Today, we welcome back Kevin Kelly, WIRED Magazine Senior Maverick, writer, and world traveler. Kevin's latest project is Vanishing Asia, a massive three part photo book containing a record of fifty years of travel in and through the world's largest continent. Originally recorded in Fall of 2021.
We previously spoke with Kevin in Episode 23 about his book, The Inevitable: Understanding The 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future
Vinay Gupta spends a lot of time thinking about disasters, which in my experience means that he's a very happy man. There's nothing better than finding solutions to really horrible predicaments for improving your outlook on life. He's the designer of the hexayurt, a shelter that can be rapidly and efficiently created from readily available materials, and has built blockchain applications as part of the leadership team at Ethereum and Mattereum.
The hidden word behind our discussion today is scaling. The scaling problem underlies both his entrepreneurial efforts and his understanding of the enlightenment process. We discuss the reasons why you may not want to be around enlightened people, whether mass enlightenment is a desirable or feasible goal, and the problems of taking initiatory experiences and spiritual technologies (tantra, ayahuasca) out of their traditional containers.
I am, by temperament and experience, more sanguine about all of this than he is. I tend to think things will eventually work themselves out over time. My enlightenment experiences have been mild and pleasant; if mine had been as harrowing as his, I would probably feel as he does.
As a technical note, there were some sound issues on our Transatlantic Skype call, which occasionally made it sound as though one of us was conducting the call while having a bath or as if we had ghost hunter-style EVPs from beyond the grave on the line. I apologize for these and hope they do not interfere with your listening enjoyment.
Today, I talk with Gary Lachman about his latest book, The Lost Knowledge of the Imagination. We discuss the need to balance the analytic "survival mode" consciousness of the external world with an older way of thinking that prioritizes the inner landscape and the imagination. We also discuss the necessity of creative outlets to regulate how much of the sensory world we take in and process, to open the valve all the way for peak experience and dial it down so we remember to do the dishes.
I spend a good bit of the interview groping toward, but never reaching, the concept of a gestalt as a shorthand mental representation of external or internal objects. Some events do not pack down well to a gestalt representation, while others form new gestalts on close examination. This process of gestalt analysis and synthesis runs behind the conversation we have here.
Gary Lachman is the author of twenty-one books on topics ranging from
the evolution of consciousness to literary suicides, popular culture and
the history of the occult. He has written a rock and roll memoir of the
1970s, biographies of Aleister Crowley, Rudolf Steiner, C. G. Jung,
Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, Emanuel Swedenborg, P. D. Ouspensky, and
Colin Wilson, histories of Hermeticism and the Western Inner Tradition,
studies in existentialism and the philosophy of consciousness, and about
the influence of esotericism on politics and society. He writes for
several journals in the UK, US, and Europe, including Fortean Times, Quest, Strange Attractor, Fenris Wolf, and his work has appeared in the Times Literary Supplement, Times Educational Supplement, Guardian, Independent on Sunday, Sunday Times, Mojo, Gnosis
and other publications. He lectures regularly in the UK, US, and
Europe, and his work has been translated into a dozen languages. He has
appeared in several film and television documentaries and on BBC Radio 3
and 4 and is on the adjunct faculty in Transformative Studies at the
California Institute of Integral Studies. Before becoming a full-time
writer Lachman studied philosophy, managed a new age bookshop, taught
English Literature, and was a Science Writer for UCLA. He was a founding
member of the pop group Blondie and in 2006 was inducted into the Rock
and Roll Hall of Fame. Lachman was born in New Jersey, but since 1996
has lived in London, UK.
I apologize for the occasional gaps in sound quality. These newfangled trans-Atlantic fiber-optic cables are sometimes troublesome. Or perhaps Mercury is in retrograde.
I used to see some amazing obituaries, often in British newspapers, detailing a remarkable life lived by someone who had worked undercover during WWII, escaped from Nazis, and gone on to live to a great old age. Frequently, these people were forgotten or never spoke of their adventures.
Elizabeth Smith Friedman, the subject of Jason Fagone's new biography, The Woman Who Smashed Codes, is one of those rare people, though her story begins with a search for the true author of Shakespeare, runs through two world wars, includes a stint fighting gangsters and rumrunners (and the jealousy of J. Edgar Hoover) and the foundation of the NSA, and ends with more Shakespeare. It sounds like a whole series of detective novels rolled into one, yet Elizabeth was a real person with an amazing story.
Want to hear more like this?
Pair with Shava Neradon using cryptography to secure communications or tales of derring-do with Adam Swartzbaugh. Show Notes and Links
You can listen to our first interview here, or through your favorite podcast site. For one reason or another, I don't think I ever released the transcript from the interview, so here it is. I will also be releasing the pdf version here at some point.
The new interview will be going up tomorrow on this site, also in transcript format.
