What Is “Now”? & How to Deal with Poisonous People

Summary

Podcast Summary: Something You Should Know

Host: Mike Carruthers
Episode: What Is “Now”? & How to Deal with Poisonous People
Date: April 27, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode dives into two main themes:

1. The Science and Experience of “Now”: What is the present moment, how do we experience time, and why does it sometimes seem to speed up or slow down?
2. Identifying and Managing Poisonous People: Who are the “poisonous” individuals in our lives, what traits do they share, and how can we respond more effectively?

The episode combines expert interviews with science-backed advice and offers memorable takeaways on relationships, time perception, and dealing with challenging personalities.

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Key Segment 1: The Power of Relationships – Harvard Grant Study

[03:07 – 06:08]

• Topic: The Harvard Grant Study, one of the longest-running studies on adult development.
• Main Insight: The single biggest predictor of happiness and health is the quality of one’s relationships.
  • "People who are more socially connected tend to live longer, stay healthier and maintain better brain function as they age." – Mike Carruthers, [03:54]
  • Loneliness and isolation, in contrast, are linked to earlier physical and mental decline.
  • Relationships do more than just make life enjoyable; they buffer stress and appear to slow aging.

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Key Segment 2: The Science of “Now” with Jo Marchant

Guest: Jo Marchant, science writer and author of "In Search of Now"
[06:08 – 25:59]

Defining “Now”

• There’s no universal “now” in physics: Einstein’s relativity shows there’s no cosmic moment of simultaneity.
  • “Now is where we meet the world...from a scientific, objective point of view, there isn’t really any now that we can pin down.” – Jo Marchant, [06:40]
• Neuroscience perspective: The sense of “now” is a brain-made construction, integrating delayed and varied sensory inputs into a subjective present.
  • “We’re experiencing everything with a slight delay...It feels like now, but it isn’t the same now as for the person that was speaking.” – Jo Marchant, [07:12]

The Present Is Shaped by Past and Future

• Our experience of the current moment is built on past memories and future expectations; removing those leaves “nothing.”
  • “If you take those things away, there isn’t really anything left. A pure present would...have nothing in it.” – Jo Marchant, [08:48]

Predicting the Present

• The brain constantly predicts what is happening now, based on all available historical and just-arrived data.
  • Example: Viral debate over “the dress” (blue/black or white/gold) highlights how experience shapes perception. [11:55]
  • Roger Federer’s tennis: The brain must predict a fast-moving object’s position, not just react, to operate in real time. [13:00]

Subjective and Cultural Nature of Time

• Our “now” is personal—formed by unique memories, experiences, and expectations.
  • “You and I would be building very different models of our world depending on our past experience.” – Jo Marchant, [12:10]
• Cultures conceptualize time differently (left to right, right to left, future as behind or ahead). [19:25]

Why Time Speeds Up or Slows Down

• Emotional state influences perceived duration; flow states make time fly, boredom or pain slows it down.
• Older people often feel time passes more quickly due to fewer novel experiences.
  • "The older we get, the more efficient our brains get...we’re not actually paying a whole lot of attention." – Jo Marchant, [20:22]

Notable Quote:

• “There’s no area in our brain that’s dedicated purely to sensing the passage of time. What we sense is change and events.” – Jo Marchant, [17:30]

Modern “Time Famine” & Productivity Paradox

• Trying to “optimize” every moment leads to a feeling of never having enough time.
  • “The more accurately we try and measure time...the less time people feel they have. This is why it’s called time famine.” – Jo Marchant, [23:54]
• This can reduce quality of life: less joy, less healthy eating, less helping others, more stress.

Practical Advice:

• “Time is a tool. It’s something that we invented to help us. It’s not a master. It doesn’t rule us.” – Jo Marchant, [24:58]

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Key Segment 3: Poisonous People – Understanding and Managing

Guest: Dr. Leanne ten Brink, psychologist and author of "Poisonous: How to Resist Them and Improve Your Life"
[27:35 – 47:16]

Traits and Origins of Poisonous People

• Definition: Individuals high in the “dark tetrad” traits – psychopathy, Machiavellianism, narcissism, and sadism.
  • “The thing that all of those traits share in common is that they involve callousness and manipulation.” – Dr. Leanne ten Brink, [29:11]
• Both genetics and environment (e.g., parenting, childhood abuse) contribute to these traits’ development. [30:17]
• Traits can be detected very early (as young as 2 years old), though children’s personalities can be reshaped with proper intervention.

