Presumably we’re not going to solve the problem of conflict between groups of people — but what would better conflict look like? And what does that have to do with brains, the spread of homo sapiens, social media recommender algorithms, tribalism, intellectual humility, or the Iroquois Native Americans? Join this week’s episode with guest Jonathan Stray — a conflict researcher — for an episode about brain science, war, empathy, outgroups, and how we might do better.

Episode Audio

Episode Video

More Information:

Jonathan Stray’s Better Conflict Bulletin

The Perception Gap

Beyond Intractability by Heidi and Guy Burgess

Braver Angels

Dignity Index

Vaughn DA, Savjani RRS, Cohen MS, Eagleman DM (2018). Empathic neural responses predict group allegiance. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience. 2018 Jul 31;12:302.

SUBSCRIBE AND LISTEN ON:

"David Eagleman offers startling lessons.... His method is to ask us to cast off our lazy commonplace assumptions.
- The Guardian
"Eagleman has a talent for testing the untestable, for taking seemingly sophomoric notions and using them to nail down the slippery stuff of consciousness."
- The New Yorker
"[A] neuroscientist and polymath."
- Wall Street Journal
"David Eagleman may be the best combination of scientist and fiction-writer alive."
- Stewart Brand
"David Eagleman is the kind of guy who really does make being a neuroscientist look like fun."
- New York Times
"What Eagleman seems to be calling for is a new Enlightenment."
- Sunday Herald
"A popularizer of impressive gusto...[Eagleman] aims, grandly, to do for the study of the mind what Copernicus did for the study of the stars."
- New York Observer