Ep 82 | How This Entrepreneur Went from a 0.9 GPA to Harvard Professor | Todd Rose

Summary

Podcast Summary: Zero Hour with James Poulos - Ep 82 | How This Entrepreneur Went from a 0.9 GPA to Harvard Professor | Todd Rose

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Introduction

In Episode 82 of Zero Hour with James Poulos, host James Polis engages in a profound conversation with Todd Rose, the founder and CEO of Populous and a former Harvard professor. The episode delves into Rose's extraordinary journey from academic struggles to academic excellence, the concept of collective illusions, the impact of technology on society, and the evolving American Dream. Through insightful discussions, Rose shares his expertise on human individuality, private opinion research, and the necessity of aligning technology with human values.

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Todd Rose’s Journey from Failure to Success

The episode opens with a candid recounting of Todd Rose's early academic challenges. Rose reveals that he grew up in rural America where conformity was highly valued, a setting that was never a good fit for him both personally and academically.

"School wasn't a good fit. And you know how it goes. If you do poorly any one time, it tends to snowball." ([01:03])

With a dismal 0.9 GPA, Rose was effectively expelled from school. His life took a challenging turn when, shortly after leaving school, his girlfriend became pregnant, adding financial and personal pressures.

"I ended up graduating from Weber State as the honors student of the year with a 3.97 GPA." ([07:06])

Rose's transformation began when he took a job as a nurse assistant, a role he found degrading and unfulfilling. Realizing the need for change, he decided to pursue higher education, inspired by his father's journey from mechanic to mechanical engineer. Enrolling at Weber State University, Rose discovered the importance of finding the right fit between his individuality and his academic environment.

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The Power of Individuality and the Concept of Collective Illusions

Rose emphasizes the significance of human individuality and the "fit" between one's unique traits and their environment. His experiences led him to develop the concept of collective illusions, where groups adhere to ideas they privately disagree with, believing mistakenly that these ideas represent the majority view.

"A collective illusion is a phenomenon where most people in a group go along with an idea that they don't privately agree with because they incorrectly think that most other people in the group agree with it." ([15:12])

Rose discusses how social media exacerbates this phenomenon by amplifying fringe opinions, leading individuals to self-silence or conform erroneously. This misperception fosters widespread policies that do not reflect the true desires of the populace.

"The short of this is everybody's lying. Every demographic is outright lying about multiple issues." ([14:57])

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Private Opinion Research and Shattering Collective Illusions

As the head of Populous, Rose underscores the importance of private opinion research to uncover the genuine beliefs of individuals, circumventing the distortions caused by social pressures. His team developed methodologies that ensure anonymity and plausible deniability, allowing for more accurate data collection.

"We just get below the hood and you start looking at what do we really believe as a people, it's shockingly normal." ([15:01])

Rose shares examples like the "Defund the Police" movement, where private data contradicted public statements, revealing a stark discrepancy between actual beliefs and expressed opinions. He illustrates how understanding these private convictions can lead to meaningful social change.

"Here's the good news, is that while they're really devastating. When they're in force, they're pretty fragile because they're social lies." ([20:16])

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Historical Insights and the Velvet Revolution

Rose references historical events to parallel modern societal shifts, particularly the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia. Led by poet and playwright Vaclav Havel, the revolution succeeded without bloodshed by fostering authenticity and personal responsibility, overturning the collective illusion upheld by the communist regime.

"For me, it was life-altering, and for her it was forgettable." ([09:50])

This example serves as a blueprint for how societies can overcome oppressive frameworks by encouraging honesty and dismantling collective illusions through grassroots movements.

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The American Dream and Societal Values

A significant portion of the conversation addresses the erosion of the traditional American Dream, influenced by Frederick Taylor's scientific management, which prioritized system efficiency over individual autonomy. Rose argues that this shift has transformed society into a selection mechanism, undervaluing human potential and fostering widespread resentment.

"We have some of the lowest levels of social trust ever recorded." ([59:13])

Rose highlights that true fulfillment lies in psychological and spiritual abundance rather than material wealth. He emphasizes that American values center around contributing to the community, fostering relationships, and having control over one's life, which contrasts with the perceived zero-sum game of status and power.

"The number one trade-off priority for the American public was I want to do work that has a positive impact on other people." ([46:05])

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Technology, AI, and Human-Centered Innovation

Rose discusses the pivotal role of technology and artificial intelligence (AI) in shaping society’s future. He stresses that AI should be harnessed to empower individuals rather than control them, advocating for human-centered approaches in technological development.

"The real question is, what do we want it to be for." ([55:41])

He warns against viewing technology as a panacea for lack of meaning, asserting that without clear values, technology can become a tool for authoritarian control rather than human advancement.

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Restoring Social Trust and Mutual Cooperation

Concluding the episode, Rose addresses the critical need to rebuild social trust and promote cooperation over mere coordination. He underscores that lowering the barriers to honesty and fostering environments where individuals feel safe to express their true beliefs are essential steps toward a cohesive and prosperous society.

"Have we created the space? Have we had the civic courage to make it safe for people? To be honest, I think this is the royal road to moving the needle on social trust." ([59:13])

Rose envisions a future where societal structures support individual flourishing, aligning technology and policies with the innate human desire to contribute and find meaning.

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Conclusion

Episode 82 of Zero Hour provides a compelling exploration of Todd Rose's transformative journey and his insightful analysis of societal dynamics. From overcoming academic adversity to pioneering private opinion research, Rose articulates a vision for a future grounded in authenticity, cooperation, and human-centered progress. His discussion invites listeners to reflect on the fundamental values that shape our society and the imperative to align technological advancements with the pursuit of meaningful, collective well-being.

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Notable Quotes

• Todd Rose ([01:03]): "School wasn't a good fit. And you know how it goes. If you do poorly any one time, it tends to snowball."

• Todd Rose ([07:06]): "I ended up graduating from Weber State as the honors student of the year with a 3.97 GPA."

• Todd Rose ([15:12]): "A collective illusion is a phenomenon where most people in a group go along with an idea that they don't privately agree with because they incorrectly think that most other people in the group agree with it."

• Todd Rose ([20:16]): "Here's the good news, is that while they're really devastating. When they're in force, they're pretty fragile because they're social lies."

• Todd Rose ([46:05]): "The number one trade-off priority for the American public was I want to do work that has a positive impact on other people."

• Todd Rose ([55:41]): "The real question is, what do we want it to be for."

• Todd Rose ([59:13]): "Have we created the space? Have we had the civic courage to make it safe for people? To be honest, I think this is the royal road to moving the needle on social trust."

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Final Thoughts

Todd Rose's insights challenge conventional narratives about education, technology, and societal values. By advocating for a deeper understanding of individual potential and the dismantling of collective illusions, Rose provides a roadmap for fostering a more authentic and trusting society. Zero Hour effectively captures these transformative ideas, offering listeners both reflection and inspiration to contribute to a more perfect union.

Transcript

[James Polis]

Well, Trump is back, and so is normal. Did we just trick ourselves into thinking that everyone is crazy? Todd Rose joins us. I'm James Polis. Welcome to Zero Hour. La la.

[Todd Rose]

La la la.

[James Polis]

In the chair today, Todd Rose. He's the founder and CEO of Populous, a think tank committed to simply making the world a better place. Who doesn't like that? He's also a former Harvard professor. He might just be smarter than all of us. Welcome, Todd.

