55,980 --> 01:04:59,180
selection, reciprocity, or reputation.

1108
01:04:59,500 --> 01:05:04,700
We need something big and new to explain this behavior because

1109
01:05:05,340 --> 01:05:08,780
otherwise, why would people ever help when they're anonymous?

1110
01:05:09,100 --> 01:05:09,340
Right.

1111
01:05:09,740 --> 01:05:11,260
So there was a lot of confusion.

1112
01:05:11,500 --> 01:05:17,470
In the end, I think a lot of that was confusion over levels of uh of analysis, where

1113
01:05:17,630 --> 01:05:23,230
realizing that we have this psychology for cooperation that does make us value other

1114
01:05:23,230 --> 01:05:26,350
people, that does make us value cooperation itself.

1115
01:05:26,590 --> 01:05:32,030
Um, and then you know, you can create an artificial situation where that

1116
01:05:32,270 --> 01:05:37,320
causes somebody to behave generously when it doesn't bring the benefit, you know, just like

1117
01:05:37,320 --> 01:05:42,280
you can create an artificial sweetener that triggers our desire for sugar, but doesn't

1118
01:05:42,280 --> 01:05:43,560
provide any calories.

1119
01:05:43,880 --> 01:05:49,640
Um, you know, you can you can provide a new scenario

1120
01:05:49,960 --> 01:05:55,640
where a normally adaptive mechanism won't be adaptive anymore because it's completely

1121
01:05:55,640 --> 01:05:56,280
artificial.

1122
01:05:56,520 --> 01:06:02,390
Our lungs are designed to extract oxygen from the air, but I can create an artificial

1123
01:06:02,390 --> 01:06:07,110
situation where like an all-nitrogen environment where these lungs no longer function.

1124
01:06:07,270 --> 01:06:09,430
And you can say, oh, it's maladaptive.

1125
01:06:09,510 --> 01:06:11,190
Our lungs are clearly not evolved for air.

1126
01:06:11,270 --> 01:06:13,670
If you know we're still trying to breathe when it's all nitrogen.

1127
01:06:13,750 --> 01:06:17,910
It's like, well, no, we're just, you know, it's it's a new, it's a new environment.

1128
01:06:18,070 --> 01:06:21,190
We wouldn't expect everything to be as adaptive there.

1129
01:06:21,560 --> 01:06:21,640
Right.

1130
01:06:21,720 --> 01:06:26,600
If somebody was oh, sorry, David, if somebody was running at you with an axe and you got

1131
01:06:26,600 --> 01:06:31,720
scared and there was a big plexiglass wall that you hadn't seen and you reacted with fear,

1132
01:06:31,960 --> 01:06:36,920
we wouldn't be like, boy, we have to explain, you know, that person can't hurt you.

1133
01:06:37,160 --> 01:06:41,640
So the fact that you got afraid means that we have to come up with some other explanation

1134
01:06:41,640 --> 01:06:43,720
for why that fear mechanism exists.

1135
01:06:43,880 --> 01:06:44,520
It's not that.

1136
01:06:44,600 --> 01:06:49,320
It's just that we've created this weird artificial situation where you can't get hurt, but

1137
01:06:49,480 --> 01:06:53,810
but that's just the evolved psychology can't anticipate this weird thing we've created.

1138
01:06:54,130 --> 01:06:54,290
Yeah.

1139
01:06:55,010 --> 01:06:56,530
Roller coasters are exciting.

1140
01:06:56,770 --> 01:07:01,970
Um even though they're you know pretty safe um just because they're triggering all those

1141
01:07:01,970 --> 01:07:05,570
cues of you know m fast motion stuff's coming at us quick.

1142
01:07:05,810 --> 01:07:06,050
Yeah.

1143
01:07:06,210 --> 01:07:06,450
Okay.

1144
01:07:06,530 --> 01:07:10,290
So I I I I love all these analogies, but I want to drill deeper.

1145
01:07:10,450 --> 01:07:15,680
So uh when you bring someone into the lab and uh give them this scenario where here's a

1146
01:07:15,680 --> 01:07:19,520
chance to co uh cooperate or give money to someone and you're totally anonymous.

1147
01:07:19,840 --> 01:07:21,120
Or punish a free rider, right?

1148
01:07:21,280 --> 01:07:22,560
Or punish a free rider, whatever.

1149
01:07:23,200 --> 01:07:29,040
Um what in that scenario is analogous to the plexiglass, to the artificial sweetener, to

1150
01:07:29,040 --> 01:07:29,920
the roller coaster?

1151
01:07:30,080 --> 01:07:32,240
What about it is evolutionarily novel?

1152
01:07:32,400 --> 01:07:34,320
How is it how does the trick work?

1153
01:07:34,720 --> 01:07:35,040
Okay.

1154
01:07:35,360 --> 01:07:41,270
Um so in in the real world, uh, you know, many of our actions have have consequences

1155
01:07:41,350 --> 01:07:45,510
and we have social emotions that you know that that trigger behavior.

1156
01:07:45,750 --> 01:07:51,350
Um, you know, we have things like guilt, uh, you know, if we cheat on somebody.

1157
01:07:51,590 --> 01:07:57,590
We have emotions um, you know, like a a a warm glow when when we help somebody

1158
01:07:57,590 --> 01:07:58,070
else.

1159
01:07:58,310 --> 01:08:03,900
Um you know, all of these emotions are what triggers our actual

1160
01:08:03,900 --> 01:08:04,780
behavior, right?

1161
01:08:04,940 --> 01:08:06,780
Whatever those emotions happen to be.

1162
01:08:06,940 --> 01:08:10,700
You know, I'm I'm a little agnostic about what they happen to be, but other people are

1163
01:08:10,700 --> 01:08:13,260
doing some great work examining what they are.

1164
01:08:13,420 --> 01:08:17,020
Like Daniel Snitzer does some great work examining what some of the what some of these uh

1165
01:08:17,180 --> 01:08:18,220
emotions are.

1166
01:08:18,460 --> 01:08:24,380
Um and so we have these emotions and they work really well in the

1167
01:08:24,380 --> 01:08:25,100
real world.

1168
01:08:25,370 --> 01:08:31,130
You know, somebody who would feel guilty about screwing over a

1169
01:08:31,130 --> 01:08:34,890
cooperative partner tends to not screw over the cooperative partner.

1170
01:08:34,970 --> 01:08:37,850
And they tend to stay in good relationships.

1171
01:08:38,170 --> 01:08:44,090
Where somebody who is absolutely guilt-free, absolutely shame-free, you know,

1172
01:08:44,250 --> 01:08:48,220
is more likely to get caught and disowned.

1173
01:08:48,540 --> 01:08:53,500
You know, uh, you know, at least in any environment environment with repeat interactions

1174
01:08:53,580 --> 01:08:58,860
where you repeatedly meet the same people, people eventually realize oh, that guy is really

1175
01:08:58,860 --> 01:09:00,140
untrustworthy.

1176
01:09:00,460 --> 01:09:04,460
So I'm not, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna uh I'm not gonna trust them.

1177
01:09:04,940 --> 01:09:07,900
So these emotions work really, really well.

1178
01:09:09,670 --> 01:09:15,510
In a lab experiment, we just create we create a situation where we sever the

1179
01:09:15,510 --> 01:09:19,590
link between action the action and the normal consequences.

1180
01:09:19,750 --> 01:09:22,790
So people can come in and they can still experience the same emotions.

1181
01:09:22,950 --> 01:09:27,270
I am feeling guilt about screwing over that other that stranger there.

1182
01:09:27,670 --> 01:09:31,350
I am feeling good about helping that other person.

1183
01:09:31,720 --> 01:09:36,040
The fairness that I value in the outside world, I value in here too.

1184
01:09:36,280 --> 01:09:42,120
But because the researchers have made it so that no one knows what happens, and because the

1185
01:09:42,120 --> 01:09:46,680
researchers have made it, that you know, they're reputation, they have no reputation, this

1186
01:09:46,680 --> 01:09:52,200
behavior is towards complete strangers, there are no longer the social consequences that

1187
01:09:52,200 --> 01:09:55,080
would normally occur outside the lab.

1188
01:09:56,110 --> 01:10:02,110
And so as a result, you know, people are still following the same, you know,

1189
01:10:02,350 --> 01:10:07,230
the same mechanisms, the same emotions that would normally happen in real life situations.

1190
01:10:07,390 --> 01:10:12,750
But we've changed the situation such that these behaviors no longer have the

1191
01:10:12,750 --> 01:10:14,990
consequences that they otherwise would.

1192
01:10:15,150 --> 01:10:21,070
And then we're surprised that people still do them anyway, but we really shouldn't

1193
01:10:21,070 --> 01:10:25,220
be surprised that that people will still do these behaviors anyway, because they're still

1194
01:10:25,220 --> 01:10:26,980
acting on the same emotions.

1195
01:10:27,380 --> 01:10:29,700
I I want to push back on that explanation a little bit.

1196
01:10:29,780 --> 01:10:30,020
Okay.

1197
01:10:30,260 --> 01:10:36,180
Um because wouldn't you so so uh you mention guilt um and how

1198
01:10:36,180 --> 01:10:39,380
it's sensitive to the costs that we impose on cooperative partners.

1199
01:10:39,700 --> 01:10:44,820
Wouldn't you expect guilt to have design features uh that involve

1200
01:10:44,820 --> 01:10:49,750
recognizing the likelihood that the person is actually going to be a cooperative partner or

1201
01:10:49,750 --> 01:10:53,430
actually is a cooperative partner, or that the person might actually know about the cost

1202
01:10:53,510 --> 01:10:54,630
that you inflict on them.

1203
01:10:54,790 --> 01:10:59,190
You'd think that a well-designed system of guilt would be sensitive to those variables, and

1204
01:10:59,190 --> 01:11:03,990
introducing those variables in a lab context might um affect the person's psychology.

1205
01:11:04,070 --> 01:11:07,430
The same thing goes with you know a sense of fairness, a sense of you know feeling good

1206
01:11:07,430 --> 01:11:08,230
when you help someone.

1207
01:11:08,420 --> 01:11:12,580
you would expect the psychological machinery to be sensitive to the likely costs and

1208
01:11:12,580 --> 01:11:17,940
benefits, to be sensitive to the repu the potential reputational benefits uh or or costs.

1209
01:11:18,100 --> 01:11:22,980
Uh so why why wouldn't we expect a well-designed system to be sensitive to the information

1210
01:11:22,980 --> 01:11:25,940
that the psychology experimenter is giving to the participant?

