Kind: captions
Language: en
it was really shocking that nobody else
was doing anything creative with sex
work like for me it was it was like
breathing like you're just doing sex and
you're bored I'm like what do you do I
don't know let's try something funny
like it's just the natural progression
and it felt to me like there was almost
no competition like I would just be
really creative and like immediately
lose the top not safe for post on Reddit
I'm like well I didn't even try that
hard
the following is a conversation with
Ayla a sex researcher who does some of
the largest human sexuality survey
studies in the world on everything from
fetishes to relationships she is
fearless in pursuing her Curiosity on
these Topics by asking challenging and
fascinating questions and looking for
answers in a rigorous data-driven way
and writing about it on her blog
knowinglust.com
she's also a sex worker including only
fans and escorting and is an
exceptionally prolific creator of
thought-provoking Twitter polls
Ayla and I disagree on a bunch of things
but that just made this conversation
even more interesting
I like interesting people in the full
range of the meaning that the word
interesting implies
I'm currently reading on the road by
Jack Kerouac
and uh would be remiss if I didn't
mention one of my favorite quotes from
that book that feels relevant here
the only people for me are the Mad ones
the ones who are mad to Live Matt to
talk mad to be saved desirous of
everything at the same time the ones who
never yawn or say a commonplace thing
but burn burn burn
like fabulous yellow Roman candles
exploding like spiders across the Stars
in the middle you see the blue Center
Light Pop and everybody goes
this is the Lex Friedman podcast to
support it please check out our sponsors
in the description and now dear friends
here's Ayla
I feel like this conversation can go
anywhere is that exciting or terrifying
to you I think it's more exciting the
uncertainty exciting too
yes
in conversations in general or just this
one I think conversations in general
like is anybody that got a certainty is
really exciting maybe if the certainty
is something new I mean novelty always
comes with uncertainty right almost
always I started trying to think of a
counter example
immediately yeah you're uncomfortable
with generalizations of that kind like
always is always a really bold for a
tears but if it's truly novel that means
you don't really understand it's outside
your distribution so therefore it's
going to have a bunch of uncertainty but
you don't think of it as uncertainty you
think about his
something new
but it actually also attracts you
because there's a lot of uncertainty
surround it probably like what is this
new thing yeah like annihilating the
mystery like that drive what about the
danger of it
it's like part I was just thinking of on
the drive over because I kind of like a
little nervous about doing this podcast
and then I was like feeling into the
unpleasantness of it like the like the
fear of what if something goes terribly
wrong and then I was also feeling into
like how much that feels like part of
why it's exciting like
if I knew that it was going to go great
I don't know did you actually imagine
all the possible ways you can it can go
wrong not like all of them but I was
like what if I say something really dumb
or like you ask me a question and I
answer it in a way that makes me sound
like a lot less capable than I am I'm
like really afraid of being perceived as
stupid or something I was also thinking
about this on the way over like I'm kind
of risk-averse in some ways like I don't
driving fat like driving fast in cars
because I was driving very carefully
here because the roads are bad yeah and
then I think I'm very like pro-risk in
other ways like being really exposed to
like a wide variety of people who might
hate you and I think like from the
outside that might look fine but I think
the monkey brain is really sensitive to
lots of people yelling at you
for whatever problems that you seem to
have so that's the big risk you're
taking is putting yourself out there as
an intellectual like through your
writing and then a lot of people yelling
at you is that is that the worst
embarrassment it's pretty bad yeah I
think I think the worst embarrassment is
if I put something out there that I
failed to like be properly skeptical of
in myself
and then people are like oh we just
caught this thing that you didn't catch
I think that's the biggest Terror yeah
from looking at your reading and
listening to your interviews
you seem to be very defensive and
worried about being good scientists yeah
definitely well you're like methodology
yes and funny enough you get attacked on
that methodology even though
you know I've I'm a fan of psychology of
like the academic psychology and it's
it's kind of disappointing often how
non-rigorous their work is how small the
sample size and so on and how big and
ambitious over ambitious the the
proclamations about results is
especially with the news reports on it
now you're both the researcher the
scientist And the reporter right so like
that's what you have with the blog your
sample size is often gigantic
the methodology is right there the data
is right there you provide the data and
then you're like
raw and honest with your interpretation
of the day like there's of honesty
authenticity to it
so I don't it's actually really
refreshing I don't know why people
criticize it I think this is what peop
this is what psychologists are probably
terrified about being transparent and
transparent in that way is because
they'll get attacked for their
methodology so they want to cloak it in
a um
in a sort of layer of authority like I'm
from this institution it was peer
reviewed this kind of all these layers
and I'm also not going to share the data
with you and I'm also going to pretend
like most psychology studies are not
replicable I'm just going to pretend
there's authority to it I think it works
a lot of people like from the outside
you're like ah the scientists with the
white lab coats with credentials those
are the people who are like doing
science and like doing science is you
know you have like fancy terms that
other people are don't really understand
