The Need for Cognitive Diversity in Our Public Policy Decisions

In this captivating episode, we bring together an extraordinary lineup of influential voices including John Vervanke, Dave Chappelle, Aaron Sorkin, and Joseph Campbell. Get ready for a mind-expanding exploration as we unlock the secrets of how diverse perspectives ignite innovation and inclusivity in policymaking. Gain expert insights from political strategist John Vervanke, be inspired by the thought-provoking wisdom of comedian Dave Chappelle, tap into the creative genius of screenwriter Aaron Sorkin, and delve into the timeless wisdom of Joseph Campbell. Brace yourself for a riveting conversation that challenges conventional thinking and reveals the transformative potential of cognitive diversity in shaping the policies that shape our world. Tune in now and witness the birth of a new era in public policy decision-making!

Full podcast episodes available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. ⁠⁠⁠

Insights for the Matt's Mindset Podcast drawn from: Insights for the Matt's Mindset Podcast drawn from: ⁠⁠Tim Ferriss⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Sam Harris⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Neil de Grasse Tyson⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Dr. Brene Brown⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Dr. Andrew Huberman⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Dr. Matthew Walker⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Jonathan Haight⁠⁠, Roland Griffiths, PhD, ⁠⁠Niall Ferguson⁠⁠, Chris Palmer, MD, ⁠⁠Dr. Michio Kaku⁠⁠, Noah Feldman, Emile Durkheim, Stanley Milgram, Jean Piaget, B.F. Skinner, Abraham Maslow, Carl Jung ⁠⁠Bill Gurely⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Jason Calacanis⁠⁠, Jim Collins, Aryeh Bourkoff, Balaji Srinivasan, Ed Thorpe, ⁠⁠Chamath Palihapitiya, David Sachs, David Friedberg⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Howard Marks⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Ray Dalio⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Naval Ravikant⁠⁠, Peter Theil Rick Rubin, ⁠⁠Todd McFarlane⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Bill Burr⁠⁠, Terry Crews, ⁠⁠Hugh Jackman⁠⁠, Matthew McConaughey ⁠⁠James Clear⁠⁠, Stephen Pressfield, ⁠⁠Seth Godin⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Susan Cain⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Morgan Housel⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Jocko Willink⁠⁠, Ayn Rand, Ray Bradbury, Aldous Huxley, Friedrich Nietzsche, Marcus Aurelius, ⁠⁠Tamara Levitt⁠⁠, Soren Kierkegaard, Jean Paul Satre, James Joyce, ⁠⁠Malcolm Gladwell⁠⁠, David Deutsch, John Vervaeke, Richard Dawkins, David Goggins, Dave Chappelle, Aaron Sorkin

Show Notes:

Introduction

• Greetings to listeners

• Quote from Jann Wenner's memoir

Discussion

• The existential threats facing us

• Warren Buffet, Nuclear Fission, and AI

• The difference between identity diversity and cognitive diversity

• Professor John Vervaeke on Opponent Processing

• World War II, the battle of ideologies, and the victory of cognitive diversity

• The festering wound of identity politics

• Symptoms of the Problem: Donald Trump

• Dave Chappelle on Donald Trump

• Umberto Eco and Ur-Facism

• Hard Power vs Soft Power

• The importance of Cognitive Diversity and respectful rhetoric in the political process

• The Brooks-Sumner Affair

• Clip from the Newsroom

• Thomas Hobbes vs John Locke on Man's State of Nature

• Joseph Campbell on "living within the system as human persons"

Transcript:

"We were another wartime generation, a country that watched live television imagery of violence that became numbing, things blowing up, napalm dropping on Vietnemese citizens. The transitions swirling up around city streets filled with black people, marching for their freedom, or railing against hopelessness. Paratroopers being sent to cities to support police. The National Guard came into our schools. These were our fathers and brothers in government uniforms. I came of age with my country in flames at home and abroad. Nixon came along and mobilized fear and hate into a national political movement. He started the war on drugs. The men I believed in were assassinated, shot down like dogs. This is not what we’d been promised. This was not the American dream."