1211
01:11:26,340 --> 01:11:27,940
So this is a great question.

1212
01:11:28,180 --> 01:11:33,450
Um and so part of the answer is it is somewhat responsive to the to these mechanisms.

1213
01:11:33,530 --> 01:11:36,010
And this is some of the research that people are showing now.

1214
01:11:36,250 --> 01:11:40,410
Um, you know, how much do we forgive somebody after a transgression?

1215
01:11:40,570 --> 01:11:44,010
Well, it depends on how valuable a partner they are.

1216
01:11:44,250 --> 01:11:48,730
You know, if they're a more valuable partner, we are more like we've experienced more

1217
01:11:48,730 --> 01:11:50,580
forgiveness towards them.

1218
01:11:50,740 --> 01:11:55,060
You know, how angry are we at somebody a violation of trust?

1219
01:11:55,140 --> 01:12:00,020
Well, it depends on how much of a cost they imposed on us and what they get from it.

1220
01:12:00,660 --> 01:12:04,980
So our emotions are responsive to a lot of that.

1221
01:12:05,620 --> 01:12:07,700
But within boundaries, right?

1222
01:12:07,860 --> 01:12:10,180
So a couple of concepts to introduce.

1223
01:12:10,340 --> 01:12:15,860
One is the idea of error management, which is uh also goes by, you know, it's

1224
01:12:16,150 --> 01:12:20,150
if people are familiar with signal detection, it's a similar sort of idea.

1225
01:12:20,390 --> 01:12:23,510
Where um you know what is more costly?

1226
01:12:24,230 --> 01:12:30,070
Uh is it more costly to miss an opportunity to cheat somebody, or is

1227
01:12:30,070 --> 01:12:34,310
it more costly to get caught cheating somebody else?

1228
01:12:34,790 --> 01:12:38,710
And in many cases, the latter is is is more expensive, right?

1229
01:12:38,790 --> 01:12:44,200
It is all these expressions, it takes a lifetime to build a reputation, but it you know it

1230
01:12:44,200 --> 01:12:46,280
takes just a second to destroy it.

1231
01:12:47,080 --> 01:12:49,960
Um, and and this is often true, right?

1232
01:12:50,120 --> 01:12:55,480
If you're caught cheating when you you know when you had an

1233
01:12:55,480 --> 01:13:00,680
opportunity, people are going to distrust you, and you might never get an opportunity to

1234
01:13:00,760 --> 01:13:02,120
you know to reclaim that.

1235
01:13:02,280 --> 01:13:07,270
You know, if you get caught cheating on your spouse, they might never trust you again, um,

1236
01:13:07,430 --> 01:13:11,110
you know, and uh you know, and and let you go out, you know, lay out late at night with

1237
01:13:11,110 --> 01:13:12,150
your buddies, right?

1238
01:13:12,310 --> 01:13:15,110
Because they will expect something, uh suspect something.

1239
01:13:15,430 --> 01:13:21,270
So um as a result, because getting caught is so costly, we might err, you know, err

1240
01:13:21,270 --> 01:13:24,870
on the side of, okay, I don't want to risk it.

1241
01:13:25,100 --> 01:13:26,540
So it's kind of a risky decision.

1242
01:13:26,620 --> 01:13:31,900
So that's that's part of it, is that there will be some, you know, yes, I'm gonna I, you

1243
01:13:31,900 --> 01:13:37,740
know, I might be more likely to cheat in this anonymous situation, but you know,

1244
01:13:37,900 --> 01:13:41,740
I might not be completely willing, just in case.

1245
01:13:42,220 --> 01:13:45,020
And different people are going to differ, different people are gonna have a different

1246
01:13:45,020 --> 01:13:50,220
threshold as to how certain do they need to be about their anonymity before they cheat.

1247
01:13:50,380 --> 01:13:52,060
So that so that's part of it.

1248
01:13:52,390 --> 01:13:56,470
Another part of it might be tying back to the stakeholder cooperation that we talked about

1249
01:13:56,470 --> 01:14:02,150
earlier, where if you perceive that you have a stake in somebody's welfare, you

1250
01:14:02,150 --> 01:14:07,750
might cooperate with them even if you know a hundred percent that that they cannot

1251
01:14:07,750 --> 01:14:08,230
observe.

1252
01:14:08,470 --> 01:14:13,750
Just like you watering that tree and protecting it, even though it cannot detect that you

1253
01:14:13,750 --> 01:14:18,070
are you are helping it, you will still help because you have it, if you think you have an

1254
01:14:18,070 --> 01:14:20,240
interest in them, then, then you'll help them.

1255
01:14:20,320 --> 01:14:21,920
And this is some of the work that I've done.

1256
01:14:22,240 --> 01:14:28,240
People are more likely to anonymously help somebody if doing

1257
01:14:28,240 --> 01:14:34,160
so will keep that person around and available to cooperate with, than

1258
01:14:34,400 --> 01:14:38,720
if it does not affect whether that person's going to be around and available to help.

1259
01:14:38,800 --> 01:14:39,120
Right.

1260
01:14:39,200 --> 01:14:44,960
So part of the anonymous cooperation might be some perception of um uh of

1261
01:14:44,960 --> 01:14:46,320
stake going on there.

1262
01:14:47,070 --> 01:14:52,670
But also, I would say we are also plastic about how

1263
01:14:53,150 --> 01:14:56,110
we learn to deal with new situations.

1264
01:14:56,590 --> 01:15:01,470
So if you chuck somebody in a lab environment for the first time, this is a bit of a new

1265
01:15:01,470 --> 01:15:02,110
environment.

1266
01:15:02,270 --> 01:15:06,990
Well, I'm going to follow the strategies that worked well for me out in the real world

1267
01:15:07,150 --> 01:15:11,470
because I spend 99% of my time out there in the real world.

1268
01:15:11,660 --> 01:15:16,940
Therefore, I'm going to apply all of the heuristics that work well in the real world in the

1269
01:15:16,940 --> 01:15:20,300
lab, even though it happens to not be beneficial here.

1270
01:15:21,020 --> 01:15:22,700
Especially the first time.

1271
01:15:23,580 --> 01:15:28,140
But the second time, I might have learned a little bit.

1272
01:15:28,300 --> 01:15:32,540
The third, the fourth, the fifth, the sixth time, I might have learned a little bit that,

1273
01:15:32,620 --> 01:15:33,580
oh, wait a second.

1274
01:15:33,820 --> 01:15:37,420
Cooperation doesn't pay off in this new environment.

1275
01:15:37,660 --> 01:15:43,510
And research, some researches have shown that people do habituate

1276
01:15:43,670 --> 01:15:45,910
a little bit to these artificial environments.

1277
01:15:46,070 --> 01:15:51,750
And so if you have people giving in an online cooperative game, how much do you want of

1278
01:15:51,750 --> 01:15:52,070
your money?

1279
01:15:52,150 --> 01:15:53,910
Do you want to share with this other person?

1280
01:15:54,470 --> 01:15:58,790
Um, well, you know, the first time they do it, they're they're pretty generous.

1281
01:15:59,190 --> 01:16:03,270
Second time, maybe not quite as much on average, third time, not as even less on average,

1282
01:16:03,510 --> 01:16:09,480
as they gradually get used to this artificial scenario as it comprises a larger portion

1283
01:16:09,480 --> 01:16:10,920
of the interactions.

1284
01:16:11,080 --> 01:16:16,680
They then start to learn these heuristics of oh, this is a new situation where the payoffs

1285
01:16:16,680 --> 01:16:17,000
are different.

1286
01:16:17,320 --> 01:16:17,560
Right.

1287
01:16:17,720 --> 01:16:20,200
Cite citation internet 2025.

1288
01:16:20,360 --> 01:16:21,000
See the internet.

1289
01:16:21,480 --> 01:16:22,120
Yeah, yeah.

1290
01:16:22,520 --> 01:16:22,840
Yeah.

1291
01:16:23,000 --> 01:16:27,080
People get used to online environments and realize, oh, I can be an asshole here.

1292
01:16:27,400 --> 01:16:28,280
And so they do.

1293
01:16:28,630 --> 01:16:34,630
Um, so that's uh so I I think that's another component of their uh of this too, is that we

1294
01:16:34,630 --> 01:16:38,390
are plastic, but plasticity takes time.

1295
01:16:38,870 --> 01:16:44,710
And we we shouldn't interpret, like overinterpret what people do the

1296
01:16:44,710 --> 01:16:48,150
first time you throw them into an artificial environment.

1297
01:16:48,470 --> 01:16:53,590
Um, you know, you can the first if you take a person who has never swum before and you

1298
01:16:53,590 --> 01:16:56,230
throw them in the water, they're not gonna do so well.

1299
01:16:56,480 --> 01:17:00,560
If you take somebody who has learned how to deal with water, eventually you throw them in

1300
01:17:00,640 --> 01:17:02,000
and they'll do the backstroke.

1301
01:17:02,160 --> 01:17:05,920
Um, but you know, the first time is not necessarily indicative of anything.

1302
01:17:06,160 --> 01:17:06,320
Right.

1303
01:17:06,400 --> 01:17:11,440
I remember even like some of the first uh data coming out of this, like, oh, we need a

1304
01:17:11,440 --> 01:17:15,680
whole new theory of cooperation, it would be something like, and Pat, you can correct me if

1305
01:17:15,680 --> 01:17:20,830
I'm wrong, cooperation, they would say, like, look, it's gonna be some, there's gonna be um

1306
01:17:20,990 --> 01:17:22,910
the end to this interaction.

1307
01:17:23,070 --> 01:17:28,590
And so you would get cooperation on the on the y-axis, is the level of cooperation x-axis

1308
01:17:28,830 --> 01:17:30,350
is what round it is.

1309
01:17:30,590 --> 01:17:35,470
And what you would see is as you're going and it's further and further, or getting closer

1310
01:17:35,470 --> 01:17:40,360
to the end of cooperation, uh, people are still cooperating, but then it starts like they

1311
01:17:40,360 --> 01:17:43,480
know this is the last round, and then it goes down.

1312
01:17:43,640 --> 01:17:47,000
And so people are cooperating less than the rest round, but it's not at zero.