and to be fair like I I have a lot to
learn I'm still like I'm self-teaching
I'm like learning through people
learning as I go I'm definitely not
super knowledgeable about this stuff
um but a lot of what those people are
doing in science is not that hard
um and a lot of people like don't try to
learn it because it seems so like
elevated and this is one thing that
really bothers me I think like everybody
can do science like if you just have
this aspect of curiosity and like you
just really want to figure something out
you can go and start you know asking
people questions doing surveys like
writing down the answers and the you go
learn how to look at that data in a way
that gives you more information about
the world like it's very simple and
straightforward if you just approach it
humbly and earnestly and you're like
please let's look let's figure this out
together but people like are think
self-crippled in this because uh they
view this as like
relegated to the domain of the experts
and you know the fancy scientists and I
think that makes me feel really sad
you're almost attracted to the questions
you're not supposed to ask oh yeah also
yes we might contribute to the
controversy not exclusively probably I
don't know you're just not limited by
like part of your curiosity is asking
questions that seem common sense like
what is some of the most controversial
questions are like around sex it's like
everybody thinks and talks and does sex
I mean it's it's the driver of human
civilization and yet there's so little
like a rigorous discussion about the
like the philosophical and the
scientific questions around it it's like
it gets really weird
to be able to discuss them it becomes
tricky to discuss them yeah supercharged
super because everybody has a really
strong opinion like whether or not you
know pornography is damaging to society
or like how sex corresponds to gender or
like what kind of sexuality is
acceptable like do can you have sexual
preferences that in them in themselves
are immoral uh people get very angry
about it well the sad part
is they're not just opinionated but most
of us our relationship with sex is a
I think I guess I want to say not
rigorous
I think it's very difficult to be
rigorous about sex like and I I would
consider uh sexual urges to be kind of
elusive to introspection in a way that's
a little bit disproportionate to a lot
of other things like you could like you
know introspect about you know how I
want other people to like me and
um how where my insecurities lie but sex
is one of those black box things a
really common thing is for people to if
you have a fetish you sort of check back
in your childhood to see an event that
corresponds to that fetish and then you
like develop a narrative like ah this
event in my childhood must have caused
this fetish and so I think this causes
people to be biased towards like a like
a concrete coherent causative way that
events happen or there's that sexual
fetishes happen
um this is just like one example of like
why I think it's really hard to be
rigorous with introspection because we
can't avoid you just want to tend
towards making like coherent narratives
which I think is not always the correct
way to explain it the narratives that
are connected to Childhood and soil and
so on yeah they origin is yeah you've uh
I mean we'll talk about fetishes because
you have a lot of really interesting
writing on that just actually zooming
out I should mention you tweeted I wrote
this down you tweeted I do not
understand how to have normal
conversations with people in person
if I'm not on drugs
so I guess
so let's both agree to not have a normal
conversation I guess assuming you're not
on drugs now or if you are Duke you
don't have to talk I feel like a very
small amount of fun a bit okay which is
a nootropic
I don't know if that counts instead of
drug well I guess I'm on caffeine yeah
so we're both
drugged up good enough to have a normal
conversation
uh we don't have to
what is normal anyway uh what do you
think is the primary driver of human
civilization is it the desire for sex
love power or immortality like avoiding
uh the fear of death constructing
illusions that make us forget about our
Terror over mortality so sex love power
death is this a Twitter poll it's a poor
option this is reality not everything it
Maps perfectly into a Twitter poll but
in this case because there's four
options and it is a small number of
characters it does but I'd like to think
I'm more interested you know what
I think your Twitter polls are
fundamentally interesting there's
something about the the brevity of a
poll limiting to a set of choices and
having an existential crisis and
searching for the answer
that's beautiful that combination well
this one's a big one like what do you
think is behind it do you believe that
there is one primary driver like do you
think that it can be understood in the
terms of primary drivers
yeah I think well maybe it's an
engineering perspective like trying to
reverse engineer the brain I don't think
we're equipped or understanding enough
about the mind to get there yeah like
what's the primary driver of a tree
yeah well then it gets the question of
what is life what is a living organism
to self-replicate probably that's a very
clean simplification but
I think life
is more interesting that
than just self-replication yeah but it
sounds like you there's a curiosity in
you that you're trying to like poke at
and I don't understand exactly what that
curiosity is so if I if I had to
dedicate a thousand years to understand
one of these topics which one would be
the most fruitful I guess is the
indirect thing I'm asking
no well fun after to me everything is
fun but I feel like yeah I mean I'm with
David Foster Wallace the key to life is
uh to make sure that everything is
unborrowable or to be unborrowable or
ever nothing is boring everything is fun
every like everything I'll could just
literally sit I honestly because I don't
think I don't know where you got that
glass but that glass exists and I forgot
it exists it was really fun to me to
know that now I was there but I felt
like really things
like if you're in like a deep agony
yeah that's fun okay that's fun because
