Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy

Sam Altman - How to Make an Abundant Future - [Invest Like the Best, EP.484]

The thing that I find most interesting and surprising about the current moment is that I think most people would say that the most impactful thing that's ever happened to humanity is starting to happen, and yet most people don't really believe it. They know it, but they don't believe it in their gut.

Hidden Brain

You Are Not Ordinary

Most of us go through life thinking of ourselves as ordinary. We assume that our experiences, our feelings, our struggles are common — that what happens to us happens to everyone. But this assumption, however comforting, may be costing us dearly.

Hidden Brain

You Are Not Ordinary

Most of us know, of course, that we are not actually the center of the universe. But we often act as if we are. We notice when we are the victim of rudeness, but we rarely think about all the times when other people were rude and we weren't around to experience it.

TBPN

Martin Shkreli Breaks Down the Collapse of Situational Awareness

The smart guys get in early, start buying, see the prices go up, buy some more. And then less smart guys take note and say, I want to do that. I want to be up 400% this year, too. And then but by the weakest hands are buying at the top. So they're also the first to sell. The first to panic. And it just creates this like, you know, every bubble's sort of the same. You have this euphoria, this peak, and then, you know, everyone sort of panics at once.

Hidden Brain

You Are Not Ordinary

Most of us think of our brains as recorders of experience — cameras that capture life as it is. But the brain is less like a camera and more like an editor, constantly making choices about what to include and what to cut. It doesn't just record what happens to us; it constructs a version of reality shaped by our expectations, our desires, and our fears.

Hidden Brain

You Are Not Ordinary

Most of us can point to experiences that made us who we are — a teacher who believed in us, a parent who didn't, a move to a new city that forced us to reinvent ourselves. But psychologists have found that we dramatically underestimate how much we will change in the future, even as we readily acknowledge how much we've changed in the past.

Hidden Brain

You Are Not Ordinary

Most of us recognize that we were shaped by the circumstances of our births. But we rarely consider that all the people who matter to us were also shaped by their circumstances. We assume the people in our lives have freely chosen their values, beliefs, and behaviors, when in fact all of these were shaped by their experiences and the brains they happened to be born with.

Hidden Brain

You Are Not Ordinary

Most of us have encountered the idea of the bell curve. Average is the most common outcome. Very good or very bad outcomes are rarer. Extremely good or extremely bad outcomes are rarest of all. But Yadin Dudai says our emotional memories don't follow a bell curve — instead, they skew toward the extremes.

Hidden Brain

You Are Not Ordinary

Most of us recognize that we're shaped by our upbringing and our culture. But researchers who study self-awareness say there's something even more fundamental at work: our failure to realize how different we are from other people. We think everyone sees the world the way we do — that our reactions, our values, our fears, and our hopes are simply the normal human response to life.

Hidden Brain

You Are Not Ordinary

Most of us intuitively feel that our inner experiences are beyond the reach of others. But psychologists have found that when we actually test this idea, our emotions, thoughts, and feelings are often far more transparent to others than we imagine — and that other people's inner lives are far more similar to our own than we tend to assume.

Hidden Brain

You Are Not Ordinary

Most of us have been taught to think about luck as a minor factor in success — just a small boost that helps certain people get ahead. But psychologist Scott Barry Kaufman says this view misses something profound: many of the things we consider to be signs of talent or hard work are themselves the product of circumstances beyond our control.

Hidden Brain

You Are Not Ordinary

Most of us know that we're biased when it comes to our own performance — we tend to think we're better than we actually are. But here's the strange part: this bias doesn't just affect how we see ourselves. It also affects how we see other people. When we watch someone else do something, we unconsciously compare them to ourselves — and since we think we're pretty good, we use ourselves as the benchmark.

The Prof G Pod

The Simple Math That Tells You When You're Rich Enough | Office Hours

Having like a scarcity mindset where you're constantly worried about not having enough even when you objectively have enough is just depriving yourself of things you could spend money on to enjoy. Again, whether it's material things experiences relationships and like the the things that you can spend that money on that you will enjoy are just going to change a lot. Like the thing you'll enjoy at 25 is different from 35 or 45 or whatever.

Hidden Brain

You Are Not Ordinary

Most of us intuitively feel that we are above average in a variety of ways. We think we're smarter than average, more competent than average, more ethical than average. Psychologists have documented that people's assessments of themselves are, to put it charitably, often not well-calibrated.

