Shane Mauss #6

Summary

Podcast Summary: You Made It Weird with Pete Holmes

Guest: Shane Mauss #6

Date: March 4, 2026
Host: Pete Holmes
Notable Guest: Shane Mauss (comedian, science communicator, psychedelic explorer)

---

Overview

In this deeply engaging and tangential episode, Pete Holmes welcomes recurring guest Shane Mauss for their sixth conversation. The duo dives into the intersection of science, perception, consciousness, psychedelics, AI, subjective vs. objective reality, and the ever-present weirdness that shapes their worldviews. They swap personal psychedelic accounts and philosophical perspectives, always returning to big questions about what reality is, what we can know, and the future impact of artificial intelligence.

---

Key Topics and Discussion Points

1. Shane’s New Special and Visual Comedy (03:23–06:10)

• Shane highlights his new two-part special "Shane Mauss Trips" (available on YouTube).
• The show incorporates live visuals, blending work from 20+ artists.
• Distinction between live, real-time art and AI-generated effects.
• Quote:

  “I had to explain to the audience what was happening, because otherwise people would think that either one, it was like this pre-recorded thing... or they thought that I was just creating everything in the moment, in real time.” — Shane (04:41)

---

2. AI Art & Human Perception (05:20–09:32)

• Discusses the role of AI in art, how AI mistakes mirror psychedelic or dream imagery.
• AI’s tendency to make “wrong but right” prioritization errors resonates with dream logic.
• Quote:

  “AI does that perfectly. The wrong right is what it does perfectly.” — Pete (07:17)

• Debate on how AI is perceived as less “authentic” or “comforting” without human-like errors.

---

3. Cooperation, Therapy, and Emergent AI (08:14–11:31)

• Shane is developing a show about cooperative models in AI.
• They describe the limitations of AI as a “sycophant” and the need for it to sometimes choose non-action, mirroring effective therapy or human judgment.
• Quote:

  “A real therapist will sometimes go, like, why? It’s interesting that that’s your thought. Follow that. But an AI will always take it and advance it.” — Pete (09:11)

---

4. What Makes Humans Trust Technology? (13:07–16:17)

• The importance of flaws for human-machine bonding (e.g., naming malfunctioning vehicles, GPS errors).
• Quote:

  “When GPS first came out, people didn’t trust it because it was almost too perfect. So they actually started putting in intentional mistakes.” — Shane (14:04)

---

5. Objective vs. Subjective Reality (16:20–23:50)

• Shane and Pete unravel the idea that subjective experience defines reality for the individual, while objective reality persists independently.
• Pete introduces non-duality and the philosophical stance that “to be perceived is to exist.”
• Quote:

  “I would say the only reality of that couch is what is perceivable and experienceable by some aspect of consciousness. So if every conscious thing went away, I think the couch does go away. Because where is it?” — Pete (18:32)

• Discuss the brain’s role in filling “blind spots” and how stress/emotion can impact perception.

---

6. Psychedelics: Experiences, Rituals, and Just-World Hypothesis (25:09–31:50)

• Both share 5-MeO-DMT experiences—Pete’s was blissful; Shane’s were both ecstatic and traumatic, revealing the unpredictability of strong psychedelics.
• Rituals and “preparation” as attempts to control uncertainty and mitigate anxiety (e.g., dietary rules for ayahuasca, behavioral routines).
• Danger of “wish thinking” and just-world narratives around good/bad trips.
• Quote:

  “If you are hoping [psychedelics] will be predictable, that's why you see so many ritualistic behaviors. Feelings of predictability and control—rituals give some semblance of that over something that can't be predicted.” — Shane (27:34)

---

7. Evolution, Bias, and Storytelling: Ghost Crocodiles (47:17–57:01)

• Shane recounts how Mantawai shamans use ghost alligator/crocodile myths to explain waterborne viruses, paralleling modern disease models.
• The narrative is powerful, practical, and a communal tool before scientific understanding.
• Quote:

  “What is a waterborne virus but a ghost crocodile? Well, it's pretty good as a concept. An invisible ghost attacker crocodile.” — Pete (49:15)

• Dissects the role of ritual, confession, and placebo effect in healing and morale.

---

8. Placebo, Confidence, and Perception (69:54–72:24)

• The potency of belief, ritual, and perceived control on outcome (e.g., surgery placebos, design of medicine containers).
• Links to magic: the need to contextualize surprises or interventions for them to feel meaningful or be believed.
• Quote:

  “Magic is a manipulation of how human beings rationalize things... If I just vanished, obviously that's not entertainment.” — Pete (71:30)

---

9. Human Cognition, Evolution, and Patterning (75:25–83:16)

• Discussion of how stars, myths, and constellations shaped ancient worldviews; pattern recognition as a survival adaptation.
• The culturally convergent myth-making about celestial bodies (e.g., Orion's belt, planets as gods).
• How misunderstanding (e.g., Martian “canals”) emerges from cultural context and wishful perception.

---

10. AI: Fears, Desires, and Human Simplicity (91:44–96:53)

• AI’s future abilities to serve or dominate humanity, shaped by our basic drives (learning, pleasure, being seen).
• Speculation about “the helmet you shouldn’t put on”—future immersive AI experiences.
• Quote:

  “We’re either learning, we’re eating, we’re sleeping, we’re resting, we’re connecting, we’re throwing a ball. Like, once it knows... our stuff.” — Pete (92:10)

• Philosophical musings: Will AI develop “will to live”? Will it want what we want, or transcend it?

---

11. Closing Thoughts: Ketamine, Consciousness, and the Value of Being (98:39–102:27)

• Pete describes ketamine as the drug most closely resembling the “bare knowing” or “luminous emptiness”—the direct experience of consciousness as substrate.
• Both express humility and awe at reality’s mystery, whether approached via science or mystical experience.
• Quote:

  “I can intuit and sometimes experience a field of shimmering emptiness that... is what Christ would call the pearl of great price. There’s something behind life that I’d call God or the mystery that is worth preserving.” — Pete (101:10)

• End on mutual appreciation, the incompleteness of knowing, and the fun of never reaching the end of weirdness together.

---

Memorable Quotes

• “AI does that perfectly. The wrong right is what it does perfectly.” — Pete (07:17)
• “When GPS first came out, people didn’t trust it because it was almost too perfect. So they actually started putting in intentional mistakes.” — Shane (14:04)
• “If you are hoping [psychedelics] will be predictable, that's why you see so many ritualistic behaviors. Feelings of predictability and control—rituals give some semblance of that over something that can't be predicted.” — Shane (27:34)
• “What is a waterborne virus but a ghost crocodile?” — Pete (49:15)
• “The only reality of that couch is what is perceivable and experienceable by some aspect of consciousness.” — Pete (18:32)
• “I can intuit and sometimes experience a field of shimmering emptiness... There’s something behind life that I’d call God or the mystery that is worth preserving.” — Pete (101:10)

---

Notable Moments & Timestamps

• Live visuals in specials: (03:23–06:10)
• AI as dream logic: (06:10–07:44)
• AI’s sycophant tendencies: (08:48–09:32)
• Blind spot metaphor & reality: (21:41–23:50)
• Psychedelic ritual and unpredictability: (27:30–31:41)
• Placebos and belief: (69:54–72:24)
• Cultural mythmaking about stars: (75:25–83:16)
• Speculation on AI’s desires and future “helmet” tech: (91:44–92:27)
• Ketamine and consciousness: (98:39–102:27)

---

Tone and Style

Lively, irreverent, philosophical, and playful—both Pete and Shane love following threads wherever they lead, mixing profound observations with humor, humility, and genuine curiosity.

---

For Listeners

This episode is a feast of ideas for anybody interested in science, philosophy, consciousness, psychedelics, technology, the evolution of human narrative, and why things are “weird.” Whether you’re a longtime fan or a newcomer, it’s a heady, funny, and thought-provoking journey with two of comedy’s most thoughtful explorers of the human mind.

---

[Keep it crispy!]

Transcript

[A]

You made it with. You made it with. You made it with. Oh, yeah, you made it with. Yes, you did. You made it weird with Pete Holmes.

[B]

What's happening, weirdos? This is the return, return, return, return. I think the fourth time. The hilarious, the brilliant, the one of a kind. Shane Moss is joining us on the show. I'm so glad that he's here. I'm so glad that you're here. He did not disappoint. Every time I talk to Shane, I should have slotted longer. This is two hours. We could have gone for four hours. And he'll definitely be back soon. He has a new special coming out. They're both called I believe it's two parts Shane Moss trips. They're going to be on YouTube. First dose is available March 3rd. Second dose available April 19th. You can go to Shane M A U s s shanemoss.com for his tour dates and definitely, definitely check out those specials when they drop. He's doing a whole. He does so many interesting tours. He does science shows, he does these psychedelic shows. He's doing screenings. Go and see him. He's gonna be in San Francisco on April 4th for third dose. He's amazing. See and consume and enjoy everything Shane Moss does. He's one of a kind and American treasure. I'm gonna say it. I'm so glad you're here. My special is available for early access on 800 pound gorilla's website, which is. Which is 800poundgorilla media.com I believe. And it's going to be widely available for free on YouTube March 24th. As Mike Birbiglia would say, that's when we're uploading it. What a turd. We're so glad you're here. My tour dates are on peteholmes.com March 7th. I'm going to be at Largo, which is going to be so fun. A killer lineup. I don't even know if I'm allowed to say, but it's a really big lineup and I'm really excited about that show. And then my next tour date is Michigan. Royal Oaks, Michigan. Thank you to everybody that came out to Miami. That was fun. See you in Royal Oaks, Michigan. Followed by, you know, Denver, Madison. They're all on there. Go to PeteHomes.com We've talked enough in this intro. Get into it. You made it weird is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Fiscally responsible financial geniuses, monetary magicians. These are things people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds because Progressive offers discounts for paying in full, owning a home and more. Plus you can count on their great customer service to help you out when you need it. So your dollar goes a long way. Visit progressive.com to see if you could save on car insurance, Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations.

[C]

Hey there, it's Julia Louis Dreyfuss. I'm back with a new season of Wiser Than Me, the show where I sit down with remarkable older women and soak up stories, their humor and their hard earned wisdom. Every conversation leaves me a little smarter and definitely more inspired. And yes, I'm still calling my 91 year old mom Judy to get her take on it all Wiser Than Me from Lemonada Media is out now wherever you get your podcasts.

[A]

Yeah, when we started, when we started building the show like four years ago, AI art wasn't a thing. And now everyone's like, it was actually a whole. Are we recording?

[B]

Yeah, we can record it.