it's like I mean yeah heartbreak is like
knowing that I'm capable of that it it
like from
uh you know we're all living in the
gutter but some of us are looking up at
the stars so when you're in that gutter
for some reason the stars look brighter
right like so like whenever you're going
through a difficult time
or whenever you see maybe other people
being shitty to each other it makes you
like really appreciate when they're not
the contrast makes life kind of amazing
I'm reading a bunch of books one of them
is Brave New World where they remove
Contra you know where they remove the
ups and downs of life
um partially through drugs but over over
sexualization all that kind of stuff and
I feel like you need
that Contra you need the ups and downs
of life
uh the dark you know you need the dark
to have happiness have like a deeply
intense feeling of affection towards
another thing or a human being yeah yeah
so everything's fun but fun is also a
weird word to Define because fun I think
for a lot of people in
like that's why I talk about love a lot
I I think I think love is a better word
than fun
because fun is like light-hearted
love is more intense
like I love that class and the water
that's in it because it's freaking
awesome like somebody made that glass
right like they and like not have many
mistakes and like there's a and the way
Ben's light in interesting ways and the
way water Blends light in interesting
ways like I can see part of your R into
that water
that's freaking amazing everything is
amazing
I'm with the Lego movie anyway
um if but if like from a scientific
perspective if I were to investigate sex
I don't know why I put love in there
let's just narrowed down the Twitter
poll let's focus on the basics here sex
power or death immortality
if I were to try to
like from a neuroscience neobiology
perspective or reverse engineer if
they're building AI systems that focus
on these kinds of Dynamics exploring the
gang theoretic aspects of it uh
exploring
the sort of cognitive modeling aspects
of it which one would get me to a deeper
understanding of The Human Condition
that's the question sex
okay Nietzsche is the will to power
uh Freud and and the bunch is all about
sex
and then
um death
uh live just uh live Burley
brilliant previous guest on this podcast
she just released a video where on her
bedside was the book denial of death
uh by owners Becker which of course you
would have on her bedside but that the
his whole work is that everything is
motivated by our trying to escape the
the cold harsh reality that we're going
to die and we're terrified of it one of
the gifts and burdens
for human beings is that we are
cognizant of our own death
and that terrifies us that's the theory
and because of that we do everything we
can we build we build Empires to escape
the fact that we're mortal wouldn't this
change quite a bit for religious people
then who don't believe that they're
going to die well they created religion
the idea there to create myths religions
you can create religions of all kinds
like yeah but if this is like one of the
defining things that
Define civilization then we should
expect to see like massive differences
between people who believe we're going
to die in people who don't good I love
it you think of like a like a
scientifically here but uh and they have
actually answers like there's a whole
Terror management Theory where they do
type write psychology type papers and
they do actual experiments I can mention
how their methodology is interesting
um they Prime with the discussion of
death like they take one certain set of
people and have a conversation with them
another set of people they mentioned
death to them before the conversation
and see how that affects their uh the
nature of the conversation it's really
interesting because death fundamentally
Alters
the nature of the conversation just even
priming
to come like reminding you that you're
going to die briefly changes changes a
lot of things these kinds of priming
papers usually not replicated
I just have like I feel like I've heard
a bunch of priming ones that
I think you have PTSD over psychology
papers it's not replicated I just did
one I just did a primary experiment on
my own and found it didn't have any
effect
but again can't you just give me okay
Carol a statement summarizing an entire
scientific discipline of Terror
management Theory I don't know uh I
think people should like I haven't
rigorously looked at how good of it
psychologically I think okay it is
interesting philosophically the way
Freud talked about the the subconscious
mind philosophically it's an interesting
discussion then you have to get rigorous
with it for sure
um but
the idea is that
like it's not that religious people
get rid of the terror of death
this is just one of the popular ways
they create an illusion on top of it
that's that idea like a myth that allows
that makes it easier for them to forget
to escape that Terror but everybody else
does different
different methods like
you feel your days with like capitalism
has a whole it's a whole religion of
itself like the rat race for getting
more and more material possessions and
so on and couldn't you argue in the
opposite direction like let's say assume
that we're Christians here and we're
like oh the atheists you know everybody
has Terror of hell and the atheists
invent this mythology where you know
actually evolution is true in order to
escape their Terror of hell so it
doesn't feel like a persuasive argument
to me but I used to be very very
Christian and I did not have a terror of
death and then I lost my faith and then
I had a deep Terror of death set in for
a few years and it felt very different
to me so for denial of death I don't
know if he says that it's actually
possible without
really a lot of work to get to the
actual Terror like I think his claims
that in early early early childhood
development
that's when the terror is real
and then we come aggressively construct
systems around it of social interaction
to to um
to support to sort of construct
illusions at the top of it I'm doing a
half-assed description of this
philosophy but there is like it isn't
interesting to simplify
the human mind into underlying
mechanisms that drive it
