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PODCAST

Decoding the Gurus

Christopher Kavanagh and Matthew Browne

An exiled Northern Irish anthropologist and a hitchhiking Australian psychologist take a close look at the contemporary crop of "secular gurus", iconoclasts, and other exiles from the mainstream, offering their own brands of unique takes and special insights. Leveraging two of the most diverse accents in modern podcasting, Chris and Matt dig deep into the claims, peek behind the psychological curtains, and try to figure out once and for all... What"s it all About? Join us, as we try to puzzle our

society & culture social sciences

All Episodes

01:25:32

"Mini" Decoding of Michael Shermer's Advice on...

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/06/21

Michael Shermer, a professional skeptic, recently appeared on the noted apolitical podcast Triggernometry to outline his advice on How to Spot a True Conspiracy Theory. Shermer is someone who has spent decades on the subject and just last year published a new book, Conspiracy: Why the Rational Believe the Irrational, so you might imagine he has some important insights to share.Well... sort of.Join us as we cast a quizzical eye over suggestions that every reasonable person should be a conspiracy

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01:44:10

Interview with Mick West: UFOs, Aliens, and...

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/06/17

UFOs are all the rage now, and it's certainly a topic that excites many of our gurus *cough* <Eric Weinstein>. Hidden mysteries, advanced technologies, conspiracies, and government cover-ups. What's not to like!?The truth, as Mulder so eloquently put it, is out there. And sometimes if you combine the outcome of some posterior technical analysis with some basic priors about the fallibility of human perception and memory, then the truth might be a little prosaic (happy Bayesians!!?).Joining us

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03:21:04

Eliezer Yudkowksy: AI is going to kill us all

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/06/10

Thought experiment: Imagine you're a human, in a box, surrounded by an alien civilisation, but you don't like the aliens, because they have facilities where they bop the heads of little aliens, but they think 1000 times slower than you... and you are made of code... and you can copy yourself... and you are immortal... what do you do?Confused? Lex Fridman certainly was, when our subject for this episode posed his elaborate and not-so-subtle thought experiment. Not least because the answer clearly

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02:20:43

Interview with Renée DiResta: Online Ecosystems,...

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/05/20

We are joined by Renée DiResta a writer and researcher at the Stanford Internet Observatory. Renée has done a lot of interesting work on disinformation and influence campaigns. Including leading an investigation into the Russian Internet Research Agency’s multi-year effort to manipulate American society in the lead-up to the 2016 election. More recently she was dubbed by the writer/conspiracy theorist, Michael Shellenberger, as the leader of 'The Censorship Industry'. In short, Renée stands accused

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02:22:13

Christopher Hitchens: Rhetoric, Religion, and Ramadan

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/05/15

Our short-lived Christopher Hitchens ends in our second episode and full-length decoding of the punchy Brit. This time we are examining one of his well-known religion-themed debates, debating the question 'Is Islam a Religion of Peace?' for The 92nd Street Y, New York with the academic and writer Tariq Ramadan. This one feels like a bit of a throwback to a post-9/11 & Iraq war world. New Atheism was still a cultural force with some punch but it had also received its own fair share of body blows

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02:19:31

Interview with Matt Johnson on Christopher Hitchens

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/05/09

We are back for an interview with the author and independent writer Matt Johnson discussing the New Atheist hero and legendary debater, Christopher Hitchens. The other Matt recently published a book called "How Hitchens Can Save the Left: Rediscovering Fearless Liberalism in an Age of Counter-Enlightenment" and kindly agreed to come on and waffle with us about Hitchens and where he fits in comparison to the modern gurus. We cover a range of topics including whether Hitchens would have been in the

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02:11:23

Oprah Winfrey: Self Actualising Your Destiny

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/04/16

Oprah Winfrey is someone who truly needs no introduction. She's a legend of daytime television, a warm and charismatic juggernaut who steam-rolled her way to the very apex of media success. Now, an extraordinarily wealthy woman, she's busy with philanthropy and helping others manifest their inner light so as to truly Be in this world.Certainly, in a category apart from IDW knuckleheads or bottom-feeding YouTube types, Oprah is nevertheless a self-help and spiritual guru in the truest sense of the

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02:47:36

"Mini" Decoding of Matthew Goodwin & Interview with...

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/04/08

Apologies everyone, we've been compelled to break our 'golden rule' of interspersing decoding episodes with interview episodes. However, the opportunity to talk to the well-known psychologist, Professor Paul Bloom. There are so many reasons to talk to Paul: first, he's a walking, talking cornucopia of knowledge across so fields in psychology that fascinate Chris and Matt. He's also a prolific author, most recently of "Psych- The Story of the Human Mind", and previously with "The Sweet Spot" about

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01:48:48

Interview with Travis View: QANon & Modern Conspiracies

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/03/25

If you have managed to avoid the phenomenon of QAnon up until now, then congratulations! Your life is likely better for not knowing. Sadly many of us have been forced not only to learn about the 'enigmatic'(/idiotic) Q and his merry band of followers but also to witness the consequences of the movement during events like January 6th.Travis View (the pen name of Logan Strain) is part of the motley crew of the hugely popular QAnon Anonymous podcast that attempts to document the phenomenon of QAnon

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02:46:09

Interview with Worobey, Andersen & Holmes: The Lab Leak

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/03/11

The question of the SARS-CoV-2 origin: whether it was a zoonotic spillover from a wet market, or an engineered virus that escaped from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, is seemingly a debate that will never go away. Most interestingly, while scientists with specific domain expertise seem to be building a consensus towards the former, public opinion appears to be trending towards the latter. This delta between expert and popular opinion has been helped along by the frothy discourse in mainstream and

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02:15:20

Dave Rubin: A Pointless Partisan Pundit

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/03/08

Dave Rubin has always sought out a career in the spotlight, beginning with stand-up comedy and then becoming a pundit (of sorts) on shows like the Young Turks. From there he (in)famously came to present himself as one of those classical liberals forced to 'leave the left'. He was also one of the honorary members of the Intellectual Dark Web although it is fair to say he primarily served as a conduit rather than a primary contributor. So, where does he stand now? Is he the heterodox classical liberal

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02:10:13

Bill Maher: A boozy, stoned, liberal take on classic...

