unSILOed with Greg LaBlanc

Could the key to a happier life be found with our most ancient ancestors and the way they depended on community over autonomy? In a modern world built to encourage independence, how do we find the right balance between connectedness and autonomy? 

William Von Hippel is a retired professor of psychology from the University of Queensland and the author of The Social Paradox: Autonomy, Connection, and Why We Need Both to Find Happiness. His research, also found in his first book The Social Leap and countless articles, focuses on the evolutionary science behind happiness.

William and Greg chat about how evolutionary science can offer guidance on living a happier, more fulfilled life, the psychological and physiological impacts of social connections, the historical context of human relationships, and the role of modern technology and societal changes in our well-being.

*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*

Why loneliness hurts more than we realize

28:38: Loneliness is really hard on your health. We know that it kills you at rates higher than cigarettes once you get older, and you're more vulnerable. And so the feeling of loneliness doesn't guarantee you don't have people around, but it does mean that you don't feel part of it.

You feel somewhat excluded. And of course, feeling excluded should hurt because our ancestors who couldn't see that they're about to be excluded are the ancestors who kept misbehaving and therefore got excluded. When you look at hunter-gatherer societies, they all follow the same pattern of exclusion, whereby before they actually give you the heave-ho, first they kind of tease you. And if you don't respond to this teasing, well, already, you're a little bit too thick-skinned, because that's meant to bring you back in line. If teasing doesn't work, then they start acting like you're not even there. They talk around you and not responding to you. Almost everybody, when they get to that point, starts to feel terrible. It feels like physical pain because our ancestors, our potential ancestors who weren't bothered by that, took the next step and woke up one morning either dead or all alone. So, the system makes perfect sense that it really hurts. 

Happiness is one of evolution's best tools

04:06: Happiness is one of evolution's best tools. It motivates us to do things that are in our genes' best interest, not necessarily ours as human beings, who may or may not want to do those things, but it motivates us to do what's in our genes' best interest—typically by making us happy when we do those things.

The tradeoff between autonomy and connection

06:34: We enter relationships which are super important to us and our happiness; we're a gregarious species. When we enter those relationships, we have to sacrifice some degree of autonomy to do what our friends want some of the time, or at least at the time they want, et cetera. And when we decide to pursue our autonomy, usually in pursuit of skills and self-development, we have to sacrifice our relationships to some degree, because that means we're spending time honing our own skills and not socializing or helping others.

Why wealth doesn’t guarantee happiness

19:47: The things that made us happy, as far as the social connections, were also the things that made us reproductively successful. And they, in some ways, they very much still are. So if I'm famous or rich, I'm high in status, and then I'm attractive to members of the opposite sex or whoever I prefer. And I'm attractive to people who I want to be in my coalition. I have the sort of social accolades that actually make me feel good. And I think that's actually the basis of the Eastland Paradox—this notion that as societies get wealthier, people don't get happier. But richer people are happier than poorer people.

Recommended Resources:

• Daniel Kahneman
• Shigehiro Oishi
• Robert Trivers 
• Ötzi
• John T. Cacioppo
• Janice Kiecolt-Glaser
• Sheldon Cohen

Guest Profile:

• Professional Profile on LinkedIn
• Professional Website

His Work:

• The Social Paradox: Autonomy, Connection, and Why We Need Both to Find Happiness
• The Social Leap: The New Evolutionary Science of Who We Are, Where We Come From, and What Makes Us Happy

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What happens to the speed of trading as technology advances? How do we move from automated button pressing machines to ultra-fast algorithms? What surprising impact does the rain have on the trading windows of financial markets?

Donald MacKenzie is a professor of sociology at the University of Edinburgh and also the author of several books. His most recent works are Trading at the Speed of Light: How Ultrafast Algorithms Are Transforming Financial Markets and An Engine, Not a Camera: How Financial Models Shape Markets.

Greg and Donald discuss the intersection of sociology and finance, exploring how financial models not only describe markets but also actively influence them. Donald explains the concept of performativity, where financial theories shape market behavior, and contrasts qualitative sociological methodologies with quantitative financial studies. Their conversation also touches on the history and impact of technologies and regulatory environments that have transformed financial trading, highlighting contributions from notable academics and instances of feedback loops between theory and practice.