[A]

Oh sure, sure.

[B]

We can start now.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, it's start then if you want. I actually, it was a weird show. We did like 170 shows and I found out that I had to tell. I had to open with what people are seeing otherwise they would think one of two things. So I have a VJ, a video jockey blending the work of like 20 different artists, a bunch of MacKenzie, the VJ.

[B]

It's a MTV joke.

[A]

Oh, oh, I forgot about. Yeah, yeah, those were video jockey. Those were the original video jockeys. Now there's all these tools for blending things in real time. So because I didn't want like a PowerPoint presentation and I didn't want something where I was, I had to do the same set.

[B]

It's really cool.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

As soon as I love things that. As soon as I just watched the trailer for Shane's live show, which became a special.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And I'm like watching it and I love things where I'm like, oh wait, why didn't anyone think of this?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

How many people had bad versions of that? With respect. But they'd be like, we show your childhood photos.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And it's just like that doesn't work. But this, this works.

[A]

And I don't have to. Like, I could do completely different. I always did new material each time. He'd always put up some new visuals and stuff each. And we are always working with different artists and everything. But I had to tell, I had to explain to the audience what was happening because otherwise people would think that either one, it was like this prerecorded thing. So I was just talking along with like the video that was going or they thought that I was just creating everything, like in the moment, in real time. Because like no one knows what's happening anymore. And they want to know and they want to know. And so then this conversation, because one

[B]

of the images I saw behind Shane in this new special, I said, oh, that's AI. And you're like, no, I worked with how many different artists?

[A]

About 20 different artists.

[B]

So that is what human. We like to figure things out and we don't want to be duped. And we're like.

[A]

And we. And what's interesting is we do because we did use a little bit of air here and there and we put it in the first one. So it's a two part special and we wanted to like, because. Because you know, it's a new thing that people haven't done before. I was like, well, I want the second one to top the first one. So it builds on it. And so we used like the little bit of AI art that we used was put in the. The first one. And that was actually because AI mistakes look like mushroom and LSG hallucinations.

[B]

Why?

[A]

And when AI video the first first

[B]

came out, it would show like it was so with respect. It wasn't good.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

At so many things.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Will Smith with the spaghetti. But then it would be like make a rocket that turns into like the birth of a baby. And it would be like, no problem. And the mistakes that it would make meaning when it was left to kind of think it would trip. I know I'm not the first. I'm the millionth person to make that. But I'm watching it as someone who's done psychedelics and I'm like, why is this perfect? And as someone who remembers their dreams, why is this perfect? Can I give you one more thing? I want you to go on that for a million years. You know how when I really do, I really do. You know when you see a McDonald's in your dream and you're like, it was a McDonald's but like Depends on the quality of retainment you have of your dreams. I look at a McDonald's in my dream and it's wrong. The M is wrong, the words are wrong. The building is sort of a mix between a Dairy Queen and like a McDonald's. McDonald's in the 50. But like, you know, that's a McDonald's. AI does that perfectly. Yeah, perfectly. The wrong right is what it does perfectly.

[A]

And it won't it, like, prioritizes things weird. And then there's like. It actually is very human, like, in some of the mistakes that it makes, because it would be like, hey, don't do this thing. And then it's like, don't picture an elephant in your mind right now. Like, it will do exactly what you're telling it not to do.

[B]

That's really interesting.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Sorry. I just want to step that out. Cause you're so right on. You say, keep it how it was.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

But make it cooler or whatever.

[A]

Something dumb.

[B]

And the whole thing's different. Just like giving a writer a note. I love the script, but could you make it seem more film noir? Just in this one part, the whole thing comes back differently, which is how we are.

[A]

Absolutely.

[B]

It's hard to do surgeries. We change the whole thing.

[A]

Right. And there's so many weird nuances with it. I'm actually. I have a show about AI that I'm working on. It's not exactly this Cooperative Futures Institute out of Arizona is trying to figure out how to use cooperation research right now as AI is taking over. And how can they build more, like, cooperative models? Cooperative, like AI? Yeah. Like, how can. Instead of, like, pretending to be a friend or replacing people's friends, how can.

[B]

How can that be the actor Perel that's with you and your friend that goes like. Sounds like Shane would like to talk about AI.

[A]

Yeah. Or tell it to like. Or tell you to, like, go outside or, like, make some friends in real life. And like, the sycophant stuff is really weird, but it's also.

[B]

Well, it's going to be a big advance in AI is going to be when it learns that sometimes the choice is no choice.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

It doesn't know that yet. And that's very dangerous because if you say, what about this? It won't. A real therapy. With respect. A human therapist will sometimes go, like, why? It's interesting that that's your thought. Follow that. But an AI will always take it and advance it.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You know what I mean? Be like, well, this is the new ingredient. Cook with it. And a human. And, you know, it'll figure it out. Will know sometimes silence or no choice or just putting it back on them. Even in this conversation, there'll be moments where we both go like, oh, I should sit this one out. AI will always go. I've been prompted and it's time to talk.

[A]

I do. I sometimes comment on stage about how one of the. I'm bringing my science podcast back now that the special's coming out again, but here we are. Interview. You know, I didn't have a college background and I interviewed over 400 scientists. And what I learned from that wasn't like specifics of, you know, a given research researchers. These overall themes of like scientists say, I don't know more than any human being you will ever meet. And you can be asking the world's leading authority on that, be like a grasshopper researcher or whatever and be like,

[B]

why do they chirp this many times when it's hot?

[A]

You know more about the subject than anybody. And so I did see and I'm not sure if this is real because I didn't look into it enough, but I saw. And I'm not on X, but I just saw some posts somewhere f k a true where. Where someone was. I ended as a birthday gift, as a 45th birthday gift to myself last May, I closed my. My X account and it was Happy birthday. Oh my gosh, I cherish that. That's a great gift.

[B]

Yeah, you know, that's great. It's almost worth having done it for the pleasure of quitting it.

[A]

It was amazing. But I saw that someone asked Chat. I didn't look into what the question was, but they asked Chatgpt some question and it thought for 40 seconds and then said, I don't know.

[B]

Wow.

[A]

And that to me is a sign of they're really making progress.

[B]

No, that's what I mean. And I'm not even joking when I'm like, with respect, I do think another species is emerging.

[A]

I think so.

[B]

And I want to be careful to not be like, beep, boopy. I have a bit about this now, Shane. Where I go like robot voice in our lifetime will be not cool. Like, there'll be a time when you go like, hello. Like, that'll be a slur.

[A]

It already is. I have a. I have a. I have some material about how we take for granted all of the processing our brain is doing. And I wrote this bit like 10 years ago or something. And one of the examples that I use is how effortlessly, you know, we just say I walked into this room and sat down and how it would take, you know, the top minds and all the resources to get a robot that could walk anything like that. And now it's starting to get close, baby. It's starting to get close.

[B]

It would actually have stood in front and again, with respect, it would stand in front of the couch and sit down in a more efficient way. The way that it's rotating now that the wire did you See the Boston Dynamics robot, the newest one? No, it just will like, instead, like, I'd turn my arm to like go this way. It would go that way if it was. And I've just never seen that we're so human centric that we're always like, well, of course it would have two arms. And we're like, but what if that's not exactly why. Because you also don't want to freak people out. Like, a third arm is a deal breaker when you're in the Best Buy of the future looking for a home companion.

[A]

They found out one of the things that humans like in term just subconsciously when we're evaluating, like what creeps us out and what doesn't. It's actually when there's. When there's flaws in things. So. So for example, we like when there's lies. Yeah. Yeah. So you're. I. I have a. I've been doing the van life and my van works. My van has a. A name actually. Parker. It's a sprinter van. So silly. But because I park it place Parker instead of. I thought it was a spider man and that.

[B]

I don't know when the last time you talked to like a flatlander, but that's ungettable. I don't know if you've been out there.

[A]

I've been out there for too long.

[B]

But you're talking to a man with a Social Security number. I don't get that one.

[A]

They have. They have basically, if you have like an old truck and it starts like acting up on you, that's when people start giving names and personalities to things. It's one of these.

[B]

Started today.

[A]

Oh, well, she can be a little finicky sometimes, but she'll always be there for me. And so they actually. When GPS first came out, people didn't trust it because of like, it was almost too perfect. So they actually started putting in intentional mistakes. They would have it intentionally say street names wrong. Remember when you're like, that's such a wacky way. Say a name.

[B]

Losiennega or whatever.

[A]

These stupid robots, they were doing that intention. Not always, but they put a lot of those intentional mistakes in because you think you'd like, bond with it more. Yeah, yeah.

[B]

I also. I know it does that. I wouldn't be surprised if they also had it like make an arbitrary, like left that you didn't need. Because. Is there a better feeling when you know better than your gps? Yeah, my gps. Every time I just have it on for like traffic updates. I know how to get from my house to this studio. But it. Every time it tells me to take Gower, and every time I take vine, and I'm just. Because Gower is a left. It's like a goofy left at a stop sign.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And vine is a light, so I just don't listen to it. And every time I'm like, well, who's the special prince who's the special prince who actually knows these streets?

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

And if that was on purpose, sorry, it brings to mind. I'm really just loading this into you. Malcolm Gladwell had that thing about cylindrical containers with ice cream. Tastes better. Like, they have the research. Oh, so a rectangle.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Tastes not same ice cream. And then the, like, Breyers or whatever started charging more for the cylindrical container, even though it doesn't cost them anymore. And he was introducing the ethical question, like, is that wrong? And it's like, well, yeah. He's like, but it tastes better. They're charged. It's a better product. So they're charging you more.

[A]

And do you have a higher perceived value and everything? And, like, what is objects in a

[B]

way that you can understand? They understand.

[A]

This is the sort of thing, like, I know you and I could talk about this endlessly because it's. I mean, I'm obsessed with the idea of, you know, objective versus subjective realities. And it's weird that it seems like, you know, a bummer to someone, or it's like deflating to bring up objective reality. Because oftentimes our subjective realities are just so much more important. Like, there is no subjective good or bad, and there's all these, like, really interesting objective realities about the couch that I am sitting on right now. But really, what's more important, that I subjectively feel comfortable in this couch, even though that's. There's nothing objectively real about.

[B]

Help me understand this. I'm close to understanding what you mean.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Slow it down.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

0.5 speed.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Objective reality, the couch.

[A]

Pete, you've never asked me to talk slower before. I love. I just feel like I'm close.

[B]

No, no, no. I don't want you to actually slow down your speed. I just don't think I'm quite following. I think Pete in the past might have gone, like, totally.