1313
01:17:47,240 --> 01:17:53,080
And what people would sort of emphasize was the residual cooperation, and

1314
01:17:53,080 --> 01:17:58,120
kind of so so even in that original data, there was sensitivity to the thing ending, but

1315
01:17:58,120 --> 01:18:01,720
they were really emphasizing the fact it just didn't go to zero right away, which I think

1316
01:18:01,720 --> 01:18:07,010
is kind of um you can I mean people were getting money by emphasizing it because they were

1317
01:18:07,010 --> 01:18:12,130
like we need to discover a brand new thing, um, which I think was sort of overselling the

1318
01:18:12,130 --> 01:18:12,370
point.

1319
01:18:12,450 --> 01:18:12,690
But yeah.

1320
01:18:13,010 --> 01:18:16,130
There's there's always an incentive to discover a brand new thing.

1321
01:18:16,290 --> 01:18:16,530
Yeah.

1322
01:18:18,210 --> 01:18:18,930
Unfortunately.

1323
01:18:19,090 --> 01:18:19,250
Yeah.

1324
01:18:19,330 --> 01:18:23,490
Uh because sometimes people will discover things that aren't new or aren't, you know, it a

1325
01:18:23,650 --> 01:18:24,770
repackaging of something old.

1326
01:18:25,100 --> 01:18:25,260
Yeah.

1327
01:18:25,340 --> 01:18:30,140
I mean, I think one one way to put it is Pat, you have been steadily doing the actual

1328
01:18:30,140 --> 01:18:35,500
science of what a lot of very well known people who study cooperation, the evolution of

1329
01:18:35,500 --> 01:18:38,220
cooperation, have sort of snake oiled into.

1330
01:18:38,540 --> 01:18:41,900
We've discovered a whole new kind of selection.

1331
01:18:42,380 --> 01:18:47,340
Um, and I won't name names, but like you're you're actually doing the science of that as

1332
01:18:47,340 --> 01:18:49,500
opposed to the the flashy snake oil.

1333
01:18:49,580 --> 01:18:49,820
Yeah.

1334
01:18:50,220 --> 01:18:53,180
I'm I yeah, I I I'm trying to avoid the the the snake oil.

1335
01:18:53,260 --> 01:18:57,030
So one of my friends and colleagues, uh Sandy Misher, has a great expression that uh

1336
01:18:57,190 --> 01:18:59,910
scientists should be monks, not rock stars.

1337
01:19:00,310 --> 01:19:00,470
Right.

1338
01:19:00,630 --> 01:19:04,790
So you know, you know, it's like distrust the people who are super flashy and got all the

1339
01:19:04,790 --> 01:19:09,670
stuff because you know, maybe they're overselling, you know, maybe they're you know cutting

1340
01:19:09,670 --> 01:19:13,830
some corners, uh, you know, sort of like the that natural selection of bad science paper

1341
01:19:13,910 --> 01:19:18,300
that uh uh which which is so good right people doing the really flashy stuff yes there's

1342
01:19:18,380 --> 01:19:21,900
select you know it could be selection for that but a great paper by the way yeah Richard

1343
01:19:21,900 --> 01:19:27,740
and Paul we need to have on and I know Willem and Karthic have another related one uh

1344
01:19:27,900 --> 01:19:32,300
and Paul I think is on that too we should have all those all those folks on but you see you

1345
01:19:32,300 --> 01:19:35,420
see Kiki this is this is why it's good to be boring sometimes.

1346
01:19:36,540 --> 01:19:38,540
Yeah you should this is another PSA.

1347
01:19:39,100 --> 01:19:44,850
Like really value we should well there's a pay like really there is huge value to boredom.

1348
01:19:45,090 --> 01:19:50,130
And I really think this, like, um the idea that you should be

1349
01:19:50,130 --> 01:19:55,810
entertained is a really dangerous idea from like a

1350
01:19:55,810 --> 01:19:57,970
epistemic stance to take towards the world.

1351
01:19:58,130 --> 01:20:03,010
If you're like, I insist that I need to be entertained by something and I'm gonna evaluate

1352
01:20:03,010 --> 01:20:08,860
everything on according to the entertainment value it provides, like buckle up you're

1353
01:20:08,860 --> 01:20:13,500
gonna you're that's gonna make a really rough uh social experiment.

1354
01:20:14,220 --> 01:20:20,220
Yeah no absolutely I I have a uh a blog post on that very topic uh cool you

1355
01:20:20,220 --> 01:20:24,780
know you will find this interesting oh cool I should sorry David uh yeah no basically

1356
01:20:24,780 --> 01:20:30,060
arguing exactly what you just said that our sense of what is interesting is uh in many ways

1357
01:20:30,140 --> 01:20:35,260
uh not to be trusted or it's not a reliable guide to what is true and useful um and it can

1358
01:20:35,260 --> 01:20:38,290
often lead us toward bullshit in in various ways.

1359
01:20:38,370 --> 01:20:43,730
And I think there's an overemphasis on uh on interestingness and being interesting uh in

1360
01:20:43,730 --> 01:20:44,130
our culture.

1361
01:20:44,450 --> 01:20:49,090
So we have just uh we have just explained why we're not interesting and boring and why it's

1362
01:20:49,090 --> 01:20:49,650
a virtue.

1363
01:20:49,810 --> 01:20:50,210
Yes.

1364
01:20:50,930 --> 01:20:54,290
Yeah we we've given a a self-serving cynical explanation for it.

1365
01:20:54,530 --> 01:20:55,010
Exactly.

1366
01:20:59,410 --> 01:21:03,250
I think there's so much to say about cooperation in I mean so here I'm gonna give you two

1367
01:21:03,250 --> 01:21:03,890
options Pat.

1368
01:21:04,050 --> 01:21:09,440
One is is there a high-level sort of summary description of like the kinds of solutions to

1369
01:21:09,440 --> 01:21:11,600
the problem of cooperation that you've discovered?

1370
01:21:11,840 --> 01:21:17,760
And then option B is, and you can do both or one or the other, is uh

1371
01:21:17,920 --> 01:21:22,320
uh Martin and Margot in talking a little bit about them and sort of how you found them or

1372
01:21:22,320 --> 01:21:24,400
what who they are because we haven't really talked about them.

1373
01:21:24,720 --> 01:21:30,590
Okay, let me let me deal with the uh the the the first one first um So one

1374
01:21:30,590 --> 01:21:36,510
of the things that I try to do when not being a snake oil salesman is to try to

1375
01:21:36,590 --> 01:21:39,150
like rather than coming up with a flashy title.

1376
01:21:39,310 --> 01:21:43,710
A lot of people like to, I have this new theory and they have their acronym for it or

1377
01:21:43,710 --> 01:21:44,270
whatever.

1378
01:21:49,630 --> 01:21:51,550
And then really like dive dive into that.

1379
01:21:51,710 --> 01:21:56,270
So so some of the stuff I'm known for, um, you know, com competitive helping, you know, is

1380
01:21:56,350 --> 01:22:01,860
the the idea that we are only implicitly competing in a in a biological market over social

1381
01:22:01,860 --> 01:22:02,900
partners, right?

1382
01:22:03,060 --> 01:22:08,660
So it's beneficial to be selected as you know a friend, an ally, a mate, a business

1383
01:22:08,660 --> 01:22:11,220
partner, coalitional ally, et cetera, right?

1384
01:22:11,540 --> 01:22:16,500
Um and in that competition, you benefit from

1385
01:22:17,060 --> 01:22:22,420
demonstrating your ability to provide benefits, but also your willingness to uh to

1386
01:22:22,660 --> 01:22:23,780
provide benefits.

1387
01:22:24,020 --> 01:22:29,950
One way to do so is to not just to be nice, but to be nicer than the other guy, right?

1388
01:22:30,030 --> 01:22:34,030
To not just be competent, but be more competent than the other than than the other person,

1389
01:22:34,110 --> 01:22:34,350
right?

1390
01:22:34,510 --> 01:22:38,910
So you know we're we're very familiar with people competing to appear more competent,

1391
01:22:39,070 --> 01:22:39,310
right?

1392
01:22:39,470 --> 01:22:45,470
Athletics is all about that, um, you know, or intellectual competitions or or or

1393
01:22:45,470 --> 01:22:50,180
whatnot, but there is also competition to to you know appear nicer, right?

1394
01:22:50,340 --> 01:22:55,460
Or I am more devoted to uh you know to you than that other person would be.

1395
01:22:55,620 --> 01:22:58,500
I'm a better friend than that other person would be.

1396
01:22:58,660 --> 01:23:01,220
Therefore, you should spend more time with me.

1397
01:23:01,540 --> 01:23:06,980
Um, and one of the best ways to you know to get a good partner is to be a good partner.

1398
01:23:07,220 --> 01:23:13,060
And so, you know, competing subtly over uh how generous one is in

1399
01:23:13,060 --> 01:23:18,990
order to demonstrate both your uh ability to give, but also your your willingness to give.

1400
01:23:19,230 --> 01:23:25,070
Um, and so this is kind of a combination of ideas from a number of other people.

1401
01:23:25,230 --> 01:23:29,470
Um, Gilbert Roberts first put out the idea of competitive altruism.

1402
01:23:29,790 --> 01:23:34,830
Um, and uh you know, some a couple of biologists, Ronald Noe and Peter Hammerstein, came up

1403
01:23:34,830 --> 01:23:38,350
with the idea of biological markets and organisms competing over partnerships.

1404
01:23:38,510 --> 01:23:43,920
So it's taking those ideas along with the idea of costly signaling, of how can you

1405
01:23:43,920 --> 01:23:49,200
communicate information about yourself in a way that's honest and guaranteed to be honest,

1406
01:23:49,360 --> 01:23:53,600
um, as opposed to just being cheap talk, you know, hey, look at me, I'm cooperative, trust

1407
01:23:53,600 --> 01:23:53,840
me.

1408
01:23:54,000 --> 01:23:55,600
Okay, well, why should I trust you?

1409
01:23:55,760 --> 01:23:57,360
How do I know that it's honest?

1410
01:23:57,600 --> 01:24:02,640
Well, I'm doing something that would not be worth it if I weren't actually intending to

1411
01:24:02,640 --> 01:24:03,600
follow through, right?

1412
01:24:03,730 --> 01:24:09,410
So it's kind of combining these different ideas together into this

1413
01:24:09,890 --> 01:24:15,490
framework of biological markets and competing over partnerships.

1414
01:24:15,650 --> 01:24:21,170
So it's drawing from these other areas and trying also to give credit to all of the

1415
01:24:21,330 --> 01:24:23,410
researchers that have come before.

