Why does the brain so easily form in groups and therefore out groups, And what differences do we see in the brain's circuitry when it thinks about the members of one group or the other? Does dehumanization have a basis in the brain, and are there any ways to rehumanize And in this context of human behavior, what do heroes look like? Welcome to Inner Cosmos with me David Eagleman. I'm a neuroscientist and an author, and in these episodes we launch from the brain to understand why and how
our lives look the way they do. Today's episode is about conflict and in groups and outgroups and dehumanization, and I want to take this on in a very human way by talking with two people who I have come to admire greatly because they are living deep in the middle of terrible conflict and they find themselves on opposite sides, but they're striving to do something rare, and we're going to meet them.
In just a moment. The first I want to set the context.
The difficulty that we always see with human societies is that we are all strapped to our most basic neural drives like anger and fear and suspicion, and an appetite for revenge.
And the question that I want.
To wrestle with today is whether there's a pathway to rising above that, Is there a higher level of rationality by which we could operate? Are there roads to get ourselves out of the networks in our brains that care only about short term things and somehow allow the long term thinking networks in our brains to gain a foothold, because I suspect that humans getting better at this is probably our only meaningful solution to all the conflicts that constantly convulse our world.
Now, if you've been listening.
To this podcast for a while, you know that I speak often about in groups and outgroups. Specifically, brains seem to be highly predisposed to form these. We attach to particular groups, whether by accident of birth, or by political momentum, or just from the preferences of our circle of friends
or mentors or neighbors or parents or whatever. Now, neuroscience works to understand how individual brains work, but what we summarize as the field of social neuroscience works to understand what happens when you get a bunch of brains interacting, and things are always more complex than you would predict from looking at single brains, in part because of issues that emerge, like the spontaneous formation of in groups and outgroups, and by the way we find this among other species
as well. For example, some of my colleagues study this kind of fighting in monkey troops. What you'll find is that two different troops of monkeys will hate each other and fight viciously, sometimes to the death. But every once in a while a monkey will get excluded from his troop and he'll end up switching sides and he'll get accepted in by the other troop, and then he'll fight just as hard on the other side. So the details
of in groups and out groups are malleable. But what we find is that primates like us love fighting and dying for whichever side we're on, And it's easy enough to see this in ourselves, whether with politics or sports teams or religions. We tend to have the side that we're on and then the wrong side or sides, and for a lot of people it gives meaning to their
lives to fight for their side. And this is all possible because of the very limited borders of our internal models, which allows each of us to so strongly believe in our truths. So behavior becomes complex when you get thousands of humans in the same place, or hundreds of thousands, or millions. And different research groups, including my lab, have done studies on how we perceive pain in another person, say a member of your in group versus a member
of your outgroup. Collectively, we've studied this across religion, race, country membership, even things like which sports team you root for. I'm going to link a number of those studies in the show notes, but for now, the b line is that your brain does not care about everyone equally, but instead cares much more about those people whom you consider part of your in group. If you see pain in
another person, your brain cares a lot more. It has a much bigger reaction if it is a member of your in group, and what this translates to is really quite shocking. A study from my colleagues, Assana Harris and Susan Fisk at Princeton looked at the issue of how our brains understand about other people. So if you put people into the brain scanner and you show them photographs of other people, there's a region of the brain that becomes very active, called the medial prefrontal cortex. This is
an area involved in social cognition. It comes online when you're dealing with another person as opposed to an object like your phone or laptop or car that.
Does not activate this region.
So the medial prefrontal cortex is specific to thinking about other people.
Now, what happens when I.