Hidden Brain

You Are Not Ordinary

Most of us intuitively understand that extreme talent is rare. But psychologist Adam Galinsky says we fail to appreciate just how rare — and how different our lives might have been had we been born at a different time, or in a different place, or to different parents. We dramatically underestimate the role of circumstance in shaping who we are and what we achieve.

Hidden Brain

How to Combat Pain

Pain researchers have found that the experience of pain is heavily shaped by context, expectation, and meaning. The same injury can feel devastating in one situation and barely noticeable in another — soldiers wounded in battle, for instance, often report feeling little pain at the moment of injury, because the wound means they will be evacuated from the front lines.

Hidden Brain

How to Combat Pain

Pain depends not just on the signals traveling from the body to the brain, but also on what the brain expects to feel. When the brain anticipates pain, it can amplify those signals — and when it doesn't, the very same injury can feel far less intense.

Book of the Day

In 'The Great Wherever' and 'Country People,' city dwellers try out rural life

There's no singular truest version of any family story. Every version comes with misremembering and projections and savory flourishes.

Hidden Brain

How to Combat Pain

Pain is not just a signal from the body — it's an experience constructed by the brain. And that means our thoughts, emotions, and expectations can powerfully shape how much pain we feel. In some cases, simply understanding that pain is not always a reliable indicator of tissue damage can itself reduce suffering.

TED

The Case for Making Art in a Crisis | Yiyun Kang | TED

We can feel a paper cut, but we cannot feel a collapsing planet. We're drowning in information but starving for meaning. The chain of understanding is broken, leaving our crisis so cold and abstract.

Hidden Brain

How to Combat Pain

The problem is that we think of pain as something that just happens to us — a signal from the body that something is wrong. But the truth is more interesting. The brain is constantly making predictions about what it expects to feel, and those predictions shape what we actually experience.

Hidden Brain

How to Combat Pain

Pain is not just a signal from damaged tissue — it's also a prediction. The brain is constantly trying to anticipate what's going to happen next, and pain is part of that predictive process. This means that pain can exist even in the absence of injury, and injury can exist without pain.

Hidden Brain

How to Combat Pain

Pain is not just a sensation — it's an experience. And that experience is profoundly shaped by what we believe about our pain, what we think is causing it, and how we feel about it emotionally.

Hidden Brain

How to Combat Pain

Pain is not just a physical sensation — it's also a psychological experience. And that means that the way we think about pain, the way we attend to it, the way we catastrophize about it or don't, can have a huge effect on how much we suffer.

TED

The Case for Making Art in a Crisis | Yiyun Kang | TED

We can feel a paper cut, but we cannot feel a collapsing planet. We have more data than any generation in history, yet reality feels further away. We're drowning in information but starving for meaning.

Hidden Brain

Changing Our Mental Maps

We often think of prejudice as a moral failing — a character flaw in people who are just bad actors. But research suggests that's not the whole story. Our minds rely on mental maps — generalizations about the world — that can lead us to make assumptions about people based on group membership, even when we genuinely believe we treat everyone as individuals.

Hidden Brain

Changing Our Mental Maps

Most of us assume that our perception of the world is accurate — that we see things as they really are. But our brains are not cameras. They are prediction machines, constantly generating models of reality based on past experience, and then updating those models when new information arrives.

Hidden Brain

Changing Our Mental Maps

We all have mental maps — representations of how we see ourselves and the world. But the amazing thing is, many of us use mental maps that were drawn up a long time ago, in a completely different context. And we continue to use them, even when the world changes, and even when we change.

Hidden Brain

Changing Our Mental Maps

Most of us recognize that we don't always act in our own best interests. We procrastinate. We reach for the candy bar instead of the apple. We say things we later regret. Psychologists have long recognized that our behavior is shaped by mental maps — internal representations of the world that guide our actions, often without our awareness.

Freakonomics Radio

Are You Really Allergic to Penicillin? (Update)

Like tens of millions of people, Stephen Dubner thought he had a penicillin allergy. Like the vast majority, he didn't. This misdiagnosis costs billions of dollars and causes serious health problems, so why hasn't it been fixed?

Hidden Brain

Changing Our Mental Maps

We don't see the world as it is. We see the world through mental maps that we've constructed over a lifetime of experience. And the problem with mental maps is that they can become outdated — they can lead us astray in a world that has changed, or in situations that are different from those in which the maps were formed.

Hidden Brain

Changing Our Mental Maps

Most of us know that stereotypes are wrong, but we may not fully appreciate how deeply those stereotypes shape our interactions with people every day. Psychologists have a term for this. They call it a mental map — an internal model of the world that guides how we navigate our relationships and institutions.