1416
01:24:31,560 --> 01:24:36,600
So, I mean, so that's one of the ideas that I'd like to be known for, this idea of a

1417
01:24:36,600 --> 01:24:42,600
biological market for partnerships and how that shapes how we communicate our attributes,

1418
01:24:42,840 --> 01:24:48,600
whom we choose, how we choose partners, we choose them based on their competence, their

1419
01:24:48,920 --> 01:24:52,040
ability to provide benefits and their willingness to do so.

1420
01:24:52,200 --> 01:24:57,970
That affects our skepticism towards them when we believe that somebody's

1421
01:24:57,970 --> 01:24:59,890
honestly a good partner versus when they don't.

1422
01:25:00,050 --> 01:25:02,290
So that that's a big chunk of it there.

1423
01:25:02,530 --> 01:25:08,290
Um more recently I've started to get into this idea of uh stakeholder uh generosity.

1424
01:25:08,450 --> 01:25:12,930
And again, you know, you know, there there's many people have come up with this before.

1425
01:25:13,250 --> 01:25:18,210
Again, I seem to be using Gilbert Roberts's terminology of stake, um, you know, because I I

1426
01:25:18,290 --> 01:25:23,570
I I think it it really nicely reflects the idea that one organism can have a vested

1427
01:25:23,570 --> 01:25:24,930
interest in somebody else.

1428
01:25:25,170 --> 01:25:31,000
And all of these other actions, like you know, reciprocity, can create a

1429
01:25:31,000 --> 01:25:32,120
stake in a partner.

1430
01:25:32,280 --> 01:25:38,040
If we're engaging in purely economic exchange, I come to have an interest in your

1431
01:25:38,040 --> 01:25:41,160
well-being and I will help you because of that.

1432
01:25:41,320 --> 01:25:46,600
If you just happen to be providing public goods, cooperative benefits, I have an interest

1433
01:25:46,600 --> 01:25:47,240
in helping you.

1434
01:25:47,320 --> 01:25:51,880
And so that provides an additional selective pressure for me to help you and for you to

1435
01:25:51,880 --> 01:25:53,080
produce these goods.

1436
01:25:53,670 --> 01:25:59,110
So it it it kind of nicely links many of these other causes of cooperation, including

1437
01:25:59,110 --> 01:26:04,390
reciprocity, including uh signaling behavior, but also links to many of these other things

1438
01:26:04,550 --> 01:26:05,910
like byproduct mutualism.

1439
01:26:06,150 --> 01:26:06,310
Right.

1440
01:26:06,390 --> 01:26:11,990
And I just want to say I love this market idea because it's really um it's dynamic.

1441
01:26:12,230 --> 01:26:16,390
And I think one of the things and it was really influential for me when I worked on a paper

1442
01:26:16,390 --> 01:26:21,220
about leadership and it was a similar idea of sort of like what what any outcome looks

1443
01:26:21,220 --> 01:26:21,380
like.

1444
01:26:21,460 --> 01:26:25,300
I think people have this idea sort of like, well, like things are static.

1445
01:26:25,380 --> 01:26:27,620
And so why does cooperation look like this?

1446
01:26:27,780 --> 01:26:30,660
Or why does this kind of cooperative relationship look like this?

1447
01:26:30,900 --> 01:26:36,740
And you see a range of sort of like both parties do really well versus like one party sort

1448
01:26:36,740 --> 01:26:39,860
of exploited and one isn't, but there's still cooperation.

1449
01:26:40,100 --> 01:26:44,260
And I think without the idea of sort of this market idea, the what you talked about before,

1450
01:26:44,340 --> 01:26:47,010
you know, if your outside Yeah, what's your other option?

1451
01:26:47,090 --> 01:26:49,250
And I think that is a really powerful idea.

1452
01:26:49,330 --> 01:26:50,370
It's a complicating idea.

1453
01:26:50,530 --> 01:26:55,730
I think people don't like, you know, the sort of snake oil people don't like complicating

1454
01:26:55,730 --> 01:26:56,210
ideas.

1455
01:26:56,370 --> 01:27:00,450
But I think it's really important for realism, which is that, and I think it's such a

1456
01:27:00,450 --> 01:27:01,010
profound insight.

1457
01:27:01,090 --> 01:27:03,970
And I think you're you you really, your work inspired me.

1458
01:27:04,130 --> 01:27:09,970
And I think it's worth saying out loud that this idea of what uh what a relationship looks

1459
01:27:09,970 --> 01:27:15,940
like is not just a function of the sort of like kind

1460
01:27:15,940 --> 01:27:16,900
of relationship it is.

1461
01:27:16,980 --> 01:27:18,500
Like, is it a cooperative relationship?

1462
01:27:18,580 --> 01:27:20,820
It just looks like this automatically.

1463
01:27:20,980 --> 01:27:26,900
It's cooperation combined with the market forces of what are the other partners' options.

1464
01:27:27,060 --> 01:27:28,740
And I think that's such a profound idea.

1465
01:27:28,900 --> 01:27:32,020
It sounds simple when you say it, but I think it's such a profound idea.

1466
01:27:32,180 --> 01:27:35,060
Um, so thank you for for in interjecting that.

1467
01:27:35,140 --> 01:27:39,220
I think it's you're welcome, but I mean it's not just what are their options, but also what

1468
01:27:39,220 --> 01:27:40,500
are their needs, right?

1469
01:27:40,580 --> 01:27:46,090
I mean, because this is where supply and demand come in and how these can vary from

1470
01:27:46,090 --> 01:27:48,330
environments to from environment to environment.

1471
01:27:48,570 --> 01:27:54,570
So in one environment where there might be not a lot of food, right,

1472
01:27:54,730 --> 01:27:56,170
food is in high demand.

1473
01:27:56,330 --> 01:28:01,930
So somebody who's particularly effective at producing food becomes a very high value

1474
01:28:01,930 --> 01:28:04,970
partner because that's what you need in that location.

1475
01:28:05,130 --> 01:28:10,250
And that's going to affect somebody's market value and what you value in a friend or a mate

1476
01:28:10,330 --> 01:28:11,610
or in any relationship.

1477
01:28:11,850 --> 01:28:17,140
In other environments, um, food might be plentiful, but maybe there is conflict with uh,

1478
01:28:17,220 --> 01:28:22,580
you know, with outgroups or this conflict over resources, in which case, um, there, you

1479
01:28:22,580 --> 01:28:28,180
know, coalitional aid is very important, is in high demand and low

1480
01:28:28,180 --> 01:28:28,660
supply.

1481
01:28:28,820 --> 01:28:33,060
And so you might become a more valuable partner by demonstrating, you know, your your

1482
01:28:33,060 --> 01:28:37,790
toughness and your you know, your loyalty uh to partners and willing to

1483
01:28:39,070 --> 01:28:41,150
help them fight off exploiters.

1484
01:28:41,390 --> 01:28:47,390
So what gets valued in a partner can vary from environment to environment, depending on the

1485
01:28:47,390 --> 01:28:50,830
local supply and demand, what is needed in that location.

1486
01:28:51,150 --> 01:28:55,950
And I think that's something where this perspective can also lead into cultural

1487
01:28:55,950 --> 01:28:56,750
differences, right?

1488
01:28:57,150 --> 01:29:02,880
In different um physical environments, different traits can be more valuable.

1489
01:29:03,040 --> 01:29:08,400
In different sociological environments, different traits can be more valuable, either

1490
01:29:08,400 --> 01:29:11,840
because they are more needed or because they are in shorter supply.

1491
01:29:12,000 --> 01:29:16,080
And that affects what people are going to do to signal their traits.

1492
01:29:16,240 --> 01:29:22,000
It affects what people are going to want in a social partner, um and how exactly

1493
01:29:22,000 --> 01:29:23,520
they're going to compete over them.

1494
01:29:23,890 --> 01:29:24,610
That's really interesting.

1495
01:29:24,690 --> 01:29:26,130
And maybe even individual differences.

1496
01:29:26,210 --> 01:29:30,930
Like I think one of the tropes of life is sort of like people, I think all of us sort of

1497
01:29:31,010 --> 01:29:33,810
sometimes we look at people and we're like, why is that person with that person?

1498
01:29:33,970 --> 01:29:39,570
Whether it's romantic or socially or just or social identities, like why would this

1499
01:29:39,570 --> 01:29:42,130
political party support this political candidate?

1500
01:29:42,290 --> 01:29:48,050
And I think the idea of sort of being humble about or thinking about that they might

1501
01:29:48,050 --> 01:29:53,880
have needs or becoming from a place that we don't have an understanding or being

1502
01:29:53,880 --> 01:29:57,560
open to hearing about or learning about what their needs are, whether they're real or

1503
01:29:57,560 --> 01:30:01,800
perceived, it might go a long way to understanding why people are doing or choosing the

1504
01:30:01,800 --> 01:30:03,160
partners they're choosing.

1505
01:30:03,560 --> 01:30:03,800
Yeah.

1506
01:30:03,960 --> 01:30:04,200
Yeah.

1507
01:30:04,280 --> 01:30:09,080
So some individuals will have different needs depending on the their phase in life, right?

1508
01:30:09,160 --> 01:30:13,320
Where they are, how old they are, uh, you know, what their profession is, uh, their

1509
01:30:13,320 --> 01:30:13,720
environment.

1510
01:30:13,800 --> 01:30:17,850
So yeah, there's going to be individual differences both in needs, what they can pursue.

1511
01:30:18,090 --> 01:30:22,890
It also means some individuals maybe higher market value and are able to pursue different

1512
01:30:22,890 --> 01:30:23,530
strategies.

1513
01:30:23,850 --> 01:30:28,810
Um, you know, because the, you know, the you know, somebody who's very competent might

1514
01:30:28,810 --> 01:30:31,450
spend more of their time demonstrating their competence.

1515
01:30:31,610 --> 01:30:37,210
Somebody who doesn't have that might instead need to focus more on demonstrating their

1516
01:30:37,210 --> 01:30:38,250
loyalty, right?

1517
01:30:38,650 --> 01:30:42,960
I might not be as awesome, but I value you way more.

1518
01:30:43,120 --> 01:30:43,360
Right.

1519
01:30:43,440 --> 01:30:47,920
So there are all sorts of compensatory strategies that different individuals are going to

1520
01:30:47,920 --> 01:30:52,640
follow as a result of their own position within the market.

