[SPEAKER_00]: So I want to give you a bit of a history of theories of suffering and I'm going to compare the Marxist theory of suffering to the Judeo-Christian theory of suffering and the reason I'm doing that is because I think the Judeo-Christian theory of suffering is actually one of the foundation stones of our entire culture and so it actually matters why you think they're suffering.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so the story that describes the entry of suffering into the world, the mythological story is the story in Genesis, the story of Adam and Eve, and basically what happens in the story about him and Eve is Adam and Eve are unconscious to begin with, and they're sort of in this paradisal state.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's no death or at least there's no knowledge of death.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's also no knowledge of self.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then Eve eats the apple that the serpent gives her, and the scales fall from her eyes, and she gives the apple to Adam and he eats it as well, so she makes himself conscious.

[SPEAKER_00]: They both wake up the first thing that happens is they realize that they're naked, and they cover themselves up.

[SPEAKER_00]: And the second thing that happens as a consequence of that realization is that they come to know the difference between good and evil.

[SPEAKER_00]: And [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, that's insanely complicated story that's dealing with a absolutely incomprehensible number of complex phenomena simultaneously, but it basically goes something like this, is that to be aware that you're naked, [SPEAKER_00]: is to be aware of your fragility and your mortality.

[SPEAKER_00]: When you have a nightmare about being naked in front of a crowd, it means that you're exposed to the crowd, all your flaws, all your mortal vulnerability is exposed to the crowd for them to see, for you to be ashamed of, for them to judge.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's partly why we're all clothed, that's partly why human being human, why clothing is a human universal.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's many human universal by the way, clothing is one of them, although it's used for many different purposes.

[SPEAKER_00]: So Adam and Eve cover themselves up, and so it's because they've realized that they're...

[SPEAKER_00]: that they're vulnerable, they're naked and vulnerable.

[SPEAKER_00]: That self-consciousness, human beings are self-conscious animals.

[SPEAKER_00]: We're really the only self-conscious animals.

[SPEAKER_00]: Other animals have the glimmerings of self-consciousness.

[SPEAKER_00]: Some of them can identify themselves in a mirror, for example.

[SPEAKER_00]: But we have whole theories of ourselves.

[SPEAKER_00]: We have whole articulated, verbal, and philosophical theories of what a human being is and what we each are as individuals.

[SPEAKER_00]: So really, those aren't in the same conceptual universe.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's a whole different, [SPEAKER_00]: It's a qualitatively different issue, in the case of human beings, where self-consciousness loads on trait neuroticism, technically speaking, which means that self-consciousness is primarily something that manifests itself in the form of negative emotion.

[SPEAKER_00]: And we all know that your own stage, you get self-conscious, is that a good thing.

[SPEAKER_00]: No, you can get so self-conscious that you're tongue-tight, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: It's not good.

[SPEAKER_00]: You don't want to be self-conscious on stage.

[SPEAKER_00]: Or maybe ever, you get self-conscious in the face of someone you're trying to impress.

[SPEAKER_00]: You turn all red, you stammer, it's like self-consciousness is a rough business.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's no wonder, because you know yourself for the fragile, fool that you are, and it's even worse than that, because it took me a long time to figure out why it was that when Adam and Eve woke up, they also developed the knowledge of good and evil.

[SPEAKER_00]: I just couldn't figure that out, because it didn't make sense to me, how self-consciousness, knowledge of vulnerability and the knowledge of good and evil were tangled together.

[SPEAKER_00]: or even really what the knowledge of good and evil meant.

[SPEAKER_00]: But I figured it out eventually, I thought, oh, I get it, I get it, it was like a real revelation to me.

[SPEAKER_00]: As soon as you know you're vulnerable, you know the difference between good and evil.

[SPEAKER_00]: Because as soon as you know you're vulnerable, then you know everyone else is.

[SPEAKER_00]: And as soon as you know that everyone else is vulnerable, you know how to hurt them.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so that means you can consciously know how to bring suffering into big.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that's the knowledge of good and evil.

[SPEAKER_00]: And you know that because let's say that you're really good at torturing people.

[SPEAKER_00]: And there's no doubt the number of people in the audience who are actually quite good at that.

[SPEAKER_00]: And maybe you all have a bit of an affinity for it.

[SPEAKER_00]: If you're married, I'm sure you're part and you're would testify to that.

[SPEAKER_00]: So.

[SPEAKER_00]: If you're going to hurt someone, what you think, essentially, is okay, what would really hurt me?