This is an excerpt from Jann Wenner’s memoir. Jann Wenner being the founder and editor and chief of Rolling Stone magazine.

There’s a quote often attributed to Mark Twain, history doesn't repeat itself but it does rhyme. And if this doesn’t sound familiar right now. Domestic issues at home and a foreign proxy war being fought without a mandate or objective.

I spoke at length in my End of History episode about metamodernism and the need for us to will and bring the movement into further focus. For more on that just go back to that episode.

At this moment in time, we have reached a state of critical mass where we have the ability and the responsibility to shepherd our civilization into the next era and we will be forced to wrestle with the potentially existential problems of climate change, globalization, and artificial intelligence.

Earlier this month, the date of this recording being May of 2023, Warren Buffet likened AI technology to that of nuclear fission, an analogy I think is quite apt. Nuclear fissions, developed in the tail end of World War II by the Manhattan project, is what allows for technologies like nuclear energy, as well as the atom bomb.

Nuclear fission is benign in 98% of use cases. It can be a source to help generate electricity, it's used in radioactive isotope tests to help identify and treat cancer, and has potential applications in space exploration.

But in one percent of use cases, we end up with situations like Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania, Chernobyl in the Ukraine, and Fukashima in Japan. While these catastrophes are unlikely and damaging on different levels of intensity, they are not existential threats.

Then there is the one percent of use cases of nuclear fission which is existential and would serve as a great filter event for humanity; the use of atomic weapons.

Buffet makes this comparison, which I agree with, that the technology of Artificial Intelligence, while benign in 98% of use cases, has the potential to be catastrophically dangerous in 2% of use cases.

In this new age we are going to have to break new ground, come up with new solutions and come together to solve these issues now facing us. What got us here won’t get us there.

We need a new perspective, hence, metamodernism. And one of the core tenants of metamodernism is diversity.

Now, “diversity” at this moment in time, has become, much like many other things, a politically charged issue. And as I have a legal background, I’d like to be specific, because definitions matter.

When I say “diversity” I’m speaking specially about “cognitive diversity”.

Cognitive diversity refers to the differences in perspectives, thinking styles, problem-solving approaches, and information processing among individuals or groups. It emphasizes the variety of cognitive abilities, knowledge, experiences, and insights that individuals bring to a particular situation or task.

I spoke extensively a few weeks ago about learning styles, and how everyone learns in a different way. This is what I’m talking about.

The word “diversity” has been hijacked by a number of interest groups. Cognitive diversity goes beyond traditional diversity factors such as race, gender, or age and focuses on the unique cognitive characteristics and mental processes that individuals possess.

It recognizes that people have different ways of perceiving, understanding, and approaching complex problems or situations, and that these differences can contribute to enhanced creativity, innovation, and decision-making.

In short, in the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, cognitive diversity is about judging people for positions of power, career and education opportunities by the content of their character.

If we have people who look different, but think the same way, it defeats the purpose, and is just politically correct sexism and racism.

In this new age, it will be more important than ever that our society be a meritocracy. That everyone leans into themselves and selects work that is uniquely suited for them.

And nowhere do we need cognitive diversity more than in politics.

John Vervanke explains the importance of the adversarial process in regards to a democracy and how it has been corrupted by identity politics. And rather than try to summarize his point, I’ll allow you to form your own conclusions:

So that was John Vervanke discussing opponent processing. The only way we can have opponent processing is if a) we lean into ourselves, allow ourselves to be authentic, form our own opinions and stick to them, b) respect not only our own opinions, but the opinions of others, for it is the mark of an educated mind to be able to hold two contradictory ideas at once c) rid ourselves of the desire for pride and control.

World War II, at its heart, was a battle of ideology. The age of divine right and monarchy was coming to an end, and humanism took its place. We had three factions of humanism: liberal humanism, evolutionary humanism, and collective humanism.

Liberal humanism held that all people were created equal, endowed with certain unalienable rights such rights including life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Evolutionary humanism held that only some people deserved these rights. The Nazi party, infamously, deciding that the Jews, the Slavs, the gay, the mentally ill, the gypsy's, and so on, did not deserve the right to life.