1521
01:30:53,280 --> 01:30:57,680
So it's a very rich perspective in order to be able to predict individual differences,

1522
01:30:57,840 --> 01:31:02,080
cultural differences, ecological differences in what people desire.

1523
01:31:02,160 --> 01:31:07,390
And it's you know it's a very pl you know we would expect a lot of plasticity in terms of

1524
01:31:07,550 --> 01:31:13,470
um you know how people respond to these different social environments uh you know that they

1525
01:31:13,470 --> 01:31:18,430
have grown up in um yeah and uh and how you know the the past environments are going to

1526
01:31:18,430 --> 01:31:21,870
affect them today because it has affected the market they have grown up in.

1527
01:31:22,190 --> 01:31:22,830
Right.

1528
01:31:24,220 --> 01:31:27,820
Well, I I want to float an idea by you, Pat.

1529
01:31:28,140 --> 01:31:30,860
It's an idea that we that Dave and I discussed on the on the first episode.

1530
01:31:30,940 --> 01:31:34,140
Uh it's a a working paper that I'm I'm continuing to think about.

1531
01:31:34,300 --> 01:31:40,300
Um, and that's between uh or that's it's it's about a conflict between what we might call

1532
01:31:40,300 --> 01:31:46,010
competitive altruism or partner choice psychology and intergroup competition and

1533
01:31:46,010 --> 01:31:47,130
intergroup conflict.

1534
01:31:47,530 --> 01:31:53,290
Um, and it may be that uh, you know, we have this rich partner choice psychology where we

1535
01:31:53,290 --> 01:31:59,290
want to uh signal how kind and generous and fair we are, um, how humble we are, and

1536
01:31:59,290 --> 01:32:03,690
we're evaluating other people based on you know whether they're gonna really provide help

1537
01:32:03,770 --> 01:32:06,730
us help for us, whether they're not gonna you know stab us on the back.

1538
01:32:06,810 --> 01:32:12,410
We were we're looking for um you know uh peaceful collaborative partners who divide

1539
01:32:12,410 --> 01:32:13,690
resources fairly.

1540
01:32:13,850 --> 01:32:18,760
Um and so there's all that stuff that we that we've gotten into uh in a variety of ways

1541
01:32:18,760 --> 01:32:22,280
throughout uh the past hour and a half or so.

1542
01:32:22,600 --> 01:32:28,520
Um and then there's this psychology of intergroup conflict, where in that case, um you

1543
01:32:28,520 --> 01:32:30,440
don't want to divide resources fairly.

1544
01:32:30,520 --> 01:32:35,160
It's in your Darwinian interest to divide resources in a lopsided way that benefit your

1545
01:32:35,160 --> 01:32:37,080
group and exploit the outgroup.

1546
01:32:37,160 --> 01:32:41,070
Uh in that context, you want to actually dominate and coerce the outgroup.

1547
01:32:41,710 --> 01:32:46,030
You want to if you uh aggress against them, attack them violently and take their stuff

1548
01:32:46,110 --> 01:32:50,910
whenever you can do so safely and at low risk when when you have a numerical advantage.

1549
01:32:51,230 --> 01:32:54,910
It's in your interest to do that from a cold Darwinian perspective.

1550
01:32:56,110 --> 01:32:59,390
Definitely need to bring in the cold Darwinian perspective so that people know that you're

1551
01:32:59,390 --> 01:33:00,590
not personally advocating this.

1552
01:33:00,670 --> 01:33:03,150
Yes but you're just outlining the Darwinian logic.

1553
01:33:03,380 --> 01:33:04,820
Yes, outlining the Darwinian logic.

1554
01:33:05,220 --> 01:33:09,700
But there's a fundamental conflict here, and that it's hard to say violently attack an

1555
01:33:09,700 --> 01:33:14,740
outgroup uh uh when you have a numerical advantage just for the sake of dominating them or

1556
01:33:14,740 --> 01:33:16,100
exploiting them or taking their stuff.

1557
01:33:16,260 --> 01:33:20,260
It's hard to do that when you live in a partner choice psychology where people are

1558
01:33:20,260 --> 01:33:25,140
constantly evaluating your moral character uh and scrutinizing everything you do from that

1559
01:33:25,140 --> 01:33:25,540
lens.

1560
01:33:25,780 --> 01:33:31,130
So if I look like a mean bully uh when I behave in that way toward an outgroup, or if I'm a

1561
01:33:31,130 --> 01:33:35,850
leader and I'm proposing a coalitional project where we go out and we attack the rival

1562
01:33:35,850 --> 01:33:40,010
group just just for no other reason than just you know self-interest or or dominance.

1563
01:33:40,170 --> 01:33:40,330
Yeah.

1564
01:33:40,490 --> 01:33:44,650
Um, well, that's gonna make me look like a really mean, ruthless, bad social partner.

1565
01:33:45,850 --> 01:33:46,730
Turn on their next social partner.

1566
01:33:47,770 --> 01:33:48,250
Yeah, exactly.

1567
01:33:48,410 --> 01:33:54,040
And so the idea is that um this might be one of the functions of what we might

1568
01:33:54,040 --> 01:33:56,840
call ideologies uh or political narratives.

1569
01:33:57,720 --> 01:34:02,600
They function to reconcile this conflict between partner choice psychology on the one hand

1570
01:34:02,760 --> 01:34:05,320
and the needs of intergroup competition on the other.

1571
01:34:05,480 --> 01:34:10,600
That we need to create these pretexts that um aggressing against the outgroup is morally

1572
01:34:10,600 --> 01:34:12,870
justified, they're evil, they're going to attack us.

1573
01:34:12,950 --> 01:34:17,270
Um, we need we're doing it in retaliation, we're it's a preemptive strike, or maybe the

1574
01:34:17,270 --> 01:34:18,390
gods said that we had to do this.

1575
01:34:18,470 --> 01:34:22,310
There are there are you know the history books are littered with these kinds of pretexts.

1576
01:34:22,470 --> 01:34:27,350
But the argument is that we actually need these pretexts to be able to mobilize effectively

1577
01:34:27,430 --> 01:34:32,550
uh in in a group competition, because if we can't have a pretext that is compatible with

1578
01:34:32,550 --> 01:34:37,270
our partner choice psychology, uh then our collective action is doomed to failure.

1579
01:34:37,440 --> 01:34:41,840
Um and so what do you think about uh this idea that that one of the reasons why we need

1580
01:34:41,840 --> 01:34:47,280
these moral pretexts is to uh um reconcile the conflict between partner choice psychology

1581
01:34:47,280 --> 01:34:48,400
and intergroup competition?

1582
01:34:48,800 --> 01:34:50,880
Yeah, uh it's a great it's a great idea.

1583
01:34:50,960 --> 01:34:56,800
I I'd been thinking along similar lines where some of this is signaling to ones in

1584
01:34:56,880 --> 01:34:59,200
group that you're not next.

1585
01:34:59,440 --> 01:34:59,760
Right.

1586
01:35:00,080 --> 01:35:05,430
Um so it's uh it it's signaling we are attacking them.

1587
01:35:06,710 --> 01:35:12,710
Uh and you know uh so I I can't just turn around and suddenly do the same to you.

1588
01:35:12,950 --> 01:35:18,710
Um so it's uh I I think a lot of it is reassuring uh other coalition members

1589
01:35:19,030 --> 01:35:24,630
that you know you will you know benefit from the spoils as opposed to become the the next

1590
01:35:24,630 --> 01:35:25,110
victim.

1591
01:35:25,830 --> 01:35:29,670
You know, um you know I'm I'm always you know surprised that people aren't a little more

1592
01:35:29,640 --> 01:35:30,520
skeptical of that.

1593
01:35:30,680 --> 01:35:35,240
You know, I I love the line, you know, an appeaser is someone who feeds a crocodile in the

1594
01:35:35,240 --> 01:35:36,840
hopes of being eaten last.

1595
01:35:37,240 --> 01:35:41,240
Um, you know, so I so I'm very you know surprised that people don't kind of see through

1596
01:35:41,240 --> 01:35:42,360
that more than they do.

1597
01:35:42,600 --> 01:35:47,560
Um, but but I do think that the a a lot of it is along the same lines of exactly what you

1598
01:35:47,560 --> 01:35:53,400
said, um, um, about trying to still maintain value towards your uh your

1599
01:35:53,640 --> 01:35:57,560
your desired partners, people with whom you could cooperate.

1600
01:35:57,850 --> 01:36:03,850
um, but uh you know assure them that they will benefit from this action as opposed to,

1601
01:36:03,930 --> 01:36:08,410
you know, I'm just a mean bastard who tends to, you know, uh take from anybody and you're

1602
01:36:08,410 --> 01:36:09,050
next.

1603
01:36:10,170 --> 01:36:10,490
Cool.

1604
01:36:10,650 --> 01:36:11,690
So you buy it?

1605
01:36:12,090 --> 01:36:12,970
Yeah, I buy it.

1606
01:36:13,050 --> 01:36:13,770
Uh you know, okay.

1607
01:36:13,850 --> 01:36:16,170
I'd like to see I'd like to see the mathematical model of it first.

1608
01:36:16,250 --> 01:36:17,290
And uh Oh damn.

1609
01:36:17,530 --> 01:36:18,730
Park, you're always doing this.

1610
01:36:19,770 --> 01:36:22,600
You did you did this to me with humor and now you're doing it to me with this.

1611
01:36:23,560 --> 01:36:26,840
But I've heard you've got a uh you know, for for some of the other questions, you you've

1612
01:36:26,840 --> 01:36:27,480
got some good stuff on there.

1613
01:36:27,560 --> 01:36:28,760
So he's got math now.

1614
01:36:28,840 --> 01:36:30,520
So so yeah, we're keeping each other honest.

1615
01:36:30,600 --> 01:36:31,160
That's how this works.

1616
01:36:31,400 --> 01:36:31,720
Yeah, we are.

1617
01:36:31,800 --> 01:36:32,120
It's true.

1618
01:36:32,360 --> 01:36:32,840
It's great.

1619
01:36:33,080 --> 01:36:35,560
Um, and then uh Martin and Marg.

1620
01:36:35,960 --> 01:36:40,760
Um wonderful human beings, uh, and and great, great researchers.

1621
01:36:41,000 --> 01:36:44,520
Um, yeah, I I I trying to think where where where to start.

1622
01:36:44,600 --> 01:36:47,720
Uh, you know, I mean, if you want to talk about origin stories, I mean somebody could

1623
01:36:47,720 --> 01:36:51,160
easily give their 40-minute origin story on on on each of them.

