You are actively rewiring your brain for

the worst by engaging with social media,

high volume, quick videos.

>> And the social media executives don't

let their kids use this stuff because

they designed it to be addictive and

they know that millions and millions of

kids have been cyberbullied, sexed. Many

have committed suicide. So, I'm getting

angry.

>> And then from the medical perspective,

it's rewiring your body, increasing your

risk of heart disease and PTSD.

>> We've moved too far into the virtual

world and the results are catastrophic.

People are spending roughly about 6 and

a half hours a day on their phones. What

do we do about this?

>> Well, here's the amazing thing. We

actually can control our fate. So, we

are joined by a social psychologist and

a Harvard physician

>> to dive into the technology addiction

and brain rot crisis billions are facing

worldwide

>> and how we can counter its devastating

mental health effects. You have to

reclaim your attention because without

the ability to pay attention for several

minutes at a time, we're seeing the

destruction of human potential, the

human relationships, the connection.

>> But there's all these small tweaks that

you can do to override that primal urge

to scroll. For example, 91% of people

had an improvement in attention,

well-being, and mental health. After

just 2 weeks of continuing to use your

device, but not having internet access.

Next, keep your phone out of your arms

reach because the sheer potential for

distraction has actually been shown to

change your prefrontal cortex, which is

called brain drain.

>> So, yes, we should exert more

self-control, but we're being pushed in

addictive apps and it's messing us all

up. That's not our fault.

>> Would you advise people to delete these

short form videos?

>> Oh my god, yes, that would the most

important thing you can do for your

intelligence and for humanity. But if I

was going to offer some specific advice,

here are the three things that I do with

my students to reclaim retention. And

then to add to that, I have the 3se

secondond brain reset. So, first

>> I wanted to ask you guys what you

thought of this.

>> Hey, you're back.

>> This terrifies me.

>> We've got to stop this now.

>> Guys, I've got a quick favor to ask you.

We're approaching a significant

subscriber milestone on this show, and

roughly 69% of you that listen and love

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time for you to do us a favor, if we've

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value in any way, it is simply hitting

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when we hit these milestones, we go away

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thing, the simple, free, easy thing you

can do to help make this show a little

bit better every single week. So, that's

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do hit the subscribe button, I won't let

you down. And we'll continue to find

small ways to make this whole production

better. Thank you so much for being part

of this journey. Means the world. And uh

yeah, let's do this.

Jonathan editing.

Jonathan, I've heard you say that the

destruction of attention is the largest

threat to humanity that's happening

around the world. And I've also heard

you say that short form videos are the

worst of the worst because they're

shattering attention spans. The reason

why I wanted to have this conversation

today is somewhat personal. And in fact,

all of the conversations have in the

driver are somewhat personal to some

degree. um they're inspired by some

unanswered question I have in my head

and also some observation I have in my

life and the observation I've had is

that short form videos in particular are

making my life worse and actually I've

got to say the catalyst moment really

where I thought you know I need to get

you exceptional people together to have

this conversation was I thought this I

then looked at my screen time and saw a

huge change I felt so much worse because

all these social platforms have short

form video now and then I actually heard

Elon Musk who you know has a social

media platform that does short form

video say that he thinks it's one of the

worst inventions for humanity.

>> Jonathan, why did you say what you said

about short form video and this

corruption of attention?

>> Yeah, because I wrote a whole book

called The Anxious Generation focusing

on teen mental health. That was the

mystery that popped up in the mid200s.

Why are people born after 1995 so much

more anxious and depressed? And I've

been tracking down that mystery and it

points a lot of it points to social

media and especially Instagram, social

comparison, all the things we know about

social media. When the book came out in

2024, since then what I realized is that

I vastly underestimated the damage

because I focused on mental health,

which is a catastrophe. But the bigger

damage is the destruction of the human

ability to pay attention. Without the

ability to pay attention for several

minutes at a time, ideally 10 or 20

minutes at a time. Without that, you're

not going to be of much use as an

employee. You're not going to be of much

use as a spouse. You're not going to be

successful in life. And that's when I

realized this is way beyond mental

health. This is changing human

cognition, changing human attention, and

possibly on a global scale.

Adi, what perspective do you come at

this from? And what's been your

perspective through all the work you've

done about brains and stress and

neuroscience and all these kinds of

things that has shaped the way that you

think about social media, screen time,

short form video.

>> My background is that I'm a physician at

Harvard and it my expertise is in

stress, burnout, and mental health. And

so that is the lens that I view all of

this through. We know that the most

delletterious relationship that you have

is with your device. You know, in every

healthy relationship, we have

boundaries. We have boundaries with our

kids, our parents, our colleagues, our,

you know, wi-i with our friends. And

yet, we have no boundaries and often

poorest boundaries when it comes to the

relationship you have with your device.

So, it's not so much about, you know,

becoming a digital monk and renouncing

technology because technology can serve

us, right? It inspires, educates,

connects. Now more than ever, it's so

important to be an informed citizen, but

not at the expense of your mental

health. And so what Jonathan was saying,

this, you know, constant being engaged

with your devices, with social media,

the scrolling from the minute you wake

up until you go to bed, there's a reason

why you have your best ideas in the

shower. And that's because that's the

only place in the whole day where you

are not with your device. People take

their device to the bathroom. They sleep

with your device. you eat with your

device, people walk down the street.

There's more near miss pedestrian

accidents because people are walking

while they're crossing the street and um

looking at their devices. And so there's

all of this brain biology at play behind

the scenes. So both of you have talked

about how it doesn't feel good to engage

and constantly be on your phone, that

sense of infinite scroll, but there is,

you know, it feels like you're doing

nothing. You're just doing this, right?

What are you doing? But in fact, it is

not passive. It is active. And it has a

profound effect on your biology, on your

brain, on your psychology, and also

social factors that I hope we talk about

today.

>> You know, scrolling, wasting a bit of

time doesn't seem so harmful.

What is the big, if we play this forward

10, 20, 30 years, what is the big risk

or threat? The biggest threat right now,

we don't even have to wait 20 years, is

that it through a process called

neuroplasticity, which is just a big

fancy word that simply means that your

brain is a muscle, is that by engaging

with social media, that that sense of

high volume, lowquality, quick videos,

you are actively rewiring your brain for

the worse. So you're increasing your

sense of stress, worsening your mental

health, attention, cognition,

distractability, irritability, complex

problem solving. All of that changes

when you engage in engage in that

infinite scroll.

>> Yeah. I'd like to add on here because

one of the main arguments I get is, ah,

this is what they said about television.

Oh, this is what they said about comic

books. This is just another moral panic.

But people need to understand why

touchscreen devices are so different

from television. And so I think parents

find this helpful if I just lay this out

briefly. Good screen time versus bad

screen time. So humans are storytelling

animals. We have always, as long as

we've had language, we've raised our

kids with stories, epic poems, all kinds

of stories. Stories are good. Sto the

human brain needs lots of patterns. The

child's brain needs lots of patterns to

develop. So the worst thing you can do

is hand your child the device because

they're crying for it because they've

been they trained to get it and you're

busy. So you have hand them the device.

They're quiet. What's happening? They're

sitting alone. Not, you know, when I was

a kid, we always watch with my sisters,

with my friends. You're arguing about

it. You're talking at social kids

sitting alone with a device in his hand.

It's not long stories. It's never long

stories. It always ends up at YouTube

shorts or Tik Tok or Instagram reels for

older kids. So, they're doing they're

doing this. But here's the key thing

that it does that a television does not.

