Welcome to another episode of The Tim Ferriss Show. I’m very excited to publish this episode. This is an experimental format, and we are calling it HERESIES.
The objective of this format is to encourage and celebrate independent thinking.
Please enjoy!
Bios of the co-hosts and guests:
Kevin Kelly (@kevin2kelly) helped launch and edit Wired magazine. He has written for The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, among many other publications. You can find my most recent interview with him at tim.blog/kevinkelly.
He is the author of the new book Excellent Advice for Living: Wisdom I Wish I’d Known Earlier. Other books by Kevin Kelly include Out of Control, the 1994 classic book on decentralized emergent systems; The Silver Cord, a graphic novel about robots and angels; What Technology Wants, a robust theory of technology; Vanishing Asia, his 50-year project to photograph the disappearing cultures of Asia, and The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future, a New York Times bestseller.
Kevin is currently co-chair of The Long Now Foundation, which is building a clock in a mountain that will tick for 10,000 years. He also has a daily blog; a weekly podcast about cool tools; and a weekly newsletter, Recomendo, which is a free, one-page list of six very brief recommendations of cool stuff. He is also a Senior Maverick at Wired. He lives in Pacifica, California.
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Noah Feldman (@NoahRFeldman) is a Harvard professor, ethical philosopher and advisor, public intellectual, religious scholar and historian, and author of 10 books, including his latest, The Broken Constitution: Lincoln, Slavery, and the Refounding of America. You can find my interview with him at tim.blog/noah.
Noah is the founder of Ethical Compass, which helps clients like Facebook and eBay improve ethical decision-making by creating and implementing new governance solutions. Noah conceived and designed the Facebook Oversight Board and continues to advise Facebook on ethics and governance issues.
Noah is host of the Deep Background podcast, a policy and public affairs columnist for Bloomberg Opinion, and a former contributing writer for The New York Times. He served as senior constitutional advisor to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq and subsequently advised members of the Iraqi Governing Council on the drafting of Iraq’s interim constitution.
He earned his A.B. summa cum laude from Harvard, finishing first in his class. Selected as a Rhodes Scholar, he earned a DPhil from Oxford University, writing his dissertation on Aristotle’s Ethics. He received his J.D. from Yale Law School and clerked for Justice David Souter of the U.S. Supreme Court.
He is the author of 10 books, including Divided by God: America’s Church-State Problem—and What We Should Do About It; What We Owe Iraq: War and the Ethics of Nation Building; Cool War: The United States, China, and the Future of Global Competition; Scorpions: The Battles and Triumphs of FDR’s Great Supreme Court Justices; and The Three Lives of James Madison: Genius, Partisan, President.
His upcoming book is Bad Jew: A Perplexed Guide to God, Israel, and the Jewish People, which is currently available for pre-order.
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Maggie Spivey-Faulkner is an anthropological archaeologist and practitioner of Indigenous archaeology, currently working as an assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Alberta. She also serves as an assistant chief of the Upper Georgia tribal town of the Pee Dee Indian Nation of Beaver Creek, a state-recognized Native American group in South Carolina. Her work focuses on using anthropological data to upend harmful misconceptions of Native American peoples embedded in public policy, science, and the public consciousness.
Maggie was raised in a tight-knit extended family in rural Hephzibah, Georgia. She is an international fellow of The Explorers Club, a former junior fellow of the Harvard Society of Fellows, and a recipient of the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. She received her Ph.D. in anthropology from Washington University in St. Louis in 2018 and her A.B. from Harvard College in 2008.
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Joshua L. Steiner is a partner at SSW, a private investment firm, and a senior adviser at Bloomberg, L.P., where he was previously Head of Industry Verticals. Prior to joining Bloomberg, Steiner co-founded and was co-president of Quadrangle Group, LLC, a private equity and asset management firm. Before co-founding Quadrangle, he was a managing director at Lazard. From 1993 to 1995 he served as chief of staff for the U.S. Department of the Treasury.