Show you pictures of groups of people that maybe you don't like very much, maybe you envy them or you pity them, Well, you still get medial prefrontal cortex activation. You still see them as humans. But if I go even further out on the spectrum to extreme out groups, that region decreases in its activation to the point where it can't even be measured anymore. And what that means is that people can look at another human being, but
it's not like they're viewing another human. Instead, they're viewing an object. And by the way, viewing these photos of extreme outgroups also activates other brain areas like the insulin, the amygdala, which is consistent with disgust. And this kind of dehumanization is the standard in warfare because of the pain of what some group has done unto you, and perhaps because of ubiquitous propaganda, you lose the ability to
see members of that group as other humans. Your medial profneral cortex just doesn't come online, and the areas involved in disgust do. And we onays see this in warfare from the descriptions that get used for the enemy. They're described as viruses or cockroaches or rats or whatever, but they're not people anymore, and that's why they can be
slaughtered with rifles or bombs. You're just taking care of a cleaning problem with the brain areas involved in humanization out of the equation your moral decision making about other people, the people in your outgroup, it just doesn't have the normal pro social mechanisms steering your behavior. So it's not just that we talk about dehumanization from the point of view of politics or psychology.
We can understand it from the point of view of the brain. Now, the reason this is so tragic that human brains do this is because when you look at people of whatever group, you find that everyone loves their families and wants to laugh, It wants to live a good life.
It presumably goes without saying that all people are equipped with the same biology on the inside. What pits people against one another are local societal issues, and then they lose the ability to see one another as humans. Now, one way to see how local these issues are is to flip open any history book and ask yourself whether you would have gotten all worked up over the conflicts
of previous societies. Does it seem worth it to you to fight and die over deities that no one even remembers anymore, or whether you think Xerxes should or shouldn't be king, Would it be worth it to lose all your children over the position of a border between two countries that don't even exist anymore, Or just take as an example that the history of Europe has been defined
by the bloody wars between Catholics and Protestants. Now, for the majority of the world, which is neither Catholic nor Protestant, this seems very difficult to understand why, because Catholics and Protestants seem really similar, They have the same deity, They just have minor differences in how they perform rituals. But that was enough to turn the soil red all over
Europe for literally hundreds of years. So you look back at these historical conflicts where thousands or millions of people died, and we find ourselves hard pressed to feel like, yeah, that was totally worth it for people to give up their one shot at existence and happiness. With a little bit of historical distance, it seems tragic that a person gave up a life with his family as parents, his children because he was so suffused in the moment with the notion that he was right and the other group
was wrong. Now, I'm not making light of these kind of decisions, because if we were there, we would presumably understand and be fueled by these local reasons, like your older brother died from being beaten to death by soldiers on the other side, or your parents were murdered by the other side, and we can easily understand the way that boiling blood can take over your mental landscape and define your life trajectory from that moment. I find that
very easy to understand. I get those feelings. And by the way, let's just note that essentially every action movie in our diet uses revenge as the plot engine because it's so easy for us all to resonate with that. So it's not to say that people didn't feel that they had good reasons to fight to their mutual deaths, but it's critical to assess what turns things around? What is required for an entirely different level.
Of societal maturation.
Is it possible for individuals in a society to somehow override this fundamental instinct for vengeance and to instead bridge differences and rebuild a new level of society, a society where a generation later the wounds start healing, and a generation after that the scars start fading, and at some point the anger and the hatred can't even be revivified.
What is required for that kind of bridge building to begin?
And what kind of people begin this process by reaching their arms precariously across the chasm?
And this question I've been wondering about.
Led me recently to two extraordinary people who embody this longer term thinking. One is Israeli, the other is Palestinian. They both have extraordinary pain in their lives and they are fighting, but they are fighting together for the next level, for the level of recognizing the common humanity of each other. They are coming at the situation with pain and love and hope and a mission. They are fighting for the future of the region instead of the past. Here are
Maoziinone and Aziz Abusera. So please tell us about your personal stories and how you got to now.
A mesuelede and fody and years old. I live my life in Israel, and I have my life before Tobel seventh and after October seventh, I lost both my parents and many many of my childhood friends, the parents, the children that were killed okay up to Gaza. And since then I began from a tour regime entrepreneur into a
piecing entrepreneur. I've been dialect dialogue in partnering, creating and strengthening a new and old friendship with Palastinians from Gaza, from Israel, from the West, back with Israelis from the dispoa And like I'm saying now, which is completely the opposite of what I said in the first few weeks, in the first three few weeks after October seventh, I said that nothing, nothing can prepare you for losing both
your parents, so many of your childhood friends. Nothing can prepare you doing what to say and out what after such an enormous loss and a tragedy. But then I realized that all my life was just a preparation. I was prepared. I was prepared for tobe the seven, and sadly and ironically, I was prepared mostly by my parents. My parents prepared me to the moment of the death, and I've been going through its spiritual and mind transformation in the last it's nearly eight months, and as reason,
I began partners and very close friends. It's a very powerful at least in my eye. And I was in for us, for us, very powerful relationship and friendship. And I I've been learning three lessons that hopefully we'll have time that we I will be able to share the three of them and hear it today. And also thank you David for evingus. You cannot believe how important our empowering, meaningful and supportive it is for us to be here with you. I learned about hope, I learned about the future,
and I learned the importance of forgiveness. So that's on a Natchell about myself and as ease.