Self-awareness and Deception

• Poisonous people usually know they have these traits (self-reported on questionnaires), but don’t view their behaviors as problematic.
  • “They are quite aware of their personality traits...What they do not see is the problem with that, because generally they perceive the problem to be your problem.” – Dr. Leanne ten Brink, [33:32]
• They tend to be highly manipulative and deceptive, often appearing charming or competent at first.
  • “When you’re around these people for long enough, you start to see that what they’re saying and the reality does not line up.” – Dr. Leanne ten Brink, [35:31]

Notable Quote:

• “We also confuse confidence, which they have in spades, with competence.” – Dr. Leanne ten Brink, [36:33]

How to Spot and Respond to Poisonous People

• About 10–20% of the population may score high on dark tetrad traits. But, “That means that 80–90% of people are not like that.” – [38:58]
• Personality is consistent across contexts; poisonous people tend to act similarly with everyone, though they may appear nicer to those who have something they want. [40:31]
• People can sometimes spot these traits after a brief encounter but should be wary of deceptive “first impressions” and update their judgments over time.
  • “We can get a sense of someone’s personality pretty quickly. ... If you keep getting information to the contrary...you should update your first impression.” – Dr. Leanne ten Brink, [41:31]

Managing Relationships with Poisonous People

• The primary advice: Recognize the traits early, then make an “informed decision” whether to continue the relationship, minimize contact, or use strategies to reduce harm. [37:04]
• Such relationships are almost always challenging and require mindful interaction.
• Shaping behavior with punishment is ineffective; rewarding positive behaviors is shown to have better results, especially in children and adults. [45:20]

Memorable Exchange:

• Mike: “So it seems like from what you’re saying is that once you’ve identified someone like this that you’re better off being further away...” [42:48]
• Leanne: “I think it’s up to every individual to think about what is valuable to them. ...these relationships are going to be hard. You might need to approach interactions with them in a more mindful way.” [43:07]

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Bonus Intel: Sleep and Appetite

[47:21 – 47:56]

• Lack of sleep activates the same brain systems as marijuana, boosting appetite for high-calorie foods. [47:21]
• Sleep deprivation doesn’t just make you eat more—it makes junk food harder to resist.
  • "If you’re trying to manage your weight, what you do at night may matter just as much as what you eat during the day." – Mike Carruthers, [47:48]

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Notable Quotes (with Timestamps)

• “Now is where we meet the world...from a scientific, objective point of view, there isn’t really any now that we can pin down.”
  — Jo Marchant, [06:40]

• "We’re experiencing everything with a slight delay...It feels like now, but it isn’t the same now as for the person that was speaking."
  — Jo Marchant, [07:12]

• “When you’re around these people for long enough, you start to see that what they’re saying and the reality does not line up.”
  — Dr. Leanne ten Brink, [35:31]

• “The more accurately we try and measure time, the more efficiently we try and use our time...the less time people feel they have. So this is why it's called time famine.”
  — Jo Marchant, [23:54]

• “We also confuse confidence, which they have in spades, with competence.”
  — Dr. Leanne ten Brink, [36:33]

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Summary Takeaways

• Our experience of “now” is complex, subjective, and constructed by our brains. “Now” is not a fixed point; it’s filtered through memory, expectation, and prediction.
• Optimizing time can paradoxically make us feel more rushed and less satisfied. Resisting the urge to schedule every second may actually expand our sense of time and joy.
• Strong relationships are fundamental to happiness and health.
• Poisonous people exist on a spectrum—with identifiable, consistent traits—but most people do not fall into this category. Early recognition can empower you to make smart decisions about continuing (or distancing) relationships.
• Managing poisonous individuals is difficult—punishment rarely works, but rewarding positive behavior can help, especially in children.
• Sleep impacts appetite and cravings; manage rest as much as diet if weight control is a goal.

This episode offers a blend of science, practical advice, and memorable stories to help listeners rethink their approach to time, relationships, and toxic personalities.

Transcript

[A]

I'm Alex Honnold, professional rock climber and founder of the Honnold Foundation. I wanted to let you know about a brand new season of the Planet Visionaries podcast in partnership with the Rolex Perpetual Planet Initiative. This is the podcast exploring bold ideas and big solutions from the people leading the way in conservation. Join me in conversation with the likes of climate champion Mark Ruffalo, biologist and photographer Christina Mittermeier, and one of the most successful conservationists of our time, Chris Tompkins. Join us on Planet Visionaries wherever you get your podcasts.

[B]

Today on something you should know. The best advice you may ever hear, backed by 80 years of research. Then we'll explore what time is, what is now, and how managing time can backfire.

[C]

The more accurately we try and measure time, the more efficiently we try and use our time. The more we're trying to pack in, the less time people feel they have. So this is why it's called time famine. So so we're living longer than ever and yet people feel like they haven't got enough time. They're always rushed.

[B]

Also, how the lack of sleep can make you gain weight and the personality traits of poisonous people and the damage they can do people with these personality

[D]

traits by virtue of being callous and manipulative. That manipulative part comes with a lot of deception. When you're around these people, you know you start to see what they're saying and the reality does not line up.

[B]

All this today on something you should know.

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[F]

Something you Should Know Fascinating intel, the

[G]

world's top experts and practical advice you can use in your life today.