*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*

Chicago pits vs. algorithms

28:34: For, say, investment management firms that have to buy and sell large portfolios of assets, there’s little doubt that the modern world of automated trading has benefits, but it also has downsides. I mean, the benefit is, quite simply, of course, that automated systems are a lot cheaper than human beings in colored jackets running around in Chicago’s pits or on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. But, at the same time, of course, if you are trying to sell or buy a very large position, then you do leave electronic traces that trading algorithms can pick up on and make money out of.

Why financial models shapes markets like engine not camera

04:31: An engine does things, it's not a camera—at least in our ordinary thinking about cameras, where you take the photograph and the landscape remains the same. An engine does stuff, it changes its environment.

The power of shared signals in trading success

34:11: The secret of my success is I realized quite early on that there were things—signals, as they would be called in the field—inputs to algorithms that everybody knew about and that everybody knew that everybody knew about. So it wasn't like I had an unsuccessful attempt, way back to research statistical arbitrage and dare nobody would tell you what exactly they were trading off of. But I think they're trading because everybody knows that if you're trading shares, then a move in the relevant index future is a very, very important signal. Everybody knows that, and everybody knows that. Everybody knows that.

Finance beyond numbers, the human side of quantitative work

02:30: Finance as an academic field, and indeed of course finance as a practice, is typically highly quantitative. And to get into the technology, quantitative work can be great, but to really get into it you’ve got to talk to people. Ideally, you want to go see things, so the methodology is more qualitative than quantitative, and it probably would not be the best of ideas.

Recommended Resources:

• William F. Sharpe
• Thomas Morton
• Fischer Black
• Coase Theorem
• Mark Rubinstein
• Eric Budish
• John O'Brien
• Portfolio Insurance
• Milton Friedman
• Commodity Futures Trading Commission
• U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission
• Leo Melamed
• The Library of Mistakes

Guest Profile:

• Faculty Profile at the University of Edinburgh
• Forbes.com Profile
• Wikipedia Profile

His Work:

• Amazon Author Page
• Trading at the Speed of Light: How Ultrafast Algorithms Are Transforming Financial Markets
• An Engine, Not a Camera: How Financial Models Shape Markets
• Do Economists Make Markets? On the Performativity of Economics
• Material Markets: How Economic Agents are Constructed
• Inventing Accuracy: An Historical Sociology of Nuclear Missile Guidance

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How are effective leadership practices evolving to keep up in a continually changing world? What can be learned from the leaders of companies like Stitchfix or Waste Management? How can AI in education be handled in a way that is open and enriching to all?

Robert Siegel is a lecturer at Stanford University GSB and author of the books The Systems Leader: Mastering the Cross-Pressures That Make or Break Today's Companies and The Brains and Brawn Company: How Leading Organizations Blend the Best of Digital and Physical.

Greg and Robert discuss the evolution of leadership, particularly in the context of managing crises and rapid technological advancements. Their discussion explores the different things that must be balanced in leadership roles, such as innovation vs. execution and strength vs. empathy. Robert also emphasizes the importance of systems thinking, adaptability, and statesmanship in modern leadership. 

*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*

Is statesmanship in short supply?

32:17: This notion of statesmanship or stateswomanship of stewardship is, it doesn't deny the ambition that we have as leaders. It doesn't deny who we want to be and what we hope to accomplish, but it's also about looking about everybody beyond us. And we have to lead men and women who agree with us and disagree with us, and we have to lead men and women. With whom we agree and disagree. Like we don't get to choose who we lead, Greg. Like we have to lead everybody. And if we've gotta get them from here to here, to me, that's what leadership is right now. And I don't think we're seeing this with a lot of the people who are put up there constantly in the mainstream media or on social media. But in the book I've got 15 to 20 leaders, all of whom are successful. And we can look at them and say, huh, well if they could do it, so can I.

