XaiJu
Decoding The Gurus
Decoding The Gurus

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Upcoming Episodes & Interviews

Hey everyone,

Matt and I have been a bit snowed under with work and various commitments so sorry for the lack of updates. We have not been slacking however so let me bring you up to date with our plans for the next month or two.

Guru episode wise we are planning the following:

1. O'Fallon & Lindsay Part 2 with Aaron Rabinowitz: Anti-Woke & Right Wing Conspir-o-rama

2. Jordan Hall & David Fuller* (Rebel Wisdom): On Gurus, Sensemakers, & Neo-nazis

3. Brené Brown (Psychology): Self-Help Series Pt 1 (with mystery guest host!)

4. Mikhaila Peterson (Alternative Diets & Pseudoscience): Self-Help Series Pt 2

5. Sam Harris (Spirituality, Meditation & Self Help): Self-Help Series Pt 3 (with mystery guest host!)

*Given past interactions with David it is possible he may be the first person covered to ask for a right to respond and if so we will have a discussion with him about our criticism.

Interview wise we have the following planned but not scheduled:

1. Annie Kelly (sociologist & podcaster) on Anti-Vaxx movements and past pandemics based on her new podcast series  Vaccine The Human Story

2. Stuart Neil (Virology Professor) on disinformation in Covid era, the good/the bad of online engagement on controversial topics, & the lab leak, specifically how it’s been treated by researchers/the public.

3. Julian Walker (Podcaster) on the evolution of the IDW, conspirituality, and the history of culture wars.

4. Stuart Ritchie (Author & Researcher) on bad science, covid disinformation, and mainstream gurus.

We *DO* want to get to Jimmy Dore & Slavoj Zizek (& possibly Naval Ravikant) so they may be slotted in at some point but at present we plan to follow the schedule above.

Hope that all sounds good but feel free to leave suggestions or other feedback in the comments below.

Oh also... 

We will appear on Robert Wright's podcast later in September and Chris *may* participate in a debate with Yuri Deigin regarding the lab leak community on Rebel Wisdom. Not sure yet...

Upcoming Episodes & Interviews

Comments

Definite parallels but not sure if it represents influence or convergent evolution.

Christopher Kavanagh

Re: Anthony de Mello ep. As a guy with no expertise in psychology, I once read a book on Adlerian psychology and I thought I recognized some influence there. Could it be?

david brown

Good illustration of how much we know about her work currently.

Christopher Kavanagh

Brene Brown is a social worker— not a psychologist

JGraves

My grad school curriculum included a bit about “how to avoid burnout in helping professions”, in which we read something from Brené Brown. She advocates for setting boundaries while serving others because self-care improves the quality of help one can provide. Pretty basic stuff, but I’m curious if she takes this “self first” idea and runs with it to the unfortunate extent that we see in new age spirituality. Looking forward to the decoding!

Carolyn Reeves

I’m so excited for the David Fuller one. I have enjoyed some Rebel Wisdom episodes, but still can’t get over the JP love though. I always get so irritated by the sensemaking thing being overused so looking forward to what you have to say. I thought after the whole ivermectin/dark horse realisations he might realise that the people that do the best sensemaking on certain topics like medicine are the ones that are qualified to evaluate the information to make sense of it. Feels like sometimes they put a lot of words and a energy into sensemaking when for those that already have knowledge within those areas it’s a bit so what.

Laura Reinger

I also think you should debate, I think you've got a great way of cutting to the point without sounding arrogant or dismissive so it will provide a good voice in the mix of misinformation.

YellowDreams

This all sounds amazing. Can't wait!

Rebecca Christiansen

This is great content. I think that if Chris debates Yuri the focus should not be on why the lab leak hypothesis is possible (it is). The debate should be "Is the lab leak hypothesis the most likely explanation". Even then, it's hard to debate how likely someone is, maybe it could also involve some aspects of which experts to trust.

MaxPlan

That discussion with David and Jordan will be a really interesting one to look at. The original interview of Jordan’s didn’t give me much insight into the views of the guy he was interviewing- Brandon was if? And I will be fascinated to see how Brene scores on the gurometer and what you make of her… I have my own views, but will keep those to myself for now- and see if anything I hear challenges them. Interesting…… I’m looking forward to it.

Christine Jenkins

Also we know nothing about Brene Brown but she’s been recommended by a bunch of people so 🤷🏻‍♂️. We will find out!

Christopher Kavanagh

We are covering a specific conversation they have about the Propertarians, I think it’s got a lot of relevant points in it and also might highlight some of the limits with the ‘sensemaking’ approach. I do think David is mostly on the right side in that discussion though (for a spoiler).

Christopher Kavanagh

I am looking forward to these. I really got a lot from Brene Brown’s work a few years ago and will be interested to hear your analysis of her work. It’s good self reflection to see how open I am to hearing the analysis of people I admire. As an active member of Rebel Wisdom, I’ll also look forward to the episodes looking at David Fuller and Jordan Hall. I hope David will be able to join you to discuss your opinions- I’ve really enjoyed listening to him and Chrius’ discussions in the past as they wrestle with things they have different views on.

Christine Jenkins

So glad you are doing Brené Brown. I find her vacuous (but harmless) but have questioned this as everyone else seems to adore her.

Charlotte Goodall

Sounds good. And I will say that even on making sense I've been increasingly annoyed with his coziness with tech 1percenters. But I still think he's overall a good actor. Looking forward to your coverage on any of it!

Ian Boese

We've got plans to cover Sam's other content but we thought this would be a good follow up to our special episode since he is active in this space.

Christopher Kavanagh

My only comment, as a sam harris sympathizer (in general, with many issues on particulars), is that i think it would be good if you don't just focus on the self-help/meditation stuff, as that really hasn't been the focus of "making sense", which I think is his primary medium for getting his thoughts out. Meditation/self help is mostly for the already converted (why it's relevant and I have issues with it so I'm glad you'll cover it). I know you guys will be fair, but I still just wanted to say. Otherwise, looking forward to all this, thanks guys :)

Ian Boese

💫💫💫

Agnieszka Z


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