1624
01:36:51,430 --> 01:36:57,350
Um, but uh they so Martin Daly and Margot Wilson are uh two of the founders of the field

1625
01:36:57,350 --> 01:36:59,270
of uh evolutionary psychology.

1626
01:36:59,510 --> 01:37:05,270
Um they both came from an animal behavior uh background so those trained as uh animal

1627
01:37:05,270 --> 01:37:11,270
behavior uh and getting I think which gives gives people a really, really strong basis

1628
01:37:11,350 --> 01:37:12,630
in the biology.

1629
01:37:12,790 --> 01:37:17,910
Um so for anybody out there who's like interested uh in in in evolutionary psychology, you

1630
01:37:18,070 --> 01:37:23,440
I'd recommend like brush up on some of the the non-human literature is is is really useful

1631
01:37:23,760 --> 01:37:28,880
because um it really helps strip away any preconcept uh preconceptions we have about what

1632
01:37:28,880 --> 01:37:33,600
what humans are like um you know and you know cultural differences and all this other stuff

1633
01:37:33,760 --> 01:37:37,520
like you know look at the the you know that the the non-humans to really get at the

1634
01:37:37,520 --> 01:37:39,200
underlying logic is is is useful.

1635
01:37:39,360 --> 01:37:45,350
So they both came from that uh that tradition and then they started working on uh

1636
01:37:45,510 --> 01:37:46,470
on humans.

1637
01:37:46,630 --> 01:37:51,110
Um, funny enough, they were reading uh or reading group working uh on uh you know

1638
01:37:51,190 --> 01:37:56,870
sociobiology, and you know, they uh they were reading about Sarah Hurdy's work about

1639
01:37:57,110 --> 01:38:02,950
um uh lions uh you know killing uh male lions killing cubs in order to cause the

1640
01:38:02,950 --> 01:38:05,750
females to come into estrus earlier or killing cubs that weren't their own.

1641
01:38:05,910 --> 01:38:05,990
Right.

1642
01:38:06,150 --> 01:38:08,630
And then somebody's like, ha, what about the wicked step parent myths?

1643
01:38:08,710 --> 01:38:10,150
So they said, all right, well, let's look into this.

1644
01:38:10,230 --> 01:38:12,710
And they start collecting, they realized nobody had looked at this.

1645
01:38:12,900 --> 01:38:18,900
So they started comparing data using um rates of like step-parental abuse to try and test

1646
01:38:18,900 --> 01:38:24,580
this idea that, well, if parents love their own kids more than other people's kids, we

1647
01:38:24,580 --> 01:38:30,580
should expect to see less abuse, less homicide in

1648
01:38:30,740 --> 01:38:32,900
biological parent parentheses in step-parent families.

1649
01:38:32,980 --> 01:38:37,060
And they found that they ran all these other things, uh, controls for it, and they started

1650
01:38:37,060 --> 01:38:43,010
using homicide data to test all sorts of other uh other hypotheses in in many other uh many

1651
01:38:43,010 --> 01:38:43,810
other domains.

1652
01:38:44,050 --> 01:38:46,370
So other questions about uh about parenting.

1653
01:38:46,530 --> 01:38:51,890
Okay, well, which children are people going to uh going to uh to love more?

1654
01:38:52,050 --> 01:38:53,810
Like, you know, there's an awkward question.

1655
01:38:53,890 --> 01:38:56,530
You know, which of your two kids do you love more?

1656
01:38:56,690 --> 01:39:00,770
Um, you know, no parent wants to answer that, but uh they started asking those kinds of

1657
01:39:00,770 --> 01:39:06,220
questions and using you know homicide data to to test that, using it to test uh hypotheses

1658
01:39:06,220 --> 01:39:11,020
about uh about mating, um, you know, and and jealousy to start testing hypotheses about

1659
01:39:11,020 --> 01:39:16,860
risk taking, um, looking at like male-male homicide and the effects of inequality on um on

1660
01:39:16,860 --> 01:39:22,220
risk taking and and homicide, um, and uh using very, very careful

1661
01:39:22,220 --> 01:39:27,430
analyses and started uh pushing evolutionary

1662
01:39:27,430 --> 01:39:29,750
psychology into other domains.

1663
01:39:29,830 --> 01:39:33,910
So starting, you know, criminologists started to become interested in their findings,

1664
01:39:33,990 --> 01:39:35,590
saying, oh, this is cool, right?

1665
01:39:35,670 --> 01:39:38,150
Uh these are these are very convincing data.

1666
01:39:38,230 --> 01:39:43,350
Um, you know, to psychologists using these data very, very carefully controlled uh in order

1667
01:39:43,350 --> 01:39:44,950
to say, oh, okay, this makes sense.

1668
01:39:45,270 --> 01:39:51,100
Also very cautious about their conclusions, um, which I think also helped

1669
01:39:51,260 --> 01:39:55,900
because you know it's it's very easy for people to make big flashy statements and and and

1670
01:39:55,980 --> 01:40:01,820
you know sell their snake oil, which you know attracts some people but will push away other

1671
01:40:02,140 --> 01:40:02,460
people.

1672
01:40:02,940 --> 01:40:08,060
Um and you know, certainly evolutionary psychology has attracted its share of

1673
01:40:08,060 --> 01:40:13,910
controversy, um, but the their good careful research did help to bring

1674
01:40:13,910 --> 01:40:18,870
a lot of people on board, including many, many biologists, were like, oh yes, okay, this is

1675
01:40:18,870 --> 01:40:19,030
cool.

1676
01:40:19,110 --> 01:40:23,830
We're treating humans like another animal, albeit a very smart social and cultural one.

1677
01:40:24,070 --> 01:40:26,630
Um and those being Pat Barclay.

1678
01:40:27,110 --> 01:40:27,830
Uh yeah.

1679
01:40:28,470 --> 01:40:29,590
One of those being you, yeah.

1680
01:40:29,910 --> 01:40:30,710
Uh sure, I guess.

1681
01:40:30,790 --> 01:40:30,950
Yeah.

1682
01:40:31,030 --> 01:40:35,030
Uh but but they also they they trained a number of other uh a number of other researchers

1683
01:40:35,030 --> 01:40:37,110
who you who carried uh you know who carried this on.

1684
01:40:37,270 --> 01:40:43,180
They trained uh people within animal behavior um And uh, you know, they within human

1685
01:40:43,180 --> 01:40:48,540
stuff, you know, like uh uh Lisa DeBrian, uh Nick Pound, uh Andrew Clark, Danny Krupp, a

1686
01:40:48,540 --> 01:40:52,380
few, a few other people uh that they trained in this uh, you know, the same sort of idea,

1687
01:40:52,540 --> 01:40:58,220
Catherine Salmon, um, so a number of other uh researchers to kind of uh carry on

1688
01:40:58,460 --> 01:40:59,500
this perspective.

1689
01:40:59,740 --> 01:41:03,420
And you know, coming up with some of the same ideas that some of the other schools of

1690
01:41:03,420 --> 01:41:08,610
thought, um you know like with the the the uh Lita Cosmides John Tuby group also coming up

1691
01:41:08,610 --> 01:41:13,170
with so there's a lot of back and forth between between those groups a lot of sharing of

1692
01:41:13,170 --> 01:41:18,930
ideas also focusing on like what's what's the underlying psychology and always looking at

1693
01:41:19,010 --> 01:41:24,850
well what you know what what is the what is the mind doing in this so rather than looking

1694
01:41:24,850 --> 01:41:30,840
at you know the behavior itself being selected for instead the selection for a

1695
01:41:30,840 --> 01:41:31,320
brain.

1696
01:41:31,560 --> 01:41:34,360
And that brain is doing stuff.

1697
01:41:35,000 --> 01:41:40,040
And so I think those perspectives fit very well together.

1698
01:41:41,160 --> 01:41:46,360
Both of them served as president of the Human Behavior and Revolution Society at one point.

1699
01:41:48,440 --> 01:41:52,510
From what I heard, Margot Wilson was the one who actually it was really pushing for

1700
01:41:52,510 --> 01:41:56,270
evolutionary psychology to be the the name as opposed to Darwinian psychology.

1701
01:41:56,430 --> 01:42:00,830
Yes, I uh Lita, yeah, Lita and John would tell so I uh because you know, I was a student of

1702
01:42:00,830 --> 01:42:06,270
Lita and John's and uh the my understanding is that Martin and Margot and John and Lita,

1703
01:42:06,590 --> 01:42:09,870
they went down to because I think John and Lita were in Santa Barbara at this point, they

1704
01:42:09,950 --> 01:42:15,390
went down to like um Palm Springs because Martin and Margot had a desert kangaroo site

1705
01:42:15,390 --> 01:42:15,790
somewhere.

1706
01:42:16,190 --> 01:42:16,990
Kangaroo rats.

1707
01:42:17,220 --> 01:42:17,380
Yeah.

1708
01:42:17,460 --> 01:42:20,740
And they had this meeting uh about what we should call this thing.

1709
01:42:20,820 --> 01:42:25,300
And there was exactly this discussion about do we call it Darwinian psychology or

1710
01:42:25,300 --> 01:42:26,100
evolutionary psychology?

1711
01:42:26,180 --> 01:42:29,220
So Pat, you know more about do you know a little bit.

1712
01:42:29,300 --> 01:42:35,060
I think Margot's uh logic was like just in uh just in case in the future,

1713
01:42:35,220 --> 01:42:40,580
maybe you know, Darwin's we we decide that Darwin's version of of evolution is maybe not

1714
01:42:40,580 --> 01:42:41,940
exactly the way that it works.

1715
01:42:42,100 --> 01:42:45,380
We don't want to be tied to one particular name.

1716
01:42:45,620 --> 01:42:51,590
And I think you know, maybe this is this is wise to not be focused on individuals,

1717
01:42:51,670 --> 01:42:53,190
but to be focused on ideas.

1718
01:42:53,510 --> 01:42:59,030
There's a great quote that the strength of a field is measured by how quickly it

1719
01:42:59,030 --> 01:43:00,870
forgets its founders.

1720
01:43:02,150 --> 01:43:05,670
And it means that that field is moving on, right?

1721
01:43:05,750 --> 01:43:06,870
And coming up with new ideas.

1722
01:43:06,950 --> 01:43:10,150
Like Darwin's ideas aren't right because Darwin said them.