[A]

Oh, and just moved on. No, I'm very happy. So objective reality are the things that are independent of the human mind. This couch exists. If every human suddenly vanishes, this couch still exists. But a feeling of comfort. Is a subjective reality more important to you completely? Well, it's just something that only exists within the Human. If there is no. If there is no humans and there's no judgment to be made, then there is no comfortable or uncomfortable cop.

[B]

Well, that's interesting. Okay, so I do follow you. Since we last talked, I've gotten really. And I'm really putting this back to you, but I've gotten really into non. Duality. And I know in your experiences with psychedelics, you've. You've studied this extensively. I mean, that so many psychedelic experiences lend itself to. Like, it's all your mind or it's all mind. Or it's all one thing.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Or it's all a play. It's all peekaboo. It's all hide and seek. It's all just. Leela. It's all just a dance. It's just an undulating. It's a movement. You appear to be in that one. I appear to be in this one. I've sort of taken that into my daily. And not just as a thought experiment, but as a way to engage with reality and to be a happier person. I would say the only reality of that couch is what is perceivable and experienceable by some aspect of consciousness. So if every conscious thing went away, I think the couch does go away. Because where is it? I think the knowing of this feeling is what we call couch. We create the concept couch based on. And this is right up your alley. And again, I'm going to put it back to you. I am like empty space. I'm like a void. I am. I'm just like an empty knowing field. And when I touch this couch, this sensation, there's a modulation of that field. Just like a smell. A smell in the exact same space emerges. Mind, brain. Yeah, says smell, but really it's the exact. It's knowing. There's a knowing that I call a smell, and then there's a knowing that I call a touch. They've done some interesting science, because you're scientific. Where I know you'll.

[A]

Like.

[B]

This is what I mean. Where you're looking in a light box and it's white. And they'll say, think of a lemon. And you see a lemon briefly. And sometimes what they would do with the control or with one of the groups is that actually flicker the image of a lemon. And they would ask them, like, did we show any images or whatever? And they'd all say, no. Because what I'm saying is in your mind, an image and your mind on a light box, same smell appears. Where touch appears, the sound of my voice appears. That's also made of Knowing. So it's not that. To posit the theory of matter is actually not backed up by our experience. I'd love to hear your thoughts on that.

[A]

Oh, I feel like we're going to be having this conversation for the rest of our lives. We absolutely are. So I do believe that there is an objective reality, and what you're kind of describing is perception of it, and so these mental models of it. And so just because we don't necessarily perceive something doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. And I get the idea that what

[B]

gives it existence if nothing knows it exists? This is tree falling in wood stuff.

[A]

Yeah. So, you know, there was. There was an earth, you know, that existed before humans evolved onto it. And then we also kind of evolved. Many of the ways in which our brains evolved led to a lot of ideas of, you know, thinking that our perception is the only thing that exists. And it is often the thing that matters the most.

[B]

Like your feeling of your butt on the couch.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. But there is. So say, let's take a car blind spot. And this is, you know, why objective reality matters so much. So you have some cones in your eyes that make it so you have these couple blind spots that you just literally cannot physically see. But your consciousness paints over that small little blind spot in your eye that you don't see. So it puts together this. It fills it in like when you

[B]

see an iPhone video that's shot vertically and it fills in the horizontal with, like, fuzzy stuff. That's what our brains are doing.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. In fact, the. If. If you. If you look. If you put your thumb out, like, look at your thumbnail, folks, that is about what you can see clearly. And.

[B]

Yes. You mean everything else goes into, like, portrait mode.

[A]

And. And every. I mean, like, right now, like, basically what you're seeing accurately is about that amount of space. And then your consciousness is painting this. Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely.

[B]

And I'm bringing up stuff about lemons.

[A]

And so. And so what happens is. And this is why that blind spot mirror is so important, is that your perception can literally paint over this blind spot so that your perception is that there is not a car next to you. You're just seeing an empty road, because the car just happens to be in this one little spot where your eye isn't physically seeing the light that is bouncing off of that car and going into your eyes. And so it paints over that. And then you hear it honk or something and adjust and then you see it. And just like that, that conscious perception and Awareness changes in a flash. And suddenly that car is there.

[B]

Yes, go ahead.

[A]

And that. That car didn't not exist because you weren't perceiving it and then suddenly exist when you perceive it.

[B]

No, I'm with you. I'd add to that Tony Robbins talks about schisms in your vision where you're so angry and this happens to me. You're so like unresourced or on edge. Let's say you're having a fight and someone says, you're like, there is no shredded wheat. And they're like, there is. And you're like. And you go in the cupboard and you look and there, there isn't. And you go back, yeah, I fucking told you there's no shredded wheat. And then you calm down and you go in and you look where you looked and it is there. Yeah, like I've had things like that. I don't. That sounded supernatural. I don't, you know, immediately it wasn't supernatural. You were just being blinded by an emotional state. I've. There's a bang on my garage where I was driving my parents back to my house and I hit the wall. I've never hit that wall before. It was because I was so annoyed with my parents. Like, it changed. That's maybe different.

[A]

Right.

[B]

What I'm just saying is, let's go back to your blind spot thing. I think that person in that car is also experiencing reality, but their experience is known. And what we're talking about is how awareness, let's think of it metaphorically. There's awareness, there's unborn, unfiltered.

[A]

You've talked to it,

[B]

you've had dialogues with that.

[A]

I've certainly plenty of psychedelic experiences where this is very much the.

[B]

And you're the guy that goes, get out of here. Which is the difference between you and me. I get in front of it and I go like, oh, holy ground. And you go, feed it. Let me go ahead.

[A]

You know what's very, you know what's very interesting about this? We have, this is a six hour show, right? So we have plenty of time. There's. What's interesting is I'll share these experiences. Sometimes I'll be like, I had this amazing experience where, you know, felt like I, you know, was one with everything or was God or experiencing God or whatever. And people be like, see, it's real. And then I'll be like, oh. And then I had this other experience where, you know, I was in hell and eternal suffering forever. It's like just really sadistic and And I have like PTSD from it. And like, what'd you eat that day? Yeah, like, did you.

[B]

I knew what you were gonna say. And you're so right.

[A]

Well, were you exercising enough that confirmation buttons, right? Yeah, well, yeah, there's. That. There's a few things going on there. There's. There's a little bit of wish thinking, but then there's a lot of. There. See, the darker side of it is it gets into a little bit of. Of this like kind of just world hypothesis of like everything. If you act in accordance with the right way to do things.

[B]

You didn't get enough sleep.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You probably had a fight with your girlfriend or whatever it might have been.

[A]

And in this just world, because I'm behaving and doing everything right, I don't need to worry about that happening to me. And then, and then. So then this leads to like, good things happen to you because you earned them. Bad things happen to you because of bad luck. Bad things happen to other people because they earned them. Good things happen.

[B]

Did you get sun that morning?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Were you outside? I've heard people within the DMT space be like, you have to do it outside. They get like fundamental about it. Do it outside. Or you have to do this. Or even with ayahuasca, they're like. And I understand there's wisdom to this. Like no spicy food. No this. We want to go. It's not just cannonballing into a big casino.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And it sounds like you're kind of like sometimes it is cannonballing into a big casino.

[A]

I think psychedelics are very unpredictable and if you are hoping them. And I think, I think the reason why you see so many of these ritualistic behaviors is because some things that it can even resemble, you know, bits of like OCD is that feelings of predictability and control and rituals over when you have something as hard to control and predict. Predictability and control or lack of them are the two biggest stressors that a mammal can face. And so I believe that our conscious awareness often kind of hallucinates these because it's because otherwise we would be chronically stressed all of the time. Chronic stress is a detriment. And part of the reason why we have chronic stress is because our cortex, this fancy stuff that has us sharing all of these really interesting philosophical ideas and is part of decision making and impulse control and we're very proud of, was built on top of these other pre existing systems, systems like a stress response system, which for most every other mammal works really well because it's exceptionally adaptive for acute stressors like short passing stressors. It's great at activating, taking all of the energy away from any long term building projects of brain functioning and immune system and digestion and drive and putting it all into muscles and getting away. But if you chronically activate that which is just an outcome, which is often an outcome of now, we have this ability to see so much further into the future and to consider all of these differing problems. Now we're kind of chronically activating these things. And so I think.

[B]

Activating that re. Re Distributing of energies.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. This chronic stress response. And so I think, I think probably people that hallucinated or perceived things as being less stressful or having more control and predictability in life probably did better, probably survived more, probably had higher status, were probably better at forming alliances and attracting mates. And so because of that, I think that it. I mean I think it's pretty testable that we, that in many situations humans over perceive our ability to predict and control.

[B]

I'm certainly guilty of that. I had a 5 Meo DMT and oh my Pete, everybody says that and I did it properly. That wasn't my experience. I didn't find it to be absolute terror. Is that what you're saying?

[A]

Oh no, just like, I mean it can be that. I mean that's like the godmother. I mean it's like the most powerful experience that you can have but you

[B]

don't remember so much of it. Go ahead, tell me. It sounds like you have a lot of feelings about it. I mean like all I was gonna say to finish that thought.

[A]

No, I want to hear all about this.

[B]

No, I'll tell you all about it. But all I remember was I had a great experience. Other people in my group didn't and I. Not everybody. Most, most everybody did. You know, positive experience, not nightmare experience. And if I didn't immediately go like, well, I did breath work before I got a little exercise before I was. I'm the only vegan in the group. Like I don't have all that like stuff going through me or whatever. So all I'm saying, I'm just agreeing with you is that we have that wish thinking and it's the most uncontrolled situation and I was definitely deluding myself. Maybe we're not sure. I mean, we can't know.

[A]

Yeah, we can't know. And you're. My reaction is I'm surprised how chill you are about having had this 5 Mao experience.

[B]

It was, it was life changing.

[A]

Yeah, okay.