[Todd Rose]

Thanks for having me.

[James Polis]

Congratulations. So you went from a 0.9 GPA to a Harvard genius. What was that all about?

[Todd Rose]

Well, it's been a fun journey. Yeah, we'll get into it. Yeah. So I grew up in rural America in a place that really prized conformity. Wasn't gonna be a good fit for me from the jump, but school wasn't a good fit. And you know how it goes. If you do poorly any one time, it tends to snowball. So it culminates. I like to say we mutually agreed that I would leave school, but in truth, they just kicked me out.

[James Polis]

It was a conscious uncoupling.

[Todd Rose]

That's right. 0.9 GPA, which you have to try really hard to get that low. I mean, I was even failing social promotion.

[James Polis]

No, it's like. It's a very special skill. It's like failing English.

[Todd Rose]

That's right. It's amazing. So it got even worse before it got better, which is about a month after they kicked me out my senior year, my girlfriend found out she was pregnant.

[James Polis]

Wow. Checking all the boxes.

[Todd Rose]

Checking all the boxes. So you flash forward a couple years later. We've got two kids. I don't have a high school diploma, we're married. I'm working a string of minimum wage jobs to the kind of jobs you could get with a 0.9 GPA. It culminates sometimes necessity is the mother of invention or reinvention of yourself. I had taken a job, this is no kidding, as a nurse assistant whose job it was to drive around and give people enemas because it paid $1.25 more an hour.

[James Polis]

That's incredible.

[Todd Rose]

And so, you know, it's an honest job. Somebody's got to do it. Not me. Forever. And I realized something had to change. Something had to give.

[James Polis]

What was the inner monologue there? When you're, like, giving enemas, like on the road? I mean, I guess you have to pull over in order to pull over.

[Todd Rose]

Yeah. You get to their house, you do it.

[James Polis]

What's the inner monologue like?

[Todd Rose]

It's funny. At first I was like, hey, wow, I can pay some of my bills now. This is good. And then you're just like, this can't be life. And there's something kind of interesting where I, at the time, didn't care so much about ruining my own life. But when you have two little kids who didn't ask to be born right, like, you have some responsibility. And, you know, I. I had had a difficult time accepting going on welfare. And my dad gave me a piece of advice that I never forgot. He said, like, you don't deserve this. Nobody owes you. But you think of this not as a government handout, but as your neighbors being willing to sacrifice a little bit of their hard earned money to give you a chance to reinvent your life. And he said, if you take that money, you take that investment, you have an obligation to make that investment pay off. And so I did that. And I started thinking, okay, well, what does it mean to improve my life enough.

[James Polis]

The reinvention began.

[Todd Rose]

Yeah. And what was interesting is never in a million years did I think I'd go to college. But I couldn't see any other path. And I had watched my father, who became the first college graduate in our whole family, go from being a mechanic to a mechanical engineer. And so I just copied him. I enrolled at Weber State University in Ogden, Utah. It was open enrollment, went to school at night, and I had just enough money from my family to cover one year of tuition. It was cheap, but that's all we had. And my dad said, look, if you want this bad enough, you'll figure out how to get a scholarship. So I knew going in that what I'd done in the past didn't work. And so I just had to be really, really aware of what situations worked for me, what didn't. And so I got really good at thinking about the fit between who I was and the environment. So, like, certain kind of classes didn't work very well. Certain structures, if you don't mind, I'll tell you it kind of all. Yeah.

[James Polis]

What was the pattern?

[Todd Rose]

So I learned a lot about my own individuality, which turned out to inform a lot of my scientific work, because I assumed I wasn't very smart. And this was just desperation. I just wanted a better life. But I found that every time I got the right fit, suddenly I did well. And I thought, maybe there's just something wrong with me. But let me, if you don't mind, I'll give you there's a moment that is life altering. And I'll tell you what I think I learned from it, too. So I'm sitting in a class I couldn't get out of, which was a history class in a big auditorium. Did not fit very well for me. Sitting at the very back with my buddy Steve, and I am complaining about how bad this class is. And he goes, oh, listen, this is nothing compared to what I've got myself into in the honors program. And I thought, Like, I thought honors program was just more work. I don't know. And he goes, oh, no, no, no, no. It's so much worse. He's like, there's no auditorium. There's just 12 people in every class. He's like, there are no tests. You just have to argue and write. He goes, I don't even think there are right answers. All we do is debate. And I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

[James Polis]

You're, like, out of your chair? Yeah, Literally, I was going to slam it.

[Todd Rose]

This cannot be how. I didn't realize such a thing was possible. I. No kidding, skipped my next class, beelined it right to the honors program, which. The top of a hill. It had a second floor of the library as its own thing. They were really proud of this. I go right in to the secretary, a woman named Marilyn Diamond. It's one of my favorite people in the world for, as you'll see in a minute. I said, I want to be in the honors program. And she's like, well, okay, let me see if I can get you in to see the director. She does. I go in and I sit down. And he goes, oh, great. We're really proud of what we're building here. Just a few questions for you. What was your high school gpa?

[James Polis]

Right?

[Todd Rose]

And I said, no.

[James Polis]

I said, next question.

[Todd Rose]

I said, 0.9, and this is no joke. His response was, what point nine? As if I'd left off the most important part. And then I said, 0.9. And he was really nice about it, but he was like, oh, you can't be in the honors program.

[James Polis]

Yeah.

[Todd Rose]

And I was mortified. Like, I just impulsively rushed up here to do this. And now I'm scrambling to put everything in my backpack as fast as possible. I just wanted to get out of there, go hide in a hole. And as I'm walking out, Marilyn Diamond's desk was right next to the door. As I'm walking out, she reached out and she grabbed my arm, and she said, listen, I overheard the conversation. If you want this, don't take no for an answer. And I was like, wait, you can do that?

[James Polis]

Yeah, dude.

[Todd Rose]

And she said, Go sit on the couch over there and don't leave until he lets you in.

[James Polis]

Wow.

[Todd Rose]

So I did, and I sat there for two or three hours. It felt like the entire day.

[James Polis]

Yeah.

[Todd Rose]

The director went and taught a class, came back, he said, what are you doing? I said, I want to be in the honors program. I said, you can't. So he finally says, hey, come back in here. And he sits me down. He said, look, why do you want to be in the honors program? Because on paper, it makes no sense. And I told him what I'd learned about myself in the year I'd been there and that I thought that this was a perfect fit. So he made a deal with me, and he said, I'll let you in on a provisional basis, one class at a time. And he said, if you're not the best student in the class, you're out. And he goes, let me clarify what the best student means. It's not that you got the best grade. It's that when I ask the professor, they will say, I can't imagine having this class without Todd in there. So you're going to contribute. So it turned out to be a perfect fit. Like, flash forward. I ended up graduating from Weber State as the honors student of the year with a 397 GPA. And I got accepted to Harvard for my doctorate. And I learned in that journey at Weber State, I learned a couple of things that would inform everything I care about professionally. The first is the incredible importance of human individuality. Not as selfishness, but as distinctiveness. And the idea, as I was saying earlier, of ability being a function of fit between your individuality and your environment. And if you can get that right, it's remarkable. But the other thing that I really took away from it is, you know, I worked really hard. I did. I'm proud of how hard I worked for this. And at the end of the day, it wouldn't have mattered if it weren't for other people, too. Yeah. Marilyn diamond changed the course of my life with one small intervention. Here's the funniest part. Just a couple of years ago, I got invited back to Weber State to get an award. Nice. For my accomplishments. It's wonderful. I love the school and I'm there. And it turns out Marilyn's retiring.