Sid Kemp is a coach, consultant and the author of ten books on business success published by McGraw-Hill and Entrepreneur Press. Until a decade ago, Sid worked with top Fortune 500 companies, government agencies like the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and think tanks such as McKinsey Consulting and Deloitte Touche. Then he took their best practices and wrote the best seller, Entpreneur Magazine’s Ultimate Guide to Project Management for Small Business.
Today, we talk about the ins and outs of the consulting business, working with the inner and outer goals of the client, and planning for the equally challenging crises of wild success and disaster.
Today, I talk with B. Alan Wallace about his multiple careers as Buddhist contemplative and teacher, physicist and cognitive scientist, writer and translator. We discuss his road to becoming a monk and returning to laity, the meditative practices of Dzogchen, how to tell a good teacher (by the quality of their students), the remarkable career of Dudjom Lingpa, and how Buddhist contemplatives and neuroscientists can collaborate to effect a revolution in our understanding of the mind.
Bio
Dynamic lecturer, progressive scholar, and one of the most prolific
writers and translators of Tibetan Buddhism in the West, B. Alan
Wallace, Ph.D., continually seeks innovative ways to integrate Buddhist
contemplative practices with Western science to advance the study of the
mind. Dr. Wallace, a scholar and practitioner of Buddhism since 1970, has
taught Buddhist theory and meditation worldwide since 1976. Having
devoted fourteen years to training as a Tibetan Buddhist monk, ordained
by H. H. the Dalai Lama, he went on to earn an undergraduate degree in
physics and the philosophy of science at Amherst College and a doctorate
in religious studies at Stanford. With his unique background, Alan brings deep experience and applied
skills to the challenge of integrating traditional Indo-Tibetan Buddhism
with the modern world.
Follow-up Q&A
After the interview went live, I received some additional questions from listeners that Dr. Wallace was kind enough to respond to:
When talking about Dudjom
Lingpa you mentioned that a teacher’s level of realization is hard to
determine and that you had to judge by the realization of the students.
Wouldn’t that be equally hard to determine?You
can tell a lot from the conduct of the students, and of course this applies to
teachers as well.
What is the best daily practice
for a beginner at meditation or someone who can only do a little each day? Shamatha
is a good start, then branch out to the four immeasurables and the four
applications of mindfulness.
Today on Startup Geometry, I talk with Mitch Horowitz, editor, voiceover artist, historian of alternative religion and the occult, and author of Occult America and One Simple Idea:How Positive Thinking Reshaped Modern Life. We discuss the influence of experimental religions have had on American history, our favorite uncanny tourism sites, how the belief that "thoughts are causative" has affected the real world, and why having a Definite Chief Aim can help you achieve it.
Robert Pool is a mathematician, science writer, and, together with Anders Ericsson, the author of Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise.
Today, we talk about the use of deliberate practice to improve physical
and mental performance, why the 10,000 hour rule isn't what you think
it is, the relationship between talent and success (it's less important
than you think, what good mental representations will do for you, and
why taste is essential to the development of expert skills.
Today,
we talk about how to think about the future, why people choose
personalization over privacy, what it might mean to look through someone
else's eyes for a day, and why the artificial intelligences in your
future won't be what you expect.
Shava Nerad is the former Executive Director of the Tor Project, open source software that helps users protect their online privacy. She is currently CEO of Oddfellow Studios, and a frequent writer through Quora (where I met her) and on her Patreon site.
Today, we talk about her early days as the youngest female Chief Software Engineer at DEC and IT manager at MIT, how to manage and relate to very different people, how she won an argument with Richard Stallman, and how and why Tor came to be one of the most praised and reviled pieces of software in the world (often by the same people).
Extended bio:
Shava Nerad has been working online since 1982, when she was Chief
Software Engineer at Digital Equipment Corporation on the IVIS Project,
the first commercial multimedia authoring system in the world. She has
been staff or faculty at UMass/Amherst, MIT, UNC/Chapel Hill, and
University of Oregon. She’s done commercial work for DEC, Varian,
ComputerVision, her own web consultancy Net Prophets, Inc., and eMarket
Group, Ltd.
While at eMarket as VP/Marketing and Business Development, she led
her company to 3rd fastest growing private company in Oregon, #285 on
the Inc5000, 25 in the Inc Urban 100, and Best Companies to Work for in
Oregon. She was nominated for Woman Entrepreneur of the Year by
reporting staff of the Portland (OR) Business Journal for her business
acumen and service to her community. She has a long history of nonprofit
and political activism, including leadership positions at Oregon Public
Networking/efn.org, The Tor Project, and Democratic organizations in
Oregon.