yeah I was gonna say your thinking seems
kind of poetic like the way that you're
sort of handling these yeah these
Concepts feel like more like
aesthetically driven I think this theme
is going to continue throughout this
conversation as we talk about
relationships and sex yes for sure I
think so and I think you're thinking
seems to be very driven by how can I
construct an experiment
to test this hypothesis yeah something
like that yeah but aren't there's some
things especially that have to do with
the human mind that are really messy
really difficult to understand there's
so many uncertainties and Mysteries
around that we don't yet have the tools
to collect the data like one of your
favorite tools is the survey is asking
people questions
and then figuring out different ways to
indirectly get at the truth because
there's flaws to the survey and you you
kind of learn about those flaws and you
get better and better asking the right
questions and so on but that's not
that's indirect access to the human mind
but do you think like Poetic narratives
are I'm not like saying poetic
narratives are bad like I think it's
like a cool way of like handling
Concepts but I'm not sure that they are
more rigorous no no no okay no but like
they might be
the more correct like philosophy might
be the right way to discuss things that
were really far from understanding yeah
I mean they might be more useful
shorthand yeah like morality like I
don't think morality makes any sense but
it's really useful shorthand to use when
handling Concepts and a lot of the time
right like ethics and morality you could
construct studies that ask different
questions like uh you know just having
worked with the autonomous vehicles a
lot the uh the trolley problem gets
brought up and I don't know you can
construct all kinds of interesting
surveys about the trolley problem but
does that really get at some deep
moral calculus that humans do it's sexy
because people like write clickbait
articles about it but does it really get
to like what you value more five
grandmas or like three children or
whatever like they construct these
arguments of like if you could steer a
train if you could steer an autonomous
car which do you choose
yeah I don't know I don't know if it's
possible with some of those to construct
like sometimes the fuzzy area
there's some topics that are fuzzing
will forever be fuzzy
given our limited cognitive capabilities
I don't know there's a way of looking at
things where it's like for example the
childhood fetish thing that I was
talking about like departed your
footages come from like you can develop
a narrative where it's like you know I
think like this kind of thing is you
know you're surrounded by feet when
you're a child this causes foot fetishes
um and this is like kind of a cool
narrative uh and I think a lot of
people's ideas about philosophy follow
the same sort of thing like what is the
narrative that is cool and I think this
is useful for meaning making like I'm
very Pro meaning making like when you're
talking about everything is uh fun
because you know the contrast or
whatever I've very much just ascribed to
that I really enjoy that that philosophy
I also find everything to be very
delightful uh but and this isn't like a
question of truth right we're not like
where is the true Delight that we're
objectively measuring I guess there's a
frame a poetic frame that you're using
to like sort of change the way the light
hits the world around you and that's
super useful because it like makes you
happier
or something
yeah but also gets
to the truth or something
yeah I guess what is the truth
um yet another question what is truth
you've uh
actually to jump back you don't you
believe that Free Will is an illusion um
so uh
why does it feel like
I'm free to make any decision I want
well it's a cool illusion I think it's
probably like where a sense of identity
oh like when you really meditate on your
sense of identity for at least for me it
seems like it comes down to the sense of
choice like oh I am doing the thinking
like what does it mean to do with
thinking it's like ah something in me
has
exerted agency over having this thought
or not having this thought
like the sense of self really comes down
to choice and so when I say that like
free will listen illusion I also mean
there's something like the selfish
illusion identity is
a trick of the light
but it's a really fun one yeah you think
a lot about your identity
I have occasionally yeah like you really
struggle with it you're proud of it I I
do too it's not we have different
Journeys but so I really take a lot of
delight in it I used to be very into
like deconstructing it like you probably
you know I did a bunch of like way too
much LSD for a while and at that point
very no no ego and now I'm like very ego
I really enjoy having a lot of ego
I actually happen to know like
everything about you really yeah like
more than you do it's interesting that's
fascinating wait could you could you
solve my problems yes all of them I've
did thorough research okay
um
what is consciousness then
I actually wrote that as a question what
is consciousness
to remind myself so like uh how's that
tie in together with Free Will and
identity and all of that it doesn't mean
what his Consciousness is like one of
the biggest questions ever I think I I
do think that people often get confused
when talking about Consciousness because
I think people are referring to two
separate Concepts and often like
combining them into one thing like we
asked the question you know is AI going
to be conscious
um I think this is kind of the wrong
question like uh like like we can
identify signs of Consciousness like ah
they seem to refer to themselves but
this is not necessarily proof of
Consciousness in the same way that like
dream characters
acting exactly the way normal human do
people do in your dream is not evidence
that they themselves are conscious so
like signs of Consciousness are not
proof of Consciousness but there is
something that we definitely know which
is like I currently am conscious I can
tell because
right like I'm like just directly
observing my experience yeah uh and so
like there's one kind of Consciousness
which is I am directly observing my