[SPEAKER_00]: And then you think, well, I'll just do that to them.

[SPEAKER_00]: And it's like, that's a good theory.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's very sophisticated.

[SPEAKER_00]: So anyways, okay, so what happens?

[SPEAKER_00]: Adam and Eve wake up.

[SPEAKER_00]: They weren't supposed to do this.

[SPEAKER_00]: God told them that they were going to be sorry if they did that.

[SPEAKER_00]: But they did it anyways, because that's what people are like.

[SPEAKER_00]: And because we always learn things that [SPEAKER_00]: that knock us out of our present paradise this right to our curious and we won't leave things alone and maybe things are not so bad and then you know ask some questions that maybe you're not so happy about asking once you find the answer and you fall out of your little paradise into history and you've got to work to set things right again and anyways God gets wind of this and any chases out of an evil to the garden of Eden.

[SPEAKER_00]: But he says some interesting things when he [SPEAKER_00]: Now you know what's the consequence of that and he says to Adam, you're going to have to work.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now that's cool, that's really cool.

[SPEAKER_00]: He has God after all, so he knows where he's talking about.

[SPEAKER_00]: He says, you're going to have to work.

[SPEAKER_00]: So why would you have to work now that you knew you were vulnerable?

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, the answer to that is, well, if you know you're vulnerable, that stretch is out into the future.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know you're going to die, you know that you're fragile.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's like, maybe all your problems are solved right now.

[SPEAKER_00]: You're all sitting here, you're safe, you're not hungry.

[SPEAKER_00]: You don't want anything to drink, et cetera.

[SPEAKER_00]: But what about tomorrow?

[SPEAKER_00]: What about next week or next month or 10 years from now?

[SPEAKER_00]: It's like just because you got all your problems solved.

[SPEAKER_00]: For this second, doesn't mean you got them solved for the rest of your iterations through time.

[SPEAKER_00]: So you've got to work, and the work is the sacrifice of the present for the future.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so that's exactly right.

[SPEAKER_00]: You have to work.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now, you see, see, what's interesting about that, and this is the theory that I was, oh, and then of course, God tells that Eve, well, you've really screwed things up too.

[SPEAKER_00]: You're going to have these big brain babies, and that's a big problem here.

[SPEAKER_00]: going to suffer in childbirth and then they're going to be dependent on you forever and because of that you're going to be dependent on this man that you just woke up and that's not going to be very pleasant for either of you, but tough luck.

[SPEAKER_00]: So that's it, that's the curse in some sense and it's exactly right, but the thing is there's a theory in there, there's an interesting theory of suffering that's implicit in that story and the theory of suffering is that suffering is built into the structure of self-conscious being.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's built right into the structure.

[SPEAKER_00]: So if you're a self-conscious being, that's your lot.

[SPEAKER_00]: It isn't someone else's fault.

[SPEAKER_00]: It isn't a consequence of sociological oppression.

[SPEAKER_00]: It isn't the consequence of the fact that our society isn't organized properly.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's just part of being.

[SPEAKER_00]: All right, so that's a big deal, because that's an important theory, because one of the questions is, well, why is there suffering or why are you going to do about it?

[SPEAKER_00]: And it's a big, it's a lot different if it's just the way it is for you.

[SPEAKER_00]: And if it's actually your fault that he's suffering.

[SPEAKER_00]: Those are, or maybe it's the group's fault that you're suffering.

[SPEAKER_00]: Those are major, those theories are really, really different.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then in the second story in Cain and Abel, [SPEAKER_00]: Cain makes sacrifices to try to get it in good with God and able makes sacrifices.

[SPEAKER_00]: And the sacrifices are kind of archaic from our perspective.

[SPEAKER_00]: They're burnt off rings so the smoke goes up where God can detect it because he's up there somewhere up there where the stars are.

[SPEAKER_00]: And God rejects Cain's sacrifices and we don't really know why, but it kind of looks like Cain is the second-grader and then God Cain goes and complains to God and says, like what kind [SPEAKER_00]: break in myself and have trying to get things together, making the proper sacrifices, and nothing's going well for me, and Abel, well, you know, he's everything he touches, turns to gold, everyone loves him.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's even a really good guy, it's like, so annoying.

[SPEAKER_00]: What's up with this place you built?

[SPEAKER_00]: And God tells Ken, don't become an intel in me that the entire fabric of reality is wrong because it isn't working out for you.