[B]

Something you Should Know with Mike Carruthers have you ever heard of the Harvard Grant Study? It's really worth knowing about, and that's why we're going to start this episode of Something youg Should Know talking about it. Hi, welcome. I'm Micah Ruthers. So the Harvard Grant Study is one of the longest running studies of adult life ever conducted. It began in 1938, tracking a group of Harvard men, including John F. Kennedy, and over time it expanded into what is now known as the Harvard Study of Adult Development, following participants for more than 80 years. After decades of data on health, success, aging and happiness, the conclusion is surprising. The quality of your relationships may be the single biggest predictor of how happy and healthy you are, according to the study's longtime director, Robert Waldinger. People who are more socially connected tend to live longer, stay healthier and maintain better brain function as they age. Those who feel lonely or isolated, on the other hand, tend to decline earlier, both physically and mentally. Strong relationships don't just make life enjoyable, they actually protect you. They buffer stress, support your health, and even seem to slow the effects of aging. In fact, the research is so compelling that Waldinger, the head of the study, says it changed his own behavior, prompting him to reach out to more friends and family, even if it felt a little uncomfortable. And that is something you should know. What is now? It seems like a simple question. Now is this moment, what you're experiencing right now. It feels obvious, constant, almost like the background of your life. But the more scientists look at it, the stranger now gets. According to physics, there may be no such thing as a universal now. And neuroscience suggests that what you experience as the present moment is actually a construction, your brain piecing together sights and sounds and sensations that have already happened. In other words, the now you're experiencing may not even be happening right now. So where does this feeling of the present moment come from? Why does time sometimes fly and other times seem to crawl? And how much of what you experience is actually shaped after the fact? My guest takes a fascinating look at these questions. Joe Marchant is a science writer and author of the book In Search of Now, which explores the cutting edge of physics Neuroscience and psychology to help understand what we mean when we say now. Hi, Joe, welcome to something you should know.

[C]

Hi, thanks for having me.

[B]

You know, what's so interesting about this topic is when you try to get your head around the concept of now, it's very hard to do because what is it now is now, but now it's gone. Right? What was now a moment ago is not now now. Or is it all part of the same now? But it seems that now. So you see. So as somebody who has studied it and written a book about it, what is now to you?

[C]

For me, now is where we meet the world is our meeting with the world. And what's so intriguing about it to me is that from a scientific, a purely objective scientific point of view, there isn't really any now that we can pin down. So physicists, since Einstein was his, with his theory of relativity, would say there is no cosmic now. There is no universal moment of happening throughout the universe that, you know, two events could be happening at the same time or not, depending on the observer. So now it's more like a perspective, if you like. It's something that's within us. And then if you look at it from a neuroscience perspective as well, even if there was a now stuff happening right now out there in the world, by the time we experience that, it takes a certain fraction of a second for that information to reach us for those events. So you're experiencing everything with a slight delay, delay. It feels like now, but it isn't the same now as for the. The person that was speaking. And different senses as well work at different speeds. Sight and sound travel at different speeds through the air, and our brain then processes them at different speeds. So you've got all this information coming in and it's delayed, it's out of sync, and yet we can still experience what's happening around us as this unified now. So again, I think that's telling us that now is something that we create within us rather than something that's just simply given to us from the outside world.

[B]

So you hear a lot about being in the present moment, to not spend a lot of time worrying about the future or agonizing over the past. And yet, when I think about that, the present moment, you being in this present moment is the result of your past, your memories that you bring to this present moment, as well as the things maybe you're worrying about in the future. So this idea that you can be in a vacuum in the present moment doesn't really make sense because you are your Memories and your concerns and what's important to you in this moment.

[C]

Yeah, it's really interesting, isn't it? Because there's a lot of research showing that your sense of time, that. The way that we bring our different time scales and our past, present and future into a moment. So everything you've learned through your life, all of your experiences, all of your memories, and everything that you're expecting to the future and all of that is being brought into each moment. And if you take those things away, there isn't really anything left. A pure present would. Would have nothing in it. And it's when we are in different mental states where we lose our sense of time, we also tend to lose our sense of self. Those two things are very entwined together, whether it's in psychosis or people who've taken psychedelic drugs, or even just in flow states where you're really immersed in the. In. In the moment when your sense time falls away, your sense of self falls away. So I think it's. It's a balance. Like, we do need to be able to not just always be obsessed with the past and the future and appreciate what's happening right now, but I think that what's happening right now, everything in your moment around you that you're experiencing depends also on your. On your past and your future. It's all of these rich threads of experience that make you you and that make your experience what it is. We're not just passively observing the world. There's lots of research showing how much we bring to how we're perceiving and what we're perceiving.

[B]

Right. Well, your now is different than my now because of what you bring to it versus what I bring to it.