Helen DeWitt is the author of The Last Samurai, Lightning Rods, and, with Ilya Gridnef, Your Name Here. The Last Samurai, originally released by Miramax Books in 2000, is being released in a new edition by New Directions in May 2016. For many years, the book was passed along in secondhand copies among cognoscenti, and I'm glad to see it back in print.
Sibylla, a single mother from a long line of frustrated talents, has unusual ideas about child rearing. Yo Yo Ma started piano at the age of two; her son starts at three. J.S.Mill learned Greek at three; Ludo starts at four, reading Homer as they travel round and round the Circle Line. A fatherless boy needs male role models; so she plays the film of Seven Samurai as a running backdrop to his childhood. While Sibylla types out back copies of Carpworld to pay the rent, Ludo, aged five, moves on to Hebrew, Arabic and Japanese, aerodynamics and edible insects of the world - they might come in handy, if he can just persuade his mother he's mature enough to know his father's name. He is bound for knowledge of a less manageable sort, not least about his mother's past. And at the heart of the book is the boy's changing relationship with Sibylla - contradictory, touching and tender.
Today, we talk about the desire to choose your own parents, your own publishing team, and your own cafe.
Photo credit: Helen DeWitt
A small correction: in our discussion of coffee drinks at Neues Ufer, the drink served in a small ceramic bowl was incorrectly identified as Kremkaffee; the correct drink name is Milchkaffee. I remember ordering Kaffe Krem in Germany at one point, which I suppose would be coffee-flavored cream. Personally, I've always liked the Dutch phrase for cafe au lait: Koffie verkeerd, "spoiled coffee" or "coffee done wrong".
Over on her site, she mentions some verbal tics of her own that annoy her. I am completely immune to hearing these & think she sounds wonderful. On the other hand, I writhe every time I hear my own voice saying anything on any recording: I always say that I have a face for radio and a voice for silent film.
Luca Turin is a biophysicist and expert in the sense of smell. He is best known to the scientific community as the proponent of the vibrational theory of olfaction: that smell receptors detect the vibrational frequencies of the molecular bonds of parts of the scent molecule. This theory represents an alternative to the older shape-based theory of smell: that scent molecules bind to specific receptors that conform to the shape of the scent molecule. The debate on this topic is detailed in Turin's The Secret of Scent, and Chandler Burr's The Emperor of Scent.
He is also the author, with his partner Tania Sanchez, of Perfumes: The A-Z Guide, which provides a sensual and witty look at over 1,000 commercially available perfumes. He also writes perfume criticism in several locations online, including at perfumesilove.com, and is a scent molecule designer and consultant to the industry.
Emanuel Derman first had a successful career as a particle physicist,
and then an even more successful career on Wall Street, doing advanced
mathematical modeling of financial instrument prices and volatility.
Currently, he is a professor at Columbia University, where he directs
the program in financial engineering. He's the author of My Life as a Quant and Models.Behaving.Badly.
Today,
we talk about the differences between models & theories, finance
& physics, and life & experiments. We look under the hood of the
Black-Scholes[-Merton] option pricing formula, talk about the gaps in
classical and behavioral financial models, and find out what he would
change about his life if he could live it again.
[0.47] Intro. Models & Theories.
[3.45] What differentiates a theory or model in physics from one in finance?
[5.43] How to protect yourself from self-deception.
[6.55]William Blake "If a fool were to persist in his folly, he would become wise."
[7.26] At Goldman, they used models without idolizing them.
[8.40] What do you teach your students at the Columbia Financial Engineering Program?
[10.15] Example: Black-Scholes[-Merton] model for option pricing. Andy Lowes at MIT, "In physics, you have three laws that explain 99% of phenomena. In finance, you have 99 laws that explain 3% of phenomena."
[12.15] Principle of replication (arbitrage pricing theory).
[16.20] What you need to know to price a derivative. How does it fail? Correcting for that. Paul Wilmott.
[22.02] Physics: better to go deep (abstract principles). Finance: sometimes better to stay on the surface. Eugene Fama: "Finance is what doesn't go away after everyone knows about it." Elon Musk: importance of thinking by first principles vs. thinking by analogy.
[24.50] ED's favorite models. Black-Derman-Toy for interest rate. Local volatility model. Extensions of option pricing. Fixing and extending models by relaxing perfect/Platonic assumptions. Mao Tse-tung: "Let a thousand flowers bloom."
[27.07] Nassim Taleb's critiques of financial modeling. Heuristics.
[29.30] Using the process of model-building to help discipline your thoughts. Quantifying vague intuitions.
[31.50] Institutional problems. Understanding the underlying assumptions.
[33.17] Exciting areas in finance research. Moving from derivatives to the underlying assets. Market microstructure.