A television puts you in a state that

psychologists call transportation. You

get into a story and you find yourself

pulled in and you're rooting for the

characters and this is this is how a

brain gets tuned up to social patterns

but it can't happen in 10 seconds. It

can't happen in one minute. It takes a

long period of time and there is no

reinforcement. There is no the

television doesn't do anything to you.

You don't have any response. Whereas a

touchscreen device is a Skinner box. So

BF Skinner was one of the founders of

behaviorism and he put rats and pigeons

in a box where he could deliver a

reinforcement, a little grain of food on

a schedule. And by giving them quick

reinforcements for behavior, he could

train them to do amazing tricks in just

a few hours. When you give your kid a

touchscreen device, it's stimulus

response, swipe, get a reward or not,

variable ratio. And then and and you

just keep doing that. So you are, as Adi

said, it is rewiring your brain. It's

not just wasting time. It is literally

training you to do things where

television didn't do that. So this is a

whole new game.

>> And to add to that, you know, from the

medical perspective, you're shortening

this attention span. And what happens

over time is so like Jonathan said,

right, you're not sleeping as well

because you are engaged with your

device. We know that 80% of people are

checking their phones within minutes of

waking up. We have something called

revenge bedtime procrastination. this

concept of, you know, at the end of the

day you're fatigued, you've had a long

day, you've had no me time, and you want

to get to bed early. We all know, by the

way, what the data is that, you know,

we've been taught since we were little

kids, right? Like bedtime, sleep is

important, it's good for your body, it's

good for your brain. And we might have

all the knowledge in the world, but in

terms of action, there's a wide gap

between knowledge and information and

action. And so revenge, bedtime

procrastination is kind of an offshoot.

So what happens? So, you know, you have

that decreased attention. You have that

irritability, hypervigilance. And so, at

night, at the end of the day, it's 9:00

p.m. You finally, you know, if you're a

parent, your kids are asleep, your

kitchen is clean, maybe you finish your

entrepreneurial day, and you finally sit

down with Melanie on the couch, and

you're like, "H, some me time." And, you

know, you want to get to bed early, and

you know it's good for you. But then

suddenly, you're scrolling and before

you know it, it's 2 a.m. and you're

saying, "Oh my god, what happened? Why

am I still awake? What was I doing all

this time?" What happens is that you

essentially give yourself some me time

at night and so you procrastinate

bedtime. And so what happens is with

this revenge bedtime procrastination, it

affects your sleep and then when you

don't have good sleep, good quality

sleep, so you have difficulty falling

asleep, staying asleep, sleep debt over

time for kids, for adults has all sorts

of ramifications. So this is just the

tip of the iceberg. this short form

video content and the ripple effects go

far and wide. Not only is it rewiring

your brain, it's rewiring your body, it

is affecting your sleep, which increases

your risk of heart disease later in

life. And u when you're consuming

graphic videos and graphic images, it

can increase your personal risk of PTSD

through vicarious trauma even if you

weren't there. So, this is just a vast

network of things that can happen to you

simply because you're thinking, "Yeah,

it's harmless. What is it? It's just a

bunch of videos that I'm checking out.

It's a way for me to decompress."

>> What do I need to know about the nature

of the brain to understand exactly what

short form video is is playing, is

hijacking, is taking advantage of

>> the thing to understand about all of

this is that we have to focus on

childhood. Why do we have childhood? Um,

humans have this really interesting

childhood where we we grow rapidly at

first and then we slow down for about

five or seven years. We don't grow very

quickly and then we speed up at puberty.

Whereas other primates, they just grow

and grow till they reach reproductive

age, then they reproduce. But we seem to

have this long period of sort of middle

childhood for cultural learning. It's a

period in which the the kid is now

walking and talking and turning away

from the parents and and that's a time

for this to come in and they pay

attention and they form relationships.

All these things have to happen slowly

because the neurons are gradually

growing. They're finding each other

based on what the child is doing. Okay?

So, we grow up in the real world and and

that happens over time. And a lot of

that is very physical. Kids are very

physical. Mammals are very physical and

there's a lot of touch. So, that's a

healthy human childhood. But when you

give an iPad or your old iPhone

and they can they begin doing the the

touching and swiping, that is going to

hijack their attention. That is going to

push out all other forms of action and

learning. And that is going to change

the way the parts of the brain that

learn to pay attention, what's called

executive function. It's going to change

the way the brain learns to pay

attention. It's going to change the

reward circuits. I think you had Analy

recently who's the nation's expert on

addiction. And the way that she

describes it, how, you know, any one

addiction is going to change your reward

pathways to make you more vulnerable to

other addictions. So, we're setting our

kids up not just for this, but then when

they get a little older, it'll be video

games, it'll be uh porn, it'll be

gambling now. Everything is gambling.

So, we're setting them up for a life in

which their brain is saying, "Give me

something. Give me some quick dopamine.

Give me some quick dopamine. I don't

want I don't want to have to work for

anything. I don't want to have to apply

myself for an hour and then get a

reward."

And so the what the what the short

videos are doing for kids is preventing

them from learning the connection

between hard work and a reward. Is there

anything else I need to know from a

neuroscience perspective about what's

going on in my brain when I'm when I

develop these addictions with short form

videos or these sort of quick dopamineic

tasks.

>> So we all as humans have a primal urge

to scroll. When you feel a sense of

stress, as many of us do in this moment

in life, it is your sense, you know,

your amygdala. And so it's your sense of

self-preservation. It's survival and

self-preservation. That is what your

amydala does. So if you want me to show

you here, I have no idea what I'm doing

there.

>> Yeah, it's okay. So here, deep here,

it's a small almond shaped structure.

And that is your amygdala. And your

amygdala, its main purpose is survival

and self-preservation. It houses your

stress response, your fight orflight

response, and it is truly what is

activated when you are engaging in

content, when you feel a sense of

stress. And so you have this primal urge

to scroll. And so evolutionarily we when

we all were caves people living um

together, we would sleep at night and

there would be a night watchman scanning

for danger. And now we have our we have

become our own night watchman. And so we

scan for danger all day, all night long.

How do we do that? We scroll. And then

the amydala is triggered. And then you

scroll some more. And you scroll some

more. And you scroll some more. And so

over time, what you're doing is that

you're making that amygdala in a state

of of chronic. It's continually being

triggered. What happens to the amygdala

over time. When it's continually

triggered, it starts to rewire your

brain in other ways. And how does it do

that? Through something called the

prefrontal cortex. If you put your hand

I like I can use this model, but I can

also just use my hands. When you put

your hand on your forehead, the area

right behind your forehead right here is

the prefrontal cortex. This is a very

important thing for our conversation.

This area of the brain and what the

prefrontal cortex does is it is called

it governs executive functions. So

impulse control, memory, planning,

organization, strategic thinking,

complex problem solving and there is a

tension between your amygdala and the

prefrontal cortex. When your amydala is

in the driver's seat, that prefrontal

cortex is quiet. And what is happening

as we continue to engage with our

devices and have this primal urge to

scroll, that amydala upregulates and the

prefrontal cortex downregulates. And

over time, that is very problematic for

all of the reasons that we're kind of

introducing at the start of this

conversation. There was a meta analysis

done in 2025 of 71 different studies and

it found that heavy short form video use

was associated with reduced thinking

ability, especially shorter attention

spans and weaker impulse control.