He serves on the boards of Yale University, the International Rescue Committee, and the SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University. Steiner received a B.A. in history from Yale and an M.St. in modern history from Oxford University.
Please enjoy!
The transcript of this episode can be found here. Transcripts of all episodes can be found here.
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What was your favorite quote or lesson from this episode? Please let me know in the comments.
SELECTED LINKS FROM THE EPISODE
- Heresy Definition & Meaning | Merriam-Webster
- Opinion: Talk Less. Listen More. Here’s How. | The New York Times
- How to Become a Better Listener | Harvard Business Review
- Excellent Advice for Living: Wisdom I Wish I’d Known Earlier by Kevin Kelly | Amazon
- Utopia by Thomas More | Amazon
- Study Design 101: Randomized Controlled Trial | The Himmelfarb Health Sciences Library
- Strawman | Your Logical Fallacy Is
- Hephzibah, Georgia | Wikipedia
- Why Sharing Stories Brings People Together | Psychology Today
- Constitution of the United States (1787) | National Archives
- Perspectives on the Constitution: Constitutions Around the World | Constitution Center
- Britain’s Unwritten Constitution | The British Library
- The Powerful Iroquois Confederacy of the Northeast | Legends of America
- Haudenosaunee Confederacy
- Wampum | Onondaga Nation
- Burning Man
- 1789: Madison, Speech Introducing Proposed Amendments to the Constitution | Online Library of Liberty
- Number of State Constitutional Amendments in Each State | Ballotpedia
- The Rise of the American Dream and the Forces That Made America | Al Jazeera
- How The Post-War Home Reflects the Changing American Dream | The Atlantic
- The Rage of the Incels | The New Yorker
- Violence Has Grown Since California Incel Shooting | Southern Poverty Law Center
- Addiction: Why Is Drug Use in America on the Rise? | Kolmac
- What Are the Cultural Differences between Europe and United States? | Quora
- American Modernism | Wikipedia
- What Should We Understand about Urbanization in China? | Yale Insights
- Indian Migrations: Indians Are Leaving the Country in Droves. Here’s Where They Are Headed and Why | The Economic Times
- Why Does American Culture Have No Rite of Passage? | Quora
- Keeping up with the Joneses (Idiom) | Wikipedia
- A Reminder That College Ranking Is Pretty Much Meaningless | Reddit
- Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs by Johann Hari | Amazon
- Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression — And the Unexpected Solutions by Johann Hari | Amazon
- Johann Hari’s Journey of Discovery About Depression | Filter
- Housing, Family, and Life‐Course in Post‐Growth Japan | Japan Architectural Review
- Why More Americans Are Choosing to Live In Multigenerational Housing | On Point
- British Centre for Durkheimian Studies (BCDS) | Faculty of Theology and Religion
- How America Fell into Toxic Individualism | Psychology Today
- SoHo | The Official Guide to New York City
- Is Moving Closer to Work Financially Worth It? | The Christian Science Monitor
- Elections: Why Fascism Still Has a Hold on Italy | Al Jazeera
- Trump Scammed $250 Million from Supporters Over Election Fraud Claims | Rolling Stone
- How Americans Say Their Priorities Changed during COVID-19 | Pew Research Center
- What Is a Right-to-Work Law, and How Does It Work? | Investopedia
- Opinion: SC Auto Industry Is Rolling into the Future | Greenville Online
- Boeing South Carolina
- Why Aza Raskin Is Building AI to Talk to Animals | Time
- Decoding Non-Human Communication with AI | Earth Species Project
- How to Speak Whale: The Power and Wonder of Listening to Animals by Tom Mustill | Amazon
- Are We on the Verge of Chatting with Whales? | Hakai Magazine
- Could This Futuristic Vest Give Us a Sixth Sense? | Smithsonian Magazine