1723
01:43:10,310 --> 01:43:12,870
They're right because there's a crap ton of evidence for it.

1724
01:43:13,670 --> 01:43:19,480
And so you could do great evolutionary psychology or evolutionary biology without ever

1725
01:43:19,480 --> 01:43:20,680
reading Darwin.

1726
01:43:20,920 --> 01:43:21,160
Right.

1727
01:43:21,320 --> 01:43:21,880
That's interesting.

1728
01:43:21,960 --> 01:43:25,800
I even when I hear people talk about Darwin and they talk about Darwinian, actually it kind

1729
01:43:25,800 --> 01:43:27,400
of always rub me the wrong way.

1730
01:43:27,640 --> 01:43:29,320
And I think this might be part of it.

1731
01:43:29,480 --> 01:43:33,960
Like that that like I kind of hear like I like I'd rather people talk about like selection

1732
01:43:33,960 --> 01:43:36,760
pressures, like the principles and not the source of the idea.

1733
01:43:36,920 --> 01:43:38,520
Like I uh that's interesting, yeah.

1734
01:43:38,840 --> 01:43:39,160
Yeah.

1735
01:43:39,320 --> 01:43:43,240
It's it we should be good based on you know the the ideas, not not the people.

1736
01:43:43,480 --> 01:43:43,640
Right.

1737
01:43:43,880 --> 01:43:48,130
Um I mean it it ties into your partner choice work.

1738
01:43:48,210 --> 01:43:52,290
You know, you if you're competing to display your your competence, you want to be known as

1739
01:43:52,290 --> 01:43:57,090
the person who had the awesome idea, and we want to all participate in that um uh

1740
01:43:57,250 --> 01:43:59,570
competitive uh altruism dynamic.

1741
01:43:59,650 --> 01:44:04,530
It it suggests you know a reason why we're so interested to uh you know tie things to names

1742
01:44:04,530 --> 01:44:09,730
rather than just the ideas themselves, because it ultimately the the idea was produced by a

1743
01:44:09,730 --> 01:44:14,370
uh status seeking primate who wants credit for it, uh and it's hard to step out of that to

1744
01:44:14,370 --> 01:44:15,330
do good science.

1745
01:44:15,820 --> 01:44:19,900
Yeah, it it will affect the the incentives for uh for for science.

1746
01:44:19,980 --> 01:44:23,020
So yeah, we gotta we do gotta be cautious of that.

1747
01:44:23,180 --> 01:44:23,820
Yeah.

1748
01:44:24,220 --> 01:44:28,620
Um but yeah I I I don't know what else you want me to say about Martin uh Martin Margot.

1749
01:44:28,780 --> 01:44:33,740
Margot unfortunately died of of cancer in 2009, which was a I think a great loss to the

1750
01:44:33,740 --> 01:44:39,590
field, not only for her um her science, but because um, you know,

1751
01:44:39,750 --> 01:44:41,030
her her humanity.

1752
01:44:41,190 --> 01:44:45,430
So she was always big on bringing different groups on board, right?

1753
01:44:45,510 --> 01:44:50,470
People who might not normally have have had a voice and and and bringing them and making

1754
01:44:50,470 --> 01:44:55,270
sure that they had a seat at the table, um, you know, reaching out to people in uh in other

1755
01:44:55,270 --> 01:45:00,720
countries, you know, to help uh facilitate the the developing evolutionary communities in

1756
01:45:00,720 --> 01:45:02,400
those uh in those countries.

1757
01:45:02,640 --> 01:45:07,920
Um they were some of the people who got um the human behavior and evolution society going.

1758
01:45:08,080 --> 01:45:12,720
So it was kind of a collection of people from um McMaster University, which is where they

1759
01:45:12,720 --> 01:45:18,720
were at the time, and uh University of Michigan and I believe North uh Northwestern, um,

1760
01:45:18,880 --> 01:45:20,400
you know, kind of all meeting up.

1761
01:45:20,480 --> 01:45:25,360
And so those three universities was kind of foring, forming the core of uh of HBAS.

1762
01:45:26,210 --> 01:45:28,850
So, you know, and it took off from there.

1763
01:45:29,650 --> 01:45:34,290
But also, I think their uh fostering of good science.

1764
01:45:34,450 --> 01:45:39,570
And I I this is one of these stories about Martin of about uh Margot Wilson that I love, is

1765
01:45:39,810 --> 01:45:42,290
uh I was giving a job talk.

1766
01:45:42,450 --> 01:45:47,810
Uh and I had prepared this talk and I was giving it to the lab, and I could kind of see

1767
01:45:47,900 --> 01:45:49,820
that it was not going so well.

1768
01:45:49,980 --> 01:45:54,940
And I have to preface this by saying Margot Wilson was one of the loveliest human beings

1769
01:45:54,940 --> 01:46:00,300
ever, just very warm, very generous just a person.

1770
01:46:00,620 --> 01:46:03,660
And so at the end of the talk, and I can see you know it wasn't going so great.

1771
01:46:03,820 --> 01:46:09,020
And I finish the talk, and she just looks at me and she's just like, that was shit.

1772
01:46:11,660 --> 01:46:17,090
And she's like, but we're gonna work with you to make sure that you get it to where it

1773
01:46:17,090 --> 01:46:17,490
needs to be.

1774
01:46:17,650 --> 01:46:20,770
And so for the next week, every night they work with me on it.

1775
01:46:20,850 --> 01:46:24,610
And like it only works because Margo was the sweetest human being ever.

1776
01:46:24,770 --> 01:46:29,330
So, like, when you're talking about intentions, you know that her intentions were really

1777
01:46:29,330 --> 01:46:35,330
good because they uh you know, you know, and it was not this this self seeking, like,

1778
01:46:35,490 --> 01:46:37,250
I'm better than you kind of thing.

1779
01:46:37,410 --> 01:46:42,860
No, it was this warmth being like, you are not meeting your full potential.

1780
01:46:43,100 --> 01:46:43,580
Right.

1781
01:46:43,820 --> 01:46:47,740
Let us help you to reach your full potential.

1782
01:46:48,060 --> 01:46:53,820
And you know, I love that, I I love that attitude of, you know what, as a field,

1783
01:46:53,980 --> 01:46:56,860
I think we would benefit from saying, you know what?

1784
01:46:57,420 --> 01:46:58,860
We can do better.

1785
01:46:59,020 --> 01:46:59,900
This is good.

1786
01:46:59,980 --> 01:47:01,340
Let's take it and do better.

1787
01:47:01,420 --> 01:47:07,050
I and I mean, I wouldn't advocate you know that sort of language in in general because you

1788
01:47:07,050 --> 01:47:08,170
don't know the intention.

1789
01:47:08,330 --> 01:47:08,410
Right.

1790
01:47:08,570 --> 01:47:12,170
You know, if if if I were if I were to say to some random person that was shit, they'd be

1791
01:47:12,170 --> 01:47:13,930
like, wow, Pat's a real asshole.

1792
01:47:14,330 --> 01:47:18,170
Um there's some petter, there's some people on Twitter that could use that advice, Pat,

1793
01:47:18,250 --> 01:47:18,570
actually.

1794
01:47:18,810 --> 01:47:19,210
Yeah.

1795
01:47:19,530 --> 01:47:25,050
Um, but but I think the general attitude of, you know what, let's let's police ourselves to

1796
01:47:25,050 --> 01:47:30,180
make sure that it is all good quality, that we don't have those

1797
01:47:30,740 --> 01:47:32,820
control conditions left unrun.

1798
01:47:33,220 --> 01:47:37,940
To make sure that we plug the holes, to make sure that we deal with the alternative

1799
01:47:37,940 --> 01:47:41,540
explanations, and that it's all communicated well.

1800
01:47:42,100 --> 01:47:48,100
I love that attitude of combining very strong scientific rigor, but also with the

1801
01:47:48,100 --> 01:47:53,110
warmth to be like, okay, let us let's bring up everybody, you know, we'll bring up

1802
01:47:53,110 --> 01:47:57,750
everybody and help everybody to do good stuff, but also making sure that we don't, you

1803
01:47:57,750 --> 01:48:03,270
know, accept substandard stuff to make sure that we uh you know we we have

1804
01:48:03,590 --> 01:48:09,350
demandingness in our work in order so that it it ends up being cited in another 50 years as

1805
01:48:09,350 --> 01:48:13,110
good, solid stuff that survived the replication crisis.

1806
01:48:13,270 --> 01:48:16,150
Um, you know, and that ends up having a lasting impact.

1807
01:48:16,480 --> 01:48:22,240
Yeah, kind and competence so the kind, unkind, competent, incompetent is a two by two

1808
01:48:22,240 --> 01:48:26,320
cell, and you can occupy the kind, competent cell of that.

1809
01:48:26,720 --> 01:48:30,240
That's I think a good goal so good goal for everybody.

1810
01:48:30,560 --> 01:48:32,960
And a kind of altruistic criticism.

1811
01:48:33,120 --> 01:48:37,830
Because oftentimes criticism is interpreted as competitive and aggressive.

1812
01:48:38,390 --> 01:48:39,190
Because often it is.

1813
01:48:39,910 --> 01:48:40,710
Because it often is.

1814
01:48:40,870 --> 01:48:41,030
Yes.

1815
01:48:41,270 --> 01:48:43,590
Uh but often it it is altruistic.

1816
01:48:43,670 --> 01:48:46,550
And it is the the intent is is to help rather than to hurt.

1817
01:48:47,190 --> 01:48:47,670
Exactly.

1818
01:48:47,830 --> 01:48:48,070
Yeah.

1819
01:48:48,230 --> 01:48:48,550
Yeah.

1820
01:48:48,790 --> 01:48:54,710
And I I think well well meaning um you know and this is maybe the you know the the private

1821
01:48:54,710 --> 01:48:57,430
comments versus the public Twitter comments, right?

1822
01:48:57,590 --> 01:48:59,670
Those are just self aggrandizing.

1823
01:48:59,910 --> 01:49:03,510
But you know the private like, hey this is good, but you know here's you know here's some

1824
01:49:03,510 --> 01:49:06,220
ways you can make it better uh, I think is is good.

1825
01:49:06,300 --> 01:49:11,420
And I think that's a good model, you know, to uh to to aim for, you know, the monk model of

1826
01:49:11,420 --> 01:49:15,020
doing good work rather than the flashiness and doing and doing it well.