[James Polis]

Oh, man.

[Todd Rose]

And she's in the audience. And I thought, what a great opportunity to just express my gratitude in front of everybody else. So I told some version of the story I just told you and the president of the university. Well, Marilyn, why don't you come up and say a few things. She comes up and she gives me a hug and she adjusts the microphone and she said, well, thank you, Todd, but I gotta be honest, I don't remember that. And I thought she was saying I was lying. I said, it happened. And she says, no, I believe it. I just don't remember it.

[James Polis]

Yeah, it's just another day for Mary.

[Todd Rose]

Yes, it turned out everybody had a Marilyn diamond story, and I've never forgotten that. Like, for me, it was life altering, and for her it was forgettable. And I think sometimes when we think about the way that we empower other people to live great lives, we think it requires such a heavy lift, and it doesn't. And so I've never forgotten that. Right. Like, yeah, effort matters, ambition matters, but we also can play a part in each other's lives that allows us to live great lives and have a better humanity.

[James Polis]

Yeah. You know, I mean, this is so. You know, it's a profound story and it's fascinating to me for a couple of reasons as, like, a political theorist. You know, it wasn't that long ago when the kind of, like the moral of the story that you're telling was one that was kind of in the air. It was kind of commonsensical. Yeah, it was. You'd see it in movies, you'd see it on tv, you encounter it in your real life. Um, and at some point, we kind of wound up in this alternate reality where on the one hand, you got people who are like, only the most incredible super specimens of humanity, are worth anything and are going to do anything, and we need to put all our chips on those people. We need to bet on those people when they come along. We need to, you know, bow and scrape, and maybe they'll inspire us to greatness. But, you know, ultimately, just be kind of one level up on the pyramid sort of doing this thing, and then on the other side, you've got. No, no, no, no, no. Everyone's a beautiful and unique snowflake. Everyone has to be catered to. If your child has the slightest quirk, you know, the wheels of human progress must grind to a halt, and we have to cater to the. You know, and it's not about producing great people. And if you see a great person, you should feel suspicious. There's probably some kind of injustice going on, really. This. This huge gulf has opened up and, you know, maybe things will change now that Trump is back. And the kind of people's idea of like, wait, is. Does normal. Is it okay to be normal? Again, are we going back to that? Maybe that'll change. But seems like we got a long way to go and you know, the story that you're telling is a story about how, okay, you know, the rule of law. That's great, that's nice. Obviously it's good to have laws and expectations. People know what to expect when they go into their lives. But behind every law and behind any rule of law is the rule of men, of human beings, of Maryland diamonds, people who say, you know what, let's see what you can do. And it's not breaking the rules, but it is letting the person shine for it.

[Todd Rose]

That's right.

[James Polis]

Do you think that we're going to kind of migrate back toward that middle and sort of re establish that new normal?

[Todd Rose]

Yeah, I do. And I, and I. And here's the good. Let me tell you why not just not just hopeful. My think tank populace, we're probably most famous right now for our work in what's called private opinion research. So no one's telling the truth about their views. We just saw an election night that was not like not no one's bingo card of the pollsters had that happening. But so we have methodologies that get around social pressure and get at what people's private views really are. We've studied, we have more data on that American public than any other organization. I'm quite sure of it. Everything from the kind of lives people want to live, the country they want to live in, what they want out of education, criminal justice, you name it. We just published what's called the social pressure index. It was massive, 19,000 person sample. It looked at the rate of self silencing, which by the way, 61% of Americans admit to self silencing. In the last year alone. Wild looked at 64 of the most sensitive issues in the country. What do people privately believe? What do they say out loud? The short of this is everybody's lying. Every demographic is outright lying about multiple issues. But what's interesting is when you get under the hood of it and you start looking at what do we really believe as a people, it's shockingly normal. Let me give you an example. We looked at issues of meritocracy versus what you might think of as more social justice oriented frames on everything from college admissions to how you hire people, you know, how you treat groups. Without fail, a super majority of Americans across every single demographic deeply privately value meritocracy. And yet depending on your political persuasion, you've got people outright saying the opposite in public. And then here's the.

[James Polis]

And taking over institutions. And first word, institutions are doing the peer pressure.

[Todd Rose]

And there's a phenomenon which I just wrote about in my latest book called A Collective Illusion, which I think is not surprising since I wrote the book. I think it's the most important topic.

[James Polis]

Obviously, right until the next one, until.

[Todd Rose]

The next week, until my next publisher. But here's the phenomenon and it's been around for a while, but it is on steroids now. And I do think people need to understand this. So a collective illusion is a phenomenon where most people in a group go along with an idea that they don't privately agree with because they incorrectly think that that most other people in the group agree with it. So as a result, entire groups end up doing things that almost nobody wanted. So we've known about collective illusions for about a hundred years in research, but they were so few and far between that it didn't really matter. With the rise of social media, this has completely changed. So right now in America, name anything that matters. It is a coin toss whether you are right about the majority. And it's been fun. We've been trying to be an equal opportunity because it's everywhere. And we did a little bit, including with the Biden administration a few years ago where we showed them the private data on. Remember the defund the police movement?

[James Polis]

Yeah.

[Todd Rose]

So at the time, this was two and a half years ago or whatever, right before the State of the Union address with Ukraine, we had private opinion data showing that publicly a majority of Democrats said they supported that. In private it was 9%. Wow. And today it's 3%. And this is what happens though. They can't read your mind if you're going along with something. Cause you're like, hey, I think this is what my group believes and I don't want to be on the outside of it. Bad stuff happens. Policies get implemented that objectively nobody wanted. Because you see, places like Seattle and San Francisco have already rolled those things back. They were bad ideas. But maybe, if you don't mind, let me tell you people, wait, how could we be that wrong about each other? Social media plays a very unique role, and let me tell you why. Because collective illusions, they can be generated by bad actors for sure, but they don't have to be. And you only have to know two things to know how this works. Number one, everybody has a conformity bias. Everybody, all else equal, would rather be with our groups, not against them. Sure, sure, no problem. Right. But to be able to conform, you got to know what your group actually believes. And this is the wild thing. Your brain's smart, but it's not that smart. It has to make a lot of shortcuts in the name of efficiency. This is no joke. Here's how your brain estimates group consensus. It assumes the loudest voices repeated the most are the majority. Right. Even when intellectually you know it's not true. It doesn't matter.

[James Polis]

Yeah. It's like a weird hedge in favor of kind of the fringiest outlier view.

[Todd Rose]

And look, when we lived in smaller groups where you knew everybody. Yeah, it probably worked. Obviously it worked well enough. Right. There was some way to check that. But now let's put it into the social media age. On the platform X, when it was Twitter, Pew Research, they found that 80% of all content was generated by 10% of the users. And those 10% aren't remotely representative of the American public. They are extreme on almost every social issue. So if 10% of the public holds a fringe view, but you think it's 80%, then unless you're willing to go against what you think your group believes, you'll say nothing. Or worse, you'll just outright lie to be with your group.

[James Polis]

Yeah.

[Todd Rose]

And the result ends up being a collective illusion.