I've heard my host tell this story multiple times and it's always as powerful to hear it again. So I'm from Jerusalem and Palestinian. I grew up in Jerusalem and I lost my brother who was killed when I was ten years old and he was nineteen years old. He was arrested and suspicion of throwing rocks, and he was beaten up by soldiers until he would confessed, which resulted in his death after he was right after he was released. And so I, unlike my Os, I wasn't ready. I
was ten years old. I wasn't prepared, and I didn't know I even had a choice other than if somebody kills your brother, you go after them. If somebody hurts your family, you go after them. And for the next eight years that was my life. I was very angry, I was very bitter, and all I saw it was revenge. It almost felt like if somebody punches you in the face,
your first reaction is to punch back. And mine unlike Moos, which in a couple of weeks, he was able to before even a couple of weeks, within a few days, he was able to speak about peace and to speak about you know when we talk together after and he said, I'm still I'm crying for kids in Gaza, like I am crying for my parents right now, saying I don't want people to revenge. I didn't have it in me
for eight years to come anywhere close to that. And so I'm always amazed by Maos's bravery and ability to do that. But yeah, eight years after, I went to study Hebrew in an open not by choice, but because if you live in Jerusom don't speak Hebrew, you really can't get to work. You can study, you can do anything. And I was eighteen, and in that classroom I first met Israelis and Jews who were not soldiers. And as nice as a soldier could be, he can tell me
to pass or not, they're carrying a gun. You can't really have a dialogue with a soldier. And in that classroom I had my first meaningful conversations with people you know, see on the other side. And in those conversations, I realized that I do have a choice, that actually the person who killed my brother was not just killing my brother. It was controlling my life for the last eight years.
And I've let him make the choices for me. Every time I chose to be angry, every time I chose to hate, every time I chose revenge because of him, and I let that anger make me want to do
something bad. I was being his slave. I was being following his choices, not mine, and realizing that I wanted to free myself and make my own choices and go on a path that is stay is different, that brings down those barriers that divide us, the barriers of hate, the barriers of anger, the barriers of fear, the barriers of you know, all those things, and to reach out to people on the other side and realizing we're not really unopposite sides, that we can be on the same
side together. And that's how I see my relationship with Mouths. Were not an Israeli and a Palestinian. Yes we are, but we're not really an Israelian a Palestinian in a nationalist term. We are both together working for the same vision and the same mission.
Why do you suppose it's so rare what you guys are doing? And I hope this picts up momentum, this bridge building, but at the moment, it's not common.
Why do you think that is?
I think it's more common than the media or the public. Is a way of especially the public and the discourse, the international discourse in Palestin, in Israel, between the rivers to the sea, there are so many organizations an individual that walking on the ground to create a shared future. As this was a co chairman of the Family Circle, a group of believed families from both sides in Soneties
and Plastidia. And there is the competitor for peaces, people who decided to choose a different way, not a violence resisted, but a non violence resistance. And there is the Women of the Sun and Women Watch Peace is Read in Palestinian women movements. And we have standing together a Jewish arable organization when with Israel that is now protecting humanitarian aid trucks that are going to Gaza. So on the
ground there are so many. But and this is why we're so thankful to your David and to do the TED organizers for inviting us to open the TED twenty twenty four. Because we must have not just our voices to be heard and to be amplified and using our easier votes, we must be on the table where the
decisions are being made because we have been overlooked. The civil society between the rivel to the to the sea has been overlooked for so many years, too many years, and we need to be there the decision are being made in order to make this the last one. It's as simple as that. So this is the journey. It's not just the two of us, our coalition. Our partners decided to take and to use our thorough our pain, our orgony to dialogue, to partner for a better future.