- I Feel Love: MDMA for Autism and Social Anxiety by Rachel Nuwer | Tim Ferriss
- Dog Tips and Training with Tim Ferriss | YouTube
- What Is It Like to Be a Bat? by Thomas Nagel | The Philosophical Review
- Chimps Have Own ‘Dialects’ But Can Learn Others | ABC Science
- Can Artificial Intelligence Really Help Us Talk to the Animals? | The Guardian
- Killer Whales Can Learn to “Speak Dolphin” | Discover Magazine
- How Bunny the Dog Is Pushing Scientists’ Buttons | The Verge
- Koko the Gorilla’s Best Moments: From Sign Language to Meeting Mister Rogers | Inside Edition
- Chiribiquete National Park: “The Maloca of the Jaguar” | UNESCO World Heritage Centre
- The Persuasive Power of the Wolf Lady | The New Yorker
- Mike Phillips — How to Save a Species | The Tim Ferriss Show #383
- How Can Animal Communicators NOT be Vegan? | Listen To Your Horse
- Why Am I, An Animal Communicator, Not Vegetarian? | InnerSelf.com
- Multispecies Constitution Project | Berggruen Institute
- Logic and Ontology | Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
- Strengthening Animal-Human Relationships as a Doorway to Indigenous Holistic Wellness | Ecopsychology
- Is This Monkey the Inspiration for Dr. Seuss’ Lorax? | Science
- The Lorax by Dr. Seuss | Amazon
- The Intelligent Plant | The New Yorker
- Opinion: The Lost Cultures of Whales | The New York Times
- Man Was Made to Mourn: A Dirge by Robert Burns | Robert Burns Country
- World’s Worst Genocides | Borgen Magazine
- How the Fijians Cook and Eat “Long Pig” | Pilot (1882)
- We Already Have Human Clones: Identical Twins | Because Science
- 20 Years after Dolly the Sheep’s Debut, Americans Remain Skeptical of Cloning | Pew Research Center
- Public Perspectives on Human Cloning | The Wellcome Trust
- Op-Ed: The Dangers of Cloning | Fung Institute for Engineering Leadership
- Gattaca | Prime Video
- They Went to a Renowned Fertility Doctor. He Secretly Impregnated Them with His Own Sperm | CBC Documentaries
- H. Rept. 108-18 – Human Cloning Prohibition Act of 2003 | Library of Congress
- Understanding the Risks of IVF Twins and Multiples | Fertility Institute
- The Distinctive ‘Habsburg Jaw’ Was Likely the Result of the Royal Family’s Inbreeding | Smithsonian Magazine
- Inbred Family: The Whittakers | Soft White Underbelly
- Eugenics and Scientific Racism | National Human Genome Research Center
- The Matrix | Prime Video
SHOW NOTES
- [11:34] Defining “heresy.”
- [14:22] Josh’s heresy: We need to teach listening over talking.
- [32:48] Noah’s heresy: Constitutions are overrated.
- [55:01] Maggie’s heresy: American middle-class culture is ruining everything.
- [1:14:54] Tim’s heresy: We’re on the cusp of meaningfully communicating with animals.
- [1:35:23] Kevin’s heresy: Human cloning is OK.
PEOPLE MENTIONED
- Antoinette Delruelle
- Thomas More
- James Madison
- Billy Crystal
- Elon Musk
- Johann Hari
- Émile Durkheim
- Don Draper
- Silvio Berlusconi
- Giorgia Meloni
- Donald Trump
- Aza Raskin
- Tom Mustill
- David Eagleman
- Rachel Nuwer
- Thomas Nagel
- B.F. Skinner
- Bunny
- Koko
- Michael Pollan
- Albert Einstein
- Usain Bolt
- House of Habsburg
The Tim Ferriss Show is one of the most popular podcasts in the world with more than one billion downloads. It has been selected for "Best of Apple Podcasts" three times, it is often the #1 interview podcast across all of Apple Podcasts, and it's been ranked #1 out of 400,000+ podcasts on many occasions. To listen to any of the past episodes for free, check out this page.
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So excited for this new format, looks fantastic!! Grabbing caffeine and headphones…
Tim- This is one of the best and most memorable podcast episodes I’ve heard in a while. I love the format and the “heresies” prompt will endlessly spawn new and intriguing discussion.