[SPEAKER_00]: says sin crouches at your door like a sexually aroused predatory cat that's basically the metaphor that that God uses and he says, and you let it in and had it and let it have its way with you.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that's really an interesting way of putting it because what God says to gain is that [SPEAKER_00]: you know you're all bitter and resentful and really it's no wonder because you know things aren't going well for you and then you've got Abel who's over shining you in every way and uh but yet it's your fault this terrible thing waited at the door and you let it in [SPEAKER_00]: and then you entered into a creative union with it and you produced something as a consequence.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that's this tormented spirit that you have now and it's polluting your relationship with reality.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that's why things aren't working so out very well for you.

[SPEAKER_00]: So go put yourself together before you come and tell me just exactly what's wrong with the structure of reality.

[SPEAKER_00]: And Cain isn't very happy about that because really it's not really what you want to hear, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: You have more misery than is necessary, because you really didn't put your act together and you know it.

[SPEAKER_00]: And you've done it creatively.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so Cain goes and kills Abel.

[SPEAKER_00]: Not's the story of how resentment enters the world.

[SPEAKER_00]: And it's the first story in the Judeo-Christian.

[SPEAKER_00]: Cannon, let's say, about actual human beings, because Adam and Eve were made by God, so they don't really count.

[SPEAKER_00]: Cain and Abel were born.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so that's something, so there's a reaction to suffering, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: The necessity of sacrifice and the consequence of the necessity of sacrifice is that some sacrifices work and others don't.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then if your sacrifices aren't met with the goodwill of God, let's say, well, then that makes you angry.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, of course it does.

[SPEAKER_00]: You can take God out of the story if you want, if you're not happy with that kind of mythological or narrative statement, but [SPEAKER_00]: doesn't really matter because the whole point is is that if you make sacrifices, especially if there's second rate, things aren't going to go very well for you and you're going to get bitter and resentful and murderous and maybe genocidal and it's really interesting, you know, because pain has descendants and if you bug, if you transgress against them, they don't just kill you, they kill seven of you and then his later descendants, kill 49 of you.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's this exponential growth of murderousness, [SPEAKER_00]: as a consequence of Cain's primary, primal fratricide and then the next story is the flood.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that's not an accident.

[SPEAKER_00]: Nothing in those stories is an accident.

[SPEAKER_00]: You have said that the humanity has become corrupt and for a person to avoid the dangers of the post-modern new Marxist ideologies and not in rule.

[SPEAKER_00]: Would you agree the same now applies to the [SPEAKER_00]: No, I wouldn't say that, um, I guess partly because I don't understand what the alternative is.

[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, first I would say that to the degree that men are just, you're unjustly upset about the way the marriage laws are set up.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I think they have reason to be concerned, especially with regards to the custody of children and the probability of paying virtually endless [SPEAKER_00]: and rectify that and so I don't think that the answer is avoiding marriage, I think the answer is political organization and pressure on the right institutions to rectify this because it needs to be rectified and I don't like the idea of telling young men to avoid permanent relationships with women because as far as I'm concerned and this is my traditional wisdom, I suppose manifesting itself [SPEAKER_00]: There aren't that many pathways through life, you know, you need a career, you need interesting things to do with your time outside of your career, interesting and meaningful things.

[SPEAKER_00]: You need a family, you need an intimate relationship to twine yourself together with someone else so that [SPEAKER_00]: Well, so that you're protected during times of crisis and able to celebrate during times of joy and and so that you set up a stable structure so that you can have children and have them feel secure and able to play.

[SPEAKER_00]: And like that's life, man.

[SPEAKER_00]: And if you miss any of that, then your life is fragmented and fractured and you're going to be hurt.

[SPEAKER_00]: And like I'm not saying that's absolutely [SPEAKER_00]: like your life just isn't in some ways that complicated.

[SPEAKER_00]: You need to bear a social weight.

[SPEAKER_00]: You need to have a family and commit yourself to that.

[SPEAKER_00]: And it's in those commitments that you find the meaning in your life.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so if you don't have them then, well, you float and you drift.

[SPEAKER_00]: And when people float drift, they usually don't float somewhere good.

[SPEAKER_00]: And they usually drift somewhere bad.

[SPEAKER_00]: So I think that there are problems with the way the marriage laws are set up.

[SPEAKER_00]: I think they're quite serious.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think I do think that they persecute men often, but I don't think the answer to that is to tell young men to avoid permanent relationships with young women at all costs because that is a very anti-life doctor and it's a cure that's worse than the disease.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's what I would say.