What leadership looks like now

06:44:  Leadership today—in a world especially that's moving so quickly—that's where people have to be able to be more adaptable, internalize certain dualities that maybe existed separately inside of a company in the past that now need to exist inside of us internally. And so I think that things are different. The ability and willingness to adapt, I think, that's constant. But what you have to adapt to depends upon the times.

Is it harder to be a leader today?

08:09: Most leaders today are not trained to be thinking in kind of this level of speed, nor are they trained to understand what happens in different functions in an organization. In the old days, you could come up through engineering or through marketing or through manufacturing, and you would've teammates who would handle the other functions. Well, now we need to understand, like, what's the connection between what we do in one function versus the other function? How do we see internal and external? I think that's harder.

Investing time in yourself is leading smarter

32:01: A leader who says, I don't have time for this, they're probably spending time on the wrong issues, like where we spend time in the past isn't where we need to spend time in the future. And so making some time to invest in oneself, reading, finding trusted partners outside of the company. Who you can talk to and learn from. And, by the way, those people can be your peers. They can be people who are older, they can even be people who are younger.

Recommended Resources:

• Pericles
• Future Shock
• Daniel A. Levinthal
• Katrina Lake
• Jeff Immelt
• Andrew Grove

Guest Profile:

• Faculty Profile at Stanford GSB
• Profile at Stanford University
• RobertESiegel.com
• Profile on LinkedIn
• Wikipedia Page
• Social Profile on Instagram

His Work:

• Amazon Author Page
• The Systems Leader: Mastering the Cross-Pressures That Make or Break Today's Companies
• The Brains and Brawn Company: How Leading Organizations Blend the Best of Digital and Physical

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What are the effects of stress on memory? How does age change the nature of this vital piece of human cognition? What are the limitations of memory, and how can we embrace them?

Ciara M. Greene is an Associate Professor in the School of Psychology, UCD, where she also heads up the Attention and Memory Laboratory. She’s also the co-author of the book Memory Lane: The Perfectly Imperfect Ways We Remember.

Greg and Ciara discuss the nature of memory, challenging the common belief that the best memory is akin to a flawless recording device. Ciara argues that memory's imperfections are actually evolutionarily beneficial, aiding in survival and decision-making. They discuss how metaphors for memory have evolved alongside technology, the reconstructive nature of memory, and the importance of understanding its functions. Ciara also explains how schemas play a role in memory errors, but how they are also beneficial.

*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*

Why forgetting your shopping list is a feature not a flaw

44:38: We don't need to have this fear that means technology is ruining our mind. This is exactly the same way as is. Like you say, you're, I dunno, you're going to the supermarket and instead of remembering your shopping list, you write it down. Okay. You don't then also need to remember it. They're able to adapt. So like if you say, I have written down my shopping list, you've essentially told your brain you no longer need to remember this. You don't need to remember bread and eggs and mouthwash. Like, our brains are flexible. Like they're not just running on tracks. It's not necessary.

It's not a good use of your resources because you've offloaded that task. That doesn't mean that your ability to go to the shop tomorrow and remember that you need to buy laundry detergent is going to be impaired because you wrote it down yesterday. It's just that we're, if you could think of it as being almost like extending your mind. Okay. It's almost like adding an external hard drive to your computer. You're just giving yourself a little bit more, like an, again, a broader sketch pad to play with. And that we, sometimes we use those tools. There's nothing wrong using those tools, but we should do them consciously.

How does the basis of memory work?

30:21: The reconstruction of memory is literally the basis of how memory works. It's inescapable. You can't just have a good memory and not have a reconstruction.

Memory helps us belong

03:46: It's important to think, not just about what memory is — it's not something static — but to think about what it's for, what its function is, and how it evolved in the way that it did.

Because just like every other part of our minds, and our bodies, every function that we have evolved under evolutionary pressures — you know, that there are survival pressures and reproduction pressures — and those influence the way in which we evolved as human beings, as any kind of species. So when we think about our memory, I think it's important to keep that in mind, and that evolution wasn't prioritizing: it's super important that you remember absolutely every boring detail of every single experience you've ever had. And, you know, that you have this perfect fidelity and recollection of every detail of everything you observe — that's not necessary to support your survival, it's not necessary to support reproduction, and in some cases, it can be counterproductive.