[36.00] Behavioral finance. (I'm a bigger fan of finding better psychological bases to economic behavior and economic concepts like risk or utility, rather than disguising social psychology research as economics through the use of math. That's what I'm babbling about in this section. -SG). Subjectivity in economic models: it's actually "How much money do I stand to gain or lose
Hayek: In physics, the macroscopic things are sense data and real...and atoms are the abstractions. In finance, the only things that are real are the people, the markets are the abstractions. Mel Brooks on comedy vs. tragedy.
[44.24] Recommended reading: Justin Fox The Myth of the Rational Market, John Kay Other People's Money, Emanuel Derman Models.Behaving.Badly, Nassim Taleb's Black Swan&Antifragile, Elie Ayache The Blank Swan & The Medium of Contingency. [48.48] Manfred Eigen
[49.12] More about Emanuel Derman can be found at..., What he would like to do if he could relive his life over again, How you can respond to a model vs. a theory.
The Models
Monte Carlo method
Black-Scholes-Merton
CAPM
Efficient Market Hypothesis
Geometric Brownian motion (random walk, martingale)
Jump diffusion models
Black-Derman-Toy interest rate model
Derman-Kani trees/ volatility smile models
Barry Michels and Phil Stutz are two of the most sought-after psychotherapists in Los Angeles, particularly by creative professionals. They are also the authors of The Tools, a book that teaches you the techniques they use in their practice to help unlock creativity, decrease anxiety and to correct the negative patterns that interfere with your life.
In this podcast, we discuss the relationship between the Shadow (Carl Jung's term for a subconscious part of your mind that contains your inner shame and other unconscious material) and creativity, plus the three immutable rules of dealing with a perpetually changing world. We also talk about their next book, dealing with Part X, or the inner enemy that tries to sabotage your growth and development.
“But the worst enemy you can meet will always be yourself; you lie
in wait for yourself in caverns and forests. Lonely one, you are going
the way to yourself! And your way goes past yourself, and past your
seven devils! You will be a heretic to yourself and witch and soothsayer
and fool and doubter and unholy one and villain. You must be ready to
burn yourself in your own flame: how could you become new, if you had
not first become ashes?”
Anthony Metivier, proprietor of MagneticMemoryMethod.com,
has taught fifty thousand people how to improve their memory using the
memory palace technique. He is a one man content factory, producing
books, podcasts, online videos and courses to teach foreign languages,
meditation and relaxation, and memory improvement.
Today, we talk about how you can improve your memory, what makes for a good online course, and why friendship can be monstrous.
Claudia Azula Altucher is an idea machine; an accomplished yoga practitioner and teacher; and a popular podcaster, author and YouTuber. Today, she brings all of this to the podcast to help you get your life on the move. She'll teach you what you need to do to clean up your life, how to get your idea muscles sweating, and why she should be the next CEO of Twitter. You canfind her online at claudiayoga.com, through her podcasts, which include Ask Altucher and Claudia Yoga, and through the Claudia Yoga YouTube Channel. Her books, including, Become an Idea Machine: Because Ideas Are the Currency of the 21st Century are available through Amazon and, as they say, wherever books are sold. From the book's description:
HOW DO I TRANSFORM MY LIFE? The answer is simple: come up with ten ideas a day. It doesn't matter if they are good or bad the key is to exercise your 'idea muscle', to keep it toned, and in great shape. People say ideas are cheap and execution is everything but that is NOT true. Execution is a consequence, a subset of good, brilliant idea. And good ideas require daily work. Ideas may be easy if we are only coming up with one or two but if you open this book to any of the pages and try to produce more than three, you will feel a burn, scratch your
head, and you will be sweating, and working hard. There is a turning point when you reach idea number 6 for the day, you still have four to go, and your mind muscle is getting a workout. By the time you list those last ideas to make it to ten you will see for yourself what "sweating the idea muscle" means. As you practice the daily idea
generation you become an idea machine. When we become idea machines we are flooded with lots of bad ideas but also with some that are very good. This happens by the sheer force of the number, because we are coming up with 3,650 ideas per year (at ten a day). When you are inspired by an extraordinary idea, all of your thoughts break their chains, you go beyond limitations and your capacity to act expands in every direction. Forces and abilities you did not know you had come to the surface, and you realize you are capable of doing great things. As you practice with the suggested prompts in this book your ideas will get better, you will be a source of great insight for others, people will find you magnetic, and they will want to hang out with you because you have so much to offer. When you practice every day your life will transform, in no more than 180 days, because it has no other evolutionary choice. Life changes for the better when we become the source of positive, insightful, and helpful ideas. Don't believe a word I say. Instead, challenge yourself to try it for the 180 days and see your life transform, in magical ways, in front of your very eyes.
If you enjoy the show & would like to hear more episodes, please download, rate and subscribe through iTunes, as your enthusiasm for the show means a lot. Please comment below if you have suggestions for future episodes.
by Marie Kondo.