[James Polis]

Yeah. So like, the sane version of this, anthropologically is like, well, you know, there are a few trusted members of the community who are the scouts and we'll send them out there and if they see something that's really bad and we need to know about it, they're going to run back and they're going to freak out and they're going to jump up and down and be yelling at us. And sometimes it might take a few times for us to be like, oh, all right, all right. I guess we should get, you know, on the Internet there are some of those people, but there are also a lot of people who are not those people.

[Todd Rose]

Correct.

[James Polis]

Who are not trustworthy and are not scouts and are not picking up on things that we should know about and.

[Todd Rose]

Exactly. Right. And the thing is, you're thinking, oh, no, I understand, that's whatever. But no, your brain's just telling it. It confuses noise for number. And the. So that's just part of the dynamic of social media. Right. The democratizing of voice, which. That's good. But what people also don't realize is state sponsored efforts by bad actors. Do you remember, this is. Sorry to go. Remember Guns of August, the book by Darth Barbara Tuchman? Yeah. So the insight there. Right. Was World War I was particularly devastating because the technology for War had changed, but the mindset about war had not. And so, yeah, you're digging trenches and fighting over small amounts of land, but now you have machine guns and chemical weapons. And I believe we have a Guns of August moment right now with regard to propaganda and manipulation because we still think it's about disinformation that's actually not that effective. The name of the game now is generate collective illusions and let our conformity bias do the rest.

[James Polis]

Yeah.

[Todd Rose]

So we know that China, we know that Russia, we know that Iran invests vast amounts of money for bot armies that do nothing but actually try to convince you that your people believe something that they do not.

[James Polis]

Yeah, I mean, this is, this is what you do. If you can't compete on sort of conventional and nuclear weapons, you gotta find something else.

[Todd Rose]

You can destroy that country from the inside out.

[James Polis]

Yeah.

[Todd Rose]

And they're doing a really good job right now.

[James Polis]

Well, you know, this is why I think Covid was such just a mind warper for so many people. People, because, like, right at the beginning, you know, my guys on the Internet who are like spurgey, you know, sort of right wing, like data guys are like, I don't know, like things in China that seem pretty bad, like we might want to watch out. And everyone's like, no, that's not going to happen. You are just like, accelerate, like, not. It's not coming here. And then sure enough, like Covid arrives and they're like, oh, we told you guys. And like, maybe we should start worrying. And it spread a little bit, but it took about 10 seconds for like the Fauci verse to go from saying, you are a racist if you are not eating the bat soup in your go down to your local wet market. From that to, we're shutting everything down and we're vaccine your kids. And if you speak up and complain about it, you're getting your. The taps are going to be turned off for you. No social media for you, no tools. You, maybe you should be, you know, under house arrest. I mean, crazy.

[Todd Rose]

It went crazy in a hurry and in part because once we were all shuttered into our homes, most of our lives were digital at that point. So we didn't even have the natural check on these illusions that comes from talking to your neighbor and being like, yeah, this is all crazy. Right? You know, it's like, nope, can't do that. And so it just spiraled really fast and you're starting to see that shatter. The thing about collective illusion is this is the good news, is that while they're really devastating. When they're in force, they're pretty fragile because they're social lies. And so if you understand the strategy, you can actually shatter them and create a kind of social change that happens pretty quick and at scale. But the key is it's not persuasion. So under an illusion, if I'm doing it because I believe it's what my group does, trying to persuade someone that they're wrong actually entrenches the illusion. You have to use social proof. Let me give you an example of where it goes wrong because it's hilarious. Remember the say no to drugs campaign?

[James Polis]

Oh, yeah.

[Todd Rose]

Okay. That all. You know, this is your brain on drugs. Any questions? I'm like, why is my brain like a fried egg? But yeah. Yes.

[James Polis]

Just look at Rachel Leigh Cook and don't worry about the rest.

[Todd Rose]

So that whole campaign, that billion dollar campaign came about because there was a small increase in first time drug use amongst teens. The government then has this billion dollar effort with the best ad agencies in the country. And it was a resounding success from an advertising standpoint. The typical American teen saw three ads a day for six years.

[James Polis]

Wow.

[Todd Rose]

I mean, like, unbelievable. Trying to scare them straight. But here's the thing. The government had assumed that the reason kids were trying drugs is because they were interested in drugs. But there was private opinion data back then right there that said that's not true. They were actually skeptical of drugs. What they wanted was to fit in.

[James Polis]

Right.

[Todd Rose]

And this is no joke. Back then, American teens were under the collective illusion that they believed most teens did drugs. Okay. So under that illusion, you blitz them with a billion dollars of ads, scaring them straight. What they took from the ads was, this must be what we're doing. Right?

[James Polis]

Everyone really is doing drugs.

[Todd Rose]

Yeah. Why would adults try so hard to get us to start? No joke. Research pretty conclusively has shown that that campaign directly led to an increase in drug use amongst teens.

[James Polis]

And with no social media, you can't just change your Instagram profile to like an I do drugs Avi. Right. You have to actually, like, social proof in your, in your little community.

[Todd Rose]

Exactly. And I just, I kind of think it's funny. It's like at some point the government took somebody's tax money and ended up getting that people, those people's kids, hooked on drugs as a result. Like, it's that wild. But the idea of social proof is really, really important because if you reveal instead of persuade, that's how you shatter the illusions. So what's fun is in my organization, we have Partnerships with pop culture, entertainment, music. You just infuse the truth into the background of what people engage with, and you can shatter them. But if you don't mind, I got my wonky. Let me tell you what's possible.

[James Polis]

Absolutely.

[Todd Rose]

Because the good news is, yes, it feels like the wheels fell off of society. I think you're seeing the green shoots now emerge as people start saying, you know what, let's just call it. This is crazy, but we got some work to do. But just to point out what's possible from a social change standpoint, my favorite example of what's happened under a collective illusion at a societal level, for sure, is the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia. So the best thing about that is it's always been an anomaly that historians have struggled to explain because it's the only time that we know of where an authoritarian regime was overthrown without anyone losing their life. It's kind of remarkable. They overthrew Communism, nobody died. And even contemporary examples, like Hungary at the time, that was bloody repression of.

[James Polis]

The Nefert, tanks in the streets, whole thing.

[Todd Rose]

Yeah. So it's like, well, what was different about that and what I love about it is who led it? And this is where you get the real insight about collective illusions was Vaclav Havel, right. A poet and a playwright like no military experience. He had written a play called the Garden Party, which was satire of communism so subtle that the censors didn't know they were being made fun of. And so it gets through. He puts it on. It becomes the Hamilton of its time. This runaway sold out all the time. But he sat there every night, didn't watch the play, watched the audience, and he said, they laughed at all the right parts. They laughed at things you would not find funny if you truly believed in Communism. So it dawns on him that the problem is not that the people of Czechoslovakia believe in communism. The problem is that they believe they believe in communism. So he writes, it's available for free online if no one has read it. It's called the Power of the Powerless.

[James Polis]

The Greengrocer.