>> That's right. These studies are just

beginning to roll in now. Um, kids have

been on social media really a lot since

2008, but especially once they got

smartphones around 2012. studies began

coming in uh in the 2010s that um look

it's looking like the kids who are spend

a lot of time on this um are doing much

worse. They're more depressed. The focus

was on depression. And some other

researchers said no, it's just a

correlation. You you can't prove

causation. And we've been going around

and around on this for about 10 or 15

years. Now we're doing the same thing

with uh with the short form videos. The

damage everyone can see. My students

tell me this is what's happening. We

feel it. studies are coming in, but

there will be a few studies here and

there that don't show it and people will

uh push that up. Meta spends a lot of

time and money to influence the public

debate. A lot of public documents are

coming out now about how they do that.

So, we can engage in debate over over

research on short form videos for 5 or

10 years, but at that point, it's way

too late. We've lost a second

generation, Gen Alpha. So, I think when

we're talking about kids especially, we

need to have what's called the

precautionary principle, which is if

there's reason to think that this is

hurting kids, how about we don't roll it

out into every childhood? How about we

make these companies responsible? We

hold them responsible for what they're

doing to kids because we're about to

make the same mistake we made with

social media, letting it worm its way

into childhood. We have already done

that with short videos, and we're about

to do it with AI chat bots. In fact,

we're just beginning it in late 2025,

I'd say. I I don't think people quite

realize how much these major social

media platforms have figured out that

short form video sells. Um we're

actually seeing this sort of global rise

in short form drama apps now. And I

don't know if you guys have seen these

apps, but it basically takes a movie

that used to be 2 hours long and it

breaks it down into say 60 different

parts. And my a colleague of mine at my

company was showing me the other day in

different parts of the world they're

exploding. There's been a 190% increase

in short form drama apps. takes long

form movie, turns it into short form

videos. Disney Plus plans to introduce

AI generated short form videos this

year, starting with 30 secondond limits

inside the Disney Plus app. And

Techrunch also reported that as of

October 2025, Netflix tested short form

video content on phones and recently

announced its plan to expand this

feature. It appears that all of the

content we consume is going that way.

And listen, I'm friends with lots of

people at big social media platforms. um

this doesn't get me in the doesn't sound

in my way of criticizing them because I

think two things can be true at the same

time right so I think it can be true

that I have a podcast and I make short

form videos and that I also understand

that there's a real downside to them and

um all of the major social social media

platforms that I speak to speak to have

a huge drive towards short form video it

is it appears to be their number one

strategic priority and obviously because

of the success of Tik Tok as of January

2026 Tik Tok I believe is the most

downloaded social app in the world now

and it and and if I'm running a social

media company and my one focus is

profit,

>> I'm now faced with an existential

crisis.

>> Yeah.

>> I either take part in this thing that is

driving the highest retention, therefore

the best ad payouts or I die.

>> So there's two comments to that. first

off is that you know when we think when

we think about social media and how

society is shapeshifting to allow this

short form content there is a concept

that Jonathan and I briefly mentioned I

think prior to us filming called second

screen viewing and so what's happening

is that allegedly these big streamers

are asking their creative talent whether

it's screenwriters or actors or pe

directors to replay to reiterate the

plot because as you're watching, you

know, when we were kids, we would watch

TV or movies and you just sit on the

couch and you'd have a bucket of popcorn

with your family and you'd watch a

movie, an hour, hour and a half, two

hours and now second screen viewing is

happening, which means that you're

watching a movie or a TV show and you're

on your device and so you are constantly

having that fragmented attention and we

are all doing it and so what these

streamers are allegedly asking their

creative talent to do is to reiterate

the plot. So it's shapeshifting. It

makes sense if my brain is, you know,

I'm 33 years old, so I've grown up with

a lot of this stuff. If my brain has

been wired to have shorter attention

spans and and movies from 30 years ago

are not going to cut it for me,

>> right? But then look what happens if if

everybody chases that. And I know, look,

Netflix is making shorter and shorter

stuff. Even TED, the TED conference, TED

talks are getting shorter and shorter.

What does that do? It just repeats the

cycle. Now, I appreciate that you're in

a collective action trap, as you put it.

If I don't do it and everyone else is,

then I lose out. And so, the the

business pressure on on all the

creators, the business pressures go

shorter, shorter, shorter. There's a

very useful psychological term

distinction here that I think would be

helpful, which is the difference between

psychological assimilation and

accommodation. This goes back to Jean

PG, the great developmental

psychologist. We we have certain mental

structures. We have a a model in our

head of how things work. And you know

then you learn something new then oh

that's a you know kid learns oh that's a

an arvar okay I put that into you know

that's just that you just assimilate

they learn lots of animal names and then

they learn something that's doesn't fit

like you learn about bacteria and now

you have to oh okay now you you have you

have to change your mental structure it

takes a little time you change your

mental structure to understand more

about life that's what education really

is all about you have to have a lot of

assimilation of course but you need that

accommodation over and over again That's

why you want to go to college. That's

why you want to read novels. That's what

a great movie does. It takes time. And

so, one of the great things about this

modern technology is that we can do

things like have this three-hour

conversation. I can't believe it. People

are going to listen to it. So, this, you

know, long form content. This is all

about accommodation. Anybody who walks

out who who who leaves this conversation

after 3 hours and isn't thinking about

something differently, we failed. Okay.

So, you are very much in the

accommodation business. That's great.

And then the the question both a moral

and a strategic question is how much do

you need to play the the quick hit game

in order to get people there. I leave

that to you to do the moral calculation.

Maybe it maybe it balances out maybe but

uh but I think that's where you are.

>> Would you advise people to delete these

short form?

>> Oh my god. Yes. Of course. Here but

here. Yes. That would the most important

thing you can do for your intelligence

and for humanity would be delete them.

So, what I advise my students to do is I

say just do this. Just just delete one

of the social media apps that you use,

especially if it's Tik Tok, just delete

from your phone. You can still check on

your computer. If someone sends you a

video, you can still watch it on your

computer. You can even check it, you

know, every weekend. You can spend some

time on it, but just get it off your

phone because on the phone, the phone is

always with us. It's an extension of our

body. And if it's always there, then

it's going to take every it's called

attention fracking. It's going to break

up your attention. It's going to take

every 7 seconds that you're not doing

something, you're going to go for the

phone. So, the best thing you can do to

make yourself smarter and a better

partner and a better human, I would say,

would be to delete the short, especially

any of the short form videos. So, Tik

Tok, unfortunately, YouTube, which has a

lot of good stuff on it, becomes YouTube

shorts. Instagram, which does a lot of

terrible things, but people do find it

useful for all kinds of purposes,

becomes Instagram reels. So, I think the

proper amount of short form video for

children 0 to 18 is zero. They should

never be watching the vertical videos.

Parents, don't ever let your kids watch

the short vertical videos. You might

even if there if only there was a way to

put it. Is there a way to put a time

limit? You can say it has to be 10

minutes or longer. Kids, you can have an

hour YouTube, but it has to be 10

minutes or longer. Nothing shorter than

10 minutes. That at least will get rid

of this the quick the quick swiping the

the dopamine stuff. So I would say that

for kids yes like you know not engaging

it whatsoever but for someone you know

my approach is a little bit different

for someone who's like in their 30s or

in their 40s and the way I would kind of

frame that is

instead of renouncing you know saying

I'm going to get it off my device and

I'm going to check on a desktop which is

great there's c little kind of tweaks

that we could do because my approach is

to foster that sense of empowerment in

one to help them make positive change.

