The Weekly Circle #8
Welcome to the Eighth episode of The Weekly Circle! A free Circles in Time newsletter released every Sunday.
Hey everybody,
It has been an interesting few weeks for the field of applied behavioural science.
One announcement that got a lot of attention was the launch of the Global Association of Applied Behavioural Scientists (GAABS). Although I was hesitant of the initiative given its close ties to one particular university, upon talking with some of the founding members this week, I’m confident they can create something that speaks objectively and independently for the field. With thought and care, this industry body could become a pivotal part of the future of applied behavioural science.
If you’re an applied behavioural researcher or practitioner, you can apply to join here. There is also a helpful conversation between the founding members on Nick Hobson’s podcast, which you can access here.
In addition to GAABS, there are also several collectives, online communities and gatherings that have emerged recently. The ones I am most excited about include a professional collective called Diversifi, A slack group called The Behaviour Slack and online meetup run by the Sydney Behavioural Economics Network.
I’m busy writing a long piece on this digital community trend as it relates to applied behavioural science, and some of my personal reflections on the space too. I’ll share that essay here in the near future.
The Circles in Time Online Programme
I’m entering week four with my third cohort of the Circles in Time online programme. The participants now all have a clear sense of the narrowly defined behaviour-based goals they are trying to achieve and a personal system comprising of evidence-based tools, tactics and techniques, for achieving those goals.
After refining their system flows, tinkering with their tactics and working out the kinks, they will put their white lab coats on, and start designing a personal experiment to test their systems on themselves. This dance, between being the subject and the experimenter, is perhaps the most unique learning experience that the programme exposes the participants to. It’s also a real penny-drop moment for many, regarding the real potential that self-applied behavioural science has to offer.
WORLD VIEWS
Here are the ideas I’ve been circling around this week.
THE WORLD AROUND US
Defence Against the Dark Arts
The Social Dilemma arrived on Netflix this week. As a longtime supporter of Tristan Harris’s work, I was aware of his key ideas. Still, it was nice to see such a clear and coherent summary, with so many credible voices from the tech community speaking out against the dark world that the social media giants are creating for us.
One of the most important messages for me was around the ethics of technology. Technology is often framed as a tool, and therefore neither good nor bad. Instead, the ‘goodness’ or ‘badness’ comes in how the tool is used. The documentary did well to argue that social media isn’t actually a technological tool. It is something else entirely. To share a quote:
“Social media isn’t a tool that’s just waiting to be used. It has its own goals, and it has its own means of pursuing them.”
There is maybe a tool there, but because there is an agenda (more attention, more ads, more money), we cannot define social media as a technological tool. Rather than a tool, a better metaphor would be to see social media as a highly addictive drug, that simultaneously conditions, compares and creates a craving for more.
Here are some of the other messages from the documentary that stood out for me:
“Facebook figured out that they were able to defect real-world behaviours and emotions without triggering the user’s awareness. Users are completely clueless.”
“If you are not paying for the product, you are the product. Your attention is the product that is being sold to advertisers.”
“If you want to control the population of the country, there is never been a tool as effective as Facebook.”
“Social media is a marketplace that trades exclusively in human futures.”
For those you haven’t seen the Social Dilemma yet, you can watch the documentary trailer here:
Watching the documentary also reminded me of two powerful pieces of content.
The first is this animated snipped from a conversation between Joe Rogan and Naval Ravikant on what Naval calls ‘The Modern Struggle’.
The second is the incredible collection of illustrations by artists, Marco Melgrati and Paweł Kuczyński.
THE WORLD BETWEEN US
The Art of Conversation
In putting together a new podcast, I have been thinking a lot about communication and the art of good conversation. What makes for an interesting conversation? How do I let my guests enjoy themselves? And share their ideas in ways they will be happy with? How do I strike a balance between structure and spontaneous immersion down unexpected rabbit holes? Should the topics be personal, or more abstract and generalisable?
To help, I decided to turn to some of the great experts on the subject to learn more about this timeless art. Someone who stood out to me was Arthur Martine, who’s thinking is nicely dissected by the Brainpickings rockstar, Maria Popova, in a post she wrote a few years ago.
Here are six of my favourite pieces of advice from Martine, on the art of good conversation:
Know when not to speak - “The power of preserving silence is the very first requisite to all who wish to shine, or even please in discourse; and those who cannot preserve it, have really no business to speak. … The silence that, without any deferential air, listens with polite attention, is more flattering than compliments, and more frequently broken for the purpose of encouraging others to speak, than to display the listener’s own powers. This is the really eloquent silence. It requires great genius—more perhaps than speaking—and few are gifted with the talent.”
Mind the rudeness of laconic response - “Never give short or sharp answers in ordinary conversation, unless you aspire to gain distinction by mere rudeness; for they have in fact no merit, and are only uncivil. “I do not know,” “I cannot tell,” are the most harmless words possible, and may yet be rendered very offensive by the tone and manner in which they are pronounced.”