Recommended Resources:

• Jorge Luis Borges
• Hyperthymesia
• Source-Monitoring Error
• Third-Person Effect
• Elizabeth Loftus
• Repressed Memory
• Satanic Panic
• McMartin Preschool Trial

Guest Profile:

• Faculty Profile at University College Dublin
• Social Profile on X
• Attention and Memory Lab

Her Work:

• Memory Lane: The Perfectly Imperfect Ways We Remember
• Google Scholar Page
• ResearchGate Page

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What is the role of active versus passive learning for math? How would data science become an avenue of math study for high school students and why isn’t it already? Where does change in math education start? At the college level or before?

Jo Boaler is a professor of mathematics education at Stanford University and also the author of a number of books, including Math-ish: Finding Creativity, Diversity, and Meaning in Mathematics, Limitless Mind: Learn, Lead, and Live Without Barriers, and Mathematical Mindsets: Unleashing Students' Potential Through Creative Math, Inspiring Messages and Innovative Teaching.

Greg and Jo discuss creativity, diversity, and meaning in math education. Their conversation identifies certain flaws in current math teaching methods, the resistance to educational change, and the importance of metacognition, visual learning, and collaborative problem-solving. Jo shares insights from her journey as a math educator, including her experiences with educational reform and the implications of neuroscience on learning math. They also examine the role of active versus passive learning, the potential of data science in education, and the impact of AI on future teaching practices.

*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*

How conjectures ignite mathematical thinking

17:00: When we ask kids to reason about maths and to come up with their own conjectures, we like to share that word with kids. This is a word that all mathematicians use—a conjecture for an idea they have that you need to test out. It's like a hypothesis in science, but kids have never heard of that word, which is, you know, means there's a reason for that. But anyway, we teach our kids to come up with conjectures and then to reason about them and prove it to each other. And they get these great discussions where they're reasoning and being skeptical with each other. And that's what sparks their interest. They actually feel like they're discovering new things. And it's, like, really engaging for the kids to get into these discussions about the meanings of why these things work in maths. So it's a great route in, not only to engage kids, but have them understand what they're doing. Yeah, it's not that common.

Why every kid should learn data science

31:02: Data science is really something all kids should be learning in school, before they leave school, and developing a data literacy and a comfort with data and being able to read and analyze data, to some extent, is an important life skill. And it probably is really important to say, if a democracy, as a lot of misinformation is shared now, and if kids aren't leaving able to make sense of and separate fact and fiction, they will be left vulnerable to those misinformation campaigns. So, it's important just to be an everyday citizen.

Why estimation is really important

34:48: The idea of Math-ish is, estimation is really important. There's a lot of research evidence that we should be getting kids to estimate, but I know that kids in schools hate to estimate, and they resist it, and they will work things out precisely and round them up to make them look like an estimate. But you ask them, what's your ish number? And something magical happens. Like, suddenly they're willing to share their thinking, but it doesn't happen enough.

The problem with teaching everything every year

14:28: In the US, we have this system of teaching everything every year. So, you start learning fractions in maybe grade three, but you also learn them again in grade four and grade five and grade six. And at the end of that, kids don't understand fractions and everything else. Everything is taught every year. Whereas if you look at very successful countries like Japan, they don't teach in that way. Fractions is taught in one year—one year group—deeply, well, conceptually. So this is why you see kids going around in these massive textbooks that they can hardly carry, because it has all this content. And, of course, when you try and teach everything every year, often kids don't learn any of it well.

Recommended Resources:

• Randomized Controlled Trial
• Metacognition
• Compression as a unifying principle in human learning
• Carol Dweck

Guest Profile:

• Faculty Profile at Stanford GSE
• Profile on Wikipedia
• YouCubed
• Social Profile on Instagram
• Social Profile on X

Her Work:

• Amazon Author Page
• Math-ish: Finding Creativity, Diversity, and Meaning in Mathematics
• Limitless Mind: Learn, Lead, and Live Without Barriers
• What's Math Got to Do with It?: How Teachers and Parents Can Transform Mathematics Learning and Inspire Success
• Data Minds: How Today’s Teachers Can Prepare Students for Tomorrow’s World
• Mathematical Mindsets: Unleashing Students' Potential Through Creative Math, Inspiring Messages and Innovative Teaching

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What is ‘good stress’ and what are the benefits of it? How does an upbringing in uncertainty prepare you in some ways better for the world than others? How are intolerance and uncertainty linked? What is the important purpose of daydreaming for creativity and business?