experience and that you cannot replicate
it like there I cannot observe two
experiences uh it is necessarily
singular and it is necessarily certain
like you can make all the arguments you
want like I'm still directly observing
it's not a thing that's subject to
reason whereas are other things
conscious this is something that's
replicable like you can apply it to
multiple people
um it's something that's not certain uh
like almost definitionally not certain
like we don't actually know if there is
you know an internal experience so my
argument is that like when people are
talking about other things having
experienced they're using a different
concept than the thing that they're
actually looking at when they look at
their own experience I think they're two
different things
definitionally not possible no if you
understand the mechanism of
Consciousness you'll be able to measure
it probably right yeah but what are you
measuring like I think this is like a
subtle difference like when you're
asking the quest is other thing
conscious
yeah the easy thing to measure is like a
survey does this thing appear conscious
yeah and then the hard thing is you
understand the actual mechanism of how
Consciousness arises
in the physics of the people do that in
a dream presumably like if you had a
very good dream or a very good
simulation yeah but we could then have
somebody in a simulation or a dream
where they go through and they fully
understand you know they do all the
tests and the tests come back exactly
they'd expect them to uh but from the
outside we're like well this is
misleading they're not actually
conscious
like your dream characters aren't
conscious right probably I don't know
are you asking are you telling I'm like
appealing to an intuition
but it sounds like you're driving
towards a narrative I don't you you did
a poll about men and women and Dreams
yeah those are some kind of difference I
couldn't tell what the difference was
except that more men than women quite a
lot more women dream vividly than men oh
which I actually found my chaos survey
it's like I did a survey maybe you know
that I said I don't know everything you
do know yes I'm sorry so as you clearly
know I'll try not to talk down to this
conversation because I don't know and I
not only know everything I know how your
future looks like really and every how
everything ends yeah so you could
probably win all the prediction markets
on my life yeah cool so well we should
also mention that you have like
prediction markets uh you have like
votes that you what what's the site
called again manifold manifold and one
of them was will I be on the Lex
Friedman podcast yeah and I voted I
invested everything I own into the yes
is there such thing as Fighters radio on
there is that it goes against the terms
no I think inside attorney is part of
the information so it's supposed to be
and then I realized it's actually public
information that I voted because like I
think my face shows up there's like damn
it it's gonna influence
you could make the fake account or I
could be lying right yeah and then dump
the stuff you know I try to manipulate
somebody made a market like is Ayla
going to post a poll spelled p-o-l-e on
her Twitter like a photo and I was like
I'm gonna manipulate this market so I
like fucked around with it and I voted
no and I accidentally posted a photo of
a poll without thinking
sabotage I yeah I accidentally yeah the
fact that my own Market that doesn't
that's like the reverse of Insider
training yeah uh what were we talking
about oh the women and the men and the
difference the vivid dreams
and the markets I forget what the market
oh because I can I can perfectly predict
your future yeah then it's not fun I
like the road mass of unpredictability
and so I I like to even though I know
everything I like to forget everything
yeah very very Buddhist of you yeah the
river no no man in the river once
whatever the footsteps however that's
one of my uh favorite questions is like
if you could press a button and then
have all of your wants fulfilled
anything that you want so it's like such
a rapid degree that you don't really
experience the one like as the wander
Rises it then is like completed
immediately so that you are completely
without want like would you would you
press that button 100 not yeah I didn't
think you would no no you know because
immediately everything stops being fine
the first it's only fun the first time
but if you want it to be fun but like
what will be my source of fun I feel
like I would like on day four just to
get off I would need to like do like
nuclear war because it'll escalate
quickly
I feel like if everything is possible I
assume you mean like something that like
is not just normal human things yeah
magical world magical world then you
start escalating really quickly
like I wonder I'll probably do like I
want everybody to just fly into the air
and hover in the air
I love you everybody and then you're
like oh
life is meaningless like why does like
you you go I feel like you get
uh no I actually that'd be a really
interesting experiment like what are the
limits like are we all capable of
becoming Psychopaths essentially
like
I like to believe not there's a very
hard limits on that like in our own mind
like of basic compassion because I love
being compassionate towards other human
beings it's one of the things I think
about if you give me power like a lot of
power like absolute power and I think
that's the power you mentioned is the
scariest kind of power because it's like
it's not even power in this normal world
it's like magical power where you lose
it's a dream world power where you like
video game Power you don't even think of
it as reality you could just mess with
the world I feel like that's terrifying
yeah basically be God
yeah but without like
I feel like the idea of God wants to
like gonna keep things like
functioning properly but then you would
probably if you wanted to keep them
functioning properly yeah then it would
rapidly like you would never experience
a time where you're like oh no that was
a mistake because as soon you like
before you even experience that the
world would shift to to match it oh
interesting now I think I would actually
I take it back I think I would regret