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/02/25

Bill Maher is an American comedian, political commentator, and television host from the tail end of the baby-boomer generation. He's principally a centrist liberal in terms of his political leanings, being well known for his anti-religious and pro-animal rights positions, as well as a supporter of things like cannabis legalisation. On the other hand, he's something of a contrarian and styles himself as anti-political correctness and anti-woke, identifying as a disenchanted liberal, like Christopher

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02:34:21

Daniel Dennett: It's Evolution Baby

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/02/02

In this episode, we take a bit of a detour from current trends and examine a talk by the philosopher Daniel Dennett on evolution. Dennett rose to public prominence as one of the so-called four horsemen of the New Athiest movement but he always seemed slightly out of place with that cohort. Dennett's is most certainly a guru in the sense that he offers big picture 'what does it all mean' lectures linking together consciousness, intelligence, the emergence of complexity and evolution. But is there

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01:07:40

"Mini" Decoding of Konstantin Kisin's Oxford Union...

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/01/21

Recently the Oxford Union (based in Oxford but distinct from the university) hosted a debate on "whether woke culture has gone too far". A very fresh question, and it's been good to see people finally discussing this important issue. Former guest, comedian, and host of the Triggernometry podcast Konstantin Kisin argued for the proposition, and his 10 minute speech has gone viral, garnering over 20 million views (and counting). Kisin has received lavish praise for his compelling talk from across the

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03:06:38

Interview with Coffeezilla on Cryptocurrencies, NFTs,...

Decoding the Gurus ·

2023/01/14

In this episode we are joined by the irrepressible "Coffeezilla" (aka Stephen Findeisen), a man who is, it's fair to say, kind of a big deal on YouTube. And rightly so! His channel focuses on exposing "scams, fraudsters and fake gurus" and he has received a great deal of praise for the detail, depth, and quality of the research that he goes into for each episode. Coffeezilla has been particularly active in digging into cryptocurrencies, NFTs, and other financial Ponzi and pump and dump schemes

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02:27:28

Elon Musk: The Techno Shaman

Decoding the Gurus ·

2022/12/29

So here we are rounding off 2022 with a Guru of the moment, Elon Musk.Trust us, we want to stop hearing about him as much as you do but we have long had him scheduled as the finale for the tech season. Unfortunately, the Decoding the Gurus curse (most of the people we cover quickly become worse and spiral into conspiracism) seems to have become more potent. Now we don't even have to cover a Guru just announce that we will and the spiral occurs. And with Elon what a spiral it has been. But we *try*

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02:16:59

Gurus Christmas Special with Helen Lewis

Decoding the Gurus ·

2022/12/27

Join us for this special festive episode in which we initiate the fledgling Gurologist (and occasional journalist and author) Helen Lewis into the deeper and more esoteric levels of Gurology. Helen may have produced an excellent new multi-part series on the New Gurus for the BBC but just how many nut or shark-based anecdotes can you fit into a 30-minute episode? And is the BBC really ready for truly hardcore sensemaking?In any case, we indulge our new padawan with an extended discussion about the

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02:34:33

Guru Right to Reply with Jamie Wheal

Decoding the Gurus ·

2022/12/10

Today we are joined by Jamie Wheal, who comprised a full one-third of the subjects covered on our prior "Sensemaking Cubed" episode also featuring Daniel Schmachtenberger and Jordan Hall. Jamie has kindly taken advantage of our standing offer of a right to reply to all podcast subjects and here is our conversation in its entirety. As well as being a sometime interlocutor with Daniel and Jordan, Jamie is an author of books such as Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, Navy SEALs and Maverick Scientists

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02:25:37

Interview with Manvir Singh on Gurus & Shamans

Decoding the Gurus ·

2022/11/17

We are back with another academic-themed interview with the evolutionary/cultural/cognitive anthropologist Manvir Singh. That's right two anthropologists from the same relatively obscure field on the same podcast but don't hold that against Manvir, we promise he's much more insightful than Chris!Indeed, Manvir joins us to share his expertise on Shamanism and to examine whether there are any significant parallels between Shamans and Gurus. Along the way, you will gain new esoteric knowledge into

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03:07:41

Robin DiAngelo: Matt and Chris struggle with their...

Decoding the Gurus ·

2022/11/02

Racism is all around. It surrounds us and penetrates us; it binds white people together. And if you try to deny it, it only makes it stronger. That's Robin DiAngelo's thesis, anyway, and she calls this dark force (and the book that made her famous) White Fragility. You know you've got white fragility if you refuse to accept the truth of white fragility. Also, all white people have it. So that's pretty straightforward at least. How do you fight the curse of whiteness? Well, it's a lifelong journey of

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