Maggie Jackson is a journalist and the author of the books Uncertain: The Wisdom and Wonder of Being Unsure, Distracted: Reclaiming Our Focus in a World of Lost Attention, and What's Happening to Home: Balancing Work, Life and Refuge in the Information Age.

Greg and Maggie discuss the nuances of uncertainty, attention, and distraction, emphasizing the importance of daydreaming and mind wandering. Maggie explores her findings about the impact of these states on creativity, learning, and memory. Their discussion also covers how societal and cultural attitudes towards uncertainty affect decision-making and problem-solving, especially in professional settings like medicine and finance. Maggie also reveals the role of dissent in fostering creativity and collaboration, and the need to manage mental well-being in an increasingly fast-paced world.

*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*

How uncertainty primes us to learn and perform

05:44: What's really important to understand, and comes from the new neuroscience of uncertainty, is that this discomfort we feel is actually good stress. So, when you're meeting up with something new or unexpected or ambiguous—in the forest, or in the workplace, or wherever—you actually have a stress response. Neurotransmitters, hormones, et cetera, you know, are cascading through your body. Your body and brain are kind of springing into action. And what's really amazing, and very new scientifically, is that your brain on uncertainty is undergoing remarkably positive changes. So, when you're unsure—this has been documented in emergency room physicians and others—your working memory improves, your attention heightens, your brain becomes more receptive to new data. So, this is a state—yes, that's uncomfortable—but that's good stress. You're actually being primed to learn and perform.

Uncertainty is a signal to learn not to retreat

06:42: Uncertainty is the brain telling itself, "There's something to be learned here." So, that puts a different spin on this idea that we should retreat from it.

Tolerance of uncertainty is a skill you can build

28:15: So, we all sit somewhere on the spectrum of this new personality trait. It was actually discovered about 50 years ago, but it's getting a lot of attention, called tolerance of uncertainty or intolerance of uncertainty. So, if you're tolerant of uncertainty—highly—you're more a flexible thinker. You like surprises, you see uncertainty as a challenge. Intolerant people, during the acute phase of the pandemic, for instance, they were far more likely to turn to denial, avoidance, and substance abuse to cope. So, it's really interesting because our intolerance of uncertainty is mutable. Not only can we boost our tolerance—we can practice, we can do daily exercises—there are clinical studies that are actually treating anxiety just by helping people bolster their tolerance and uncertainty. But it's also important to know that it's situational.

Recommended Resources:

• Yerkes–Dodson Law
• Jeremy P. Jamieson | Google Scholar
• Carol Collier Kuhlthau | Rutgers University
• Harry S. Truman
• “The Einstellung Effect, Explained”
• Amy Edmondson
• Daniel Kahneman
• Robert Stickgold
• James J. Collins

Guest Profile:

• Maggie-Jackson.com
• LinkedIn Profile

Her Work:

• Amazon Author Page
• Uncertain: The Wisdom and Wonder of Being Unsure
• Distracted: Reclaiming Our Focus in a World of Lost Attention
• What's Happening to Home: Balancing Work, Life and Refuge in the Information Age

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How can the leadership power be wielded for both good and ill? How can leaders use their influence more ethically and effectively, and why is that important for the growth of the whole superorganism?

Adam Galinsky is a professor of leadership and ethics at Columbia Business School, and also the author of the books Inspire: The Universal Path for Leading Yourself and Others and Friend & Foe: When to Cooperate, When to Compete, and How to Succeed at Both.

Greg and Adam discuss Adam’s research and teaching experiences, emphasizing the complexities of human leadership compared to leadership in the rest of the animal kingdom. Adam highlights the importance of understanding power dynamics and how small actions from leaders can have amplified impacts on their teams. 