Hidden Brain

Changing Our Mental Maps

Most people assume that if you change your mind about something — if you update your beliefs — you've essentially gotten rid of the old belief and replaced it with a new one. But that's not how the mind works. The old belief doesn't disappear; it gets inhibited, suppressed. And when you're under stress, or tired, or distracted, that inhibition can fail, and the old belief comes roaring back.

Hidden Brain

Changing Our Mental Maps

our brains actually navigate the world by coming up with mental maps. These maps act like an autopilot system, allowing us to navigate our lives more efficiently. But sometimes, they can lead us astray, leaving us stuck on a path of negativity and unhappiness.

Daily Stoic

6 Stoic Rules To Beat Ego

Because you don't want to look stupid, you'll stay stupid or because you don't want to ask for help, you don't get help. Uh or you don't want to look like you want it too badly, so you don't get it.

Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy

John Kim - How to Raise a Few Billion Dollars - [Invest Like the Best, EP.482]

The thing that makes a great investor is this idea that they're able to hold conflicting ideas simultaneously. They can be a bull and a bear on the same company. They can be optimistic and pessimistic at the same time. And they're able to weigh those things and come to a conclusion that they can act on.

Hidden Brain

Changing Our Mental Maps

When we think about making changes in our lives, we typically focus on behaviors. But often, the more powerful lever is the mental map we're using to navigate the world. If the map is wrong, no amount of effort will get us to our destination.

Hidden Brain

Changing Our Mental Maps

We often think of our beliefs and mental models as reflections of reality — accurate maps of the world that help us navigate our lives. But what happens when the map is wrong? What happens when the map itself is the problem?

Hidden Brain

Changing Our Mental Maps

We all walk around with mental maps of how the world works — maps that tell us what's safe and what's dangerous, what's possible and what's not. The problem is that these maps were often drawn a long time ago, in circumstances that no longer exist. And we keep using old maps to navigate new terrain.

TED

The Unexpected Wonders of My Son’s Short Life | James G. Robinson | TED

Forget that anything ever goes wrong. How incredible is it that anything ever goes right?

Hidden Brain

Changing Our Mental Maps

These maps act like an autopilot system, allowing us to navigate our lives more efficiently. But sometimes, they can lead us astray, leaving us stuck on a path of negativity and unhappiness.

Idea Knock Down

How Algorithms Manipulate You (and How to Fight Back) | Idea Knock Down | TED

We're basically unleashing the most powerful predictive persuasive algorithms in the history of the world on brains that aren't fully developed yet. When these lawsuits go forward and we get discovery from tech companies, they know that these are problems and then they're doing it anyway.

Idea Knock Down

How Algorithms Manipulate You (and How to Fight Back) | Idea Knock Down | TED

We're basically unleashing the most powerful predictive persuasive algorithms in the history of the world on brains that aren't fully developed yet. Yeah, there's been these like exponential rises in anxiety, depression. Um, you know, young women and girls have fallen off a cliff almost with the rise of social media.

Hidden Brain

Waking Up Your Spiritual Brain: Part 1

People who have more of these experiences tend to be happier and healthier. They feel a stronger sense of connection to others. They find it easier to cope with adversity. And yet our culture often treats these experiences as suspect — as signs of irrationality or self-deception.

EconTalk

Do Less, Heal More: The Case for Medical Conservatism (with John Mandrola)

financial incentives, professional identity, and language itself ("bone-on-bone," "the widowmaker") conspire to push patients toward interventions that can do more harm than good.

Life Kit

To be or not to be a parent

The word decide comes from a Latin root meaning to cut away from. So every decision involves loss. So what I say is don't ask will I regret my decision. Ask which decision will I regret least.

TED Radio Hour

Are we using screens as a scapegoat for teen mental health?

the stories that you and I are told repeatedly every day about teenagers today, that they are lost, that they are worse off than ever, that somehow smartphones and social media have destroyed them and their brains, it doesn't match the data. And it doesn't match what they tell us. There is a massive gap.

Hidden Brain

A Secret Source of Connection

Most people think that small talk is a waste of time, a polite but ultimately hollow ritual. But when researchers have studied what happens when strangers actually talk to each other, they've found something surprising: people consistently underestimate how much they will enjoy talking with others, and how much others will enjoy talking with them.

EconTalk

Do Less, Heal More: The Case for Medical Conservatism (with John Mandrola)

Mandrola argues that financial incentives, professional identity, and language itself ("bone-on-bone," "the widowmaker") conspire to push patients toward interventions that can do more harm than good.