[Todd Rose]

Yes, the Greengrocer. It's exactly classic. It is the perfect example of how authoritarians can use collective illusions to drive mass behavior against the will of almost the entire population. But what's amazing about it is once he realizes that's the problem, he says, well, then the answer isn't military, and it's not even politics. It's authenticity and personal responsibility. And he is mocked for this. Like, that's so ridiculous. They've got all the guns. Yeah, Right. But he goes about setting up, called the Small works Projects, creating spaces for people, to be honest, what he called living in truth again. And what's amazing is nobody saw the Velvet Revolution coming. The CIA missed it, the KGB missed it. Even Havel was shocked at how fast it happened, because only a few weeks before the student protest that led to the revolution, he was interviewed in an international magazine, and he said, hey, look, revolutions take time. We can't lose faith in it. I am in it till the end, but let's just be clear. I probably won't even be alive to see the end of it. Three months later, he was the first democratically elected president of a free Czechoslovakia. Yeah, I think I look at that and go, look, if that's what's possible under an illusion. If a poet can overthrow communism, think what we can do as Americans. Right. Because we've got such a bright future if we can start living in truth again and stop being so afraid to be honest with each other about what we believe. Yeah.

[James Polis]

And in that sense, what Havel did was really more of a restoration than a revolution. And I think that's how a lot of people are feeling right now. Sort of like, is it safe? Can I emerge from under the blanket and start living life again? You talk about shattering that collective illusion, and I'm sure you're. You were following this even more closely than. Than most people. There was a big narrative running up to the election and through the election about how the polls were not right anymore, and you couldn't really trust the pollsters. And instead of looking to the pollsters to see that. That map of the different states, you should look to the betting markets. And here comes Poly Market, and they've got their map. And, you know, there's this one French guy, Teo something or other, you know, just comes from, you know, the name for.

[Todd Rose]

For.

[James Polis]

For God in Latin, which I thought was funny. And this guy's getting beat up on. On the Internet because, oh, what did he get himself into? He's got like 30 or $40 million or something riding on. On Donald Trump. And it's like, well, is he crazy? Is he a Trump war worshipper? Like, what is this guy's deal? And it took until, I don't know, like, maybe election night for the story to come out that this guy, even though he was kind of eating up most of the betting markets with his enormous wager, it wasn't this kind of thing where it was like, well, you know, trust the people who are throwing money around instead of the experts. What was really going on was this guy did his own private polling.

[Todd Rose]

Yes.

[James Polis]

And the polling that he did was not what all the regular pollsters were doing. He was doing neighbor polling.

[Todd Rose]

That's right.

[James Polis]

And the essence of neighbor polling is exactly what you're talking about, where instead of asking someone point blank, you know, what do you really believe? What does your neighbor believe? What are they thinking? And that turns out to be way more accurate. So accurate that the poly market map.

[Todd Rose]

Ended up being the best predictor. So this is exactly right. So with private opinion research, it is basically, you have to give people anonymity and plausible deniability. Right. And the neighbor method is perfect because it basically allows me to tell you what I think with complete plausible deniability. Right. I'm just telling you what I think my neighbor will do. Yeah, right. There's no way you can think that that was my idea.

[James Polis]

It's like asking for a friend.

[Todd Rose]

That's exactly right. So we always, when we do it, like all of our methodologies do something similar, like, you know, that no one could actually know what your. What you believe. And it's like. What's funny about it is I always say our research efforts are to get around the distortions of social pressure. And our cultural work as an organization is to make that unnecessary. Because free societies don't function when two thirds of the people don't feel like they could actually be honest with each other. And the only people who benefit from collective illusions are fringe people who know that if they just let people be honest, they would lose. And so when you feel like people are trying to get you not to be able to speak up, you gotta understand two things. One, they are a fringe. They are always a fringe. Think about it. If you believed that the majority of Americans were with you on your opinion, all you'd want is to lower the cost of courage for people to be honest. Then you win. But if you know you've got some wacky fringe idea, what you gotta do is silence everybody. So all anyone hears from are the fringe.

[James Polis]

Yeah.

[Todd Rose]

Like, it's pretty basic.

[James Polis]

You gotta capture institutions instead of letting people do their thing.

[Todd Rose]

That's right.

[James Polis]

Yeah. All right, so let's say it works. Normalcy returns. People are sort of thinking freely and doing their thing. Social trust starts to. Starts to reemerge. The green shoots that, you know, we go from sort of special snowflakes and superhumans to, like, everyone kind of comfortably being human. What do you do with that society? I mean, you look at what's going on in tech right now, and there's a split. You know, you got some people who are like, look, this is all about sort of giving people opportunities to just kind of thrive more and have more flourishing existence or increase prosperity, grow the pie. You know, pretty standard stuff. And then you got this other side, and the other side is like, hey, this is it, you guys. Politics solved, mortality solved, right? Like, all social problems go away, all scarcity goes away, our humanity goes away. We can do anything to ourselves that we want. Just, you know, how can we'll really read people's minds? We don't need pulling. We don't need neighbor pulls. Just chip in the brain and then we can have collective consciousness. What could go wrong? Transcendent, right? What could go wrong? What do you say to those people? They seem pretty convinced.

[Todd Rose]

They do seem pretty convinced. I think let's step back and say the moment we're in right now, I think it's really important. What you saw recently was that people got fed up with living in the lie and wanted to reclaim some kind of truth, right? And elections have a fun way of doing that because I go into a booth and you don't know. You don't know what I did. So we got a little bit of a reset there. But I think what's really important is what we do with this, because all we've said so far is what we're against, right? The sort of woke nonsense, right? Like, there's just some stuff that really went off the rails and we're not okay with it. But if you really want to drive change and do something important, it's not enough to be against something. What are we for? And this is the moment where it's not enough to just say, oh, it was all great before. No, there's room for improvement. At our best as Americans, it's about a more perfect union. It's about the constant striving to live up to our principles, even though we always fall a little short. So I think we're in a moment of incredible opportunity. The basis for our work at Populous is so wonky, but we spun it out of the university to is. I think we're living in a paradigm crisis right now. In society, we are not arguing over marginal things. We're debating fundamental assumptions about free society. And I believe that part of the problem that's led to a lot of these folks who are like, well, it's just tech will save everything. And, you know, this weird utopian thing that, you know, whatever we'll get to Is there's a discontentment, rightly, with where our industrial standardized society has taken us. And I point the blame directly to one person, Frederick Taylor.

[James Polis]

Wow.

[Todd Rose]

And the rise of scientific management.

[James Polis]

Taylor.

[Todd Rose]

Yes, yes. Because it completely inverted the relationship between institutions and the public in a democracy. He flat out said in the 30s, in the past, people were first. In the future, the system has to be first. And this is one man who influences people's lives globally that they've never heard of. But he invented the concept of a manager at work. He's the person that turned you into a cog in the name of efficiency. And what he promised was if you give up that autonomy and we treat you as an interchangeable part, we can make more stuff. And by the way, he was right.

[James Polis]

Yeah.

[Todd Rose]

So, so good for him. We do have a lot of stuff. What we forgot was stuff is not the ultimate aim. Materialism is not the aim of humanity. It is always in service of psychological abundance, of spiritual abundance. Right.

[James Polis]

Especially when the stuff seems to be getting lower and lower quality, the more the quantity increases.