[SPEAKER_00]: when you deal with really serious issues, say, yeah, issues of good and evil.

[SPEAKER_00]: And you might think, well, do you deal with issues of good and evil as a clinical psychologist in the answer to that?

[SPEAKER_00]: Is in serious cases almost inevitably, so with post-traumatic stress disorder, for example, if it's a soldier who's experienced it, or for that matter, a civilian, it's not often so much because of what happened to them.

[SPEAKER_00]: although that can't happen.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's because of what they did.

[SPEAKER_00]: They see them doing something, say, on the battlefield or in normal life, that they cannot believe they did.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's so far outside of their self-concepted.

[SPEAKER_00]: It opens them up to a different dimension of reality.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I would say that dimension is the dimension of evil.

[SPEAKER_01]: Not me, meaning that they killed someone or that they made a mistake, or so that they're basically sort of turning it on themselves.

[SPEAKER_01]: And that's why.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, maybe they killed someone in a particular [SPEAKER_00]: You know, or maybe they went into my lie, you know, you remember in Vietnam where they shot up the entire village.

[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, you don't know what you'd be like on a battlefield, but you wouldn't be like you are sitting here, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: You'd be a different thing.

[SPEAKER_00]: You'd be a different creature.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I mean, one example is that, you know, men often rape in battle, but sex is very seldom a public display, although it can be in battle.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, to my way of thinking, that means there's a whole different neural circuit involved under those conditions.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's much more brutal.

[SPEAKER_00]: and you know you have a self-concept.

[SPEAKER_00]: Imagine that you're like a mid-American guy, you know, young kid basically get shipped off somewhere and do something absolutely barbaric.

[SPEAKER_00]: How do you fit that into your conception of the world?

[SPEAKER_00]: One of the things you do with people who have post-traumatic stress disorder is [SPEAKER_00]: guide them to find a philosophy of good and evil, because otherwise they can't orient themselves again in the world.

[SPEAKER_00]: So they have to become more sophisticated, and really they have to become more metaphysically sophisticated.

[SPEAKER_00]: And it's very common in my experience for [SPEAKER_00]: an encounter with malevolence.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so I would describe malevolence as the desire to hurt for the sake of the hurt, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: As an art, really.

[SPEAKER_00]: And it's often an encounter with malevolence that breaks people.

[SPEAKER_00]: I had a client at one point, I'll say she was in college.

[SPEAKER_00]: She was bullied very [SPEAKER_00]: she was so unable to cope with conceptualizing what they were doing because it was one of the madhouse throughout and she decided no and he decided he would make her life miserable and she was a naive girl which matters because you're more likely to get post-traumatic stress disorder if you're naive and the malevolence that the two displayed [SPEAKER_00]: costred to a psychotic break.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that's not so uncommon.

[SPEAKER_00]: So when you talk about serious things in psychotherapy, you end up speaking what's essentially a religious language, it's a language of the war between good and evil.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's a huge part of it.

[SPEAKER_00]: I lose my ability to think straight or intelligently in confrontational or unfriendly social situations.

[SPEAKER_00]: Any suggestions for adaptation or improvement?

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, a couple, I suppose, one is that when you get nervous in this kind of situation that you're describing, what often happens to people is they start paying attention to themselves.

[SPEAKER_00]: They get self-conscious.

[SPEAKER_00]: So, you know, let's say I got self-conscious all of a sudden during this Q&A.

[SPEAKER_00]: What would happen is that I'd start paying attention to the questions and the screen.

[SPEAKER_00]: and what I'm doing and I'd start paying attention to how I was feeling and to the nervousness and then I'd start to get aware that I was not responding properly and that would make me no more nervous and then I would get more aware of that and that can just shut me down entirely.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's happened to me now and then in an lecture and sometimes almost happened when I was talking to Sam Harris the first time.

[SPEAKER_00]: I paused for a long time and then became aware of the pause and then [SPEAKER_00]: It's not so much that you have to stop attending to yourself because if you start thinking, I should stop attending to myself, then you'll just think about yourself more.

[SPEAKER_00]: What you have to do instead is pay more attention to the situation and to the people that you're talking to.

[SPEAKER_00]: So you have to increase the degree to which you're attending outwardly.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that'll stop you from attending inwardly.

[SPEAKER_00]: that's a very effective technique.