*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*

On the power perspective taking

40:13: One of my biggest research findings was, you know, that power lowers perspective taking, right? Even though the powerful have greater impact and, in some ways, need for perspective, they have less of it. But I also have shown that there's a particularly powerful force of power with perspective taking. And so I actually call it—it's like driving a race car, right? Would be a good analogy. So power is the gas that lets you go fast. But if you don't have a steering wheel, you're gonna crash into things. So perspective taking is your steering wheel. And so, if you just have the steering wheel without the gas, you just sit there going nowhere, right? So it's the combination, I think, of the two that are really, really powerful.

Leadership tools can build or break

51:48: Every single part of the leadership toolbox can be used for good. Or it can be used for a really bad goal. It can be used to hurt people. And so part of what inspiring leadership is, using the toolbox towards inspiring goals, and to making other people's lives better.

The five-second leadership habit

26:47:  One of the things that I hope from my books and from my teaching is it just helps people take a little step back and think thoughtfully about, like, little things that they can do, to, when they walk into a meeting, just be a little conscious of, like, where's the best place for me to sit? Five seconds. That's all you got to think about it, right? But like, what am I trying to accomplish in this meeting? Who needs to speak? Okay, I'm going to sit here, right? And I know people sometimes feel like, oh, it's overwhelming enough time. Like most people I know, once they get into the practice of doing that, it's actually very invigorating. It gives them a sense of agency, it gives them a sense of control over the world because they understand it. It's like the pill in the Matrix, right? Like the things, all of a sudden make sense in a way they didn't before.

Recommended Resources:

• Dave Brailsford
• Deborah H. Gruenfeld
• Superorganism
• Claude Steele
• Cameron Anderson
• Don A. Moore
• Bruce Kogut
• Linda Rottenberg
• Groundhog Day (film)

Guest Profile:

• Faculty Profile at Columbia Business School
• AdamGalinsky.com
• LinkedIn Profile
• Social Profile on X

His Work:

• Amazon Author Page
• Inspire: The Universal Path for Leading Yourself and Others
• Friend & Foe: When to Cooperate, When to Compete, and How to Succeed at Both
• Google Scholar Page
• Ted Talks

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There have been periods throughout history when cultural aficionados of the time proclaimed that painting was dead! Yet, the artform has risen over and over again. What is it about painting that makes it so timeless and gives it the ability to continuously evolve? Why, after centuries, can we still be awestruck by the right combination of brushstokes? 

Art critic Martin Gayford has interviewed many artists over his lifetime about their craft. His books explore painting through a multitude of eras and even gives a personal account of what it’s like to sit for a painting in Man with a Blue Scarf: On Sitting for a Portrait by Lucian Freud. His latest book, How Painting Happens (and why it matters), compiles wisdom from numerous artists past and present. 

Martin and Greg discuss the challenges of writing about a non-linguistic medium like painting, the unique, often physical process of painting, and insights Martin has gleaned from his conversations with contemporary artists, including what makes a painting a great one.

*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*

The silent intensity of painting

16:13: You don't have to talk or put things in words to think. There is such a thing as physical thinking, and painting is probably a very good example of that. That was one of the points that struck me when I was posing for Lucian Freud, which I—was a very long, drawn-out process. As you can imagine, it took about 18 months to produce two paintings. And Lucian was very slow, but it wasn't that he was painting all the time very slowly. Most of the time in a sitting, he'd spend thinking, looking. And then, after quite a while, and mixing up the paints and contemplating the situation—looking at me, looking at the painting—then he'd dart forward and put a stroke on, quite fast actually. But probably 95% of the time, he wasn't doing that. He was considering the situation.

Why we still need painting in a world of screens

42:43: It's arguable that, therefore, paintings, sculptures, unique works of art are what we need now. 'Cause they're the opposite of phones and screens and endless deluge of imagery and distraction, which the modern world offers us. A painting is—if it's good enough—it's something you can just look at for the rest of your life, and if it's really good enough, it'll carry on being rewarding.