[C]

Yeah, exactly. There's a lot of work in neuroscience showing that we're not just passively receiving signals that are arriving. Often we think about now or, you know, what we're experiencing. Any particular moment is there's just objects out there in the world and sort of the light signals beam to our eyes and we experience that and we're, you know, if you and I were in the same room, we'd be experiencing pretty much much the same thing. But it seems that that is not actually what's happening at all. Partly because of what I said before about, you know, if, if we did that, we would always be living a little a fraction of a second in the past because of the time it takes for the signals to get to us. And all the signals that are arriving will be all jumbled up because the sight and sound from a speaker, say, would arrive at different times and it'd be this chaotic jumble of sensations that wouldn't make any sense. And there's quite a lot of evidence now that actually what the brain is doing is always predicting ahead. It's like we're not predicting the future exactly, but we're predicting the present. The brain is running a model of what it thinks that this sort of. All of these past sensations that have arrived mean for what is likely to be happening now. And it's that model that we are perceiving. So you and I would be building very different models of our world depending on our past experience. So I can give you a couple of examples. I don't know if you remember the. The dress that went viral, the Internet. I think it was in 2015. And some people thought there was a photograph of a dress, and some people saw it as white and gold, and some people saw it as blue and black. Do you remember that?

[B]

Yeah, yeah.

[C]

It was massive. And essentially what seems to have been happening is that it was an ambiguous photo. You couldn't tell from the photo itself what the lighting conditions were. Was it an overexposed blue and black dress or an underexposed white and gold dress? And depending on your. Your previous experience, your experience with different lighting conditions and the kinds of environments that you've grown up in, different people's brains are jumping to very different conclusions about what is the most likely situation for this photograph. And so different people with different backstories are seeing completely different things. So when we say that your brain is predicting ahead what's likely happening now, it's using, you know, sensations that have just arrived, like a few hundred milliseconds ago for the events. But it's also using that entire lifetime of. Of. Of history. That's what I mean by the brain is drawing all of these different timescales into a single moment. Everything that you've learned through your life is feeding into what is you perceive is happening. Now. Another example I quite like is the tennis. There's a photograph of the tennis player, Roger Federer, and he's playing in the final at Wimbledon, and he's just had the ball served to him. And there's his photo. It's really dramatic where he's kind of stretched out with his. His racket and he's. He's looking at the ball just about to. Which seems like fairly obvious. Like, of course he's looking at the ball, but there's this speedometer behind him showing that that ball is traveling at 125 miles an hour. Which means that in the time it would take for the light signals from the ball to reach his eye and then for those signals to be process, reach the visual cortex of his brain and be processed by his brain, that ball would have traveled eight feet. So the, the, if he was basing what he saw on the latest possible signals he could possibly have received from that ball, it would have been eight feet away in a completely different part of the court. And yet he's not looking at that out of date position. He's looking at exactly where the ball is now. And so what is he looking at? He's looking at his brain's model based on all the information that it has on where that ball is going to be now at this moment. And that's what enables him to hit that ball. So all of the time, this is what's happening in all of our, our brains, where the brain is gathering all of the information that it can and it's using that information. Everything you've learned since you were a baby up to a millisecond ago is feeding into that, that model of your present moment. And that is going to be very different for everybody.

[B]

How exhausting.

[C]

Yeah, I mean, the brain is working really hard. We feel like now is just this very natural thing that we have this direct connection with events around us. And we're just sitting back like we're watching a movie or something and it's just all being beamed into the brain and you're seeing what's happened, but it's not, it's a really active personal process. We are working all the time. We are interacting. Our eyes are darting around, there's little hairs in your ear are vibrating. You're, you know, to feel something, you have to run your fingers across a surface. If you don't move, if you don't interact with your world, there will be no sensation. So it's like a dance with the world is a phrase that I use that everything that you experience, you are creating, you are exploring, you are meeting the world, you are interacting, you are making that sensation. It's like a joint project, if you like. It's not a question of we're just sitting back, having the world beams to us. And so, yeah, it is kind of exhausting. But I think it's also really liberating to realize that how much agency and control we have over what we are perceiving within each moment.

[B]

In just a second, I want to talk about and get your thoughts on how we perceive time. How Sometimes it seems to speed up and sometimes it seems to slow down business owners.

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[B]

talking with Jo Marchant. She is a science writer and author of the book In Search of the Science of the Present Moment. So Joe, what about the experience that everyone has had that when things are really great and you're having a wonderful time, time goes by faster and when you're in the hospital, time goes by slower, but it doesn't really, it just seems that way that you're now slows down?

[D]

Yeah.