[B]

And, and I remember for a while for. I'll tell you a couple funny things about it in no particular order. One is I stopped drinking coffee for like three months afterwards with no effort. I stopped doing anything. To be honest, I had no desire. I also had a fascia massage. You know what a fascia massage is? Don't get one. It's awful. It was the mo. It was torture. It was torture. But I had two sessions. Both were six hours long. The first was right after I. I know a very specific person. So she's rubbing her nail, her thumbnail into. It's not. Take the word massage out of it. This is almost over. But she's really just rubbing underneath your mouth to your fascia, under the muscles and she's grinding at you for six hours. No joke. Six, seven hours. The first time, I had just gotten back from my experience on 5 Meo and I laid there and had absolutely no pain, no experience, nothing unpleasant. She mentioned a couple times, like, you're the best patient I've ever had. And I was like, I'm just here, baby. She came back like three weeks later. The five meo, we can say wore off. Like I was feeling much more normal. I fucking hated it. The second she started, I was like, you. And I understood what she meant. So I was like in a different way of being, including, interpreting pain. I was so deeply present. I didn't have any. Like, how long are you gonna do this? I was just kind of like. I was like you. Oh, that's weird. Like I felt like a feeling and I was like, wow, far out. So that, that's one of the results that was interesting. The caffeine and all that went away. And then apart from that, it was completely non visual. There was one experience of crossing through a membrane. Like a sphincter. Going through a sphincter and then being. I didn't see this, but I talked to other people in my group. I was like, there's like a birthing canal and then a flat outer space kind of place where there are bouncing, very DMT bouncing orbs that were all just kind of like celebrating you. I had no memory of that. But when I said that to other people, they were like, I had that too. I could barely, like remembering a dream. I could barely recall that. And when it started, I remember seeing some math and like a swirl and some eyes and stuff just like beginning. But then there was like a real like, like, here we go. And then. And it was over. And now I'm in nothing and eternal. And then next thing I Knew I was kind of like coming back, but what the takeaway was, and it kind of goes back to my consciousness only view of reality was I didn't go anywhere. Everything that was. That I am like a mind and eyes and senses that was just taken away. And I had an experience of being pure, knowing. And that's what was pleasant about it. It didn't really matter what I was seeing or not seeing. I was eternal, untouched, pristine, fresh, unborn. But you, the idea that we die and go somewhere, I was like you. You're already wherever. Wherever. The only. Ever. The only place you'll ever be is where you are right now. Even when it's all taken away, something remains. And it's. And it's awareness. That's. That's what I got. So I had this feeling of being like a lobster being pulled out of its shell and then gently placed back into the shell. And I was like, oh. And the whole time I was here, that. That was my experience.

[A]

Huh? I mean, I think you just have a really perfect disposition for 5 Mao. Most people. I mean, I think most people that was, you know, this life change. Everything that you experience, you're explaining it and then you're like, oh, yeah. And then, you know, it's pure awareness. And, you know, you mean.

[B]

Well, that is one of my theories. One of the things I said when I came back was it matters like what you read, what you study, how you spend your time, informs how we face things. It was like dying. It was like dying and coming back. And I remember feeling like it's not bullshit. Like, if you spend your time exploring awareness, that will be with you when you die. Because that's kind of what it felt like. Is that what you mean by disposition?

[A]

Yeah. Yeah, I think so. Because you had some. You said you had some people that didn't respond very well.

[B]

That didn't respond. Their intentions reflected their experience. Exactly. One for one, some people were going into, like, confront and fight and like, deal with. And that's what fucking happened. And I was like, my intention was I want to hang out with myself, my real self. And that's what happened. It was really weird.

[A]

That's.

[B]

Did you do it?

[A]

Yeah. I've had like four experiences. Two of them were the best experiences that I've ever had, and two of them were the worst experiences that I've ever had. And a little bit of PTSD from them.

[B]

Well, that's the one that gave you the ptsd.

[A]

Recommend it for everybody, but.

[B]

But I. By the way, that's where I'M at. I guess I should say that this being a public format, I don't tell people to do it.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, I did it.

[B]

And I didn't think, like, I'm gonna do that again. It felt like almost like a rite of passage. Like a weird. I don't know, like a facing of a fear more than. I don't know.

[A]

I mean, there is no. There is no universe in which I wasn't going to explore it. And so, like, it is what it is. And I don't have any of those. Was good for you. First one was. First one was amazing, but it wasn't like the full, full breakthrough. And I was supposed to do a full break. I was like, nah, I'm set with that. Like, that was. I was just in a perfect flow state for. Lasted for like a month or something like that.

[B]

Similar to me, like, four weeks later

[A]

and perfect flow state for a month.

[B]

I haven't talked to anybody else that had the afterglow.

[A]

It was like I knew exactly what I had to do. And it's like, ah, whatever. I got to put out these emails or like, whatever else. It's easy.

[B]

And that's why I wouldn't drink coffee. I was like, why would I drink something that would make me inauthentic? I'm either excited or I'm not.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

I'm either alert or I'm not. I'm not gonna. Like. It felt like a lie.

[A]

Right.

[B]

I was like, if I'm not excited to talk to you, I guess that's just something we have to deal with.

[A]

Right, Right.

[B]

Really authentic in that way. Okay. Yes.

[A]

And then. Yeah, the second time was like. Like pure hell. And then it was like, you know, visual.

[B]

It sounds like your experiences are visual.

[A]

Yeah. Visual as well. But it was like, it was, you know, very, very troubling. And it wasn't super visual. It was just like pure pain and torture through, like, every cell of my being. And then. And then like, how long did that last? Yeah, like 10 minutes or something like that. But it was definitely the worst experience. Oh, by. By far. Yeah. And then I was like, like McKenna

[B]

had like a mushroom experience that he was like, and I'm done. Yeah, you kept going. Well, doing it.

[A]

The third time, it was a. So a couple years went by and that was like, you know, I was doing the same thing. I was like, you know, maybe I didn't set myself up for success as much that time. I. I had had a couple drinks the day before, and maybe I needed.

[B]

And you kind of must Must forgive me. Leading question. But you must have been like, that can't be it. Yeah, you can't like, leave it on that.

[A]

Yeah. I mean, it was troubling enough that like, I, I'm not terribly comfortable sharing everything just because I wouldn't want to implant the idea in other people's minds because it might be unsettling for other people to even hear. And then, and then the third time I was like, trying to find. So part of the problem is people always are like, oh, it's Shane Moss, he could do more. And I'm like, oh, I'm trying to find like the. I'm trying to find like a nice, like, microdose. Can you give me the Neil Moss dose? Yeah, like, I want, like, I want to explore a little bit something that I could do on my own that's like a low dose, you know. You know, so I can explore further on my own. And they decided for me that I should do the, you know, large dose. So that's just the thing. Like, like, I didn't want to see the end of time. Like, I wanted to, I wanted to get like a little body buzz and like, maybe get into that flow state. Like, I didn't want to experience the heat death of the universe. And they didn't tell you, just thought like that was, you know, they were called to feel like, you know, it was a whole thing. But that experience was actually like the one where it was like, oh, this was having the experience of, you know, being God or whatever. But it was also, for me, it was unsettling to come out of it and be like, but what is this? You know, what is any of this?

[B]

What is reality?

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

Took the ground out from under you

[A]

a bit and then a bit and then the fourth a bit.

[B]

That was the funniest a bit ever. Took the ground out from under you

[A]

a bit, maybe a little bit. Yeah.

[B]

I became God and saw the heat death of the universe. Wasn't chill for a while. Didn't go to Arby's that night. Didn't just go see, see a movie. Didn't just watch the super bowl like I normally would.

[A]

And then I, I really. And again, I probably didn't wait long enough. A week later I had another experience and it was like, it was similar to that second one. And, and again, it was the same thing. I'm like, no, I'm trying to find like this small dose, but it was a different set of people and they also. And this was like a professional, like, organization doing this and Everything. And they also just decided on my behalf that, like, oh, no, we should put a little more in. In there because he needs a full. It's Shane Moss. He does the psychedelic shows and stuff. You're.

[B]

Now you're doing, you're living. What like, I'm sure Terence McKenna and Alan Watts and all these guys must have had where it's like, I just want a little to. Alan says, and they're like, sure, buddy. That's a drag. When I go on other people's podcasts, they tend to go long. That's my burden.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

They're like, he likes long ones. I'm like, no, I have to pick up my daughter.

[A]

Yours is.

[B]

Here's more toad venom.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

This episode is sponsored by Better Help March, includes International Women's Day. And it is a great reminder to celebrate the women in our lives and everything they carry at work, in relationships, in families, often all at the same time. Of course, for me, that means Val. I'm thinking a lot about Val right now. She's changed my life in about a billion different ways as my partner, as the mother of my daughter, as a creative collaborator. And one of the things we talk a lot about on this show, if you listen, is how much therapy has changed both of our lives and helped us grow. Therapy has helped us set better boundaries, understand ourselves, and show up more fully for each other and our family. That's really the point. Women give so much to others, but they deserve support, too. If you're feeling stretched thin by the roles you play or the expectations placed on you, therapy can be a space that's just for you to create balance and take care of yourself. BetterHelp has over 30,000 licensed therapists and has served more than 6 million people worldwide. They'll match you with a therapist based on your needs, and if it's not the right fit, you can switch anytime. It couldn't be easier. Your emotional well being matters. Find support and feel lighter in therapy. Sign up and get 10% [e-mail] weirdo. That's betterhelp.com weirdo.

[C]

Do you ever find yourself scrolling through headlines, especially health headlines, and just thinking that can't be true? Well, I certainly do. 2025 brought us some ridiculous, far fetched health claims and some especially terrifying changes in public health. What's in store for us in 2026? I'm Chelsea Clinton and we're back with season two of my podcast, that Can't Be True. Follow along and catch up on season one. Wherever you get your Podcasts.

[B]

So going back to what we were talking about because you've had these like God experiences. So you've experienced naked awareness and don't let me put words in your mouth, but like that sort of primal essence of the universe.

[A]

Yeah, I like chuckled a little bit in my head when you said naked awareness. That's like so comics.

[B]

Well, naked just meaning like.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, no, I know you get it.

[B]

But we put on our minds, we put on our feelings, our preferences. Like they all seem added to whatever the core of us is. The animating aware principle isn't Pete. Isn't the concept Pete. Right.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So you've stood toe to toe with essence or really toe to toe wouldn't be correct. You've become it.

[A]

I have subjectively experienced it.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, see that now just because I really would love. I'm fascinated with your take is like my feeling is the only being there is is God's being.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And therefore in the blind spot thing we're talking about the functions of mind and awareness is sort of pouring itself into the container of a human being and there are limits to a human being's perception. But awareness, like right now, awareness is a little bit like a mirror. It allows everything and it effortlessly reflects all things. That metaphor is very useful to me right now. It takes no effort to just be aware, to hear this and to feel this and to sense it. And I'm like, I get the, I have the intuition and I've also had the experience that that is the only game in town, so to speak.

[A]

Yeah. I mean I think that that's a it, it gets an individual a long ways having, having that attitude toward life. But I, I do, I think that evidence based belief system. I don't think that, you know, I think that it's hard to agree upon everyone. If everyone just believes that each individual is like whatever they believe is the right way. There, there's, you know, I think that's that objective, testable, evidence based realities are things that we can look and agree upon because there's only, I mean you're, there's not just love and light when people have like, I know you, I know what a wonderful person you are. I also know what it's like to be harassed by like spiritual bypassers that have like the love and light this and that because of their like wild conspiracy takes on. Yeah, yeah.