the first time I hurt somebody
see in my visualization was like a video
game where everybody's like NPC really
dumb no I think the first time I I
witnessed paying from anybody that's
when I would stop and I would probably
run into that very quickly
like even just the hovering make a
person hover and they're gonna be
probably really upset with the hovering
right and so I'm gonna be like no don't
do that anymore and then I'll probably
go to honestly I'll just return back to
my normal life
uh yeah that's kind of what I feel like
like if I had the power to do anything I
think I would probably want to have a
life very similar to where I am now yeah
yeah I mean there's it's like with Uber
like it'd be probably more convenient to
do certain things
but even then
like the struggle like I got a flat tire
so I have to fix that I kind of the flat
tire makes
makes everything more beautiful was that
cool I could do like a normal manual
thing
uh but also it makes you like appreciate
your car appreciate Transportation
appreciate the convenience the
transportation all of it I I know some
people who would like call this a bunch
of copium like you're just sort of
making do with what you have like we
wouldn't go back to Amish times or like
pre-technology because to like in order
to make ourselves appreciate things more
and so it seems like a hindsight
reasoning uh which like I can appreciate
that argument but I don't know I'm like
anyone who uses sorry to interrupt the
word copium in their um in their
argumentation
um uh I think it's sauce
yeah it's that's my entire argument is
now no I'm just kidding I'm sorry go
ahead sorry I interrupted rudely the
flow of thought uh but you you so you
don't think so in part you disagree with
that kind of argument
um
yeah because I I think people have this
idea that if you uh like come to accept
or like Find meaning in what you have
now this is sort of at odds with trying
to improve it
and all right I don't find this to be
the case I find like the attempt to
improve it to also be part of it like I
enjoy the fact that there's something
like problematic going on because now I
get the experience of like striving to
make it go away and like that in itself
is where the meaning lies it's not just
that things are bad it's that there's
things are bad and we're trying to stop
it and also exactly there's if you
combine that with a sense of optimism
that the future can be better yeah that
feeds
feeds into this productive effort of
making things better
and it somehow makes the vision of the
things that are better more intense
having experienced shitty things
yeah
so we talked about Free Will and
Consciousness and what drives human
civilization question left unanswered
it's a homework problem for the reader
okay
let's get like a scoreboard at the end
the amount of questions the answer
successfully versus not like polls yeah
can we talk about some practical things
sure
uh so one of the many amazing things I
think of you as a researcher but you've
also been
uh doing research in the field yeah
field work good field work the Jane
Goodall love
yeah
uh how did you get uh what's the the
short and the long story of how you got
into sex work how did I get into sex
work well I mean there's a whole like
childhood thing where I was
conservatively homeschooled uh do you
want to actually talk about your
childhood I think it's interesting
because you also worked at a factory
it's like your childhood is really
fascinating uh and difficult uh
traumatic so um and you've written about
it
there's a lot of ways we can talk about
it but maybe
what are the things you remember
the good and the bad of your childhood
of your maybe interaction with your
father
yeah my dad probably has narcissistic
personality disorder and so it was very
centered on very controlling childhood
immensely so
um we were homeschooled and pretty
isolated from the outside world like we
didn't know anybody else who wasn't
homeschooled we went through a program
called Growing Kids God's way which was
very is like the kind of program where
you're not supposed to pick up babies
when they cry to train them that they
can't manipulate the parents because
like baby crying was viewed as like uh
you're just teaching them from an early
age that they're allowed to make the
parents do what the kids want yeah and
they're very against this philosophy so
you know that combined with a
narcissistic personality disorder dad
was pretty rough
uh it's a controlling super controlling
yeah and developing and feeding the
self-critical aspect of your brain yeah
very much it was you know I was like
lazy but I was never going to accomplish
anything in life it's gonna move out of
the house and realize how good I had it
at home you know the classic stuff uh he
was very like logical and smart though
and so he'd also like teach us
logic stuff I remember some of my
earliest memories or him like giving me
basic logic puzzles like the dog has
three legs you know how many dogs the
four legs and I I would mess up and
uh but he was he was a evangelist
basically a Christian evangelist so we
like Bible study five nights a week I
memorized I think 800 verses of the
Bible by the time before I became an
adult
um
yeah and it was very patriarchal also I
was expected to grow up and become a
housewife basically they're like oh you
can go to college to meet a man and also
to get a little bit of education so that
you can homeschool your own kids like we
were explicitly told that women were
subordinate to men
um in regards to like making decisions
when you're married our pastor's
daughter was not allowed to leave home
because she would be outside of the
authority of a man so when she got
married she was allowed to leave because
she was never allowed to live in a house
where she was not under a hierarchy this
is like the kind of culture that that we
live so there's a hierarchy and uh the
gender aspect to the hierarchy is men at
the top of that hierarchy men at the top
okay but you're on psychology your own
mind
um so most of that self-critical brain
is bad right it was confusing because he
told me that I was smart but also that I
would fail
uh but I I I'm not smart enough right or
like smart but not smart enough smart
