Shermer and Zak discuss: neuroeconomics, neuromanagement, and neuromarketing • Zak’s work with the CIA and DARPA • immersion and how is it quantified (with a formula) • monotony of the mundane • the ordinary and extraordinary • peak-end storytelling • immersion in advertising, entertainment, education, attractions, marriage, and retail • what makes a great movie or successful unscripted TV show • novelty • sensitivity training programs • how to give a TED talk • immersion and political candidates • The Bachelor: Ben’s season • happiness, flourishing, meaningfulness, purposefulness and immersion.
Michael Shermer introduces the theme of Skeptic magazine volume 27, number 3: Race Matters.
The United States today is hopelessly polarized; the political Right and Left have hardened into rigid and deeply antagonistic camps, preventing any sort of progress. Amid the bickering and inertia, the promise of the 1960s—when we came together as a nation to fight for equality and universal justice—remains unfulfilled. Shermer and Steele discuss: what has changed in race relations in America in the past 30 years, and why “The promised land guarantees nothing. It is only an opportunity, not a deliverance.”
In Science Salon podcast # 139, Michael Shermer speaks with Shelby Steele about his book Shame: How America’s Past Sins Have Polarized Our Country and about his new film What Killed Michael Brown?