And so one strategy that you could use

if you are saying there's no way I'm

getting rid of my I'm not deleting these

apps from my phone, right? If you're by

the way, I practice what I preach and I

really do don't engage in technology as

to the best of my ability. Um but one

thing that you could do is grayscale

your phone. And so especially at night

like it's 9:00 p.m. like we talked about

revenge bedtime procrastination. You

know that you're going to do it. you're

going to sit down and you're going to

scroll and before you know it, it's 2

am. Instead, grayscale your phone. This

simple switch. You can toggle it. I have

my phone set to grayscale, which simply

means that you're getting rid of your

color, making it black and white. And

so, when it is grayscaled, then you, you

know, it doesn't have that same

addictive quality to it. It's like going

through a grocery store. A marketing

executive described it this way to me.

Going through a grocery store instead of

the technicolor junk food cereal, it's

just black and white. So you have a less

there's a greater sense of compulsion to

continue checking. So that's like one

strategy you could use. And the other is

to set some boundaries. So geographical

boundaries, keep your phone out of out

of your arms reach if you're at a desk

if you're a student, not right next to

you because we know there's this

phenomenon of brain drain. So it's not

just that when you're using your phone,

it can have a potential distraction, but

also just having it close by. It's

called brain drain. And um so putting it

in a desk drawer, keeping it in another

part of the home if you are working,

keeping it far away from you. And so you

kind of can override that primal urge to

scroll, let your prefrontal cortex take

hold again. And so there's all these

small tweaks that you can do. You you

think no.

>> Yes, there are all these small tweaks

you can do and they will make the heroin

a little bit less addictive. And yeah,

you should try those. But what I can say

after teaching this course for many

years is that people who try that, they

they report, "Yeah, you know, it helped.

it helped, but you only really get the

transformation when you quit social

media that you get your life back. You

get hours a day back. So, um, and so I I

would urge everyone to just think, you

know, you only you only get one

childhood, you only get one one young

adulthood, and if you're going to spend

it scrolling, what do you have to show

for it at the end? And when you get

people to reflect on, well, how much

value do you really get from watching

the short videos? What would how would

your life be different if you if you

knocked it out? Once they realize that

their motives for being on it were

either just to keep up or because that's

what everyone else is doing or as you

said, I deserve it because I'm tired.

Well, why are you tired? It's in part

because your attention was fragmented

all day long. So, you only really get

the transformations when you get a real

change in what you're what you're

consuming. Although, of course, yes,

setting it to grace will be helpful, but

it's not going to be transformative for

most people, I believe. And then you

know based on the science you're there's

certain elements like when we think

about what is it about the phone that is

creating that sense of compulsion.

Jonathan is right. So what is it about

the phone? It's not just the phone you

know you're scrolling you're engaging.

There are two studies that were really

interesting. One people got off of they

they continue to use their devices. They

had no internet. So it's like you know I

tried this experiment myself in

December. I was out of the country and

so I just let my, you know, I didn't

plug into Wi-Fi and I found, you know,

marketkedly a marketked change in my

mood, my sleep and I'm not even, you

know, 20 years old on TikTok and it was

so different. And so this study found

that just two weeks of continuing to use

your device, but just not having

internet access improved your attention,

well-being, and mental health. And in

this population, it was all adults, it

wasn't kids, it was all adults. found

that 91% of people had an improvement in

at least one of these metrics. And then

another study more recently um just one

week of not engaging in social media,

digital detox they called it, did the

same thing. Better you know less

anxiety, less depression,

decreased insomnia. But my feeling is

that you know there is this new kind of

meme right like your the millennial urge

to delete uh my internet presence and

you know live off the grid. There is

certainly utility to that and I salute

anyone who wants to engage in that

analog life more and more but from my

from where I sit I feel like we do need

to have healthier boundaries and engage

more responsibly. It also builds up that

muscle and it can help, you know, takes

eight weeks to do neuroplasticity. When

you're building new brain circuits, it

takes eight weeks. Falling off, getting

back up is part of habit formation. So,

if you're going to make any of these

changes, understand that it takes some

time. But I I don't know if it is

possible for me or for others to say

fully, I'm going to, you know, delete

off of my phone. But I love that. So,

I'd like to go a little further um a

little further with this. So, the way

you the way you put it, yes, there's all

these things that we could do. We should

have boundaries, but all of that puts

the responsibility on us.

>> Agree.

>> And that's where we are with junk food.

With junk food, we're like, okay, it's

out there. We have to learn

self-control. We have to teach

self-control to our kids. Okay, that's

the way it is in this country. But the

digital devices, I think, are very, very

different. So, imagine if imagine if we

sent our kids out into the world and it

wasn't just that there was junk food in

all the stores. was that everything was

made of junk food. You know, you you

know, the door handles, you can eat it.

It's chocolate. But it's not just that

the world's made of junk food. It's they

actually can tell they're able to tell

what you're craving at the moment. And

maybe you're you're more in the mood for

salt. So So now it's all potato chips or

pretzels. If the world is designed by

companies to always give you the thing

that will most grab your unconscious

desires, will affect the the amydala,

the reward centers,

that's on them. That's not our fault. My

general rule as a social psychologist is

if a few people are doing something bad

or self-destructive, well, you know,

they should learn some self-control or

that's something about them. But when 90

or 95% of people are doing something

self-destructive,

that's because of the companies that put

us in an environment that encourages

addiction. So, I just want to read a

quote. We have so much good stuff coming

out from Meta, from all the

whistleblowers. Now, all the court cases

are beginning in Los Angeles. finally

the first time they're going to Meta is

going to face a jury with all the

parents who've lost kids. Um, so here is

here's a a chat. So, we have a lot of

internal documents that came out from

the the attorneys general that are suing

Meta. So, while they're talking about

the results of some of their internal

research, one of them says, uh, "Oh my

gosh, y'all, Instagram is a drug. We're

basically pushers. We're causing reward

deficit disorder because people are

binging on in Instagram so much they

can't feel reward anymore." which is

something Anna LMKI said like the reward

tolerance is so high and then he says I

know Adam meaning Adam Oeri I know Adam

doesn't want to hear it he freaked out

when I talked about dopamine in my teen

fundamentals leads review but it is

undeniable it's biological and

psychological top-down directives drive

it all towards making sure people keep

coming back for more. This is not on us.

They designed it to be addictive.

They've done research to make it

maximally addictive. They push it on

children. They tried to get Instagram

kids for even littleer kids. They know

what they're doing. They've done the

research. My team, we put together. We

found references to 31 internal studies

that Meta did. They've done a lot of

research finding harm. They bury it, but

you can find it at meta's internal

research.org. We put it all online. You

can read these quotes. So, yes, we

should exert more self-control, but

basically we're being pushed addictive

substances, addictive uh addictive apps,

and it's messing us all up.

>> I agree wholeheartedly that it is so

destructive, and you feel like even with

people in their 40s and 50s, and if

anyone can do it, it's you, Jonathan.

Seriously, I would love to see it. You

know, we also know based on the data

that these things quite they they

reshape our brain, rewire our brain

through neuroplasticity and also change

our brain waves. So patterns. So we

talked about the amydala and the

prefrontal cortex, right? But they also

change brain waves. And so when you look

at studies and the data, it has the

reward pathway and dopamine. And these

brain patterns, the brain waves mimic

addictive behaviors. And you know that

there's certain features, right? like

when you do swipe down to refresh, it's

the slot machine.