What I’m about to say may be a heresy given your listener demographics, but in keeping with the theme, here it goes:
I think this show will be a success but would be stratospherically more compelling (and more profound, layered, true-to-life, fiery, complex, and illustrative of our humanness and society) if one of the primary hosts was a woman. Not because it’s the PC thing to do, but because a female voice will dramatically change the game for the better in all ways possible.
On that note, Maggie made this episode better in all ways possible.
Love the Heresies format! Interesting and courageous.
This first episode made me think of a heresy that I am dying to hear contemplated in the public discourse.
I think that the pursuit of radical life extension is profoundly immoral. And the concept has been inadequately examined.
I’m talking about the quest for immortality, but I think I also mean the 30-50% increase in longevity that us WEIRD people have already achieved in the past hundred years or so.
I would like to hear public intellectuals and technologists ask themselves “do I want EVERYBODY to live radically longer?” “Do I want my parents to live forever?” “Do I want my boss at this firm to live forever?” “Do I want to live forever if most of my loved-ones do not?”
And I would like to hear discussions about the implications of lives being radically extended, with or without proportionately extending the timeframe of childhood, female fertility, careers, etc
My heresy is that the individualistic pursuit of life extension is both unwise and immoral. It could amount to an inter generational crime.
And further to this, perhaps a separate heresy, the general “safety-ism” of our WEIRD culture has the same implications.
I hate to come off as a moralist, but I haven’t heard these sentiments expressed in public, so I want to be provocative and clear. Am I the only one who thinks these things? Or do most people?
If you don’t want to live forever, don’t take the treatment. You get no say however if I want to.
I think you’re right Ray. In the current state of affairs no one could stop anyone from taking a treatment in order to live radically longer. But I can “say” something. And I’m worried about us sleepwalking once again into a profoundly altered humanity. As we have done recently with, for example, widespread social media adoption. I don’t like restrictions on behavior any more than I suspect you do, but I’d like to see more conversation and reflection prior to adopting history-changing technologies. That’s why I liked this new format so much! And why I appreciate you picking up my thread.
Wasn’t sure where it was going when I logged on, but loved every minute of it! Very interesting group of people in the room. Put together my list of heresies on my walk today.
WTF is this the Tim Ferriss show!?.
Tim Ferriss is unstoppable.
Episode 677.
HERESIES
VERY FRESH
AMAZING
Like the new format very much. My heresy is that life is not about longevity or happiness – although I have no issue with either – but creativity. We are not humans with a soul, but an eternal soul having a human experience (one of many) to learn how to be creators, given the “fate” we were born into as the palette for our creative endeavors.
Tim – I quite enjoy the heresies approach and your ongoing experimentation-in-all-things. This format was more energy to pay attention to: not a bad thing just a note to say please don’t stop doing the one-on-one interviews too.
Two topics on my Tim Ferris interview wishlist
A heresies conversation around the topic of sleep and dreaming putting together Dr. Matt Walker + Dr. David Eagleman and having them talk through their differences and theories around why we dream alongside some people who disagree with them both. Could be fun to throw a psychadelics expert or an indigenous elder in the mix.
A one-to-one interview with a biomimicry expert like Janine Benyus or Dayna Baumeister and/or materials scientist like Anna Ploszajski. Then later a heresies format talking through different paradigms and belief frameworks that putting wildly different viewpoints together: could be especially fun to put biomimicry in the mix with a mycopunk, an AI expert, or an economics person.
Your work is remarkable, I’m incredibly grateful you’ve chosen this path 🌌
You never know what the lesson is going to be when listening to an episode of the Tim Ferriss Show.
For me, it was Maggie explaining how when someone tells you something or shares something with you, you share something back and show that you understand. As a form of bonding.
I have been beaten up so many times over the years for just that behavior. Been accused of being selfish, pulling the spotlight back on myself. It has been a tough lesson to learn to not do that.