This was the implication of World War II. The US and Allies, for all their faults, had the advantage of cognitive diversity. I go into greater detail in my World War II episode of my America series, but, one of the key factors of winning the war, was the atom bomb.

And two of the cornerstones of the Manhattan Project were Albert Einstein and Robert Oppenheimer, both Jewish. Einstein was born in Austria and actually emigrated to the United States because of Hitler’s racial policies.

The Allies won, in large part, because of cognitive diversity. I go into much deeper detail about this in my America Series so check that out for more.

But suffice to say, in the political landscape we find ourselves in today, embroiled with identity politics, you can’t engage in opponent processing. This has been a festering issue since at least the 1988 election between then Vice President George H.W. Bush and then Governor of Massachusetts Michael Dukakis. This election cycle marked the first time the term “liberal” was used as a pejorative meaning someone weak, out of touch, hypocritical, and condescending. Picture the famous picture of Dukakis riding in the tank.

Since then, both parties have devolved into an immature kind of race to the bottom in their attempts to appeal to their voter base. In today’s politics, you can’t endorse any of the positions of the other guy. In fact, you run smear campaigns to steer those on the fence toward your side.

Character attacks, to me, always prove that the person perpetrating the attack is unwilling or unable to have a fair discussion about the issues, so they have to resort to what is essentially name calling. And I don’t know about you, but an inability to have a substantive debate on important issues is the last quality I want in my elected officials.

We continue to ignore the symptoms of this problem, leading to the emergence of candidates such as Donald Trump. Dave Chappelle does a fantastic job of explaining the phenomenon that is Trump, so rather than paraphrase, here is Dave Chappelle on the issue.

One of his main things Trump wanted to do was “drain the swap”. Now I don’t want to downplay the problematic nature of Donald Trump. Umberto Eco an Italian philosopher, writer, and scholar, outlined 14 common characteristics of fascism in his essay "Eternal Fascism" which make a fascist a fascist and Trump fits into many of these categories, including

Cult of Tradition: Fascism emphasizes the rejection of modernism and a romanticized idealization of the past, often promoting a return to traditional values, cultural heritage, and rituals.

The appeal to emotion rather than logic,

Demonization of the Enemy: Fascism frequently relies on scapegoating and the creation of a perceived enemy or "other" to rally support and maintain a sense of unity among its followers. This enemy can be based on factors such as race, ethnicity, religion, or political ideology.

Nationalism: Fascism often promotes an extreme form of nationalism, characterized by a fervent loyalty and devotion to the nation or state. It frequently employs nationalist symbols, slogans, and narratives to foster a sense of unity and superiority.

Machismo and the Cult of Masculinity: Fascist ideology often celebrates and idealizes hypermasculinity, promoting traits such as physical strength, aggression, and dominance.

And

Populism and the Cult of the "Common Man": Fascism often appeals to the grievances and aspirations of the "common man" and presents itself as a champion of the people against perceived elites or external threats. It seeks to create a sense of unity and solidarity among the "common people" through charismatic leadership.

But, as mentioned, Trump is just a symptom of a much larger problem. See, while Trump very obviously used all of these tactics in what we might describe as “hard power”, the left uses different tactics of control and hegemony, in what we might call “soft power.”

How? Reputational damage, cancel culture, propaganda, and character attacks. During covid, a time of extreme duress that should have united us, and indeed, the world, in the face of common enemy, dissenting opinions were silenced, businesses were forcibly closed, and politicians and health leaders blatantly lied to the public about certain key aspects of their plan and did not retract or amend statements when evidence proved the contrary.

So despite the problematic nature of Donald Trump, he is just a symptom of a much larger problem.

And when you get a fever you don’t say, “curse this fever, it should never have happened. It came at the least convenient time. I don’t understand how it could have happened”

No. You take stock of the situation. Am I getting enough sleep, am I eating healthy are there ways I can reduce stress, is this bacterial or viral, I should rest and get vitamin c and soup.

You identify the root cause of the issue and take steps to fix it. You don’t carry on as normal, working 18 hour days, eating the same diet and condemning the fever for being an outcome that just don’t want

The fever is symptomatic or a much greater problem, namely, your immune system is weak and a virus or bacterium see’s this weakness as an opportunity to manifest itself and propagate its genetic structure.