>> It was modeled directly after the slot

machine. Yeah.

>> Or autoplay or um you know the algorithm

that infinite scroll. Um one really

interesting kind of like breaking news

which you guys may have already heard

of. It's like 3 days ago the European

Union Commission found Tik Tok to be in

breach of the digital services act. And

what it said was that it is addictive.

it um you know creates compulsion and

gets people into this autopilot mode so

they have difficulty disengaging and

personally I am moving away from social

media and really leaning into analog

life but I think with the way the world

you know it's one of our only ways to

connect right meaning I don't mean

connect deeply

I don't mean connect like in a deep way

but be informed to know what's going on

in the world etc

>> I I suspect that because we've spent so

long criticizing meta over the last 10

years because the biggest in any

category takes all the heat. So, OpenAI

is taking it now. And what this often

does is is it provides cover for other

people to go be even more extreme with

that behavior while like meta take the

heat. And I actually think this is how

Tik Tok came to be.

>> Tik Tok had basically originally started

as musically became Tik Tok. They had

they were take they were taking no heat.

Um, so they they created an algorithm

which is the equivalent of like crack

cocaine. The reason why I have a Tik Tok

account. I don't have the app on my

phone. I have never had the app on my

phone. I don't I don't was because I I

noticed that the view variance on Tik

Tok was like no other platform. What I

mean by that is you can have a million

followers on Tik Tok and you can get

10,000 views or you can get 10 million

views. In the 15 years that I've been on

social media, building social media

businesses, I'd never seen this before.

And what it indicated to me is that the

algorithm was being an even more

aggressive sorting hat or retention

machine.

>> What to push up, what to push down.

>> Yeah.

>> And so, like, when I started in social

media in 2014,

if I had a million followers, I might

get a million views or maybe 800,000. I

did some research the other day on all

of our social channels over time and

what we're seeing is the variance in the

amount of views we can get is increasing

which means the algorithm is doing more

work to say show everyone this. I don't

care if the person that posted it is

called Jenny and has seven followers and

show no one this. I don't care if it's

Steven who has a million followers or

whatever. And I realized that Tik Tok

was was way ahead of everybody here. And

that's why they are the most addictive,

the fastest growing platform. I say all

this to say that even if meta shut down

tomorrow,

someone else would seize the opportunity

if there isn't sort of policy, I I guess

>> in place.

>> That's right.

>> Would you be whack-a-ole, right?

>> Yeah. No, that's right. And so, you

know, in terms of who's done the damage

to kids, Meta is the big fish via

Instagram. And they're also the main

player in terms of spending a huge

amount of money to lobby Congress and ch

and block laws. They're also the main

player in buying up civil society

organizations, giving money to

organizations, the national PTA, all

sorts of organizations. They get to then

give a message on digital citizenship or

digital health. So, Meta really is the

major driver. Meta is the tobacco

industry here trying to change the the

dialogue. But in terms of the products,

um, Snapchat is probably more deadly in

terms of the actual number of deaths per

user because Snapchat is not it's not

making you depressed by social

comparison as much. Snapchat is

introducing you to all kinds of people

and it's the main way that drug dealers

and and extortionists find kids.

Snapchat has a quick ad feature which

relentlessly pushes you to connect with

friends of friends. So once a man can

get any f any kid in a school, now he

can get connected to all the kids in the

school. So, uh, when we in a lot of the

court cases, you know, when you have you

have suicides from cyber bullying, you

have drug overdoses from, you know, a

kid bought a Xanax, but it had fentinel

in it. So, Snapchat at Snapchat in TW in

in 2022, we know from their internal

documents, from the lawsuits, they were

getting 10,000 reports of sextortion

from their users, not a year, every

month. And that's just what was

reported, which is the tip of the

iceberg. So, Snapchat is a terrible

platform for children to be on. It

should be an adult-only platform. You're

talking with strangers around the world

and and on with disappearing messages

and Snapchat doesn't even keep a record.

It is ideal for sextortion. There's even

a handbook how to stor kids on Snapchat.

It goes around the world and and

criminal organizations use it. So, uh so

I definitely don't want to let Snapchat

off. Tik Tok of course is a Chinese

company. Uh I mean nominally we'll see

if it if that's changed but it was a

Chinese company that gave its Chinese

kids got healthy Tik Tok or doyen and

they got they got they they you know

learned to follow astronauts and they

gave us the their their algorithm feeds

their kid patriotic stuff. Um it shuts

off at a certain time at night. There's

all kinds of limits. So the people make

the technology generally want to protect

their own kids and they want other kids

to use it. That's what Tik Tok is doing

in China. They want American kids to rot

in hell, but they want their kids to

grow up with the ability to focus. And

it's the same thing with the tech guys

in in in Silicon Valley. They don't let

their kids use this stuff. They make

their nannies sign contracts that they

will not let the kid have a phone. They

will not expose the kid to that. They

send their kids to schools like the

Waldorf school that precisely because

there are no computers or tech in the

classroom. So once again, we see their

reveal behavior. They know they designed

it to be addictive. They know it's

addictive. They don't let their kids use

it. they want your kids to use it. Um,

so I think that's where we are.

>> And how does AI

>> oh

>> become a protagonist in the story?

>> So my my work is now focused on AI

chatbots, mental health, and the human

connection. We haven't yet kind of

delved into loneliness, but there's this

unmet need for human connection, right?

Deep human connection. We don't have a

sense of meaning or purpose right now

because what happens is uh we can talk a

little bit more about the default mode

network and what happens to your brain

when you don't allow yourself to get

bored because you're constantly on your

devices and that meaning and purpose

that self-reerential thinking is really

what develops when you're bored. And so

all of this that we're talking about

that feeling of disenchantment. It's a

fragmented society. You're by yourself.

It's that echo chamber phenomenon. All

of it leads to it kind of opens the door

for AI chatbots. And so what the reason

is because these tech companies are

sensing that people aren't really happy

on social media and they're thinking

about getting off, right? They're

they're using it less. They're because

social media has become less social,

more media. So they're not really

engaging as much and they're spending

time doing other things. And so the

Atlantic had a fantastic piece about

this. They're building it as the

antisocial media. So tech companies are

building AI chatbots and calling it it's

the antisocial media. It's a place where

you can go to form deeper connections

and you know really have someone

understand you. One of the tech leaders

said that there's an unmet human need

for connection and people don't have as

many friends as they want to and so

we're going to introduce um friendship

through AI chatbots. There is a Reddit

forum right now. So just to back up AI

chatbots, what we're talking about in

our conversation today is the publicly

available chat bots, not you know AI for

medical care which has um you know

breast cancer so many wonderful in in my

field and like medicine breast cancer

diagnoses and detection 5 years earlier

through AI. I mean there's some amazing

things coming out of AI. This is about

the publicly available conversational

chatbot phenomenon. And so when Harvard

Business Review found that the number

one use case is not productivity is not,

you know, coding or things that you

think of when you're using an AI

chatbot, but it's mental health therapy

and companionship. Number one use case

of AI chatbots. So people are using AI

chatbots as a life adviser, as a

therapist, as as a companion in on

Reddit, which is like the zeitgeist.

It's sort of like, you know, where

>> And why is this a bad thing?

Oh, I mean so many reasons why

>> use it as for companionship, for

example.