[Todd Rose]

Right. And you know, James Trussell Adams, who coined the term the American Dream during the Great Depression, who, Who hated Frederick Taylor, he said, you know, there's a time for quantity and a time for quality. And with the rise of industrialization, the value of quantity diminishes quickly. Yeah, we forgot that the point was quality, quality of life. And I think we're seeing this striving for meaning and purpose, not just more stuff. And for the first time, I believe we're living in a society where our technologies and our resources can be put in service of our humanity. And I don't mean that as some collective thing. I mean it as we now understand the individual in a way we haven't before, and we can actually invest and cultivate in people's potential to contribute. Right now, because of Taylorism, our free society is structured as one big selection mechanism. Back to your earlier point about, like, this view of, like, there's like these superhumans and we got to find them and invest in them. It's called the talented 10th argument. There's a bell curve. It's innate. There's only a few people that are really worth it. So in a democracy, then the fairest thing you do is make education a sorting mechanism for who deserves resources.

[James Polis]

Right. Harry Potter thought that's right.

[Todd Rose]

Exactly right. And whereas what we've learned from the science of individuality, which is what my expertise was at the university, is we've woefully underestimated human potential and it's not that everybody can be Einstein, it's that everybody can be excellent at something. And you don't know in advance what any one person is capable of. And so if you buy into those assumptions, then the right thing to do is cultivate, create the chance for people to discover, develop and contribute. And if we don't lose sight of that possibility, then we are on the cusp of a new paradigm that makes good on what our founding fathers envisioned, but we could never quite get to, which is a society where the pursuit of happiness, like, properly understood, is the aim of every individual. And we are all better off because each of us are better off.

[James Polis]

Yeah, I mean, I think that spiritual thirst is palpable. It's real. You go back and you look at Taylorism and all the collectivism of the 20th century and bleeding over, you know, it can cause people to think like, well, well, how'd he do it? You know, how did he manage to convince everyone to sort of force us into the system? Was it some global cabal? Like what was going on? Well, you go back to Alexis de Tocqueville and he was warning us in the 1800s, like, you know, for him, his focus on democracy in America was not like the political system as much as kind of a general equality of conditions, you know, or sort of the, the crowd. Ness of people continues to grow as a force. And he warned us. And he warned us because he. When so many people are so similar, they look at each other and they start thinking things like, well, you know, this guy's basically the same as me. Why should he have anything better? Why is he winning but I'm losing? Why is it that he seems secure and I seem like everything is in flux and I could, I could go all the way back to start at any moment and people start seeing themselves. Yeah. As equal. But, you know, those little differences seem to matter so much more and you get all this envy and people see themselves as interchangeable and insignificant. And so that kind of groundwork, you know, it's a tough lesson for people to learn because they just think, no, equality is good. And the more equality then the more everyone's going to feel free to be whoever they are. And it's like, well, but that, you know, we, we ran that experiment.

[Todd Rose]

That's right.

[James Polis]

And I'm not saying equality is a bad. And that it's bad when two people are similar or, or kind of on the same. On the same plane, but there are psychological effects here.

[Todd Rose]

Correct.

[James Polis]

That contribute to this kind of spiritual malaise. If we don't get that sorted, then we're never going to be satisfied, no.

[Todd Rose]

Matter how equal society 100%. And the thing is, is we forgot that the equality that we were talking about is moral equality and legal equality. Right. It is because we are so different that we are going to treat each other equal before the law and in our morality. We understand, we know right from wrong, we have the ability to imagine a life and pursue it. But this is exactly right. It's like, well, the funny thing about the envy part, just the resentment that comes from this. Adam Smith warned about this as he created a whole new paradigm, right? Like my libertarian friends, I always think Adam Smith's the person that everyone cites that no one's read. He was a moral philosopher.

[James Polis]

Well, I mean, it wasn't just wealth of nations, there was a whole nother book.

[Todd Rose]

There is moral sentiment. It's like he cared a lot about how to improve the law of life for everyone and got to free markets is the only way. If you weren't generating abundance, if you were a zero sum, life was tough. But he did warn that if you bought into this idea that you could literally grow the pie economically, which was absurd back then, and that we take for granted that one of the trade offs there was that you are way more ripe for envy and resentment. Because at any given time, all envy is relative deprivation. It has nothing to do with, well, I'm better than my ancestors. Who cares? Why do you have something that I don't? We seem to be the same, right? And under the guise of equality, I now deserve something that you got because why do you have more? And so he points out, he's like, you just gotta be careful here because as we generate abundance, there are just more opportunities for people to see those things as unfair. And we're living there right now. This is wild. And one of the most frightening things we've ever found in private opinion is we've measured the level of resentment in America right now. So historically, when a majority of people in a society believe it's unfair, it is so politically and socially unstable that it's the stuff of revolution. It doesn't guarantee it. But you know, the best data we have publicly, even back to the Great Depression, never got to a majority thinking society was unfair. We have private opinion data right now that 93% of Americans believe society is unfair. I mean, this thing does not hold. It's our next big project is using private opinion to go deep on, like, what is at the root of that. But you're Seeing some stuff that we already see in our data.

[James Polis]

What do you think is at the root of the year?

[Todd Rose]

So I think there's a couple of things based on the data we have right now, and then we'll have definitive answer early next year. So if we just look at the stuff from the social pressure index in areas where literally every demographic privately agrees and publicly agrees, so the issues around, like, meritocracy and equal treatment rather than equal outcomes. Let's take affirmative action. In college, did you know even 2/3 of African Americans don't think that's right?

[James Polis]

Yeah.

[Todd Rose]

It's like, who are we catering to? Like, nobody thought this was fair.

[James Polis]

Well, you got like 60% of Latinos voting against the open borders.

[Todd Rose]

Correct. And so there's a number of things that we've done from a policy standpoint in the name of fairness that are antithetical to people's view of fair. And so I think it's a huge consequence of these collective illusions that allow us to get there. But if you don't get a clear sense of who we are as a people, what our values are and what our ultimate aims are, this is how it ends. Right. Because when you get resentful, you become hyper. Zero sum.

[James Polis]

Yeah.

[Todd Rose]

Burn it down kind of thing.

[James Polis]

Yeah.

[Todd Rose]

Like, and you, you've seen that politically. Right. Like the fringes across the board cater to that sort of, let me give you the scapegoat. And when we get to the scapegoating, that's not good.

[James Polis]

No, no, definitely not good. And this is why the spiritual component is so important. Because if people are walking around all the time thinking about what do I deserve? What have I earned?

[Todd Rose]

Yeah.

[James Polis]

What is due to me from everyone else, that is just a recipe for resentment for sure. And if you come into the world from the standpoint of I've got humility in my heart and I know that at best I deserve nothing.

[Todd Rose]

Yeah.

[James Polis]

You know, that might seem to be at odds with a society where it's like, well, you know, if there's a crime, you gotta sort of punish the, the, you know, and restitution for whoever was. Okay, that's fine. But spiritually, that's not the way it works.

[Todd Rose]

No. And. And the thing is, is if we come back to the, the fairness thing there, the other stuff we see is it's the end of compliance culture now. So that Frederick Taylor paternalism that has defined our society for almost 100 years is so antithetical to American ideals, but we were getting more stuff, and so we said nothing. Right. And now we're sick of the more stuff as the ultimate aim.

[James Polis]

Yeah, we got too much stuff.

[Todd Rose]

And we want control of too much corn back.

[James Polis]

Too much.