[C]

Well, this is one of the really intriguing things about about time and about now is how malleable it is. Like you say, we've all had experiences of time racing by going so fast, even when we're having a great time and we wish that it wouldn't or time really dragging. And you can see examples of very different kinds of time with different disorders and mental states as well. There's a disorder called a kinetopsia where people don't perceive smooth movement, but their now is kind of chopped up into these sudden jumps. There was a lady in Germany who had a kinetopsia and she complained that when she poured a cup of tea she would see the liquid just frozen in the air, like going from the spout to the cup, and then the next moment the cup would have overflowed or she'd try and cross the road and she'd see a car in the distance still, and then all of a sudden it would be right on top of her. So she had this sort of sudden jumping kind of a now and then. Of course you've got examples when we're in a flow state or people take psychedelic drugs where it almost seems like time just stops completely. And I think this feeds into what I was saying earlier about how we never experience clock time directly. So physicists looking out in the world don't find a kind of flow of time that's happening out in the world. So we only ever experience events, interactions, and then we kind of glean clock time from that. It's a really useful tool to help us to coordinate our interactions. But it's, it doesn't seem like abstract, linear, mathematical. Time is actually a thing on its own that's ticking by independently. And we, we don't have any sensory organs for time. There is no area in our brain that's dedicated purely to sensing the passage of time. What we sense is change and events. And that explains why clock time is so malleable, because we're not experiencing it directly. If there's lots of exciting events happening, we will experience time very differently compared to if nothing very much is happening.

[B]

I'm wondering if there are cultural differences in the way people in different cultures experience time or think about time. And now if you speak English, you

[C]

probably think about time as going from left to right. If you had to write, draw a timeline. Whereas cultures who read from right to left see time as going from right to left, there are cultures who don't read who see time as flowing uphill or maybe east to west with the sun. The Aymara people of Chile, they see the future not in front of them like we would, walking into the future. They see the future as unseen, hidden behind them.

[B]

There's also this perception that I think most people have as they age, that time goes by faster the older you get. And I've hear various theories on that, is that, well, you know, a day for a five year old is a bigger part of their life, so it seems like it takes longer, but also because maybe as you're older, you've kind of seen it all and so there's nothing new to kind of mark the time. What's your take on all this?

[C]

Yeah, I think both of those have some merit. I'm probably would lean more towards the second explanation that you just gave where it's in terms of the relevant events and changes and connections and a young child, their brain is so flexible and they're so attuned and alert to everything that's happening in the world around them. It's all new and it's all different and it all matters. And they're just interacting in that in a very, very active way. And the older we get, the More efficient our brains get. We just learn certain patterns of thinking, and we're relying on those assumptions and those things that we've learned. When we're perceiving the world, we're not actually paying a whole lot of attention. A lot of the time, we don't need to. We know where the toothbrush is. You know, we know how to get to the kitchen. We know what's in all the cupboards. You know, we're just sort of going through the motions a lot of the time. And so we are not experiencing as many events. And therefore time seems to go faster. I mean, there's also a difference between how time appears or how long we feel time is taking in the moment, as we're living a moment. And then there's also how long we think a period of time was after the event. So when we're thinking back to our memories. But I think in both cases, how you're interacting with the world and how much attention you're paying to what's around you and whether you can free yourself from your assumptions and biases, and that does help time to go slower. Just as a side note, there's really nice research on the emotion of awe. Awe, when we're just really amazed by something that's just vast, that surpasses us, that's beyond us. And your jaw drops and you're just like, wow. And that seems to be a really effective way of suspending all of those assumptions and the normal ruts and paths that you're thinking normally takes. And then time slows down as well. And people who experience awe feel as if they have more time.

[B]

Well, it is interesting that we have this objective clock that we all live by. We all, our whole lives are governed by the clock. And yet, as you've pointed out, our experience of that time measured by that clock is so subjective, which is why you get people saying things like, God, that took forever, or, wow, that went by fast. And yet the clock didn't change. The clock is just the clock. And our experience of it has really relatively little to do with that clock.

[C]

Yeah, I think for most of human history, we didn't have clocks or any sense of this mathematical clock time. It was really Newton who came up with that idea. Most physicists today don't think that that's actually how time works. So time is more like a. A kind of bookkeeping device, if you like. It's a useful mathematical tool that we can use that helps us to coordinate what we're doing with what everyone else is doing. But it's not something that exists in itself independent of the events. It just helps us to synchronize with what's going on around us.

[B]

Does our human obsession with time, our needing to not waste time, to schedule things and show up on time, this whole idea of trying to corral time, does that in itself have an effect on our perception of time?

[C]

There's this phenomenon in psychology called time famine, which people are reporting more and more, which is where the more accurately we try and measure time, the more efficiently we try and use our time. The more we're trying to pack into our schedules every day and deadlines and appointments, the less time people feel they have. So this is why it's called time famine. So we're living longer than ever, and yet people feel like they haven't got enough time. They're always rushed, always stressed, trying to get to the next appointment. And. And this has real negative effects on people's quality of life. Because when people are feeling time famine, they don't do things that they enjoy. They are less likely to eat healthily. They don't go and see the doctor when they need to. They're less likely to help other people. You know, all of these things that improve our quality of life, make life worth living, we don't do because we feel that we don't have enough time, even though we actually have more time than ever. And that comes from how precisely we're measuring this clock time. And we're of chase every last second, every last millisecond. And I think just taking a step back and realizing that time is a tool. It's something that we invented to help us. It's not a master. It doesn't rule us. And if we can step back from that and start thinking a bit more about lived time, about how we actually experience each moment and how we interact with the world, that's something that doesn't disappear when you try and chase it. That's something that I think expands the more you think about it and the more you immerse yourself in it.