Painting as a language without words

02:02: Painting or visual art isn't exactly a language. It's certainly not a verbal language, but it's a means of communication. And as such, it doesn't necessarily neatly translate into words.

How artists reshape art history to suit themselves

39:37: Although artists—practicing artists, rather—may have tremendous insights, and the insights of a kind which nobody else has access to, they're going to see art history and the art, the work of all other artists, from the point of view of their own art. And they'll be utterly out of sympathy, therefore, with quite large sections of the art of the past and of the present. To an extent, that's true with critics. They'll have certain idioms, certain styles, certain media they like more than others. But a critic can be a little bit less prejudiced. Oh, I'd like to think critics can be a bit more open-minded about what they're looking at. An artist will pretty well instinctively refashion the whole of art history so that it leads up to what they're doing today in their studio. But we don't all have to do that.

Recommended Resources:

• Lucian Freud
• Patrick Heron
• Willem de Kooning
• Clement Greenberg
• Tracey Emin
• James Turrell
• Damien Hirst
• Pierre Bonnard
• Bridget Riley
• Peter Paul Rubens
• Robert Rauschenberg
• Gary Hume

Guest Profile:

• Professional Website

His Work:

• How Painting Happens (and why it matters) 
• Man with a Blue Scarf: On Sitting for a Portrait by Lucian Freud
• Modernists and Mavericks: Bacon, Freud, Hockney and the London Painters
• Shaping the World: Sculpture from Prehistory to Now
• Venice: City of Pictures 
• A History of Pictures: From the Cave to the Computer Screen
• The Pursuit of Art: Travels, Encounters and Revelations

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What is the intrinsic link between philosophical inquiry and personal development? How can academic thought and theory be applied well to practical living in the real world?

Kieran Setiya is a professor of philosophy at MIT and also the author of a number of books, including Knowing Right From Wrong, Life Is Hard: How Philosophy Can Help Us Find Our Way, and Midlife: A Philosophical Guide.

Greg and Kieran discuss how philosophy and self-help have diverged over time and the potential for their reintegration. Kieran explores the practical use of philosophical reflection in everyday life, the evolving view of philosophy from his early academic years to now, the impact of Aristotle's concept of the ideal life on contemporary thought, and the nature of midlife crises including his own. They also touch on topics like the value of choice, future bias, the role of suffering, and the integration of philosophy in early education. 

*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*

Why Aristotle’s ideal life isn’t always the answer

06:58: What am I going to do here and now, in the conditions I'm in—which are always, to some degree, imperfect—right now, maybe particularly challenging for many of us? And it's just not obvious at all. In fact, I think it's not true that the best way to answer the question, "What should I do in my problematic circumstances?" is, well, look at what an ideal life would be and just sort of aim towards that. And that just—it's both impractical and often very bad advice. It's like if someone said, "Well, you don't have any yeast; try to make some bread." You could think, "Well, what's the thing that's going to be most like a regular loaf of bread?" Or you might think, "Yeah, that's not the right thing to aim for here." There's some more dramatic pivot in how I'm going to try to make a kind of bread-like thing. And I think that's a good—a better—analogy for the situation we're in when we try to think about what to do here and now, when ideals like Aristotle's are not really viable.

On regret, choice, and the value of missed opportunities

21:21: Regret is a function of something that's not at all regrettable. Mainly the diversity of value.

Detached wanting and the good enough life

38:10: Stoics have this idea that virtue is the key thing for eudaimonia, and nothing else really matters for eudaimonia. But there are all these—what they call—preferred indifferents. So all the other stuff you might want, it's reasonable to want it, but you should want it in a kind of detached, "that would be a bonus" kind of way. And I think, while I'm not a Stoic and I don't think they draw that line in the right way, I think they're right that there is some kind of line here that has to do with sort of moderation and greed. In effect, thinking at a certain point: "If your life is good enough, you look at all the other things you could have," and the right attitude to have to them is something like, "Well, it’d be great if I had that. Sure." But the idea of being angry that I don't, or feeling like "this is unacceptable that I don't" is just not a virtuous — for want of a better word—it's not a reasonable, justifiable response.