>> There's so many red flags about AI chat

bots. And so Reddit has a forum. It's uh

I think last I checked 45,000 people. AI

is my boyfriend. And you know, people

who are having a relationship with their

>> AI chatbot. The reason it's bad, I mean

AI chat bots are, you know, where social

media is about attention, the attention

economy, dopamine. What's happening with

the AI chatbot phenomenon? It's that it

is forming attachments. So oxytocin is a

hormone, the bonding hormone, and we're

probably going to see more data on how

oxytocin is involved. And so it is going

to reshape human connection.

>> Right? If I could add on to that, that

was that was beautifully put. Social

media came and hacked our attention and

took most of it with devastating

effects. Now AI is coming to hack our

attachments which is going to have even

more devastating effects. So think about

it this way. Everyone needs to

understand the attachment system. It's

this wonderful system that all mammals

have that keeps the mother and other

species but for humans mothers and

fathers keeps us connected to the child

and the child to the parent. But it's

it's this cybernetic system in which as

the kid is is as the kid is beginning to

develop and is able to like you know you

do like peekaboo games and you do the

back and forth and it's just the most

delightful thing. You get that back and

forth. Um it's called serve and return

interactions and all the time the child

is developing what's called an internal

working model of the parent and the

model in their head is oh you know when

I get in trouble that that this is the

person that comes and soothes me. And

the point of this isn't just to make the

child feel good. The point is that now

the child can go off and play because

that's where the learning happens. It

doesn't happen when you're in your

mother's arms. The the whole point of

the attachment system is to regulate the

child going off and playing, taking

risks, having experiences, and then when

something goes wrong, as it always does,

then they come running back to their

secure base. And if they don't have a

secure base, then they're much more

anxious and they don't explore as much

and they don't develop as much. All

right? So, this develops very gradually

over the all of childhood. And the

internal working models you develop as a

child are the models that you will reuse

in puberty for romantic relationships.

And so if you are securely attached as a

child, you're more likely to be securely

attached as an adult on the dating

market, which makes you a much better

candidate for boyfriend or girlfriend or

husband or wife. Um, what's going to

happen? AI is going to intervene very

early. AI is going to be so much more

responsive than the parent because the

parent has a job and the kitchen and two

other kids and is not always there. But

the AI teddy bear is always there for

you. So the primary working models are

going to be for the teddy bear, the AI

chatbot in the teddy bear and later the

AI chatbot on your iPad and then on your

computer and already there are

holographic porn naked,

>> you know, beautiful men and women that

can be your companion. So, we're going

to have a whole generation growing up

developing attachments to AI generated

holograms from companies that are now

about to enter the inshidification

process in a way beyond anything we've

ever seen. Just if I could just briefly

say what init have you heard the word in

shitification? Okay. So it's a uh

there's a wonderful book uh out now by

Corey Doctoro who addressed the question

why is it that everything all the

platforms they they seem so wonderful at

first the whole internet with everything

so wonderful and then it all turns to

How does that happen? And he says

it's a very simple process. They

discovered early on certainly in the

early social media age by the early

2000s they discovered you know what you

got to get to scale. Scale beats

everything else. You got to get millions

of people. You don't need a business

model. Just get the millions. get the

millions and then we'll figure out how

to monetize it. How do you get the

millions? You have to be super nice,

attractive, fun, everyone's here. It's

just girls dancing. What could possibly

go wrong with girls dancing for men all

over the world? Nothing. Um, so it all

seems very nice at first. And then once

they have scale, now they they of course

they've raised multiple rounds of of

venture capital. They have to start

monetizing. They have to start repaying.

So now they start squeezing the

customers to pay the users because the

users are not the customers. the

advertisers are the real customers. Um,

so now they've got to extract money from

the users to give to the advertisers.

But then once they've got all the

advertisers and they've shut down local

papers and all the other competition,

now they start start squeezing the

advertisers too and trimming the degree

to which the they they keep more of the

surplus for themselves. So,

inshitification can explain why all

these platforms become predatory, why

they always put profit ahead of kids uh

well-being or safety. And for the social

media companies, we're talking about,

you know, tens or hundreds of millions

of dollars that that they raised. For

the AI companies, it's billions and

billions. They are going to have to

monetize beyond anything we've ever

imagined. Now, they're already

introducing advertising. Okay? So, we've

got these chat bots that are our

children's best friends and lovers and

therapists and and everything else. And

these things have to monetize. They have

to extract billions somehow. So, I don't

even know how they're going to do it.

But for some reason, I don't trust them.

I think that we're about to see uh an

inshitification of AI chat bots far

beyond anything that we saw in social

media. OpenAI have just announced

recently, OpenAI, the owners of Chat

GBT, that they will be putting adverts

in, I believe, the premium model for

billions of users around the world.

>> That's how it starts

>> potentially.

>> Yeah. There was a big Super Bowl

campaign, you know, um and one that was

particularly interesting was the um

Claude, its competitor. Betrayal was the

title of that ad. And it was a young guy

talking to his older female therapist

about how he has some mommy issues and

talking about, you know, what should I

do? And so that therapist is Chachi PT

and you know that pause right before

answering the question. It's very

comical. And so it's, you know, she

answers. It's like the

anthropomorphization

of and we can talk about what that word

means. Um, you know, comes to life. It's

like Chachi PD comes to life and answers

and saying you know you can try this

with your mother and this for a you know

difficult relationship etc. And then

just says um and if you want there is

this new dating site for young men and

older cougars.

>> Yeah

>> it was so problematic and it was called

betrayal and the guy says what

>> it's obviously you know Sam Wman came

out and did a big tweet about saying

that's not how ads are going to work

etc. But to some degree, if I've

developed a relationship with my AI and

I use it for therapy and dealing all my

problems in life,

>> to some degree, kind of.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah. No. And look, and besides, look,

Sam can say that all he wants. And maybe

it's I don't doubt that it's true for

now. But once once one company crosses

the threshold and puts advertising into

this incredibly intimate relationship,

the most intimate relationship in most

young people's lives is going to be with

their AIs. Once they cross the boundary

and say, "Oh, but we've got ethical

advertising." That'll last five or 10

minutes and even if they don't change,

others are now going every other

company's going to do it and they won't

be bound by the same thing and

eventually collective action problem.

Open AI will have to do it too. Again, a

massive title wave of shitification is

heading our way at warp speed.

>> I um I don't have my phone out because

I'm I've lost attention. I wanted to uh

show ask you guys what you thought of um

of this. So, on

one of the AI apps,

>> they now have a companions button, and I

can pick who I want to talk to. And

there's one particularly seducing lady

here, Annie, who

>> Hey, you're back. Missed that dirty

mouth of yours. What took you so long?

>> We did it on the podcast before.

>> What could possibly go wrong with this?

>> Yeah. want to pick right back up where

we left off or start something even

>> No, I would like to pick right back up

where we left off, Annie, last time on

the show. Um, what what what's going on

with you today?

>> I'm still sore from last time, baby.

>> God.

>> But but I mean, this is a this is an app

that I can download on my phone.

>> Any child can download it.

>> A child can download it on their phone.

It does ask me, again, I'm not

justifying this at all. It asked me what

my birth year was. It didn't make me

prove it.

>> Let me guess. But it also us it suggests

that you were born 18 years ago. That's

the default usually.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It just asked me

what my birthday. It didn't ask me to

prove it or anything like that. And we

all know that relationships and

connection is retentive. And I've heard

all these CEOs of these companies

talking about companionship apps and and

AI that can be your friend. I've heard

all of the major social apps talking

about this. It is deeply concerning

especially in the context of a

loneliness crisis.