[SPEAKER_00]: You can practice that generally speaking every time you get nervous, start paying more attention and that'll that'll that'll help you out a lot.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's really good suggestion for social anxiety and general is that if you see most people but not everyone but most people have enough implicit social skill because they were reasonably [SPEAKER_00]: socialized when they were children, so that they do know how to act in social situations, but they get anxious, and then that interferes with them, implementing what they know, just like if you're a pianist, and you get anxious in self-conscious while you're playing, you'll forget what you know, because while you've activated a different part of your brain, [SPEAKER_00]: If you can remember to pay attention and you can direct your attention outward and you attend hard enough then what will happen and try to put the other person at ease and try to ask them questions then that'll kick in the automatic because you're paying attention to what the person is doing and to their facial expressions and all of that that will [SPEAKER_00]: knowledge that you have and make things much more smooth and anxiety free.

[SPEAKER_00]: So attention really, attention really plays a huge role in regulating anxiety.

[SPEAKER_00]: I would lower tasks.

[SPEAKER_00]: I would love to hear you do a lecture series on raising children properly.

[SPEAKER_00]: Is that something you would consider?

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, in my new book, I've written a chapter on that called, don't let your children do anything that makes you dislike them.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I've laid out a bunch of, I've laid out, [SPEAKER_00]: a philosophy of care and discipline that's predicated partly on a French philosophical legal notion, which is, do not multiply rules beyond necessity.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's sort of like a legal equivalent talk, I'm a razor, and an English common law principle is [SPEAKER_00]: Which is use minimal necessary force and I think the union of those two, which is don't have too many rules But make sure that you properly enforce the ones that you do have is a good start for how you might consider your attitude with regards to raising children The other thing you have to figure out is exactly what's your aim and You know one of the aims that people have had most recently Pushed by clueless psychologists.

[SPEAKER_00]: I would say is that you want children to have high self esteem [SPEAKER_00]: And that's actually a large part, treating eroticism anyways.

[SPEAKER_00]: But, and it can be modified to some degree, Jerome Kagan has done some very interesting work on that.

[SPEAKER_00]: The best thing to do, I think the best thing to orient yourself towards with regards to children is that you're trying to make your child, your children, or help your children to be delightful in the eyes of others.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so that means they have to be reasonably well socialized, and that really takes place between the ages of two and four because what you want for your children is that when they go out into public, when they're away from you or even with you for that matter, what you want for your children is for other people to genuinely like them, because if they behave reasonably and they attend properly to adults and they know how to play with other children, then wherever they go, they're going to be, um, [SPEAKER_00]: unless they encounter someone truly malevolent, they're going to be welcomed with smiles and open arms and that's not going to be fake because almost every human being actually likes children if they're reasonably behaved.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so your job is to make your children highly socially desirable because that opens up the world to them.

[SPEAKER_00]: So there that's not a lecture series, but it's a little lecture says I'm studying to be a teacher But I'm also an introvert could this be a big problem.

[SPEAKER_00]: Can I still be a successful teacher?

[SPEAKER_00]: Actually what seems to predict success at teaching best is intelligence and conscientiousness That's the data so far.

[SPEAKER_00]: So if you're conscientious then you'll probably be fine.

[SPEAKER_00]: I mean [SPEAKER_00]: extra introverts have a harder time speaking in front of groups, but you can learn to do that, you know, an introvert can become a very successful public speaker.

[SPEAKER_00]: May not enjoy it the same way that an extrovert might, but that doesn't mean that you can't learn the skills and what I would recommend.

[SPEAKER_00]: for an introvert is the same thing that I do when I'm lecturing, as I never talk to the whole group, you know, it doesn't matter how big the crowd is, I'm always picking out individuals in the group and talking specifically to them, so I'll make a point to an individual and I watch their face and see if they're nodding and understanding, right, because that way you make contact with the entire audience, and then [SPEAKER_00]: you know, I'll talk to someone for about 15 seconds or so.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't want to put them on the spot too much.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then I shift my attention to someone else and I sort of pinpoint around the room and that keeps everybody in the room focused on what I'm saying because each person reflects the entire crowd back to you.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so I would say if you're an introvert or if you want to speak in public in general, forget about the damn crowd.

[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't exist.

[SPEAKER_00]: speak to people one at a time and an introvert can do that just fine.

[SPEAKER_00]: So, you know, that's where your strength would be and I would say you're much more likely to be unsuccessful as a teacher if you don't work hard at it and if you're not interested in it and so if you're an introvert I wouldn't worry about that.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think that that'll be the biggest problem that you'll face.