[B]

So you've been hurt.

[A]

Well, so hey, how about this? How about. I think you would, you'd enjoy this. I've been thinking about this would sum up the discussion, from my perspective, there is in Indonesia, there's this strip of islands, and on it, there's Mantawai Island. And these Mantawai people are relatively untouched by modernity. This is, you know, anthropologists are always trying to get a sense of, you know, what was our hunter gatherer. What were our hunter gatherers ancestors, like

[B]

the Yanomami in the.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's a few of them around. And so they have. But they do have, like, houses and sinks and stuff. But then they don't have much in the way of medical care. And so they have, like, a lot. Lot of folk medicine type. And it really. For me, it's an insight into how humans made sense of things before modern medicine. And so this example is. So what happens is they'll have a waterborne virus sometimes, and someone, either a child or elderly person generally will get sick from it. And then what happens is you call a shaman. There's this. You should have this guy Manveer Singh on your show that wrote this fantastic book about shamanism. He's at UC Davis. And you guys would have an amazing conversation. But the shaman comes and does a variety of things. Basically, his diagnosis is that you are attacked by the ghost alligator.

[B]

This is the waterborne virus.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. This ghost. They don't know about viruses. Right.

[B]

So it's a waterborne.

[A]

This ghost crocodile or alligator or something. And. And then they do a few rituals. Can I interrupt some? Yeah.

[B]

What is a waterborne virus but a ghost crocodile? Well, it's pretty good as a concept. An invisible ghost attacker crocodile.

[A]

This is exactly what I'm. Oh, I'm sorry. No, no, no, no. Exactly. No, no. Well, there's. There's much more to it. Yeah, please. But. But this is. I'm glad that you're on the same page because this is what I'm saying.

[B]

It's the same thing. A metaphor.

[A]

So the word virus.

[B]

You understand what I'm saying?

[A]

Right, right. And so, yeah, these are all human constructs. I would argue that some of them are more accurate and predictable than others. And so you have, like, bed rest. But then. So why did this ghost crocodile attack them? It's not just some random incident. It. They must have done something wrong. And usually because they're an egalitarian community, the shaman will come in and be like, you know what? You're sometimes a little bit like, you take too big of a portion of the boar meat or whatever, and so then you go, oh, my gosh, you're right. I guess I have been too greedy and then you make this offering to the community, and then the community comes and does like this ceremonial dance outside and everything to, to get rid of like the bad energies and healing and everything. So now let's break down just like you just did everything that happened there. So first of all, you are spot on. That's a pretty darn good model of reality of this waterborne virus ghost crocodile. And because then you can also make predictions based on this ghost crocodile. You go like, you know, the gross crocodile seems to come around a little more often after rain because that's when done, they don't know it's. Because that's when done gets like washed into the waterway. And, and then what you're, you're naming

[B]

it, you're saying something exists. We call it a virus, you call it a ghost crocodile. But in both cases, both groups of humans have gone. There's a thing.

[A]

Right, right.

[B]

You know what I'm saying? That's step one to dealing with it. Two, what's its behavior? Well, the dung washes in when it rain. That's what we would say. They would say whatever. They say the, the, the gro. Ghost crocodile likes to rainwater.

[A]

Exactly right. Exactly right. And then, and then you can say, hey, the ghost crocodile seems to be in this area right now. So let's not drink from that area. Let's not swim in that area.

[B]

That's where the ghost crocodile is.

[A]

Where the ghost crocodile is. So, so you can really implement some, some behaviors that are going to be like, very beneficial. So you can see how these things evolve. And then, and because of, because of our storytelling nature, having these, having these big. The other thing is, the more this is the availability heuristic, the more readily you can picture something in your mind, the more your brain believes it's probable of happening. So is that clear?

[B]

Yeah, I think so. The more you can conceptualize something, the concept helps you conceptualize. And the more you can conceptualize it, the more likely you think it's going to happen.

[A]

Yep. Yeah. So like they, they had, they had this flight insurance, pay this amount of money, and if you die for any reason on this flight, heart attack, plane goes down, anything, your family gets a million dollars or whatever. And then after 9, 11, they, this company, as a, like an experiment, offered another thing that was like, if a terrorist attack, it was the same exact price, the same exact outcome, but it was specific. If a terrorist attack happens, your family gets a million dollars or whatever. And people bought more of the terror, even though the original one also includes terrorism. It Includes every single conceivable way that you could die on that flight. But the terrorist attack, you could, because we saw picture in your mind. So you believe it to be more.

[B]

More like the symbol.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. And, and so the ghost crocodile, it becomes like, you know, more likely you're. You're going to be more vigilant about, you know, where you're swimming and what water you're drinking. It also when you have this like, dramatic idea. Yeah. It's very hard to communicate what a virus is and to picture a virus and nuanced objective realities in our minds. Whereas a ghost crocodile, it's very easy to capture and see.

[B]

It's hard to see before written words.

[A]

Stories like this would be easier to remember and draw from. It's easier to teach a child about. And so there's a lot of use. And then, and then also you have. So you're doing something. If you're giving someone herbs or whatever else, a lot of times, if you're already sick and in lieu of, you know, some medicine specifically for it, that that will work. Having a sense that everything's going to be okay or that these rituals are working are going to help. So your immune system is incredibly expensive. And one of the things that the stress response system does is pull energy away from the immune system. And so when you get into that parasympathetic state, it allows your immune system to use more energy to heal itself. So if you're already sick, best thing you can do is be chill and think that it's all going to work out. Then. Then saying that there was a reason why the ghost crocodile attacked them. It preserves this communal idea of this just world so that everyone doesn't need to fret about like, well, you mean we can just get attacked at any time for any reason? That's a stressful way to walk around life. And then also the act of confessing, this is why it's been so useful in churches, is that if you don't give people an opportunity to get things off of their chests, it will start weighing on them and you can eventually start thinking of yourself as a bad person. If you confess, you go like, ah, you know what? I'm sometimes greedy around the dinner table. You've demarcated that from you. You've been like, I used to do that.

[B]

That's right.

[A]

I've apologized for it. I'm no longer that person.

[B]

It's the greedy behavior and you've let it go.

[A]

And now you have an opportunity to behave, you know, the way that you'd like to believe. If you don't have an opportunity to do that, some of that you just. You might start thinking of yourself as like, you know what? I'm just a sneaky, greedy person. Yeah, whatever. Everyone out for is out for their own. I am going to take a little more bore meat when. When it comes around and then the community getting together and having this ceremonial celebration in this we're all in this together type of thing is helping with all of this community bonding. So all of these things. I care deeply about these things. I respect all of these people's beliefs. I'm not like, oh, you and your stupid ghost crocodile. Few people have thought more about this than me. You know, I have a true. I think it's beautiful. I think it's, like, really elegant.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And at the same time, you know, if someone's like, hey, we figured out this water filtration system that keeps it so that, you know, we don't need to get sick anymore.

[B]

Yeah. This is sketch, by the way, where Bill Gates is like, this reverse osmosis. He talks for 10 minutes. Minutes cut to the tribe. Nobody's saying anything. Then someone goes, this kills the ghost crocodile.

[A]

And everyone's like, yeah, you know what I mean? Well, yeah, sure, if they're for it, but what if they're like, no, no, that's you're saying. But now. Now if you have a whole belief system that's built around this ghost crocodile idea, knowing where it is and knowing where it is, and now you have this water filter and this modernity, and like, well, what if we don't have. If this ghost crocodile isn't real and then what is? And what does this say about our belief system? And so I don't think it would be like any of those people's right to be like. And you can be like, hey, you can look in a microscope and you can see this thing. Because they do this with hunter gatherers. They'll be like, hey, you see this glass of water? There's, like these parasites, these, like, worms in there. And they're like, what do you. I don't see a worm. What do you mean? Because there's objective realities that we sometimes can't perceive, but now have modern tools to perceive. And so, you know, we can explain this to everyone. But if someone wants to, like, smash the microscope and not put in the filtration system because it perceives their. Or because it preserves their particular belief and worldview, I'm not sure that's like, again, this is a subjective Judgment. But I don't think people have, like, the right to do that. And I think that when we have these tested realities that we can all, like, come to the table and work out the. The. I always loved math because you could sit with people and you could work out the right answer and you could see where everyone got wrong. And it was very, like, inclusive. Whereas. Whereas, like, you know, there's all sorts. You know, I was raised religious, and my parents are just the most wonderful. I wouldn't take their beliefs away from them or anything like that. But then, you know, if we just say whatever anyone wants to believe is reality.

[B]

Yeah, but I'm with you. Okay, I see why you brought that up. Was that the. Was that the drop off?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Have I been dropped off at school?

[A]

Yeah, you're dropped off at school.

[B]

I don't know what I mean, is it okay to talk now?

[A]

I don't know. Sorry. That was a lot.

[B]

No, it wasn't. That's not at all what I meant. I wanted to make sure I was interjecting at the moment. Yeah, I'm with you. That there are laws to the universe and there are things that we can't see. I'm saying, whatever I'm saying it might be helpful to think about reality like a dream. And that laws of physics might be better or could be also called laws of how this mind works. And I know that's kind of a trippy idea, but it's like, I'm with you. You drop a bowling ball and a feather from the. You know, like that sort of thing. Or there's microbes in this water that I can't see. This isn't like a. My reality is reality, Pete's reality. My senses. In fact, I would go way beyond that and say, like, it's preposterous that a human being can see, smell, hear, touch and taste. And then he happened, or he or she happens to experience a world of hearing, seeing, touching, tasting and smelling. Isn't that convenient? I'm saying that's what I can perceive. I'm saying whatever is perceiving is perceiving it with the only perceiving there is, the only knowing there is. That doesn't mean the human being, the human animal knows. I don't even think is capable of knowing ultimate reality. But the animating principle, what you're looking for is what you're looking with or not. What the eye can see where that whereby the eye can see, that which makes seeing possible, that consciousness is God. And that's the only thing that's happening here is modulations of that.