1827
01:49:15,180 --> 01:49:21,020
And providing the provide private criticism to uh you know to bring everybody's work up.

1828
01:49:21,180 --> 01:49:23,260
So I'm sure you have criticisms of my own stuff.

1829
01:49:23,420 --> 01:49:26,060
And please, I'd love to hear them so I can make it better.

1830
01:49:26,140 --> 01:49:28,700
You know, but we'll maybe do this uh do that off camera.

1831
01:49:28,940 --> 01:49:31,470
Uh no, no, Bar Barclay, your stuff is spotless.

1832
01:49:31,550 --> 01:49:35,230
I couldn't find a a thing to criticize in there if if I if I my life depended on it.

1833
01:49:35,550 --> 01:49:37,070
Keep shoveling there, Pins off.

1834
01:49:38,590 --> 01:49:44,270
Well, I mean, I think uh in that respect, I think Pat you have done uh a wonderful

1835
01:49:44,270 --> 01:49:50,180
job sort of continuing Mar uh We should have Martin on, but Margot We

1836
01:49:50,180 --> 01:49:51,700
need to have Lita on as well.

1837
01:49:52,100 --> 01:49:53,780
It'd be fun to have them on together.

1838
01:49:54,260 --> 01:49:58,580
I do remember John, who also we lost more recently than Margot.

1839
01:49:59,220 --> 01:50:00,980
He talked about Margot.

1840
01:50:01,460 --> 01:50:02,660
I think it was at HBus.

1841
01:50:02,820 --> 01:50:04,820
He was sort of like a memorial.

1842
01:50:05,060 --> 01:50:07,860
And he talked about, he showed a picture of where she grew up.

1843
01:50:07,940 --> 01:50:11,910
And I remember the one thing that stuck with me was he said, and you might know about this

1844
01:50:12,070 --> 01:50:17,190
too, Pat, where he said she sort of had a difficult childhood, like it was sort of a rough

1845
01:50:17,270 --> 01:50:22,310
physically, like I mean, I think she like grew up in like kind of a physically challenging,

1846
01:50:22,390 --> 01:50:25,190
like kind of in the woods in Canada's north, yeah.

1847
01:50:25,350 --> 01:50:31,030
Um, and John's take on that was sort of it opened her eyes to sort of um

1848
01:50:31,510 --> 01:50:37,430
that life can be difficult, and it's important to sort of be sober about

1849
01:50:37,720 --> 01:50:43,320
what exists and to sort of I I don't know how to put it, but he sort of argued that he

1850
01:50:43,320 --> 01:50:49,240
thinks it sort of allowed her to sort of operate and look at things that other

1851
01:50:49,240 --> 01:50:52,040
people might look away from, like homicide.

1852
01:50:52,520 --> 01:50:58,200
Not because it was salacious or to sort of be statusy about it, but to sort of say

1853
01:50:58,360 --> 01:51:03,690
this is really insightful because, you know, as they argued, you know, most homicides

1854
01:51:03,930 --> 01:51:05,930
people are motivated to figure out why it happened.

1855
01:51:06,090 --> 01:51:07,930
It's a really rich data source.

1856
01:51:08,090 --> 01:51:12,730
It's really clearly showing the output of strong motivations, you know, like it's not a

1857
01:51:13,530 --> 01:51:14,810
strong passions involved.

1858
01:51:15,050 --> 01:51:15,450
Exactly.

1859
01:51:15,610 --> 01:51:18,170
So you're really getting at a big part of human nature.

1860
01:51:18,250 --> 01:51:24,100
Um but it's it's also a data set that um, you know you don't have like

1861
01:51:24,100 --> 01:51:25,940
self-you know self-reporting bias, right?

1862
01:51:26,340 --> 01:51:29,300
People self-presenting themselves in a in a particular way.

1863
01:51:29,540 --> 01:51:29,780
Yes.

1864
01:51:30,020 --> 01:51:35,140
Um they initially you know got into that because with the you know child abuse data, people

1865
01:51:35,540 --> 01:51:37,940
could always say, Well, maybe there's a reporting bias.

1866
01:51:38,100 --> 01:51:38,260
Right.

1867
01:51:38,420 --> 01:51:42,660
Okay, well, let's look at homicide because you know the vast majority of those get

1868
01:51:42,660 --> 01:51:43,830
reported, right?

1869
01:51:43,910 --> 01:51:47,590
So it's and it's just it's just a better data set and they found even stronger effects.

1870
01:51:47,910 --> 01:51:48,070
Right.

1871
01:51:48,310 --> 01:51:51,990
It's not like the people, it's not like homicides are found up by self-report of just the

1872
01:51:51,990 --> 01:51:53,830
people who admit to killing people, right?

1873
01:51:53,990 --> 01:51:54,150
Right.

1874
01:51:54,230 --> 01:51:54,870
It's that yeah.

1875
01:51:55,030 --> 01:51:59,430
When when when we discover a body, there's an independent, disinterested group that are

1876
01:51:59,430 --> 01:52:00,790
trying to figure out what happened.

1877
01:52:01,190 --> 01:52:01,430
Yeah.

1878
01:52:01,750 --> 01:52:06,630
There was a paper a while back about calling psychology is the science of self-report and

1879
01:52:06,630 --> 01:52:07,990
finger pressing, right?

1880
01:52:08,070 --> 01:52:11,910
You know, your you know experiment, you know, dink, dink, dink, dink, dink, or self-report.

1881
01:52:12,280 --> 01:52:14,200
um, you know, what happened to behavior?

1882
01:52:14,280 --> 01:52:18,040
And I, you know, I think looking at things like you know, homicide data is a great example

1883
01:52:18,200 --> 01:52:20,440
of there's there's real behavior involved here.

1884
01:52:20,760 --> 01:52:21,320
Yeah.

1885
01:52:22,360 --> 01:52:26,360
Well, um, but yeah, thank you for uh for being with us today.

1886
01:52:26,440 --> 01:52:32,280
And yeah, really um I can't over emphasize that uh if people haven't looked up Pat

1887
01:52:32,600 --> 01:52:38,170
your work, um they should look you up and um uh yeah, and just thank you for for

1888
01:52:38,170 --> 01:52:43,210
helping solve this this problem of cooperation uh and doing it in a way that is not snake

1889
01:52:43,290 --> 01:52:48,970
oily and that very much is in keeping with Margot's spirit of sort of doing

1890
01:52:48,970 --> 01:52:54,730
things carefully um and and not in a uh flashy status-seeky

1891
01:52:54,730 --> 01:52:55,050
way.

1892
01:52:55,450 --> 01:52:55,770
Thank you.

1893
01:52:55,930 --> 01:52:56,170
Thank you.

1894
01:52:56,250 --> 01:52:57,370
And thank you for having me on here.

1895
01:52:57,450 --> 01:52:58,010
It's been great.

1896
01:52:58,090 --> 01:53:03,530
And, you know, thank you for hosting this this podcast and getting uh ideas out to uh to

1897
01:53:03,530 --> 01:53:03,930
everybody.

1898
01:53:04,010 --> 01:53:08,420
You know, you're doing a great job of uh yeah uh exposing people to some uh great

1899
01:53:08,420 --> 01:53:11,940
researchers I've you know listened to some of the other people you've had on here and

1900
01:53:11,940 --> 01:53:12,660
they're fantastic.

1901
01:53:12,820 --> 01:53:15,700
So I'm I'm honored to be in that category.

1902
01:53:16,180 --> 01:53:16,580
Thank you.

1903
01:53:16,740 --> 01:53:20,820
And we're gonna honored that that you spent some time chatting with us and we and we'd love

1904
01:53:20,820 --> 01:53:22,660
to have you back sometime, of course.

1905
01:53:22,820 --> 01:53:27,540
Um this was a wonderful conversation and uh yeah we have to have you back and we love the

1906
01:53:27,540 --> 01:53:32,260
idea of sort of getting return people uh just talking about other stuff now, you know, once

1907
01:53:32,260 --> 01:53:37,810
we get under the uh under what what you do um so to pick our brains uh as a as a group but

1908
01:53:37,970 --> 01:53:43,250
thank you so much pat uh it was wonderful um yeah yeah thank you thank you very much

1909
01:53:47,650 --> 01:53:53,650
so uh you have spent another couple hours with uh david and myself congratulations or i'm

1910
01:53:53,650 --> 01:53:59,580
sorry depending on how you feel about it Uh, if you enjoyed the

1911
01:53:59,580 --> 01:54:03,740
time you spent listening to us, uh please say so.

1912
01:54:03,980 --> 01:54:05,260
Tell people about it.

1913
01:54:05,420 --> 01:54:11,260
Um, you know, write us a kind review, uh, write about us on social media, uh,

1914
01:54:11,420 --> 01:54:13,260
anything to help spread the word.

1915
01:54:13,420 --> 01:54:18,140
Um, we we we do this uh with with the hope of actually reaching people, and the only way we

1916
01:54:18,140 --> 01:54:22,070
can reach people is if is if you help us out uh by spreading the word.

1917
01:54:22,470 --> 01:54:22,870
That's right.

1918
01:54:22,950 --> 01:54:23,990
We have such wonderful guests.

1919
01:54:24,070 --> 01:54:27,190
And I mean one of the reasons we're doing it too is because we have the wonderful guests we

1920
01:54:27,190 --> 01:54:29,910
have on are uh not all of one reached.

1921
01:54:29,990 --> 01:54:35,110
Um so yeah, to whatever extent it feels like weird to um uh

1922
01:54:35,990 --> 01:54:41,750
click on something to broaden the reach, just remember that there's all kinds of uh

1923
01:54:41,910 --> 01:54:45,510
someone else will do it for someone else who isn't as deserving.

1924
01:54:45,670 --> 01:54:47,110
Let's let's put it that way.

1925
01:54:47,400 --> 01:54:48,920
Yes, absolutely.

1926
01:54:49,160 --> 01:54:51,080
So uh please do your part.

1927
01:54:51,160 --> 01:54:55,240
And uh yeah, we'll see you next time with another awesome guest.

1928
01:54:55,560 --> 01:54:56,360
Sounds good, David.

1929
01:54:56,440 --> 01:54:57,720
I'll see you in about a week.

1930
01:54:57,960 --> 01:54:58,600
Sounds good.

1931
01:54:58,760 --> 01:54:59,080
All right.

1932
01:54:59,320 --> 01:54:59,720
Bye.

1933
01:54:59,960 --> 01:55:00,440
Bye.