Recommended Resources:

• Aristotle
• Eudaimonia
• Telicity
• Arthur Schopenhauer
• Utilitarianism
• Plato
• John Stuart Mill
• Reasons and Persons
• Iris Murdoch

Guest Profile:

• KSetiya.net
• Faculty Profile at MIT
• Profile on Wikipedia
• Profile on PhilPeople.org

His Work:

• Amazon Author Page
• Life Is Hard: How Philosophy Can Help Us Find Our Way
• Midlife: A Philosophical Guide
• Practical Knowledge: Selected Essays
• Knowing Right From Wrong
• Internal Reasons: Contemporary Readings
• Reasons without Rationalism
• Substack Newsletter

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How does strategy factor into the mindsets of presidents like Lincoln and Reagan on both a micro and macro level? What parts of grand strategy are at play when new countries enter NATO due to the Russia-Ukraine conflict?

John Lewis Gaddis is a professor of history at Yale University and also the author of several books on history and strategy. His latest books include The Landscape of History: How Historians Map the Past, On Grand Strategy, and The Cold War: A New History.

Greg and John discuss the concept of historical consciousness and its relation to strategic thinking. John goes over the teaching of strategy from a historical perspective, comparing it to evolutionary sciences and emphasizing the importance of common sense in strategic decisions. They also explore the use of metaphors in understanding history and strategy, the role of theory, and the necessity of adaptability in leadership. The conversation touches on various historical and contemporary examples to illustrate these ideas, including the strategic mindsets of figures like Lincoln and the implications of NATO expansion and the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*

Are we failing to preserve common sense in business schools?

36:38: This whole thing about preserving common sense at all altitudes, it seems to me, is something that's often missing in business schools and also in businesses, as we've seen in various cases. So, if reading some history can create that kind of attitude, then I think it's worthwhile. And the reason I think it can work gets back to the sports metaphor because, okay, maybe your business guy is not interested in reading history, but they're probably watching the March Madness or the Super Bowl, and they're probably talking about coaches and why are certain coaches better than other coaches and so on. And when they're doing that, they're talking about what I'm talking about, which is just drawing these lessons from the past, looking at the objective, operating within the rules but understanding that the application of the rules is going to be different in every situation, every moment of the game.

The optimal grand strategists know when to adapt and when to steer

27:518: I think the optimal grand strategist would be someone who is agile and situationally aware, but also retains a sense of direction.

Big ambitions fail without this one principle

01:57: It seems to me that there's a kind of logic of strategy, which transcends time and place and culture. And when you set it out, when you give examples of what you mean by that, it sounds like a platitude. So if, for example, I were to tell you that aspirations can be infinite but capabilities must be finite, you would say, I knew that all along. You would say that's a platitude. You can get strategy on that? Well, yes, I think you can build a strategy on that because history is full of people who lost track of that insight, who let their aspirations exceed their capabilities to the point of complete overstretch and self-defeat. [02:50] History is littered with people who forgot that aphorism. And the aphorism is just plain common sense.

Why naive questions matter more than you think

30:56: You have to realize naive questions are always good to ask. Because one of the problems with theorists is that they don't like naive questions because they're inconvenient. And they're much more interested in the purity of the theory, the rigorousness of the theory, if it's a laboratory sense of replicability, of the theory. But for somebody to come along and just ask a naive question, sometimes they're not prepared for that.

Recommended Resources:

• George F. Kennan
• Napoleon
• Mark Antony
• Murder Board
• John Negroponte
• Leo Tolstoy
• Painting As a Pastime
• Presentism
• Isaiah Berlin
• Augustine of Hippo
• John C. Calhoun
• Vladimir Putin

Guest Profile:

• Faculty Profile at Yale University
• Wikipedia Profile

His Work:

• Amazon Author Page
• On Grand Strategy
• The Cold War: A New History
• George F. Kennan: An American Life
• The Landscape of History: How Historians Map the Past
• Strategies of Containment: A Critical Appraisal of American National Security Policy during the Cold War
• The United States and the End of the Cold War: Implications, Reconsiderations, Provocations
• The Age Of Terror: America And The World After September 11

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