This week we host James Paul Gee, recently retired Arizona State University professor and researcher in a plethora of topics including psycholinguistics and discourse analysis. As we talk about his latest book, What Is a Human? Language, Mind, and Culture, Gee casually uplifts our fundamental understanding of what it means to be, well, human and how we’ve severely underestimated animal intelligence and overestimated our own. We discuss the significance of identity signals throughout anthropological history, how ideas of basing safety on certain identifiers has evolved into what we know today as cultures, religions, and nations and how they have been polarized to both unify and divide. Gee attributes the mass spread of misinformation in recent years to the human need for comfort in something regardless of veracity, though he posits an optimistic goal: to make the truth comforting and to speak the facts that engage with people’s hearts. Whether we use these methods to reform our systems or to redefine how we view our kind, they will no doubt be instrumental in getting us and our world to flourish.

Check back soon for a full transcript of this conversation.

Here are some of the references from this episode, for those who want to dig a little deeper:

Henry’s blog series with James Paul Gee, 2011

2011 Pullias Lecture: Games, Learning, and the Looming Crisis in Higher Education

James Paul Gee’s What Is a Human?

Julian Jaynes’ Bicameral Mind

About Hampshire College, where Gee first taught

James Paul Gee’s poetry

Amanda Gorman performing her poem “The Hill We Climb” at Biden’s inauguration

My Octopus Teacher

Alpha Go

For another take on Moby Dick, listen to our earlier episode The Great Eastern with Howard A. Rodman

Share your thoughts via Twitter with Henry, Colin and the How Do You Like It So Far? account! You can also email us at [email protected].

Music:
“Swinging on a Star” by Bing Crosby

“In Time” by Dylan Emmett and “Spaceship” by Lesion X.
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In Time (Instrumental) by Dylan Emmet  https://soundcloud.com/dylanemmet
Spaceship by Lesion X https://soundcloud.com/lesionxbeats
Creative Commons — Attribution 3.0 Unported — CC BY 3.0
Free Download / Stream: https://bit.ly/in-time-instrumental
Free Download / Stream: https://bit.ly/lesion-x-spaceship
Music promoted by Audio Library https://youtu.be/AzYoVrMLa1Q
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Share your thoughts via Twitter with Henry, Colin and the How Do You Like It So Far? account! You can also email us at [email protected].

Music:
“In Time” by Dylan Emmett and “Spaceship” by Lesion X.
In Time (Instrumental) by Dylan Emmet  https://soundcloud.com/dylanemmet
Spaceship by Lesion X https://soundcloud.com/lesionxbeats
Creative Commons — Attribution 3.0 Unported — CC BY 3.0
Free Download / Stream: https://bit.ly/in-time-instrumental
Free Download / Stream: https://bit.ly/lesion-x-spaceship
Music promoted by Audio Library https://youtu.be/AzYoVrMLa1Q
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––