[Todd Rose]

Correct. Too much corn. We want control of our lives back. And so there's a hidden element of that unfairness where you're just like, I don't care if it's even a better decision. I want to make my own decisions. And I do think, look, I do think we recognize that we want people to have a fair shot. That idea of the American dream. So we don't like it when there are arbitrary obstacles to people. Whether that's overt discrimination or it sucks when you see someone who literally has the ability but can't go to school, can't do something. So we do recognize that we owe each other something in terms of like, you know, support for you being the best version of yourself. But that's different than we deserve it just because how precious.

[James Polis]

Yeah, the reciprocity, that's love of neighbor.

[Todd Rose]

But that's right. And to me, when we get back to sort of a bottom up view of how we live well together, it's about cooperation, not coordination. And that's a big distinction. Right? Coordination is somebody sets the goal and we all play our part as a cog. That's paternalism. Cooperation is a bunch of individuals with their own aims working together so they all can accomplish what they want to accomplish. And I think that's, we've got to get back to those principles. And I actually think there's a moment coming that can crystallize that pivot from acknowledging what we're against to acknowledging what we're for and what we aspire to. And I think it's the 250th we are going to have a conversation about what our identity is as Americans.

[James Polis]

2026.

[Todd Rose]

And one of the cool things, one of my favorite things we found in private opinion is we looked at the trade off priorities people have for a successful life and their definition of the American dream using methods you can't game. The number one trade off priority for the American public was I want to do work that has a positive impact on other people. In the top 10 for every demographic was, I want to be more involved in my community. It was about character, it was about relationships, it was about community and it was about control of your own life. What doesn't show up in the top trade off priorities is status related variables. Wealth, power, control over people. Yet when you ask Americans what most Americans would say, they think most people want fame and Fortune and are intrinsically selfish about it. So think about that. We've got a reality in society where people want to live their lives. They don't see that someone has to lose for them to win, and they actually want to contribute. But they think everybody else is playing this zero sum game of status. Well, if I believe everybody else is playing that game, I have to play that game.

[James Polis]

Well, I mean, it's so revealing because what is our whole economy kind of been crafted around until, you know, maybe, maybe the tech is starting to win out now. But for a long time, it was not, I want to work for the betterment of my fellow man. It was, I want to learn for the betterment of my status.

[Todd Rose]

Right.

[James Polis]

That was the education system. That was what we wanted out of people.

[Todd Rose]

Yeah.

[James Polis]

That was the kind of conformity that was enforced. It was a competitive conformity. It was, you know, scrambling to get sort of fewer and fewer crumbs. It was the faculty lounge. It was, you know, people just being professional students. You look back on it now and you go like, wow, that was like a terrible idea. And it hasn't worked. And you overproduce all these sort of highly educated people who don't know how to, you know, make it from one day to the next in their, in their personal lives. And how could this happen? And the answer is, because that's the system that was engineered for us.

[Todd Rose]

That's exactly right.

[James Polis]

And a lot of people started to believe, like, well, you know, if this is. Is what we're all being sort of sucked into, then this must be reality.

[Todd Rose]

Yeah. And what's funny is, so we did this where we tracked the trade off parties people have for education prior to Covid, all through Covid and after. And watching first of all, this massive illusion where people are like, yeah, I don't like this anymore. I want kids being educated for meaning and purpose, to be good citizens, to figure out their gifts. Right. Oh, what do you think most people say? Oh, it's about standardized tests and getting into college and getting the best paying job. And it's like, you know, they want financial security, but it's this weird, like, that's changed now. And you're seeing it in the rise of, like, who would have thought that education would be the first institution to truly have the illusion shattered? I mean, you watch what's going on around the country, whether it's backpack funding being passed in so many states and just people are like, Covid kind of broke it for people. When it's like, you just assume this thing Worked because then people wanted it because it's what you saw people drop their kids off at the bus stop every day. Yeah.

[James Polis]

It was a ritual.

[Todd Rose]

Yeah. And then they were suddenly like, tag, you're it. And then you see what goes on. You're like, what? What in the world is this?

[James Polis]

Yeah.

[Todd Rose]

And then people are just like, nope, this isn't okay anymore. And so, for example, in private now, for the first time, 80% of Americans want school choice in public education, including a super majority of Democrats. Yeah, it's. It's done.

[James Polis]

Well, this is where the rubber hits the road for so many people. I mean, you know, obviously parents, but also young people, you know, and you look at where those young voters are at and they're not where they're supposed to be. And this is, I think Covid. And their experience with school is such a huge part of that. And so many people right now just like opening up the question of like, well, wait a minute, what are we, what are we doing with education? What is the education even for? What's the purpose of what world are we in? And how do you find a way to meet individuals? And that moment, education.

[Todd Rose]

And if we get it right, and we've got a bunch of projects I'm really proud of, trying to use the technology in service of our humanity, then we can do something at scale that allows every individual to both master the things that they need to master, but also discover their uniqueness and turn that into contribution. That's possible now. It's not even more expensive. It's not a question of resources, it's a question of will.

[James Polis]

You think we're going to Mars?

[Todd Rose]

Oh, for sure. And by the way, the weirdest thing for me, I gotta be perfectly honest, I would so totally sign up for that.

[James Polis]

Yeah, like, I don't know, one way ticket.

[Todd Rose]

Yes. Look, if you gotta. Everyone's gotta die at some point. I would be king of Mars for two days. For two days.

[James Polis]

After your long journey.

[Todd Rose]

So now what?

[James Polis]

Right?

[Todd Rose]

You better have someone else in there with you that you really like to talk to.

[James Polis]

Yeah, well, some of those Martians in the making are like, no, I'm not going to die.

[Todd Rose]

That's right.

[James Polis]

Going to be at 800 years Martian funny.

[Todd Rose]

It's like these folks, these sort of post humanists, right? That it's like, I'm going to live forever. And you're like, you don't even like the life you have. Like, this is the idea of quantity versus quality. You think extending your miserable life right now is going to make you Happier. It's like, it really worries me when we think about the paradigm that can be, I believe this one of both material prosperity and psychological and spiritual abundance requires only the fusion of two other worldviews. Right. Classical liberalism, which is just process. Right. And humanism. If you get those two things right, we can have a kind of world that you'd almost only dream of before. But right. As we're on the cusp of that, we've got these folks that are like, you know, what we should do is bail on both of those things.

[James Polis]

Right?

[Todd Rose]

Like, for what? Like, and it's like, no, no, no, no, no. It is about the quality of your life. It is about living up to humanism and its ideals, not abandoning it. Just like it's about living up to classical liberalism and the promise of that prosperity for all not reverting to communism because you're mad about who's on Instagram showing you their wonderful life. And you, you don't have that.

[James Polis]

Yeah. I mean, people forget so much of what communism was all about was becoming sort of transcending our humanity.

[Todd Rose]

For sure.

[James Polis]

We won't need to work. We can be whoever we want. We can extend our will throughout all of our technology.

[Todd Rose]

It's entirely materialism.

[James Polis]

Yeah.

[Todd Rose]

Right. It has no place for the spiritual, no place for the individual psychological desire to aspire, achieve and contribute.

[James Polis]

Yeah. When in reality, for spiritual abundance, you don't need any tools.

[Todd Rose]

No.

[James Polis]

You hardly even need clothes.

[Todd Rose]

That's right. To me, you think about the spiritual abundance, it's like, it really is more about the idea of, like, yeah, those things are preferable. I'd prefer to be rich, not poor. I'd prefer to be healthy, not sick. But in reality, none of that actually matters. You can still achieve the spiritual abundance individually and collectively.