I agree. I think there's many of us. We might not be necessarily the majority right now, but that's because right now people are hurt and people are in pain, and not everybody. When people are afraid, and when people are in pain and when people are suffering, it's hard for us, you know, as a humans, to make to make rational decisions. That's not only in our case. I think that's everywhere in the world. People can cannot think
rationally in these times. And that's why our voices are important this time, me Mas and many others like us who are really trying hard. But I'll just agree with MOUs it's not easy to get our voices across, whether it's in the media, and so we need all the help we can to amplify voices like ours. We need all the help we can to let the world know that we exist, and to let world leaders know we exist, and to make sure, like Moos said earlier, we are
not sidelined. We look every peace agreement and the negotiations that have happened beween Israelis and Palestinians so far with the US, with Europe, peacemakers like us were not part of it, and I think that's one of the reasons things havn't worked out well so far. The stuff we know about how to build relationships, the stuff we live, and we know each other way better than anybody else in this country know each other. We spend so much time together. We talk, we don't always agree, we work
through disagreements. We know how to talk through tough communication stuff. You know, we were in an event was a nine and we've had not the two of us, but the group of Palestinians of Israelis at disagreements, had hard moments that or even tears, and that's fine. But we know how to work through it, and our politicians don't know
how to work through it. And so if you know, I don't want to sound a little too arrogant, but if the experts on this are not invited to the table when these conversations are happening, we shouldn't be surprised that we are where we are today.
You guys are, of course correct that there are other groups on the ground and that we don't hear about them very much. One of the other organizations that we met at TED this year was an Israeli Palestinian choir of children who sing together.
That was extremely moving.
But why do you suppose that so many people are interested in widening the gap as opposed to bridging the divide. I can understand, and in the sense that, for example, as he's with your story about the anger, or my oles with your story, so many people feel an anger that they can never let go. So what can we do as a society to bring people from the widening divide camp over towards the bridging camp.
I think I understand people anger. We have to relate to people, not to attack them. I you know, somebody asked me today, a journalist, how do I call somebody in Gaza now and tell them about peace? And I said, if I call someone in Gaza right now, I don't start lecturing them about peace. If I do that, I'm out of touch. I am, I'm being ridiculous If I do that. The first thing is starts with listening to people paint, listening to where they're coming from, crying with them,
feeling what they feel. That's very If we not with people in their hard moments, then I'm gonna listen to us. So that's that's I think a major part. You know, one of the stories that was most touching to me.
I always like to share is this friend of mine named antone goodman who works for Rabbis for human rights, and right after October seventh, where he had friends being killed, and he would go to the funerals and he will leave the funerals and drive to the West Bank where Palestinians he knew there were being attacked by settlers and he would bring them whatever they need because they weren't able to buy supplies. They didn't have food, they didn't
have water, and they were in terrible situation. He was leaving a funeral of one of his friends and driving into the West Bank and being with these people. And that's how you really beat that hate and that fear, and that you know, that divide by being there, by being with people, by showing that you care. You mentioned I always mentioned earlier, standing together and being out in the streets. You know, peacemaking isn't just in a room,
isn't just in a comfort. You're out with people in the streets, You're out with them, seeing where the need is and saying we will do action together, when when Mahos says hope is an action. I look at these people and I send those videos to friends of mine, Palatinians, friends of mine, and they see it and they they are amazed.
You know.
I had one Palacinian friend come at ted to the meeting with standing together, and I had to convince him to come. I was like, come on, it will be really good, and this is I don't know if I want to hear another.
Is right now.
