I love listening to people like Huberman, who are completely open about what they don’t know, and what studies say about us wacky humans. Like saying that the desire to fit in and not be singled out is strong, so strong, we will let an authority tell us to hit a buzzer and harm someone if they get a quiz question wrong.
The study I’d like to see is how many people want to hear that about themselves or their fellow humans. It would probably be an equally high number that says they would never give in like that. They would say they are contrarians, and that they love going against authority. They’d tell you they went to a convention in Dubuque where everybody was a contrarian and they all agreed about how awesome they are. The speakers told them how science was wrong, and they didn’t bother giving any evidence because that’s what the authorities want.
That comment is a tad confusing
A. Huberman the neuroscientist supplement salesmen?
Yeah I trawl too much YouTube, but there he is.
Like we needed studies to appreciate that. Seems to me history does a dang good job of teaching the same. Not that I knock the studies, defining and quantifying stuff is always interesting and fun. Still the lesson has been repeated endless throughout human history.
Give into what?
Is there something diabolical or sinister about learning about our biological selves and the deep actual history of this planet, that frankly, created us humans?
Sometimes I have pronoun confusion.
I know there have been many studies, and that history has also taught us about authoritarians. That’s not the lesson that I think everyone misses. The “give into” part, is that the same people who hate Hitler, and know what Milgram did are the same ones who say “yeah but, I wouldn’t do that, I wouldn’t push that button”.
It’s not diabolical to learn, it’s human to learn about human nature but not apply it to ourselves because we believe our cognitive abilities are better than those people in the study. We think it’s “them” who give into marketing or vote for the sharp-dressed man, not “us”.