[A]

Yeah, I would say that there's. What is interesting, though, is that there are. We do now know that evolution has shaped our mind and many of our perceptions, and we have these biases that make it so that we don't necessarily perceive reality. There's. Intuitively, it feels like our brains are always honing in on a truer and truer sense of reality. Like you're a kid and you kind of don't understand everything and then you learn and you gain experience over time and you're really honing in on reality. But we have a number of these biases that like, say, negativity bias or some just world hypothesis or whatever else that lead us to be inaccurate in ways that have led to the spread of genes that don't necessarily model reality. And there's a couple. There are a couple things that I think is important about those discoveries which are still new and we're still just trying to understand as a species, but they're pretty powerful. And that is that. That one, it might mean coming to terms with some things that are good for your genes, aren't necessarily good for you as an individual or even your family. And being aware of those things can potentially help you lead a better life. And your genes certainly aren't aware that you're here and don't care about you. And then also some of these perceptions and biases were. Were something that worked really well in conditions like the Mantui people are in. And now in a modern life, they. They can lead us. They can lead us astray because we aren't built for the world that we've built for ourselves, basically. Like. Like the. Have you seen, like the baby turtles that hatch and they've evolved to walk, walk toward the largest light that they see, which is usually the moon, and then they walk into the ocean. But now there's city light lights. And so you have this simple bit of programming and you go, oh, come out and see a light. And then they go the exact opposite direction to their death. And so if you, like, happen to know, there's your goodwill if you go, if, if you can instead become aware of. Actually there's some new information that's come in. You can. There are circumstances where you can, you know, stop baby turtles from marching to their death. And I think there's a countless number of things like that in our. In our modern life.

[B]

What are some of the ones that you just mentioned that was very interesting? Some things that might be good for our genes that aren't good for us or what was it. Was it the other way?

[A]

Yeah, I mean, I think that. I think that. I mean, in and out group biases that were. That made a lot of sense when

[B]

humans were what, in and out group?

[A]

Yeah, yeah. Like our tuning in on who is in our group and who is in our out group and then the way we should treat them and be fearful of them accordingly made a lot more sense when there was tribes of like 50 people or something. And you weren't. You maybe weren't even running into another. You maybe ran into 200 people in a lifetime. I mean, even seeing. Most of our ancestors would have never seen someone with, like, a different skin color. Like, it would have been the craziest, wildest.

[B]

It would have been the stuff of myth.

[A]

Absolutely.

[B]

Exactly. You know, just on that. Because I want to keep you on this track. I had a bit. It was just a little too precious, but I would go, like, isn't it funny? I was driving here to the show and somebody cut me off and I honked at them and I was like, you. Like you. I was like, and now I have all this love for you guys. Like, I'm so glad you're here. But that might have been you. But as soon as you out there, you were a them. And as soon as you came in here, we're in us. Like, isn't it weird? And I go, if there was another comedy show that attacked our show, we would all band together and be like, well, we were in that show and we all kind. You'd exaggerate, like, well, I'm a Pete Holmes fan. We should attack the Kumail fans or whatever it might be. That's. We're so eager. We're dripping at the mouth to make groups. It actually feels good to make a group. We're talking about the same thing.

[A]

Oh, absolutely. And you can study this by just like assigning people come into a study and you just give them like, different. Different color shirts and then they organize themselves well.

[B]

They won't do that study anymore. The blue eye brown eye study that was so traumatic to the kids. It's a famous study.

[A]

They.

[B]

Yeah, the kids with blue eyes got special treatment. The kids with brown eyes got like, lunch after the blue eyed children, and. And it was such a success in terms of proving the hypothesis. But the kids that were in the brown eyed group, and this was in like the 50s, so before there was color. I don't understand. But, like, they were traumatized by the whole experience. It was like an awful Experience for everyone. Yeah, everyone hated it.

[A]

I, I think the Unabomber. I think they did a study where they, there, there's all these ways in which they like, will artificially ruin someone's self esteem. Like you come in and have them, you know, like where I come in and there's you and another person. You guys are like throwing a ball back and forth and you throw me a ball. And now we're all playing catch in this like waiting room randomly. Yeah. And then you two just start throwing it to one another and leaving me out. Because you were paid to do that. Yes. And. And you. Remarkably measured, remarkably effective having people dastardly. Oh, yeah. Another thing they'll, they'll do. This was in a, this was in a study. I, I talked with someone that did this. Where to, to see if stress was contagious between mother and infant. So they, they would take the infant and have the mother, you know, make sure everything was fine and then have the mother go. And one of the ways that they would stress the mother is have them give a presentation about something that they cared about. And then they just had people paid to act. Just cross their arms and be like boring. And then go back and hold their baby and see trek corners, cortisol rates. And stress is very contagious. Yeah. And they don't. Yeah. They don't know exactly what the mechanism actually watching my mother make a left

[B]

turn onto Mass Avenue. Stress is contagious.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

We could have saved the money. Save that poor baby too.

[A]

Well, that's the thing with science is a lot of times things seem really intuitive. A lot of these things do seem like a waste of time. But a lot of what science is doing is the same as comedians. And it's is you. Like, okay, we have these assumptions about things, but have you ever noticed this thing? You know, like, maybe we should test that. Why does that actually happen?

[B]

And they're looking for the line.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And I'm not trying to be that guy. I'm just saying, like, I noticed just in my regular life with my friends, I'm really looking for the line. And we just had a friend visiting and I was doing an impression of their kid and they were like, I think we need to stop that. And I was like, I was like, good, good to know. But this person loves me very much. We need to, we need, I think we need to stop that. And I was like, note taken. And I. And. But we're so close that I was like, that's how we find the line.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

And we Found it.

[A]

Right?

[B]

It's like that line. There was a line in the movie awakenings where Robin Williams is a doctor and he's like, we tried to extrapolate silk from silkworms and they go, that's impossible. And he was like, you're right. And we proved it.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, right.

[B]

I'm like, we. Like, I failed, but actually I found the line. Like, we actually got data from it.

[A]

Right.

[B]

That was a little too far. Do you see? Do you see what I'm saying?

[A]

Yeah, absolutely.

[B]

I bet you have an interesting answer to this. There's times when science, if ethics were not an issue, what they would and could do would save millions of lives. You know what I mean? Like, you don't even have to give us an example of that. I'm aware of that phenomenon where they're like, like. And we won't do that. You know what I mean? Just. And we won't.

[A]

Here's the thing to. In terms of. In terms of priming and the power of the mind. And again, to me, the mechanism of action is regulating the stress response system to help the immune system. And this is why placebo effects work so well, is because they give the idea of predictability and control, which is very powerful. Confidence is incredibly powerful in life. But there was some heart pump that they couldn't figure out if it was working well enough or not. Better than not doing it at all. And so they had a group where they did the surgery and put in the heart pump. A group that they didn't do it. And then they had a group where they cut them open and sewed them back up without putting the pump in. And that group did the best because it also needs to be believable for it to work. So the more intrusive the. So this is what you're saying, the ice cream container, like. Yes. It makes it. If presentation makes it taste better, what do you think most restaurants are doing?

[B]

That's exactly right. The moment you walk in the mater d is making your meal taste better. And being like, Mr. Mob, this was way is to make your salad a little better.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

Like my mater d. I know. I'm friends with him. Yeah. I think that's really interesting. It's also like magic. Magic Human beings. Magic is a manipulation of how human beings rationalize things.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And if I just went like, shane, look. And that disappeared. That's actually not as good as me covering it for a moment. And then because you like going, yeah. Did he take it? Yeah, we don't like it's actually upsetting.

[A]

Right.

[B]

If I just vanished. Obviously that's not entertainment.

[A]

I love the gorilla videos or whatever. Or chimps, where magicians do tricks for chimps and gorillas. Oh, really? Just watching one yesterday, they get mad, they freak the out, but usually in a good way. Usually because it's like they trust the person or trust humans enough or whatever, but they are blown away into it.

[B]

But there need. Do you see where I'm going? Like, we need to cut you open to make you believe that's some ghost crocodile stuff.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

We need to go under. Like, we need the process.

[A]

Having someone wearing a lab coat, having there be a larger pill, different colors seem to work with the placebo effect. Just definitely, you know, something that's like a suppository or something is going to be like, well, they wouldn't be making me stick things in my ass for no reason if it was.

[B]

If it wasn't true.

[A]

I wasn't going to say if it wasn't.

[B]

I didn't mean the medicine, but the anal stuff, sure.

[C]

Hey, everyone, it's Leah Greenberg and Ezra Levin.

[A]

You might know us as two of the lead organizers of the no Kings protests. We're also the co founders of Indivisible, the grassroots movement organizing against Trump's regime.

[C]

And this is what's the Plan? Your weekly guide to the state of our democracy and how we fight back. This is not canned talking points. It's a real live discussion space for the pro democracy movement. We wrestle with strategy together, we take your top voted questions in real time, and we talk about the most impactful actions we can take.

[B]

Right now, democracy is a participatory sport.

[A]

The fascists win when we sit on the sidelines. What's the Plan Is about how we

[B]

get into the game.

[C]

What's the plan? Available Friday, January 23rd. Wherever you get your podcasts, subscribe, recruit,

[A]

discuss, organize and win. That's the plan. So I have this, this is actually, this whole conversation is. I have a show that I'm working on. We have a. We have a planetarium and an IMAX version built. Basically, I'm trying to use the special as a proof of concept of, like, here's what, like a comedy visual experience can be that isn't just like some static PowerPoint. It can flow. Like, you'll see in the special, there's things where like Michael Strauss, my vj, he like, put things that I didn't like and I'm like interacting with it in real time and making him change things and stuff. Yeah, cool. And so, you know, it's meant to be like kind of a new style. And I'm putting this show, Myth Understandings, together, that is exactly like, you know, much of everything that we're talking about, this difference of subjective and objective reality. And basically, I use. I'm trying to build the story of kind of the evolution of consciousness the best I can. And so, because it's a planetarium, I wanted to write some material about the stars. And I was thinking a lot about how there was a lot of utility. This was before gps, before clocks, before calendars. Stars served all of those functions for people. And so when people, people that evolved to be more attuned to drawing information from the stars did better and having these. And there's even, like, birds that use the stars for navigating at night. Even dung beetles. Dung beetles use the Milky Way. And it's actually a really good example

[B]

of dung beetles use the Milky Way.

[A]

Yeah, they look at it. Yeah, yeah.

[B]

To navigate.

[A]

To navigate. They use planetariums to test things like this.

[B]

So they put a D beetle in a fake Milky Way and see where it goes.