And I kept pushing him and he came with me and halfway through Uri was speaking from standing together, and halfway through the talk he leansward me and he goes, I want this guy to be our president, the Palestinian president. And he was amazed by the conversation. He's like the way he speaks, the compassion he has, the empathy he has so to me, at the end of the day, being with people, crying with them, being there, helping wherever
there is need, but also telling people's stories. You know, people who listening to us right now might not be able to be underground, but they can pass these stories and nothing changes who we are, Nothing really moves us
more than stories. And John Paul Ledrac, one of the fathers of conflict resolution, Field used to say, when you're in an intractable conflict and feel nothing is working, you still have the stories that you can share and those stories will eventually make Those stories will eventually reach people hearts and make a change. So people can take my story, they can take Masa's story, they can take Antone story, they can take standing together stories, they can take there
are so many of these stories. If they share them, we can bring that divide much much less and understand that there is a way to work together. And as I must say, he's also walking the walk. He's not just talking the top because as he approached me on the oktob eight sending me a message on my Facebook and we ever met before, we met only for two minutes, maybe a decade ago, and we knew each other since
being in the same industry in tourism. But as this approached me on What'sapp and said, I'm sending my condolescence and I just want you to know that I'm with you, and I immediately reply with a broken art And two days after, I think we spoke for the first time ever one on one on WhatsApp or Google me, and then we've done a webinar together, And you cannot believe
it's very difficult to pay condolescence in general. Okay, if it's for your neighbor, a class and made friend, it's very difficult to go to a wet ceremony or pick up the phone and send your condolescence. So can you imagine how difficult I knew how difficult it is for a Palestinian to pay its convalescence to me. And the only npiece ignested members in Israel that caught my family well Arab parliament members.
None of the Jewish Israeli parliament members ever called us. He didn't send us a letter, nothing, what's up message? Nothing, So it's this is bravery. This is bravery, and I must match it. I just must as a human as I had to match it. And of course to start this dialogue, very difficult dialogue. And and that's a reason
I get connected. And we are brothers in pain, in sorrow, and and we also brothers in in the know how the importance of dialogue, the importance of knowing the other side negative, not necessarily agreed not to agree on the other side, negative, but just a way that there is another narrative. And then together we are building a new narrative, a narrative of the future. And this is what we are focusing all our energy.
Now, Moos, you mentioned earlier that you had learned three lessons.
Tell us about that.
So the first two lessons I learned from our mutual thread. Now Ramsi a Palestinian peace activist and peacemakers, and he was interviewed with my brother again to the CNN with Christian Aman Paul, and Christian asked him Ramsey, well do you find hope? It was after October seven when the war on Gazza wage in a dramatic and castostophic numbers and news arrived any old there, I don't find it. I created hope is an action, and together with hamsi as It and others, we came out with a formula.
A simple formula might be difficult to execute by very simple. For how we are creating hope, it's starting that we create up together. You can never create up on your own, Just like love, you must have partners. And then we must envision a better future and act to make this future into reality and prove ourselves that our actions are effective. That's it. That's how you create hope, because if our actions are effective, it means we're going to reach this
envisioned future. So this is what we are doing now, and we help others frame the work and their efforts und the notion that they are creating hope. They are not coming to us or speaking to us to find to look or that will give it them hope. They are creating hope the oralization we may, but also so many others, and this is our hope is being created.
This second lesson I let from Ramseh. It was when he said that he's willing to forgive about the past, he's willing to forgive about the present, but he won't forgive, not to himself and to no one else about the future. And this is a very fundamental sentence and phrase. What does it mean forgive and to whom about the past and the present? That's what I ask myself, and I realized that in order to build the future, I must forgive.
The easy answer was I need to forgive. Hamas Hamas push the trigger in my narrative, Hamas kill my parents. Hamas is a fundamentalist extusimist organization that is oppressing and killing his own people and innocent people in general. And it was my parents' misfortune and bad luck that Hamas kill them. But all my anger, I was seeking revenge. I wanted to punish. I was blaming those who I held accountable for the killing of my parents and my friends.