Thanks Maggie. I am not crazy. Don’t know where I picked that up, probably from my parents. I grew up in California, and I certainly didn’t learn it from anyone round here.
Another thing I do – midday meal is dinner and evening meal is supper. Get a ton of grief on that one.
I love the concept of this show. One heresies to discuss is the historical development of religion; the other marriage. Do another one please
Tim this idea could make a great adult game…….
Dug the format and the panel. Well done! More out there heresies please! Kevin has plenty I’m sure.
Long time listener (i.e. listened to all of your previous podcasts over the last year and read tools of titans, Tribe of mentors, and 4-hour work week) I felt compelled to leave a comment and be more involved in your community. This discussion reminds me of deep conversations I used to have with my colleague (and best friend) during my PhD. We would have these deep, argument centric, smash up sessions where we would move between fractalising and re-constituting ideas/beliefs mainly centered around scientific hypotheses but also life lessons as well. Although you are sort of, on the surface, just sharing your opinions and beliefs, I can hear in your voices the same deep considerations, re-evaluation and sublime interest. I think this new format is absolutely phenomenal as it shares with the world how great minds operate in practice. My deepest and humblest gratitude to everyone for sharing their heresies in open discussion. Please, keep them coming.
My heresy is that consciousness, even sentience is a spectrum (like the senses of vision, hearing etc.) EVERYTHING is conscious and we humans are actually on a limited section of the spectrum, while believing we are at some kind of pinnacle. Just as we cannot see as insects or birds do, or smell as a dog does, we cannot perceive what is beyond our spectrum.
Does this mean that you believe that an individual human’s capability is limited? How then does one describe growth? Or is this time gated by your birth and death?
Tim – Peter Singer should 100% be involved in Heresies – either in a recurring role or as a guest. I just heard him being interviewed on another podcast and he is clearly THE expert in this field and has such interesting perspectives. Plus he’s a Princeton professor as I’m sure you already know 🙂 I thought for sure you would have been one of the first to interview him but I couldn’t find anything.
The earth is flat, mars = devon island, and NASA’s “satellite” imagery is all from weather ballons and plane flyovers.
Now THAT is a heresy!
But once you know, you know.
Great show, love the format. Maggie was a delightful addition. As someone working in STEM, the contempt for humanities I frequently encounter is shocking and this show highlights how diverse perspectives help. Clearly nobody on the panel read “Never Let Me Go”, or even watched that Black Mirror episode in season 1 (both quite popular) to imagine the pitfalls of cloning. Artists explore many concepts in great depth that can inform technological advancements. Please continue the format with a wide range of panelists, makes me think.
Holy crap! What Maggie said about listening–that’s how my brain works too. Maybe it’s a Canadian thing (cultural difference from American ways) or learned from growing up in an aboriginal community that stuck with me.
Loving the format and discussion, only 25 minutes in…
I enjoy all of your episodes, Tim, heresies and all. This one drew me in because we all get trapped in our own fish bowls, and either/or thinking is rarely productive. I especially liked hearing Maggie’s voice. She’s quite the spitfire! I have a heresy I’d love you to cover in a future episode, that US health insurance in its current state is not socially responsible.
Intended as helpful a critique of this “heresies” format, which has huge potential:
My impression was of five people who were not nearly diverse enough in their beliefs and who were far too anxious to find common ground rather than really explore each other’s “heretical” beliefs and what makes them heresies within *their own social groups.* I think Tim is a talented enough host to avoid the talking-head shouting match outcome of people who fundamentally disagree, so he should take more of a risk with his guests.
Imagine an episode in which an archetypal Ivy League progressive expressed agreement with a so-called MAGA Republican on some issue (however narrow) and the debate jumbled up all sorts of prior role expectations. Now that would be something! Otherwise, to be honest, there are plenty of other podcasts for deep intellectual discussion, which is somewhat of a different lane from Tim’s show.
Clarifying/summarizing point to my previous comment: I’m not saying Tim shouldn’t skip podcast lanes. I’m saying that if he does, he should do so in a way unique to that lane that aligns with his characteristic talents.