[B]

Well, any conversation about time and now I find it really interesting, and I think a lot of people do. That's why movies like Back to the Future and the whole concept of time travel fascinates people because it's all about this thing that we live through time, and yet it's so hard to put your finger on it. I've been talking with Jo Marchant. She is a science writer, and the name of her book is In Search of Now, the Science of the Present. Moment and there is a link to her book at Amazon in the show notes. And Jo, thank you for being here.

[C]

Thanks Mike for having me. It's been really fun talking to you

[I]

about now Eczema is unpredictable, but you can flare less with epglis, a once monthly treatment for moderate to severe eczema after an initial four month or longer dosing phase. About four in ten people taking Ecglis achieved itch relief and clear or almost clear skin at 16 weeks, and most of those people maintain skin that's still more clear at one year with monthly dosing.

[F]

Hempglis Lebricizumab LBKZ a 250mg 2ml injection is a prescription medicine used to treat adults and children 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 88 pounds or 40 kilograms with moderate to severe eczema, also called atopic dermatitis that is not well controlled with prescription therapies used on the skin or topicals or who cannot use topical therapies. Ebglis can be used with or without topical corticosteroids. Don't use if you're allergic to ebglis. Allergic reactions can occur that can be severe. Eye problems can occur. Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening eye problems. You should not receive a live vaccine when treated with ebglis. Before starting evglis, tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection.

[I]

Ask your doctor about ebglis and visit eglis.lilly.com or call 1-800-LilyRx or 1-800-545-5979.

[J]

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[B]

We've all dealt with difficult people. A controlling boss, a manipulative partner, someone who seems charming and confident at first. But over time, something feels off. And the impact these people have can be surprisingly damaging. Research suggests that a relatively small number of people with certain personality traits are responsible for a disproportionate amount of harm in relationships, in workplaces, and even across society. So who are these people? Why are they often so persuasive, even likable? And why do so many of us miss the warning signs until it's too late. Because once you're dealing with someone like this, the usual rules don't apply. You can't reason with them, you can't fix them. And the longer you stay in it, the worse it can get. The good news is there are patterns, and once you understand them, you can protect yourself. My guest studies what she calls poisonous people. Dr. Leanne Ten Brink is a psychologist at the University of British Columbia whose research focuses on deception, psychopathy, and social behavior. She's author of the book poisonous how to resist them and improve your life. Hey, Leanne. Welcome to something you should know.

[D]

Thanks for having me, Mike.

[B]

So can you please explain a little deeper what a poisonous person is? And is it the same thing as a toxic person? And what are the traits of a poisonous person? All of that to set the stage here?

[D]

Yeah, that's a great question. So we end up using kind of lots of euphemisms for these folks in our lives. But when I talk about a poisonous person, what I am describing is someone who's really high on what I call the dark tetrad. So these are a particular set of set of personality traits. They include psychopathy, Machiavellianism, narcissism, and sadism. And the thing that all of those traits share in common is that they involve callousness and manipulation. And so by virtue of that, people who come into contact with these personalities tend to be on the receiving end of that, resulting in lots of pain, an outsized amount of harm that they cause in their social networks, and certainly can create these kinds of toxic cultures.

[B]

And where does that come from? And maybe it's not all that important to know why, but why are some people so poisonous?

[D]

We have fairly good data now to suggest that these personality traits, particularly psychopathy and narcissism, which we know the most about, come from a fairly even mix of genetics and environmental influences. When it comes to psychopathy in particular, these folks are characterized by that callousness and manipulation that I talked about earlier, but also impulsivity and really low remorse. Unsurprisingly, these folks tend to be overrepresented in, say, prison populations and engage in a whole lot of antisocial behavior, both criminal and non criminal in nature. We can see these traits early in life. Research suggests that you can detect callous and unemotional traits, in particular in kids as young as about 2 years old. That suggests that there's a genetic component. We do know from twin studies that individuals who have a shared genetic component are more likely to share that psychopathic type of personality than those that are less related, like fraternal twins or siblings. There is also a component of our environment. We do know that harsh parenting practices and outright abuse as children can also increase the likelihood the kids start to show these callous and unemotional traits, and that tends to continue throughout their lives.

[B]

So do poisonous people ever change?

[D]

So I think this is one of the most pervasive myths about psychopathy. In particular, we tend to think that individuals with these traits are completely unchangeable. Now, granted, it is very difficult to change. It is very difficult to change any aspect of our personality. And people with these traits tend not to be particularly motivated to change. But there is evidence that if they get involved in therapy and if they stick it out long enough, we do see decreases in violent recidivism rates. Usually this research is done in the prison population, and the goal there is to decrease the likelihood that they will reoffend and come back to prison. A more hopeful kind of outcome is what we see with kids who have some of these emergent traits. You know, we don't call kids with some of these traits psychopaths. We don't use that term for them because of that stigma, that concern, you know, that they cannot change. Because that's not true. Because kids with these traits actually can become more empathic, less aggressive over time with the right treatment.