And this is the Israeli government. This is raally government has promised us, the Israelis, the Jewish is realiest again and again, security and safety, and they didn't do to the promise. So I want to punish them. But those feelings were destroying me from the inside. I stopped. I literally stopped functioning as a father, as a husband. I become sick physically and mentally. But after listening to Hamsey, I said, maybe I need to forgive them in order
to cure myself not to be sick. So I've decided it's a decision forgiveness. Unlike reconciliation, forgiveness is something you can do on your own. It's not a dialogue. You can make a decision to forgive. Reconciliation is a process which we must choose as people. I've decided to forgive this is Raelic government, which was for me a breakthrough and when I'm telling it to Israelis Jewish Israelis, they
cannot believe it. They cannot believe it. Like when I'm speaking to my friends in Gaza, they say, we will never forgive Ramas, we will never forgive from us, but we must. We must in order to build the future. And the third lesson is about the future. The gap between as this story and my stories, this Israeli is as Palestinian, has never been as wide as today. It's never as been as white. The gap is huge, but and it's the biggest but I ever encountered in my life.
There is a miracle. Our store is meet the Israelies and Palestinian store is meat in the future future that is based on this only a common ground share principles acknowledged, acknowledgment and recognition, equality and dignit, reconciliation and healing, security and safety. We meet in the future. And I didn't came up with those principals on my own. We built it together as Is and myself and seventy others Palestinian
and Israelis. We gathered for seventy two hours with a two Geneva based organizations, Beto Hope and Principals for peace, and we wrote a chilter one page child, but a very profound, very inspiring one chilter that is dealing only with the principles of the future and now what we should do. And David, I sis, our well parties, we need together to take our people there, to take humanity to this future. And I don't believe that it's possible. I know that it's possible.
By the way, I'm going to link the Charter for the Future sure in the show notes so everyone can access this and see this. And the really amazing news is that what you guys are doing is working. It's catching fire. You both recently met with a world leader. Tell us about that.
An amazing world leader. We both met with Pope Francis. Didn't just meet him, We got to hug him, which is you know, I was telling my os the night before we met him, as I know, we barely probably gonna touch, you know, go and like shake his hands, but my dream is to hug the pocon and he pulled us in to do that. But it was very meaningful. It was very meaningful because he is a very influential man. He's a you know, billions of people listen to his voice and what he has to say, and world leaders
listen to him. He's going to be attending the G seven meeting, for example, and so we wanted to have our voices and our stories presented to him, and he responded in such a powerful way.
He hugged us.
He told people to take a moment of silence and reflect and how they can help us. There were over twelve thousand people in the gathering in an arena depache in Verona. He then talked about how war is not a solution, how war only creates more misery and more suffering, which is exactly what we believe and realize. We align, We align fully, and so we very grateful and honestly, the question is why other leaders are not inviting us
to talk to them as well. This is you know, G seven going to be discussing Israel and Palestine, but our voices are not there as of now, and we're hoping that they realize how important it is to hear people like Malos and me and others. It doesn't have to be the two of us, but somebody should be there from our community, and the absence of that voice is not helpful at all, so, yeah, I was how they feel for humans.
It's I'm still digesting was happening there on the stage seriously, But now I'm honest and humid enough to say that this was a life changing event for me. But at the same time, we made this story because the pope a message was so profound about the importance of conflict
in order to rise, to evaluate, to improve humanity. But it's up to us, humanity, humans to choose how to solve those conflicts through war or through dialogue, and it's our decision to make and if we choose, and again it's in the family life, in business, partnership, neighborhood and between nations. When we choose to solve the conflicts through dialogue,
it's empowering. We are rising, were evolving through this dialogue and hearing pop Forensics saying that gave me so much energy, just believing in as Seas and I, but in our coalition and organization that we are working with the strength the strengths of the past. We choose, and we choose the path of dialogue, of reconciliation, of partnership. And before the going on stage, we were asked by many of the Italian journalists, is peace possible? And we kept telling
them you are the answer. The twelve thousand piece builders, that they are the departure of the answer, because eighty years ago there was one wedging in Europe. Millions, tens of millions were killed in Europe, and we came to every honor from Brassel and everywhere you go, you see the same flag of the EU. Everyone are getting ready for the U election. You don't pass any border control, no passports between the EU that are being stamped using
the same currency. So Europe is the answer. And we told them you're the answer that now we need your guidance, your support to envision with us the future between the river and the sea. And it was very very powerful moment.
When we look around right now, what we see are young people taking clear sides. But what do you guys think is the right way to get young people to take the side of bridge building and think about how to do that.