[James Polis]

Well, and the crazy thing is you've got collective delusions in your own heart. You've got all those voices saying, like, yes, you know, you, you do need, like that $300 hoodie and you do need that cover, you know, and you need to, like, if you're not having a discussion with those voices in your head and telling them that they need to get in line, you're going to succumb to the same kinds of problems that you're talking about when you see it happening outside, collective conscious for sure.

[Todd Rose]

And let's be clear. Like, I think, you know, I think the Stoics had it right on this, which is. And I think even Buddhism has some version of this, which is, it's not that we don't partake and participate in those finer things in life, it's that you put them in their proper place, right? If you expect them to do things for you that they are incapable of doing, you will be miserable. And I think that that extends to our technologies. If you think AI is somehow going to solve your lack of meaning, you're fooling yourself. You're fooling yourself. If all technology is values neutral, we have to decide what it's for. And if we don't have a clear sense of our values and we make technology our master, we're in really big trouble, right? And so AI for me is this thing. I think we're having the wrong conversation about it. It's coming and it will be here and it will be the bedrock of our future economy. It just like it's so obviously valuable, right, Economically. The real question is, what do we want it to be for? And there is a fight going on right now between an authoritarian view of AI, it's used to control you, and one that's used to empower you. And what's crazy is there's the first lab that I know of that got started, this human centered AI lab at Oxford is the one of a kind in saying we're putting a stake in the ground around human freedom and the individual, and we are going to do everything in our power to ensure we bend the curve of AI toward that. Because it's what gets embedded in the code from the jump that allows it to go the way of China and authoritarianism versa. And you see that even in some of the stuff that Google, the shenanigans that they were going, it's like, come on, man. But we have to know as a people and we have to speak the truth about what we value to create the demand side pressure for this technology to be used in service of our individuality and our humanity.

[James Polis]

Yeah. One of my favorite Bible stories on this topic. It doesn't seem like it at first glance, but you know, I think Genesis on AI, no, it's the young prince shows up and says to Jesus like, you know, I heard about you, I think this is awesome. You know, tell me, tell me what to do. You know, I'm here at your service and I want to follow you. And he's like, great, give away all of your wealth and come with me. And you know, the guy's immediately like so bummed out and dejected and he's like, no, I was afraid that you say that. Now you're saying it. What do I do? Right? And he just sort of like. Like mopes off and we never hear from him again. And. And the disciples are like, like, wow, that escalated quickly. Like, you know, does this mean that, like, any. Any man who has anything at all, any money cannot be saved? And. And Jesus says, you know, well, many things are impossible for. For human beings, but with God, nothing is impossible. And that is such a rich parable about any kind of wealth. It's not just a pile of gold in the corner. It's not, you know, fine linens or whatever. It's technology. It's AI. It's all of these things that if we're just relying on our own materialist sort of notions of gain and sort of, you know, increasing our. Our mere prosperity, it's that. That psychology itself is going to turn these tools that could be so valuable into things that are worthless, that are like a millstone dragging us down right around our neck.

[Todd Rose]

I mean, that's exactly right. One of the things I'm excited about coming, we're participating in as a part of a big, broader effort is for the 250th. Because what we found is, rather than tell people what they should do, when we see the private opinion about the life they want to live, they want to contribute, they want to be involved in their community. Let's give them that chance, and let's show them that's at the heartbeat of American identity. Like, we can solve our own problems. We can help one another. We can find fulfillment and meaning and purpose in that, right? So there was going to be this massive effort at 250 million acts of service, not collectively, but, like, what do I do? And what's really funny is I think people don't realize how much they already do this. You know, I was talking to my dad. He was a former pole vaulter, right? What did he do? He. He volunteers to officiate pole vaulting meets because they don't have enough people to do it, right? Does it all the time. And I said, yeah, you're already volunteering your contributors. That's not what that is. I just do that because I love it. That's the point. It doesn't have to feel bad. It doesn't have to be because someone told you to do it. But if we can get back to that habit of living in the truth of what it means to be an American, that we all still deeply believe in these founding principles, we just need to make this a more perfect union. I actually am, like, unbelievably bullish about where we're going next, but it's not just going to happen. Right. We have to lower the cost of courage for people to be honest with each other. Because you're going to. We don't agree on everything, but you're going to be shocked at what we do agree on. And you brought something up that I want to circle back to around social trust. Because there's probably no, no more important cultural element to a prosperous society. Because if we don't trust each other, then you have to control each other. Here's what's wild. So, as you probably already know in the US so first of all, we've had declining social trust every generation since Frederick Taylor. Every single one.

[James Polis]

Surprise.

[Todd Rose]

Yeah, surprise. Hey, you take everyone's autonomy from them and treat them like robots. But we have some of the lowest levels of social trust ever recorded. And yes, we just found in our latest social pressure index, only 38% of Americans believe most people can be trusted. That is really dangerous. But here's the cool thing, if you just parse that by whether or not you feel pressure to self silence. So the people who are self silencing, only 30% believe most people can be trusted. Well, duh. If I live in a society where I don't think I can even just give you my opinion, why would I trust people? But that's like third world level social trust. Okay, for the people who haven't felt like they have to self silence, they have Scandinavian level of social trust. Majority of them believe most people can be trusted. Turns out they don't differ. The self silencers are not on any other demographic factor. All the difference is is the cultural side of this. Have we created the space? Have we had the civic courage to make it safe for people? To be honest, I think this is the royal road to moving the needle on social trust. And when that starts to move in the right direction, lots of things become possible.

[James Polis]

Yeah, I think you're absolutely right. And you know, we've had a good five years of trying to get everyone to believe the science, right? And what that has meant is kneel before the science.

[Todd Rose]

And, and by the way, as a scientist, it makes me extremely angry because science is not fact, it is provisional knowledge. It is Karl Popper who's the only philosopher, I'll say, the philosopher of science, who I think everyone should read because he's famous for figuring out what's the difference between astrology and astronomy. Because before that everyone thought, well, it's the data, it's the positive proof of something. If you have a hypothesis that all swans are White. You can see a thousand white swans. It doesn't guarantee you're right. One black swan and you know you're wrong. So he realizes that we can get to truth only through the elimination of error. It's the falsification of ideas. So when someone tells me to trust the science, it is a guarantee. What they mean is that science validates my worldview and I can't seem to persuade you. So I'm going to tell you that. Trust the science. Or when Fauci was like, you're arguing with me? I am science. I'm like, yeah, buddy, yeah.

[James Polis]

That gives you a fake church and a real theocracy, and we should have the opposite.

[Todd Rose]

That's exactly right. And every single, like, let's, like, biologically, evolution is our best explanation. You know, from a scientific standpoint right now, it is most certainly wrong. And any good scientists worth their salt is not trying to, like, build a moat around that idea. It is actively trying to falsify it. Right. So it really makes me angry because I think science at its core is the most anti authoritarian way of thinking. I don't care if your name's Einstein. Gotta bring the data. Right? So anytime you hear anyone say trust the science, you know they're trying to manipulate you.

[James Polis]

Todd Rose, keep that data coming. We'll be watching. Thanks so much.

[Todd Rose]

Thank you.

[James Polis]

All right, that's all the time we got. Until next time around. I am James Polis. This is Zero Hour, and may God have mercy on song.