Don’t be a self-righteous contrarian - “Leave quibbling of every kind to lawyers pleading at the bar for the life of a culprit; in society and conversation it is invariably out of place, unless when Laughter is going his merry round. At all other times it is a proof of bad breeding.”
Leave your conversing partner pleased - “The great charm of conversation consists less in the display of one’s own wit and intelligence, than in the power to draw forth the resources of others; he who leaves you after a long conversation, pleased with himself and the part he has taken in the discourse, will be your warmest admirer. Men do not care to admire you, they wish you to be pleased with them; they do not seek for instruction or even amusement from your discourse, but they do wish you to be made acquainted with their talents and powers of conversation; and the true man of genius will delicately make all who come in contact with him feel the exquisite satisfaction of knowing that they have appeared to advantage.”
Aim to create cheerfulness - “Cheerfulness, unaffected cheerfulness, a sincere desire to please and be pleased, unchecked by any efforts to shine, are the qualities you must bring with you into society, if you wish to succeed in conversation. … a light and airy equanimity of temper,—that spirit which never rises to boisterousness, and never sinks to immovable dullness; that moves gracefully from “grave to gay, from serious to serene,” and by mere manner gives proof of a feeling heart and generous mind.
Practice genuine humility - “Nothing is more nauseous than apparent self-sufficiency. For it shows the company two things, which are extremely disagreeable: that you have a high opinion of yourself, and that you have comparatively a mean opinion of them.”
THE WORLD WITHIN US
The Quantified Self
The science-fiction author, William Gibson, famously said that “the future is already here – it's just not evenly distributed.”
My sense is that Benjamin Richardson is part of that unevenly distributed future. Perhaps as a result of necessity and urgency, Benjamin has taken the idea of the quantified self to a weirdly impressive level.
Where others are getting to grips with measuring their resting heart rate and the blood glucose levels, Benjamin as forged on, carving out a path. A path towards what physiological health tracking and self-experimentation may start looking like in the years to come.
Here is an example of one of his tracking protocols for a recent quantified self-experiment he ran to understand the effects of a fast mimicking diet.
His experimental procedure included fives steps:
Select the potential outcomes / impacts that mattered to me
Figure out how to measure those outcomes
Plan out the food I would eat on the diet
Conduct the diet and track the measurements
Evaluate the outcomes
Upon completing these fives steps, he would make a data-driven decision about whether the fast mimicking diet was something he wanted to integrate into his everyday life.
What’s more, he has made all of his data publically available online, as well as his reflections and the decisions he made going forward.
Is this the future of consumer health technology? As it gets easier to measure ourselves both behaviorally and physiologically, and the correlates with healthspan, disability and mortality become apparent, I don’t see why it wouldn’t.
WISE WORDS
The quotes I’ve been circling around this week
ON LISTENING
“If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.” ~ Francis Bacon
“If we take the time or courage to find out what people feel and think, and to listen to the heart of their story, we are capable of losing the narrowness of our preconceptions and the nitpicking manipulations in our brain, making us geared up to view the world, openly and with confidence.” ~ Erik Pevernagie
“People don't want to listen to their thoughts, so they fill the world with noise.” ~ Erin Entrada Kelly
“Much of human behavior can be explained by watching the wild beasts around us. They are constantly teaching us things about ourselves and the way of the universe, but most people are too blind to watch and listen.” ~ Suzy Kassem
ON GIVING
“It is the apathetic person that sees the cause while the charitable person sees the need.” ~ Shannon L. Alder
“It is better to do little things with love than big things without love.” ~ Lailah Akita
“Always give without remembering and always receive without forgetting.” ~ Brian Tracy
“Generosity is not in giving me that which I need more than you do, but it is in giving me that which you need more than I do.” ~ Kahlil Gibran
“Kindness is a magical spell—performed by enlightened beings—meant to enchant hearts and lift weary souls that they might fly.” ~ Richelle E. Goodrich
“Behold I do not give lectures or a little charity when I give I give myself.” ~ Walt Whitman
ON SELF-COMPASSION
“Remember, you have been criticizing yourself for years and it hasn’t worked. Try approving of yourself and see what happens.” ~ Louise Hay
“I think the reward for conformity is that everyone likes you except yourself.” ~ Rita Mae Brown
“Using self-compassion doesn’t mean letting yourself off the hook for missteps, but owning them and still holding space to love yourself.” ~ Gina Senarighi
“The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely.” ~ C.G. Jung
“My life has been filled with terrible misfortune, most of which never happened.” ~ Montaigne
COMMUNITY UPDATE
This week we are kicking off the first few conversations of the Sample of One webinar-podcast series. There is also an experiment check-in for the community members who were a part of the first community workshop. It feels like the community wheels are slowly starting to get moving. Exciting times!
SOMETHING TO PART WITH
Until next week,
Take care,
David