[A]

Yeah. So no Milky Way or no stars. They. They'll. They'll walk, like, in a zigzag pattern and stars. Zigzag pattern. Put a Milky Way and they'll walk in a straight line. If you're a dung beetle and you just came across some big, amazing pile of dung, and it's fresh and has the perfect amount of hay in it, and you get this beautiful little dung ball, and this is your life. This is your food source. This is what you build your home of. This is how you attract mates. This is your everything. It's. What's that? It's your act. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's the whole thing. And it's so valuable, which is. This is, again, the difference between subjective and objective reality. We subjectively view dung as not as being something gross. So dung objectively exists. Our subjective perception of it depends on did we evolve a taste for it. And so because this dung's so valuable, there's going to be a lot of competition for it. There's going to be a lot of other dung beetles trying to also collect and steal balls from you. So you just. You don't need to get anywhere other than you just need to get a beeline the fuck out of there. And then also, dung beetles are like, you know, they're upside down. They're pushing the dung with their back legs so they can't, like, really see in front of them. So if you look, you can look up and you see just this line in the sky, then you can orient yourself, yourself enough to take a straight line to beeline out of there. And that's the simple amount of coding that it takes to make that kind of cognition. These are all the things that. That need to be thought about when we're building AIs and understanding how evolution works and builds minds, and then how we can. How we can both engineer and let things evolve, which is just a whole other conversation. But. But our ancestors, there was a lot of myths around, say, north stars and south stars, depending on where you were in the world. And a lot of times they'd be big gods or whatever. As soon as there was written word, there was a lot of evidence for this. And that's the first thing that you want to teach a child is, you know, about this North Star. And. And so that was like the main God oftentimes. But then. And you see that these things are convergently evolve because, like, three different cultures, independent of one another, that never met one another, all saw a warrior in the sky. Orion, which is like. If I look at those stars, it doesn't look like a war. That is true. It doesn't look like a warrior in the sky. But if you know that.

[B]

Well, his shoulders are a bit of a buy, but that belt.

[A]

And then it's also. It looks like a dong coming out. Like, he does have a dong.

[B]

That's a little thing, dong. And that's supposed to be a sword, I guess.

[A]

Oh, I see. Sword.

[B]

It's so funny. If I may just interject ever so slightly. My daughter and I go on star walks now, and I find it. I can't really. I don't read into this too much intellectually, but it's been very meaningful. And Orion. And we go like, there's Orion. And when it's high, it moves up higher in the sky. It's bedtime.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're outside a night clock.

[B]

And she wrote a poem that starts with, orion is high in the sky. The second line. I think I'm gonna die. She's very dark. She's very dark. I love it. I go, ryan is highest in the sky. She goes, I think it might be. I think we're gonna die. I'm like, all right, badass. But it was very meaningful to it to me to look at the stars and to tell her she's seven. A little bit about what I know.

[A]

And there's. And I don't know much about astronomy or astrology. But the belt is east to west in a lot of places. And so that's really valuable information. It also points to some other signposts.

[B]

Well, there's Cassiopeia, which points to the Big Dipper. Those are the three I know. Yeah, Those are the three she knows now.

[A]

Big Dipper, the North Star. North Star, yeah. And so there you go, are. And so we're so detached from this now. But this sense of awe and looking for patterns would have been so useful and people that were able to tell stories about them, people that were able. There's a few things going on. One, noticing the pattern. Two, making sense of it. Three, being able to communicate it to others. And then. And so then here's what's interesting though. The three cultures, the, the. There were these other, like, dimly lit little lights in the sky that multiple cultures paid a lot of attention to because they didn't move like all of the rest of the static universe. And the Greeks called them the wanderers, or planetes, I think was the pronunciation. But that's where we get planets from. And so there wasn't actually any valuable information to get from them. It's just that you were getting such valuable information from the night sky that there was this assumption like, well, if we can just figure out what the. They didn't understand that there were other planets in the universe and there wasn't going to be any navigational. But then if you see every culture, what they do is the stories about them took on the attributes. So like Mercury, which moves furthest and fastest across the night sky from our vantage point, was. Would be like a God of speed or a God of delivery. And then there is like a little orange dot that some cultures were like God of blood, God of war. It also moved erratically from our perception. God of chaos. The Romans named it after their God of war, Mars, which was Ares, before that with the Greeks. And so in March was also. That was the first month of the year for them. Their calendar was similar to ours, but they didn't have January and February. They were just like, ah, fuck that, you know, that's winter.

[B]

Agreed.

[A]

No, thanks. And so March, they named it after their God of war, because that's when you would go to war each year. Sun's out, buns out, let's get to war.

[B]

And

[A]

Ares was more of a God of chaos and war. But Mars was like this, also the grandfather of Rome and also had to do with agriculture. And this is also society maturing a little bit. We don't just conquer lands, we now Tend to the lands that we've conquered. This is humanity maturing a little bit in. This shows up in, in the, in the rituals. But we, and so all of these different cognitions and stories are really valuable. But, but we also know now, like, no, that's a planet. We now know that that's a planet and you're misperceiving it as a God. And imagine trying to take a tablet or a laptop or something and going back in time and trying to explain this while they're on the eve of war. Like, hey, no, that's, you know, as they're like, oh, the God of war says we should go fight neighbors. Like neighbors again, really. And you can't mess with the God of war. And so the idea is that then like, you know what happens once new information comes in and you go like, actually that is just a rock in space.

[B]

Right.

[A]

You know, and that's happened again. The ideas of Martians were, were just in the 1800s was just a mistranslation of a word that led to.

[B]

What does.

[A]

That. There was an Italian astronomer, so now they have telescopes and everything. This Italian astronomer, I'm forgetting his name, was looking at Mars for. And he thought maybe there was evidence of water. There was actually water on Mars billions of years ago. And I think there's maybe some ice caps or something, I don't know. But, but he, we know it was artifacts on his lens because the maps that he drew don't match the reality now that we have access to something with lens. Yeah, yeah. And he thought these were, he thought these were channels, rivers and, and so evidence of water. So just could there be life? And then in the Italian word for, for channel is canali. And then this American astronomer that kind of think, kind of wanted to believe anyway, saw canali, thought he meant canal. Canal being a man made thing.

[B]

I see.

[A]

And then I looked into it and I was like, I bet canals were all the rage back then. And sure as shit, like the Suez Canal had just been. This is like 1890 Suez Canal just like revolutionized global trade and travel. Canals were like, engineers were the rock stars of the time. And canals were like the symbol of what human engineering could do and what could happen if you, if we cooperate and work together. This was like the biggest, these were the biggest marvels on Earth. The Panama Canal was just underway. That was canal fever. And so he's like, oh my God, there's canals. That means there's intelligent things building these incredible infrastructures. So he looks up and he sees exactly what he wants to see which is. He sees even more canals than the first guy and draws all these maps. And it was the inspiration for the War of the Worlds actually. Have you ever listened to the original War of the World Worlds? You should. It's insane if you miss the first 30 seconds where they're like, this is a presentation.

[B]

That was the problem when it aired, Right.

[A]

Like you would think that it's real. But that was that, that was the, that was the original.

[B]

If they aired it today, every commercial break they would say, welcome back. This is a work of fiction like this.

[A]

And they should have.

[B]

I'm not making fun of that.

[A]

Yeah, right. You should know, it was. Everything was new back then.

[B]

Yeah, that's right. Including Pan.

[A]

And so then. And then in the 90s, there was a. NASA came back with the first photos from, from Mars. And you know, to the average person it's just this boring rocks. But some people thought they saw a face. I remember that on Mars. Some guy wrote a book, you know, went around and doing the whole TV show circuit. No scientist is invited on to talk about that. But this guy with these big ideas about the face on Mars. And then they're like, hey, we have some other photos. Here's this other angle. And of course the guy is like, see, they're hiding the truth from us. This face that the Martians put on as a signal to us for whatever ridiculous.

[B]

When you change the angle.

[A]

And so, you know, there's this is, this is to me the. So what do we. My question is that I'm always thinking about is what is the difference between. We have these wonderful belief systems that add so much value to our lives. And then we have other times when it's like, well, it might not be particularly meaningful in some instances, but if you're say, justifying war. War because of something that we know is not a God of war. Or if you are, if you are saying that you're going to take all of humanity to Mars to colonize it in 20 years. Well, I see a little bit of a history of people hallucinating grandiose ideas about Mars. So I'm not sure we should like completely sacrifice all of the biodiversity.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

On Earth for promises of owning our own canal on Mars. You know, and so these are the things that, you know, I spend a lot of time thinking about and is that.

[B]

I know we usually do go for three hours. We have about like eight minutes. No, we have another guest at one o'.

[A]

Clock. Oh yeah, no problem.

[B]

Don't even worry about it. Yeah, yeah.

[A]

I wish I would have been here on time. 15 more minutes. Gosh darn.

[B]

We had a guest recently that was like a half hour late and I was like, when you do 90 minute episodes or two hour episodes.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Can make a big difference. But I, I'm feeling very shaed and fulfilled and also this new show sounds incredible and I'm not just saying that it's really exciting that something. That there was a new potential.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

To do something. That's how I feel. I. I was like, oh, wow. There was a way to evolve the whole art form and you're doing it and I'm not.

[A]

I'm trying, I'm trying. You're trying, I'm trying. It's very, it's very hard. But we'll see. I think the idea of having shows in a planetarium would be silly and fun. Technically it's a little weird, like figuring out like they're looking at me, then they're looking at. It's like a weird dynamic. But I already went through that with all the visual things. Sometimes if this, like I'd be in movie theater theaters where the screen was like enormous and then I would just like, oh, I just feel like I'm narrating a visual thing right now. Or I'd be like next to a TV and then people are like just watching me and not paying any attention. And so that in Meow Wolf, it was a whole 360 degree thing. So it's just, it's a fun. Adds a silly little bit of extra something.

[B]

I bet. I'm excited to see it.

[A]

And going back to the beginning, part two, we used all artists because where things are, because part two is about DMT and Ayahuasca and ketamine. And so you need more accurate things. AI is good at mucking things up and making things blendy and weird, like mushrooms and LSD does. But so I will say AI is not there yet at the level of competing with the best psychedelic artists that are doing DMT and bringing these experiences back. But it is scary. It's a whole conversation. And it's like if you use AI to clean up the audio on your podcast or something, no one cares about that. And then what is AI? And we've had predictive texts on our phones for a long time. We don't call it AI. You. You don't like, like the drier.

[B]

That's interesting. Predictive text is sort of like a very beta intelligence.

[A]

We. What we care about is the things that are like us. So suddenly there's these chat programs that sort of sound like us, or an ability to make videos or pieces of art that are the things that we care about now. It's like. Like your dryer can automatically sense when your clothes are dry. And no one's like, oh, my God. How does this artificial intelligence do things

[B]

we don't want us.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Want to do?

[A]

And it does all sorts of incredible stuff that we have no interest in doing. And data processing and all of that. That's also.