but like not virtuous or something okay
so okay right there's always a flaw yeah
there's always a flaw I think a lot of
it was a lot of the the fucked upness of
my brain came from feeling like I didn't
have the authority to think because it
was so like carefully like suppressed
like the my ability to like Express or
have any sort of power was just
absolutely annihilated like systemically
like psychologically they would do like
psychological torture mechanisms to make
sure that like I wasn't actually
thinking on my own or like being able to
deviate from anything anybody ever told
me to the degree that it's still
ingrained in me like I once was a friend
we were traveling and he wanted me to
hop a turnstile it was like very late at
night the train was here and I could not
physically force myself to do it like he
was like yelling me like come on do it
like like no but I was trying so hard to
make my body across the line and it was
just it's like embedded in my physical
being to like be unable to do stuff like
that which is really annoying that
you're not free to take action in this
world yeah some
so it's that that was I think the most
annoying part of the my upbringing
would you classify it as like suffering
at the time yeah definitely well it's
confusing because like when when I was a
child it was it was just painful in the
sense that like things suck but it was
placed in a meaning framework right like
it is good it is virtuous to submit to
your parents and do what they want if
they tell you to say goodbye to your
best friend forever and ever talk to
them again you go do that without
complaining and so like I would go do
something like that and I would like it
would suck it really was like concretely
painful but it was also placed in this
narrative where I was like fulfilling
some sort of Greater purpose sure uh and
so so it's very confusing to refer to it
as suffering because there's so many
painful things we do today that are
placed in The Narrative of a greater
purpose that like I think I would agree
with like I go get a medical procedure
done that sucks but I'm like ah this is
helping me in the long run but like say
if I got abducted to an alien planet and
they're like by the way all of those
medical procedures you got done like you
didn't have to get them done those are
totally unnecessary then I might get
really upset about it yeah I wouldn't
trust those aliens though because they
probably want to do different medical
procedures I saw I saw some I saw a
thumbnail for a video that I'm proud of
myself for not clicking on about a man
who's claimed that he had sex with
aliens
and I was like for not clicking on that
because I was wondering because because
that I would probably watch it for like
20 minutes and then I should be doing
work oh I see so like I and I I and I'm
actually happy because I get to imagine
what it all the different possibilities
that could have been for that man who
was like a really high like resting
happiness State yes yeah it's probably
like a mushroom State yeah wow do you do
mushrooms I've done mushrooms before it
was very awesome
but like more intensely awesome
but but like like because I was just
looking at nature it makes nature even
more beautiful I think but it's already
it's already pretty beautiful I haven't
done MDMA
um
people say that I I should it's very
nice yeah yeah anyway
um but I'm already yeah what did you
call it resting happiness day yeah
harvesting happening happiness
yeah that's a good that's a good way to
describe it but it's not like some of
it's genetic that you're able to notice
the beauty in the world and some of it
is practiced where you realize focusing
on the negative things in life
like unproductively is uh
it's it just doesn't help your mind
flourish so like you just notice that
and it's like
I mean I think people with like
depression uh learn that or like
probably with trauma too is like there's
certain triggers like if you're if you
suffer from depression you have to kind
of consciously know there's going to be
triggers that will expire like force you
to spiral down and so just avoid those
triggers some people have that with diet
with food and so on and so I just don't
like whenever there's uh shitty things
happening or Shady people
unless I can help on this unless I can
do somehow hope like why why focus on it
yeah anyway uh
back to you upbringing what uh
what was the Journey of escaping that
um I well I left home like kind of early
um because my my dad and I were not
getting along by the time I was a
teenager
um but I still Christian for a while and
I lost my faith after I think I moved it
away and I started having friends that
weren't religious or like weren't raised
in the super conservative environment
that I came from and I think uh I this
was not conscious at the time this was
my hindsight story but I believe that
like being exposed to a culture in which
I had the capacity to believe like
allowed my brain to actually seriously
consider the thought that maybe all of
this stuff was untrue that I'd been
taught like six thousand year old Earth
and evolution is a lie you know macro
Evolution and all of this stuff uh
because like when you're when you're in
immersed in an environment like that I
don't think you actually have a choice
like your brain has to believe these
things because this is a survival thing
like if you believe this you'll be com
like if you believe the wrong thing
you'll be totally cast out even if
they're not gonna cast you out you're
going to be cast out in like communion
with others because we're always told
that you can't like trust non-believers
really they don't have a moral compass
they're going to screw you over and so
I'm like oh I can't beat that like
everybody's gonna Outcast me internally
yeah so anyway I wasn't I don't think I
actually had the capacity to seriously
question my faith even though I thought
that I was questioning it quite hard
until I got into an environment where it
was safe to do so and once I started
being able to make friends who were not
religious I'm like oh if I lose my faith
I'm still going to have some sort of
community
um and then at that time I went through
some questioning and then I lost my
faith and