[B]

When you talk to people who you have identified as poisonous people, do they recognize or do they, because of their subjectivity, see them as normal and other people as however they view other people, but that they don't see the problem, they see something else?

[D]

And the answer is both yes and no to what you just asked. So, yes, they are quite aware of their personality traits. One of the ways that we measure these personality traits often is with self report questionnaires. We literally ask someone about how callous they are, how often they lie to other people, how impulsive they are, whether they think they're better than other people when it comes to narcissism, for example, and they self report like, yeah, I am all of those things. So they're quite aware of their personality. What they do not see as the problem with that, because generally they perceive the problem to be like, your problem, Mike, it's your problem, or my problem. And their behavior doesn't affect them so much, so they don't necessarily see much of a reason to change.

[B]

Okay, so they see themselves as that way. Do we see them as that way? In other words, do we think that poisonous people are poisonous people? And we can spot them a mile away or do we think something else?

[D]

That's a great question, and it's a bit complicated one, because people with these personality traits, by virtue of being callous and manipulative. Right. That manipulative part comes with a lot of deception. We are terrible lie detectors, even though we might think that we're very good at it. If you actually give people a whole bunch of truths and lies and ask them to sort out which is which, they tend to perform around chance, like 54% accuracy, which is not much better than flipping a coin. Usually when we're talking to another person, just in a conversation, we aren't even really on the lookout for lies. And so sometimes we see things like what psychologists call love bombing at the start, particularly of a romantic relationship. You know, they come across as like the perfect partner. They're saying all of the things that you want to hear. Now, some large proportion of those might be lies that we're just not catching. Similarly, in the workplace, you might hear someone with these traits talk about all the great ideas that they've had, all the successes that they had, how they're such a wonderful leader. But if you ask other people on their team, you might get a very different story. When you're around these people for long enough, you start to see that what they're saying and the reality does not line up. But deception can be quite convincing at the outset. And we also confuse confidence, which they have in spades, with competence. And so we sometimes perceive they really strongly think they know what they're doing. And we're like, oh, they know what they're doing. Not recognizing that there's a difference between confidence and competence.

[B]

So what's the goal with dealing with these people? Is it to identify and then walk away? Is it to try to somehow work around it? What's the goal here?

[D]

I think that really depends on you, the nature of the relationship, what you want or need to get out of that relationship. I mean, I think what I hope people start to learn is how to detect these personality traits earlier and then recognize some kind of hard truths about these personalities and be kind of armed with that knowledge to make a clear eyed, informed decision about whether you want to continue on in that relationship or avoid that person. And if you do decide to continue on in that relationship, you're not powerless. You're not like, resigned to become a victim because there are ways that you can try to manage interactions with them to mitigate the harm.

[B]

Is there any concern, though, about jumping to conclusions? Some people are Just more difficult than others. Is this a spectrum or is this. They either are or they aren't or what?

[D]

You know, we often jump to language like that person's a psychopath or that person's a narcissist. And that implies that you either are one or you aren't one, when in fact these are personality traits just like, just like extroversion, just like how open you are in that they exist on a continuum. So you can land anywhere from very low to very high on these traits. When it comes to self report measures, you can ask people, you know, to what extent does this behavior, this callous behavior characterize you? Do you agree that this is how you act when it comes to manipulation of other people? And if people consistently say, yep, that sounds like me, like that I'm impulsive like that I am callous like that I'm manipulative like that, then you might be able to say, okay, it seems like they're agreeing that they, you know, have these personality traits. And research suggests that that's about 10 or so percent of the population. Similarly, you could look at the extent to which people endorse having these kinds of dark personality traits relative to lighter personality traits like care and concern for other people. And research suggests that about anywhere between like 7 and 20% of people have higher dark than light traits. So maybe somewhere around like 10 to 20% of people have higher levels of these traits. That's what I would kind of classify as these poisonous people. That sounds like a lot. I think it's really helpful to think about the flip side, which is that that means that 80 to 90% of the population are not like that. And I think that helps to provide a little bit of optimism for the future and for our social interactions.

[B]

But are these people that you would call poisonous people, are they poisonous to everybody? Because it seems like probably to their mother they're very nice, but maybe to you they're not. I mean, like, is it? Or are they?

[D]

So personality traits are defined as consistent thoughts and feelings and behaviors across time and context. And so that should be across interactions with different kinds of people. Now, it's possible that you have something that a dark personality wants. And so they might try to use flattery, manipulation of some kind to, to get to that. But on average, they're going to behave in these, you know, callous kinds of ways in response to almost everyone they meet.