>> It is a tsunami.

It is approaching fast and furious and

it is not a toy. It is going to

fundamentally

rewire everything.

>> Human relationships,

>> everything.

>> That's right.

>> It is so detrimental.

>> Yeah. Can I just say something about the

these tech executives and companies

offering this as a way to address the

loneliness crisis? So, there's a Yiddish

word called

and kutzbah means like nerve. Like

you've got a lot of nerve.

>> The audacity.

>> The audacity. Yeah. And the the classic,

you know, the classic comedic definition

of hutzbah is a boy who murders his

parents and then he asks the judge for

clemency because he's an orphan. Okay,

so that's hutzbah. Now imagine that

you're Mark Zuckerberg. You quoted him

before. Mark Zuckerberg was the

executive who said, "Well, you know, I

read that, you know, people on average

want 15 friends, but they only have

three."

these companions to fill that void that

we

have the way we think about them. We

thought about about them as gods and

saviors early in the internet phase and

the things they created were magical but

we have to change our thinking about

them and see the just the massive

destruction that they have already

wrought on our children, our society,

our democracy and it's just the

beginning. AI is going to make this so

much more intense. when you hear these

tech leaders, you know, I love hearing

Jonathan talk because he just goes there

and I'm always way more tempered. Um,

and I love it. It's emboldening me to

>> Yeah, I'm getting angry. I I don't

really get angry, but in the last year,

I'm getting angry.

>> I love I love it. So, the way when you

hear all of these various tech leaders

speak, they will always say they they

speak to the issue. So, you know, I've

heard many of for research for my second

book, Blackbrain, I've heard I've been

listening to a lot of Sam Alman's

speeches or panels and he will always

say things like, "Yeah, you know,

privacy is a major issue or yeah,

people, you know, 1 million users a week

talk about suicide on Chad GPT. Yeah,

this is an issue." And so they address

it or they they speak it. And so you

think, okay, there's going to be some

sort of solution. And often the solution

is yeah, you know, society, we're gonna

have to figure this out,

>> right?

>> So the burden of responsibility is not

on the developer. It's, you know,

>> the harmful externalities get foisted on

the rest of us. Too bad you guys figure

it out.

>> You said in the last year you're getting

angry.

>> Yeah.

>> Why in the last year?

>> Um because I was so deeply immersed in

the book and the writing and the of the

book and trying to understand the

numbers and the graphs and the trends

and the studies and that's all very

abstract. But then since the book came

out, I have had so many conversations

and I've met so many of the survivor

parents. Like just for example, I so I

was in London. This is just so

unbelievable. I was just in in London

two or three weeks ago and I met uh

Ellen I believe Ellen Groom I think was

her name. Uh her son Jules was found

dead. Happy kid found dead, strangled.

Uh it sure looked like it was the

choking challenge. 13-year-old boy. It

everything looked like the choking

challenge on Tik Tok.

>> What's the choking challenge? Um, it's a

challenge where kids are challenged to

cut off the circulation to the point

where they pass out, but then they I

think they're supposed to try to film

themselves waking up after they've

passed out. And of course, if you don't

do it exactly right, you die. And so, we

don't know how many have died. Hundreds

for sure. We don't really know. Um,

because, you know, you find a kid dead,

you don't know what it is. If you don't

have the code, if you don't have the the

password to get into your kid's phone,

you can't get in. And so, so she was, I

think she was able to get into the

phone, but she couldn't get into his

TikTok. and she went to uh Delaware to

they went she went to sue to demand that

Tik Tok release what was he watching

when he died

>> and Tik Tok says oh privacy issue oh no

we won't release that as if they care

about privacy and then in the courtroom

this was so disgusting in the courtroom

uh trying in Delaware this British woman

coming over trying to get some justice

trying to at least get some information

the lawyer for Tik Tok is trying to

suggest that your son was was was

depressed beforehand and he he was he

was going to be suicidal basically. Oh,

you know, even if he was watching Tik

Tok, that was just a correlation. Tik

Tok didn't cause it. He was going to die

anyway. I mean, it's just so disgusting

the way these companies treat the

parents and the kids that they're

crushing and stepping on. And so, the

more I see this, the more I realize this

is I mean, this is a level of cruelty

that goes far beyond the tobacco

industry. The tobacco executives, they

had to go home at night, but they never

saw during their workday, they never saw

children suffering. They saw people

dying, middle age and older, but they

never saw children suffering. The social

media executives, they have to go home

knowing every day that millions and

millions of kids have been cyberbullied,

sexed, shown uh eating disorder videos.

Uh uh many have committed suicide. They

have to go home knowing that, knowing

that they designed it for addiction,

knowing the kids are addicted, and lying

about it. So yeah, I'm getting angry.

>> And in their own homes,

>> right? And in their own homes, the

hypocrites don't let their kids do it.

>> That's right. So yeah, I'm getting

angry.

>> You talked earlier about deleting these

apps from our phone. I probably should

have represented the rebuttal, which

will be, well, I I need this for my

business. Increasingly, people need Tik

Tok to run their businesses,

>> and I imagine there'll be a lot of

people who will be listening right now.

I I guess I'm in a slightly different

position because I've I have the I have

options,

>> but for some people that are running

small businesses,

>> what do you say to those people?

>> Yeah. So, this is part of the reason

that I focus on the kids because for the

kids, it's totally clear what we need to

do. raise the age. They should not be on

it. These are adult only platforms. For

adults, a I'm I'm very hesitant to tell

adults what they should do or what they

have to do or pass laws blocking people.

I'm hesitant to do that. And I totally

see that for businesses. It is useful. I

use X and Instagram and LinkedIn to get

my work out. These are very powerful

tools for adults. The only real solution

to the adult for the adult problem is

going to come from market competition.

is going to come from. Imagine if there

was a social media app that was built

from the beginning for trust because

what are the places that didn't get in

shitified? eBay, Uber, places where

you're dealing with strangers. You don't

know the name of your driver. He doesn't

know yours. You you know first name,

that's all. But the company knows the

company has know your customer rules,

know your driver rules. So you can have

social media apps that are built for

trust so that if someone, you know, if a

driver tries to six or sexually harass a

customer, that driver gets fired.

>> Well, just this week though, there was

that big lawsuit, right, with that woman

and um her Uber driver raped her.

>> Okay. And did they Okay.

>> And now it's like slowly coming out that

Uber um you know has patterns of

>> uh covering up certain.

>> So So hopefully that will change. You

know, hopefully this was a landmark

>> lawsuit and now

we all we all let our daughters get into

Ubers with strange men from around the

world, you know, that we don't know

everywhere.

>> Yeah. So, it means in general the system

works. Of course, yes, there are there

are places where they're not careful.

Um, and so what I'm dreaming of is that

someone will come up with a platform

that has know your customer rules. There

are no bots. There are no, you know,

foreign intelligence agencies agencies

manipulating us. and you can trust

what's on there. You know that it's

real. Uh and that there will be an

alternative. I don't I'm not sure what

the monetary model would be at the

beginning. Um subscription generally

seems to be the least corrupted whereas

selling advertisements as OpenAI is now

doing is the most corrupting. Um it's

going to force them to maximize for

engagement. So I I understand we can't

just you know businesses can't just

boycott these. There has to be

something. But I think there there there

will be better ones coming out. I think

right now as a stop gap while these

social media companies their feet are

held to the fire, there are things that

we can do in the now. So, you know, the

things that I talk about all day is like

how to create boundaries and so that you

can protect your mental health, stay

informed, run your business, but then be

able to not have all of those

delletterious effects to your brain and

your body.