[SPEAKER_00]: And one reason with a stalker, my stalker is highly intelligent and rational, making him scarier.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm beginning to work with police and lawyers, but wondering if you have experience in this realm, not knowing the specifics of your situation, no, you can't really reason with a stalker.

[SPEAKER_00]: The stalker is already gone beyond the realm of normal social behavior, you know, and I would say with most stalkers assuming that you're dealing with a genuine article that [SPEAKER_00]: They tend to be a little bit on the paranoid side, or maybe a lot on the paranoid side.

[SPEAKER_00]: And the problem with people who are paranoid is that they have adopted a couple of axioms as absolutely fixed and there's no shifting them.

[SPEAKER_00]: So I would say, [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I hate to give advice in a situation like that, but I wouldn't say that the probability of using reason is precluded by the fact of the stalking behavior.

[SPEAKER_00]: So good luck with it.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's very scary.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's hard for people to be protected from someone who's intent on following them, and perhaps are making their life miserable.

[SPEAKER_00]: What are your thoughts on using psychedelics to help people overcome traumatic experiences?

[SPEAKER_00]: Hey.

[SPEAKER_00]: Be careful because psychedelics can cause traumatic experiences like those things are no joke, man.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think we know enough about them yet to make useful generalizations about their hypothetical clinical utility.

[SPEAKER_00]: There are some decent studies indicating with psilocybin, for example, that it might have utility in the treatment of depression.

[SPEAKER_00]: It looks like it's a really effective smoking cessation medication, which is really cool.

[SPEAKER_00]: Um, so, but I think what happened was that when the psychedelics burst onto the scene in the 1960s, they terrified us so much that, like, we all re-coiled at their very existence and then decided not to exactly try to figure out what they were.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I can understand that, man, because those things are seriously weird, like they're incomprehensibly.

[SPEAKER_00]: Strange.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think we understand them at all.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think we understand them anymore than we understand consciousness I think that they may have great therapeutic utility, but, you know, they're viciously powerful Medications and weapons and so you use the Matt your own peril something to the Carl Jung said Which I really like because he talked about psychedelic use a little bit although he was pretty old by the time the psychedelics burst on the scene You know, he said beware of unearned wisdom [SPEAKER_00]: And I really like that because even if the psychedelics can open the gates of perception and flood you momentarily with information of genuine cosmic significance, that doesn't mean that you're the sort of character.

[SPEAKER_00]: You're not the sort of vessel that can tolerate being filled with that kind of divine fluid.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, it might just break and crack you.

[SPEAKER_00]: So I would say, you know.

[SPEAKER_00]: approach those things with trepidation.

[SPEAKER_00]: You should have the same attitude towards psychedelics that the ancient Israelites had towards the Ark of the Covenant, which was that, you know, God was in there, but if you touched it accidentally, you would die.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's pretty good.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's a pretty good general attitude to have with regards to any serious encounter with psychedelics.

[SPEAKER_00]: Those things require respect.

[SPEAKER_00]: They're not toys.

[SPEAKER_00]: They're not games.

[SPEAKER_00]: They're not fun.

[SPEAKER_00]: What we don't understand what they are, but you know, they're worth treating with tremendous respect.

[SPEAKER_00]: You have any advice for someone who may be asexual?

[SPEAKER_00]: I want to have a husband and children, but I'm 27 and haven't felt a connection with anyone.

[SPEAKER_00]: I've just seen everyone as friends so far in life.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, you might want to see a sex therapist, that might help.

[SPEAKER_00]: I guess the other thing I would say is, well, you know, it might not be too bad an idea to act out what you want, perhaps in the absence of any necessary desire.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like, you know, you might be so full and so far inside yourself that it's very difficult to get out.

[SPEAKER_00]: What a sex therapist would do would be, once you were in some kind of let's say friendship that you wanted to move forward would be to have you guys practice interacting in an intimate manner stage by stage so that you could get accustomed to it, so you need to explore whether that's asexuality, as you say, or if it's fear or if it's, you know, it might be fear of rejection, it might be fear of sexuality, it might be that you're slow to warm up and introverted [SPEAKER_00]: But I think seeing a sex therapist might not be a bad idea, I mean, you know, I guess the other thing and I say this with some hesitation is that if you find someone you like, that you could be friends with, I mean, you could try initiating a romantic relationship and practice it for a couple of months and see what happens because you know, maybe you'd warm up across time.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's certainly it's certainly a possibility.