[B]

How hard is it to spot these people, to identify them, and how quickly can you do it? Because I like to think that I could tell one of these people, maybe not instantly, but it wouldn't take me too long in a conversation to go, wait, wait, wait, wait a minute, hold on. Or are they really good at hiding it?

[D]

No, I mean, there is some research. There's a fantastic paper by Scott Lillenfeld and his colleagues where they did what psychologists called thin slicing. So they take this like 5 second, really short clip of these individuals and we know their psychopathy scores and they show these clips to people and they ask them, you know, to what extent do they appear to be callous, manipulative, impulsive, etc. And what they found is that people did pretty well at detecting who was high on these traits after watching just a five second clip of them. And so we can get a sense of someone's personality pretty quickly. What I tell people is also really important, is not to get too stuck on the first impression, especially if it was rooted in that kind of deceptive behavior early on. Because personality is that extended pattern of thinking, feeling and behaving across time and context. If you keep getting information to the contrary, in the future you should update your first impression. But your first impression can be quite valuable.

[B]

So it seems like from what you're saying is that once you've identified someone like this that you're better off being further away than very close. That there's not a lot of value in a relationship with someone who scores pretty high on this. Is that a fair statement?

[D]

I don't know. I think it's up to every individual to think about what is valuable to them. If this is your parent, your child, you know that it's. You may find a lot of value in maintaining that relationship, even though it is a difficult one. I think what is fair to say is that these relationships are going to be hard. You might need to approach interactions with them in a more mindful way than you do with others because you can't quite count on them having the same kind of values, like concerns about fairness, concerns about not causing harm to other people. That said, I think it's up to each individual person to decide whether that relationship has value.

[B]

Well, what could possibly be the value? I mean, it sounds more like obligatory relationships, like they're your parents or they're your child. But looking for value doesn't sound like there's a lot of value there. It's more obligation.

[D]

It's an interesting question. I mean, we have interactions with people for all kinds of different reasons and we can't just throw people away so easily.

[B]

I think I know the answer to this question. But can you shape the behavior of a poisonous person with things like punishment or consequences?

[D]

Somehow punishment doesn't hit them as hard, like neurologically speaking. And so they don't experience what we call passive avoidance, which is kind of learning that that action came with a negative consequence. And I want to avoid it in the future. And so if you don't learn that, if your brain doesn't kind of register that as well as other people, then punishment ends up being a less effective tool for shaping these people's behavior in the future.

[B]

Then what works? Anything.

[D]

One thing that we really shouldn't ignore is the usefulness of reward. And this is a thing that sometimes people are like, oh, they're, they're a bad person. I don't want to reward them. But if you're not rewarding these individuals for doing something good, like if you are not rewarding them for doing something honest, doing something kind, then you're not teaching them the behaviors that we wish that they would engage in instead of the behaviors that they actually do. And so some of the best research on treatment for kids with callous and unemotional traits really focuses on rewarding them for engaging in waiting their turn or sharing a toy with a sibling or another peer. Reward really can help shape behaviors if

[B]

we're willing to give it adults as well. Or it only works with children.

[D]

Adults as well. So adults certainly are more reward driven as well.

[B]

Well, you said something a little earlier that really struck me as to why this is such an important topic to discuss. Because what you said was, in conversations with people, when we meet them, we're not looking for this. We're not looking for the lies and the deception. And, you know, we're pretty much taking people on face value. It's only later that it's like, hey, hey, wait a minute. This isn't. Something's wrong here. And so I think this is really helpful to see what the. What to look for. I've been speaking with Dr. Leanne ten Brink. She is a psychologist at the University of British Columbia, and she's author of the book Poisonous how to Resist Them and Improve youe Life. And there's a link to her book in the show notes. Leanne, it was great having you on. Thank you so much.

[D]

Thank you, Mike. I really appreciate it.

[B]

You ever notice how food looks a little more delicious after a bad night's sleep? It's not lack of willpower, it's biology. Research shows that when you don't get enough sleep, your body starts behaving like it does under the influence of marijuana, activating the same system linked to the infamous munchies that people get after smoking marijuana. In one controlled study, people who slept just four hours a night didn't just eat more the next day, they specifically craved higher fat, higher calorie foods. In other words, lack of sleep doesn't just make you hungry, it makes junk food harder to resist. It's one more piece of evidence that if you're trying to manage your weight, what you do at night may matter just as much as what you eat during the day. And that is something you should know. And if you enjoyed this episode, please don't keep it a secret, tell other people about it. It really does help us grow our audience and helps us continue to create episodes. I'm Micah Ruthers. Thanks for listening today to something you should know.

[K]

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[C]

Every style, every home.

[L]

Hey marketers, listen up. Before this, there was this. Our voice. It's how we shared knowledge, built communities. Well, guess what? Voice is back. That's why Spotify Advertising has published a new report, the Soundon Era. Because audio moves culture forward and if your brand wants to be heard, you need a sound on Strategy. Go to ads.Spotify.com to download the Soundon Era and turn up the volume on your business.