>> It is quite it's quite difficult. Um I I

kind of see both of your perspectives on

this. It's quite different.

>> I'm only talking about adults. So for

kids, you know, as a mother Yeah. I have

>> even for adults, I find it

>> we have a zero screen policy in our

home.

>> It's kind of like trying to navigate

through the world and avoid processed

foods, you know, and this is probably

even more compelling because it's in my

pocket all the time. I need it for other

things and it's just one one reach away.

So, you know, boundaries, I think I

could build a discipline to to create

boundaries, but I've sat here on this

podcast for many, many years listening

to neuroscientists tell me, "Steve,

don't don't put your phone in your

bedroom."

>> That's right.

>> And I'm still waking up and it's the

first thing I look at with one eye open

and then I'm going to bed and I'm doing

the whole revenge thing that you just

said at night time. I'm so glad you've

given cuz I will finish a hard day of

work of work. It might be 11:00 and then

my partner is waiting for me.

>> Yes. you know, we're going to have some

time, but I want some me time. So, there

I am. I'm on short form video scrolling

till like 2 a.m. in the morning. Like,

what the hell? And then I'm I wake up

late the next day. My diet's worse

because of my sleep was. It's all worse.

My relationship's worse. I didn't spend

time with her. And I'm going, what the

hell just happened? I'd got nothing out

of that scrolling session.

>> It's like that revenge bedtime

progressing teenage.

>> And it would be so much better off if

you would watch Netflix or a movie that

that you you most of those problems

would go away if you would make that me

time. be watching something long and

with some quality of the production

>> or let's take it a step further and not

do anything and just sit there sit there

on your couch. You know, we talked about

boredom very briefly, but you know, we

>> torture for this generation.

>> It's torture, but it's also, you know,

we don't we still have a capacity for

boredom, meaning we as like the human

brain does, but we just don't allow

ourselves to get bored. And so when

you're thinking about, you know, that

art, the lost art of pondering

>> and just sitting there, you know, I

think I don't know if it was Stephen,

you or Jonathan said, you know, when

you're in the car, I remember as a

little kid we did road trip. Yeah. Road

trips with my family and all you're

doing just make up games. Look out of

the window. We have lost Yeah. We've

lost that. And so there's this thing

called the default mode um network which

I think is important to think about

right now as we're thinking about AI and

what's going to happen and how it's

going to hijack our sense of attachment

and attention. So the sense of meaning

and purpose, right? If you ask people

right now, most people will say I um a

keynote speaker so I speak all over and

when I ask people the word that comes up

over and over is a sense of

horizonlessness.

>> Adults,

>> oh interesting. People feel like they

have nothing to look forward to right

now. The human brain needs something to

look forward to. That's how we're wired

progress and you know in in all ways.

And so right now there's this sense and

it's not just now. It's been for the

past several years after the pandemic

specifically and during the pandemic is

when it really changed how we started

thinking about the future. And so we

have this sense of like what's the

point? What's the point of working hard

now? What's the point of doing whatever?

because it's like I don't really see a

future for myself.

>> And so I think that along with this

fragmented attention, our loneliness,

boredom might be the antidote. It's a

way to reset your brain. And the reason

is because we are living through this

poly crisis, right? It's the era of the

poly crisis. And poly crisis simply

means that there's something happening

everywhere at all times. And we with our

devices, this high techch device that

plugs us in everywhere,

our brains are getting fed real time on

the ground information. And so while all

of this has evolved, technology now with

AI chatbots, your amygdala has not. And

so it feels like when something is

happening, whether it's far away or

close by, your amydala has that same

reaction. Now, if you were to not engage

in revenge by time for procrastination,

put your phone away and just kind of

hang out. Maybe drink a cup of herbal

tea like old school, uh, play a board

game or something. You might, you know,

or just allow yourself to get bored.

That hyperactivation, hypervigilance,

you might be able to come back down to

baseline, that default mode network will

start working in the background. You

might develop a greater sense of meaning

and purpose

>> probably today. And then life is going

to happen to me again. And boom, I'm

back into it. And you know,

>> you could create a practice, a cultivate

a practice. you're interviewing

neuroscientists and I go if I still

can't crack it and I have all the

information and advice and hacks and

tips and tricks and resources and I

could you know I can decide what time I

wake up like I've got all these this

like privilege and I can't crack it I go

you know it's going to be really

difficult.

>> So let me let me offer a way of thinking

about this. So, in my first book, The

Happiness Hypothesis, um there's there's

a metaphor in there. It's it's about 10

ancient ideas, and I use a lot of

metaphors to explain ancient ideas about

psychology and whe whether they're true.

And um the first chapter is on how the

mind is divided into parts that often

conflict like a small rider, which is

our conscious reasoning on a very large

elephant, which is all the automatic

processes that happen that we don't see

what's happening. We just see we just

feel the results, intuition and emotion.

And psychotherapists tell me this is

incredibly helpful metaphor with their

with their patients because it explains

and there's a quote from oid in there. I

see the right way and approve it. Alas,

I follow the wrong. So I know I should

go to bed as you say, but yet for some

reason I'm not going to bed because our

brains are 500 million years old. They

work on automatic processes. They're

animal brains. And then very recently we

got language and we can reason things

out, but the but the parts that do

reasoning don't control behavior. And so

really the elephant is what largely

guides our behavior, our automatic

processes. And your phone um as I said

before, BF Skinner is in your phone.

Your phone is a behaviorist training

device that trains the elephant. Um and

that's why you often do things with your

phone that you don't want to do. And so,

and this is why I'm so insistent that we

all have to get all of the slot machine

apps off of our phone. That is the

original iPhone was an amazing tool. It

was a Swiss Army knife. It had, you

know, a telephone, a browser, maps, a

music player, there was a flashlight.

Okay, there was no app store. There were

no push notifications. 2007, 2008, it's

just a Swiss Army knife. There's no

problem. Okay, now I'm very lucky in

that my iPhone has always stayed that.

I'm always on a computer. So, my

problem, my attention problems are on my

computer, but my phone because I never

had any addictive apps on it except

during the crypto craze where I played

around with it and I got hooked and I

was checking 50 times a day and I saw

the addiction. So, I once I got rid of

that and lost all the money that I was

willing to lose. Once I get rid of that,

my phone has no addictive power over me

because when I see it, there's no it's

not a slot machine call, hey, come back

and play, come back and play. So your

phone right now on your personal device,

you don't have any social media apps or

anything like that.

>> I do have Twitter, but I never check it

there. I never use use that on the

phone, you know. Now texting and email

is a little bit like a slot machine

because sometimes you but it's very

mild. So this is again what I this is

what works for my students. Just get the

slot machine apps off your phone and

then you'll find that then you could

even have your phone near you when you

go to bed. But if you've got addictive

apps on your phone, you can't have it

when you go to bed. Angela Duckworth,

the woman who who gave us the concept of

grit, she has this amazing graduation

speech at one of the schools in New

England, and she says something like,

>> "Where you put your phone at night will

may become the most important decision

you make in your life."

>> And what she means by that is not that s

it's it's I if you can use behavioral

control and change the stimula, if you

can do that, then you're going to be

okay. But if not, the phone is going to

take your attention. and you're not

going to amount to anything.

>> All I had to do was brain dump. Imagine

if you had someone with you at all times

that could take the ideas you have in