so in that given your friends giving you
a situation you have you you now have
the freedom to think essentially or at
least the ability to think of something
that was acceptable in the new culture
yeah
without
I mean is there a danger of like
adopting the beliefs of the new culture
so like there's some aspect of just
being able to think freely which you
weren't able to do when you were growing
up just to think like look at the world
and wonder how it works that kind of
thing but I mean you rip it within
certain boundaries like there's certain
basic assumptions
and as long as you're following those
basic assumptions which is to be fair
it's like kind of what we're doing now
like we have I have I gone and done the
personal research that like evolution is
the thing that's going on have I looked
at like the age of the stones no I
haven't I'm trusting other people yeah
uh which I think is like a fair choice
to make given where I'm at right now but
you're also assuming like
there's causality in the universe time
is real yeah that like that first of all
the thing that your senses are
perceiving is real
you're assuming a lot of things
I'm aware of the assumptions you're
making like as opposed to not making
those assumptions at all like you have
to assume something and I did it's very
suspicious right that I went out of this
very conservative culture and now I well
I guess I don't believe things that are
super in line with the current culture I
think this is why I feel a little bit
safer right now because like when I was
Christian I believe generally Christian
thanks but now I believe a bunch of
things that like people really hate like
I get canceled online all the time I'm
like okay this is a sign that maybe
you're thinking independently if you're
like able to think things that are
completely at odds with the people
around you and and to be fair this is a
little bit easier to do when it's like
General culture but it's much harder to
do with your peer group like the people
that you trust your friends the people
whose opinions you respect like
disagreeing with those people is very
difficult and I'm not very good at it
yeah I do think that if you establish
yourself as a person who can be trusted
and is a good human being you have a lot
more freedom
to then explore ideas that are different
from your peer group so like those seem
like if you separate the space of ideas
versus some kind of like deeper sense of
what this person is
like that that this they're an
interesting and trustworthy and good
human being well like do
somebody that you respect to you because
they're significantly smarter than you
and can you imagine believing an idea
that you've heard them talk really
disdainfully about like how would you
feel coming to me like I believe this
thing that you find to be
yeah I do all the time oh yeah yeah you
may be braver than me
and Jamaica I support doing this like I
try to do this but I think like like
subconsciously I noticed that I'm I
don't do it as much and so I'm
suspicious of myself I'm like oh I
wonder if I'm hiding to myself like
actual curiosity about things that might
deviate from my peer group because I
noticed that I'm not actually deviating
with them as much as I do with the
outside world yeah it's a Jimmy like
because I do see most people I interact
with are smarter than me but I also have
this intuitive feeling that uh dumb
people which I consider myself being
have wisdom
so like in the disagreement actually I
also believe in the power of
conversation and in the tension of this
agreement so I think I even just
disagreeing from a place
from a good place from from a place of
like love and respect for each other I
think I just believe in that so it's not
like individuals you're disagreeing
you're like working towards arriving at
some deeper truth together right even if
the other person is is uh
is smarter maybe that's maybe that's how
I justify for myself I just I'm also a
fan of conversations because like I've
seen just listening to conversations
it seems like a great conversation more
emerges from it than the sum of its
parts right like somehow two people
together can do
like that dance of ideas can somehow
create
um create a cool thing by the way I
enjoyed I saw a video of you dancing
at a bar drunk
it wasn't the bar drunk it didn't look
drunk but just the dancing it was like
ballroom dancing type of thing I was
like yeah something like that I've been
doing a bit of Tango dancing I like it
Argentine nice I like stuff with the
body in general like uh like wrestling
or combat like usually when there's
attention you have to understand the
mechanics of how two bodies move when
they're in conflict and dancing is
it's similar like you have to do like
rapid thinking also like rapid intuitive
physical thinking and that's my favorite
kind of thing like a lot of exercise is
really boring to me because you can just
do it while your brain's off but
something like ballroom dancing or
Fusion dancing like you have to
constantly be like figuring out like
it's a rapid puzzle and that's so
beautiful what's Fusion dancing that's
the video that's the effusion dancing is
like if you have any sort of dance
background you can come and you just
kind of mix those together speaking
about people like ballet with people
doing ballroom with people doing Blues
cool and then there's an interesting
dynamic because there's I don't know
maybe you can correct me but there's uh
that's very meta there's usually a lead
in the follow
I guess most dances have that yeah yeah
and so that but both have a different
like you both have to be quite sensitive
to the other human being but in a
different way
yeah it's interesting yes so I like both
that there is that definitive role
but also
like it's not somehow that one is better
than the other there's an interesting
tension between the two yeah yeah it's
cool because it's like a basic rule set
that allows for a ton of expression I've
recently started to experience
experiment with like reverse leading
it's not like back leading it's like I
don't know like sometimes I was like
what I'm typically following I'll like
occasionally throw in a little lead here
and there but don't but don't you kind
of always oh I see but don't you hit
hint at
a