Beat Your Genes Podcast - podcast cover

Beat Your Genes Podcast

BeatYourGenesbeatyourgenes.org
Evolutionary psychology with Dr. Doug Lisle, PhD and Nathan Gershfeld, D.C. Most psychology advice treats your brain like a broken machine. Beat Your Genes starts somewhere different: your instincts aren't broken. They're just optimized for a Stone Age environment that no longer exists. Dr. Lisle - Evolutionary psychologist, former Stanford lecturer, and co-author of The Pleasure Trap - has spent decades developing frameworks that explain human behavior from the ground up. Nathan Gershfeld, D.C. - trained first as an electrical engineer and then spent 14 years as a Doctor of Chiropractic. He brings a systems thinker's curiosity to every conversation. He mostly lets Dr. Lisle talk. Topics include relationships and attraction, self-esteem, personality, depression and anxiety, willpower, the ego trap, and how pushy people exploit agreeable ones. 380+ episodes. New episodes every other week. New here? Start at beatyourgenes.org/start-here
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Episodes

06: Why Men and Women Are Wired to Want Different Things: The Psychology of Gender Differences

In 2005, Harvard president Lawrence Summers lost his job for saying something Dr. Lisle calls scientifically non-controversial: that men and women have psychological differences rooted in biology, not just socialization. Dr. Lisle unpacks why the evidence on this is overwhelming, why polite society refuses to look at it, and how those differences quietly run every dating dynamic you've ever experienced. Dr. Doug Lisle walks through the Stone Age problems that shaped male and female brains in opp...

Mar 24, 201653 minSeason 1Ep. 6

05: Psychology of Politics: Why Liberals and Conservatives Disagree

Most people assume political conflict is about values, policy, or who is morally right. Dr. Lisle says it is actually about one ancient question your Stone Age brain has been asking for 100,000 years: share or not share. Every other issue is a historical accident sitting on top of that core divide. In this episode, Dr. Doug Lisle walks through the evolutionary psychology of politics, drawing on the work of Tooby and Cosmides at UC Santa Barbara. He explains why "stingy" and "lazy" were the two b...

Mar 17, 201657 minSeason 1Ep. 5

04: Staying with a Man Who's Not Right For You

Most therapists treat the survival of a relationship as a good thing. Dr. Lisle calls that idea insane. Your Stone Age brain is running an algorithm designed to protect a pregnant woman in an environment of scarcity, and that algorithm will keep you attached to a man who isn't right for you, long past the point where every other signal is telling you to leave. In this episode, Dr. Doug Lisle unpacks the Last Man on Earth Syndrome, the Good Guy Trap, and the real reason women feel pulled to stay ...

Mar 09, 201655 minSeason 1Ep. 4

03: High Cost of High Expectations

Most parents believe heaping praise on a child is a gift. Dr. Lisle says it is often a trap. Telling a kid they are brilliant, gifted, or a straight-A student when the evidence is shakier than that quietly sets an expectation they cannot safely meet, and the motivational system's best response is to stop trying altogether. What looks like laziness, procrastination, or self-sabotage is usually something much older and smarter at work. In this episode, Dr. Doug Lisle unpacks what he calls the ego ...

Mar 03, 201658 minSeason 1Ep. 3

02: Stepping Stones to Self-Esteem

The self-esteem movement of the 1970s got one thing profoundly wrong. It treated self-esteem as a vitamin you give to yourself with affirmations in the mirror, and it told generations of parents to flood their kids with praise. Dr. Lisle argues the mechanism was never designed to be fooled that easily, and the people trying hardest to fake it are usually the ones suffering most. In this episode, Dr. Doug Lisle walks through the evolutionary architecture of self-esteem. He explains Mark Leary's s...

Feb 25, 201659 minSeason 1Ep. 2

01: Happiness vs. Pleasure : What is the goal of life?

Most people assume life is about pursuing happiness. Dr. Lisle says that's not what your brain is actually built for. Your nervous system was designed to pursue pleasure and avoid pain, and happiness is a secondary guidance system that keeps you moving in the right direction. Confusing the two is one of the most consequential mistakes a person can make. In this first episode, Dr. Doug Lisle introduces the foundational framework behind Beat Your Genes: that all human behavior, at its root, is dri...

Feb 18, 201659 minSeason 1Ep. 1
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