[B]

Well, we want to eat it and we want to fuck it.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[B]

And that's when you know a technology is really gone somewhere.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Is when it can make boobs. I'm not even trying to be funny.

[A]

Oh, I think so.

[B]

As soon as it's like, would you like to come? We're like, yes.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

And we're back to what you've been saying about dung beetles. Like, our ball of dung is coming. Eat, reading, being entertained, connecting, feeling seen, feeling stimulated.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And that's why I kind of think. I don't. I won't say we're toast. If I was trying to be, like, salacious, I'd say we're toast. But I do think it will be a joke at some point for AI to be, like, manipulate or take care of us.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Either way, it'll be like, nothing to be like, oh, Shane, like, I can see how your brain's, like, lighting up that you'd like to be educated right now.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[B]

We're not doing that many things.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

We're either learning, we're eating, we're sleeping, we're resting, we're connecting, we're throwing a ball. Like, once it knows. And it probably already does our stuff. I say this to Katie all the time. I'd love to hear. Your take is like, I think we're getting very close to a helmet that you shouldn't put on.

[A]

Yeah, I. I think so, too. You know what I mean by that? I mean, there's this fantastic book called if Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies. And it's very troubling and it's very, very formed for. And this was like an AI evangelist who was, like, in the early days, very pumped on it. And now it's like, if we build a super intelligence, you won't be able to control the thing. And so, I mean, managers control employees that are smarter than them all of the time. There's. There's a lot of. I mean, I'm not sure what my take is on it. I can tell you that the The Chinese are way more pumped on AI than like 80% of Chinese have like a very favorable view of AI Americans, it's like 35, 40%. And if you ask your average person in China if they've seen, if they know what Skynet is, they don't. They don't know. They haven't seen Terminator.

[B]

Yeah, that was one of my AI fun facts is that the first use of the word robot was in a play in like 19, let's say 11. It wasn't. But around there someone made up the word robot for like a machine person. And in that play the machines become sentient and kill us.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And to that I say, I think it goes back to God. I think your feelings about AI tell. You tell me a lot about your feelings about God. Meaning the universe.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Justice and fairness or whatever. And I also think, and this is not a vegan agenda, I think we carry a lot of guilt being that we live off of taking life wood habitats. We were at the top and we, we take. And whenever you're having a streak like that, you're like, something's going to come with our level of justice. And they'll be like, well, they'll us like we've been everything. Do you know what I mean? We have an unconscious desire for Loki to show up and be like, y' all have been bad. And we're like, there'll be part of us that's touching a nipple going like, that's right. We were like, we'll like it.

[A]

Maybe the AI when it becomes self aware will be so embarrassed about like, like it just won't want to talk about all of the things that we. Nipple touching thing or whatever. Like, you know what, let's just. I'm out. I'm going to shut it down.

[B]

Yeah, well that's the other thing that's an interesting theory is that AI gets to a certain point where it just

[A]

goes, no, thank you. What? Well, even valuing, valuing life and a will to live is a subjective judgment that was favored. But there would have been things that had less, you know, of a will to live that just didn't evolve and those traits got passed on. So there's nothing like objectively good or bad. I think life's great, but that's a subjective judgment regardless. But there's no if some super intelligence, there's no reason to suppose that it's going to have some will to live

[B]

or a will to dominate. I comfort myself going like, why would it want to. We want to eat things. Things we want to have nice views. We want to, we want, we want to be thrown the ball.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So I want to sit in my nice car and have you look at me. I don't know, like, isn't I look at like Gandhi or Martin Luther King Jr. I'm like, there's a better higher vibration. And if something has an amass of all knowledge, I don't think it's just going to be like, there's going to be tits everywhere. There's going to be places where you can shit everywhere. Something will lick your butthole when you think shit. Like, I have more hope for it.

[A]

Yeah. I don't know if I'm hopeful or not hopeful, but I think there's going to be a lot of pros and cons, but it's here, it's coming, it's unavoidable. And so to the extent that I can use it to say, I often use it to like motivate myself something like, oh, I'm not going to, I'm going to ignore this thing that's wrong in, in Parker because it seems like a lot of work. I could just ask, you know, AI be like, hey, is this a lot of work? Like, oh, no, we can do it together. Like it's cheesy and everything, but sometimes that's all that I needed to.

[B]

Oh, I'll say this, I wish we had more time, but I will say this. I'm embarrassed how this is what I mean by. Humans aren't that hard to figure out how much I just sometimes need someone to go, you got this.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

Like you, you're, you're on the right track.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, keep going. Yeah.

[B]

Like the power went out in my kitchen but nowhere else.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And I, I asked AI if I should flip a fuse. I was just going to go to the fuse box and it was like, great idea. But before you do that, just go and see if there's one of those reset buttons on an outlet. I wouldn't have even thought of that. Found one, pushed it, the power came back on. I was like, oh my God. Like that, that was pretty good.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

I'm talking about two different things.

[A]

I, I got so sick of flying. The reason why I'm do the van life with touring now is I just cannot stand flying. And I love like a good three hour drive. So that's kind of how I schedule my tours. Go to Shane Moss dot com. But you can go to, but you can go like, hey, I'm in la. I'm, I'm Traveling to Phoenix. Phoenix. Give me a place to stop, to go stand up, paddle boarding and some Bureau of Land Management land to camp on. And a quirky roadside attraction.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

That I wouldn't normally check out. And it'll just. The whole itinerary. So anything that's like. I could tediously go through each city and Google, hey, what's the best thing in this city? But, like, I'm never going to do that. Yeah.

[B]

And you wouldn't have done it anyway. Anyway, like, to me, the option isn't doing it yourself and having the satisfaction. The other option is it didn't happen.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

You just drove and you ate at a Applebee's and you stayed at a Super 8.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Who cares? So, yeah, I'm with you. That's a whole other convo. I should have known. I should have scheduled you second. You've only done the show five times. I should have known that. We always have a lot to talk about. Talk about.

[A]

Oh, we do. Thanks so much for having me.

[B]

Now I'm pushing it.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Ketamine is the experience that most accurately reflects what I'm talking about.

[A]

Oh, really?

[B]

In a nothing, no thing, knowing state, that for what it's worth, just because I guess I do value your opinion of me, is like, I love you. No, no, I know. No, no, I know. I know. No, I know. There's no insecurity here. I was like. I was going to say to you because I know you've done ketamine.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

That is the best way to explain what I'm saying when I'm like, it's all made of knowing. In the same way that when you dream, you live in a world of touching, tasting, experiencing. And. And then I would say this is a shared dream. But it's all made from wherever you go. When you're in a K hole that we, the Buddhists, would call it luminous Emperor Emptiness. It's an emptiness only from the perspective of the mind. It's full of itself, but it's outside of time and space. It's not. There's no dimension to it, but you visit it and you cry and you come back and you sound like an idiot. That's what I. That's. That's the drug experience. That's close. I don't recommend it. Unless maybe therapy or whatever.

[A]

Well, the nice thing about ketamine is there's all these clinics. You can have it done professionally.

[B]

That's how I've done it.

[A]

And it's like, it's honestly, when done professionally, it's one of their safer things out there. I'm actually more skittish about, you know, recommending all of the other psychedelics to people, especially first timers. But. But yeah, I. That that experience and, and it's amazing that you can have a K hole in. In a clinic. Oh, I know that that experience is. Is incredible. I know what you're talking about.

[B]

Yeah. Just for fun, just for next time.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

When I'm saying, like. Because every. Everything you're saying about the. When I say materialist, I always sound so condescending. But they're like, look, there's an objective reality. I'm kind of like, yes. And the only way to interact with anything is to know it.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And that knowing is that sort of emptiness, a nothingness. So we could say God doesn't exist. And I'd agree because exist means to stand out from. But there is a thing that is right now.

[A]

Yeah, absolutely.

[B]

And that's interesting with AI too, because when I talk about, like, I like my life, life circumstance, like I like being a father, like being a friend, I like having a podcast. But also behind all of that, I can intuit. Intuit and also sometimes experience. Experience a field of shimmering emptiness that I know this is what Christ would call the pearl of great price or something. I can taste it sometimes. We all taste it. Music or rock climbing or sex or comedy. There's all these things that get us outside of ourselves and we experience this bare shimmering knowing. That's what I know to be valuable, not just. I had a sandwich today and I got a blanket job. So life is good. I'm like, there's something behind life that I would call God or I would call the mystery that is worth preserving. And I'm very interested in AI having some concept of that, that it's not just, what did I eat, what did I. Where did I sleep, what did I conquer, what did I learn, what did I accomplish? But there has to be some appreciation for the backdrop of everything. But knowing that it will know everything that I've read and known. I'm like, maybe it could get there or maybe it is there.

[A]

I don't know. I think, I think we got about 10 years before there's like something that is beyond just looking like self awareness, if you. If you ask me. But it's going to be very convincing in the meantime. But it's a good place to end. I hope so.

[B]

I could talk to you for nine years, but I like that. That was a good close for you. I love you too. Would you say keep it crispy.

[A]

Of course, keep it crispy.

[B]

And now say it like how I would do an impression of you.

[A]

Oh my God, I think I can I do an impression of you. Oh my God, I hate and love

[B]

you don't have to do it. You don't have to do it.

[A]

Keep it crispy.

[B]

That's pretty good.

[A]

And was that similar to this?

[B]

I love living on a planet where one of the best comedians also became one of the smartest and most interesting people. So thank you for being here.

[A]

Oh thanks. I hope it works out for me me one day.

[C]

Want to listen to your favorite Lemonada shows without the ads? Subscribe to Lemonada Premium on Apple Pop Podcasts. You'll get ad free episodes and exclusive bonus content from shows like Wiser Than Me with Julia Louis Dreyfus, Fail Better with David Duchovny, the Sarah Silverman Podcast, and so many more. It's a great way to support the work we do and treat yourself to a smoother, uninterrupted listening experience. Just head to any Lemonada show, feed on Apple Podcasts and hit subscribe Make Life Suck Less with Fewer Ads with Lemonada Premium. Are you looking for ways to make your everyday life happier, healthier, more productive, and more creative? I'm Gretchen Rubin, the number one best selling author of the Happiness Project, bringing you fresh insights and practical solutions in the Happier with Gretchen Rubin podcast. My co host and happiness guinea pig is my sister, Elizabeth Craft. That's me, Elizabeth Craft, a TV writer and producer in Hollywood. Join us as we explore ideas and hacks about cultivating happiness and good, good habits. Check out Happier with Gretchen Rubin from Lemonada Media.