And while much of this can be chalked up to corruption, the desire for power and control, and cynical opportunism, it is not going to end well for us if we allow it to continue.

We have to change our behaviors to fix the systemic problems our society faces.

How do we do this? We start introducing more cognitive diversity to the political sphere. We need medical doctors, we need biologists, we need neuroscientists, we need business people, we need moms, we need people who identify as LGBTQ, we need people who think there is only he /him, and she / her and we need people who identify as non-binary and we need to have respectful discourse.

That is the most important part. We need to engage in opponent processing. We need to be able to listen to arguments and be willing to revise our opinions in light of new information.

The last time we had a breakdown of civil discourse between the parties on a level that we are seeing today, it culminated in the incident I’m not sure if you’ve ever heard of, which today is referred to as the Brooks–Sumner Affair. On May 20, 1856, Senator Charles Sumner, an abolitionist from Massachusetts, delivered a speech titled "The Crime Against Kansas" on the Senate floor. In his speech, Sumner harshly criticized slavery and its supporters, specifically targeting two senators from South Carolina: Andrew Butler and Stephen A. Douglas.

Two days later, on May 22, 1856, Representative Preston Brooks, a pro-slavery Democrat from South Carolina and a relative of Andrew Butler, took matters into his own hands. Brooks entered the Senate chamber, where Sumner was sitting at his desk, unaware of any impending confrontation.

Without warning, Brooks approached Sumner and began to brutally assault him with a metal-topped walking cane. The attack was swift and severe, with Brooks repeatedly striking Sumner on the head and shoulders. Sumner was trapped under his desk, unable to escape or defend himself effectively.

As a result of the assault, Charles Sumner suffered severe injuries, including head trauma and lasting physical and psychological effects. The incident became a national sensation, further deepening the divide between North and South and exacerbating tensions that eventually led to the American Civil War.

If we are to be able to be in a position to tackle the existential threats that face, not just us, but the world at large, we need to introduce more cognitive diversity into the system and we need to treat one another with respect and realize we are part of the most successful experiment humanity has yet tried and it has so far succeeded in creating the greatest civilization history has yet known.

That was a clip from the Newsroom, written and executive produced by Aaron Sorkin over ten years ago. We would do well to remember that not so long ago, Thomas Hobbes, the English philosopher, described life as “nasty, brutish and short.”

John Locke, upon whose principles the United States and by extension, this civilization was born under, disagreed, and was optimistic that humanity can act in a way that promotes reason and tolerance. Who are we going to prove right? The pessimist who thought people had to be ruled with an iron fist because they couldn’t be trusted? Or the optimist who thought the angels our our better nature would invariable prevail?

Locke argued that we all have rights to life, liberty and property and that the purpose of the government is to protect those rights. But more importantly, at this moment in time, we have a social contract with the government which must be upheld by both parties.

We as individuals must be cultivating our gardens with the ideals of reason and tolerance, and we must demand our elected leaders do the same.

We must understand that, in life, nothing is true, and everything is permitted. Meaning, everything that is not a scientific constant in this universe is a fragile social construct that could disappear as suddenly as the dinosaurs or as slowly as the concept of monarchy.

We must be the shepherds of our own civilization to ensure that the world we are leaving behind is better than the one we inherited.

There’s an interview with Joseph Campell which I find particularly cogent to this point, so pause for that clip.

Campbell’s point, which I agree with, is we don’t need a revolution. We don’t need to get rid of the system. We need people on an individual level to live in the system as human beings.

We need Luke Skywalker, not going over to the dark side. We need Jesus and Buddha not giving into temptation.

We need bankers who have the best interests of the country and their clients at heart.

We need politicians who have the best interests of their country and their constituents and the world at large, at heart.

We need individuals acting as agents of integrity in their communities and holding cowards accountable for what they put in their neighborhoods. We need cognitive diversity and respect to be able to face the unprecedented challenges of our generation. And we can do it, together.

Light and love my friends. Go in peace to love and serve.

Outro: My Way, Frank Sinatra Epic Version