I actually want to start on kind of building and what ma O's mentioned a bit earlier in answering that one. I'm always happy when young people are active. I'm a bit disagree when people say, oh, they shouldn't protest, they shouldn't be out. We want the compassion, We want them to care, we want them not to be apathetic. But we also want to try to help guide that momentum into making a change and making sure it doesn't lead into hatred, it doesn't lead into more polarization. And there's
a thin line between one sometimes and the other. And so we want to be part of making sure that yes, people are out, people are expressing their opinions. Look, I'm very grateful for the Israelis for protesting. So I always say the faces when I see somebody like my o's and somebody like standing together and somebody like women wish peace out in the street, that gives me straight, That gives me hope. And so I can't come to America and tell people, well, but you shouldn't do it. But
let's think together what makes a difference. So I would start with what Mao's mentioned. I think narratives are so important. Understanding the narratives, understanding the stories, get yourself to know where where the sides are coming from, and understand that are difference. But let's think not only of the differences of the past, but also of how can we move together towards the future, making sure we work together Jew's, Muslims, Christians and not be this is a Muslim group, and
this is a Jooshi group and so on. And I know this because in my in my journey, learning the Israeli narrative was extremely, extremely important. This is why I started Measurey tours where I take people with the all narratives and get people to understand the two narratives. And I watch people who are angry one sided Israelis or Palestinians, pro Israelis or pro Palestinians come in the tour and leave really transformed, not necessarily changing every political view, but
having more compassion and having more empathy. So that's where you start. You start with learning the narrative. And secondly you start learning what you can organize and how you can organize in a way that can make pressure and can make a difference. And so I've been working actually with some of the campuses, being talking to people who work in those campuses, talking to few conflict resolutions experts, and I think in some campuses it has worked incredibly.
A dialogue has worked well between the university and the universities and the students and the administration. I was involved in one before this that was, you know, as speaker was invited that the students didn't like, and so that speaker is very anti Palestinians, and they wanted to make it clear that the university that they're not happy about the choice. The administration didn't know really what to do
and reached out. I worked with the president of the university and with my colleagues and negotiating between the sides, and we ended up coming out with really an amazing solution where the students were recognized for their objection of the speaker, but they had a space to do that within the program, where before the speaker got unstaged, they were told, you know, we understand you have some concerns.
You're not happy about our choice, and we know that some of you don't feel comfortable being here with the commencement speaker for this year, and if you would like to leave, we understand that. And their grievance is were shared with everyone in the room. Some of them got up and left, The speaker got on stage did her talk. There were not a one disturbance through the whole time,
and everyone was happy about that resolution. I think we jumped very quickly into accusations and into positions, and into even sometimes looking and those stories of like the one story we don't like and instead of looking for how do we negotiate and come up with solutions that works for everyone. If you have concerns, you're not happy, that
is fine. We should respect that, and let's talk about how can we work together and what can be done and what the university can be with the students and for the students to be also paragmatic, and you know which is harder to do sometimes on eighteen and nineteen year old I remember myself in those times. But honestly, there's so much possibilities of solutions that are just not
being executed. And partially because on American campuses it very quickly became a political big thing and every leader of every party, every extremeists start showing up and campuses and you have people shouting at each other and you don't come to solutions doing that.
Also, David, if it's okay, I'm inviting universities and students to approach us. It can be as easy I through our social media or it's very very easy to find us and reach out, and it's not just as easy. And I there are so many now that we have like an intelligation teams, but are still in his realities that can come all through webinars, all physically to your universities, to all communities, to your walking place, and we can help you because then you will lelp us. It's it.
We are all in it together. So please, this is exactly what we want to offer. Also because we think we know from our own experience the importance of dialogue, the importance of knowing the other side narrative, not to agree, but knowing the other side negative in order to build a shared society. Those who say we are pro Israelis, we are poor partistans. We are produced, we are brought that. I always tell them, you're right, and you choose the
right side. Of course, you choose the right side. By choosing the right side, we are ensuring the wall will continue. It's as simple as that. It's very sad, but it's as simple as that. If you want the bloodshed to end, the world to end, you must choose the peacemakers. You must choose humanity, you must choose dialogue. And this is what so many of us, between the evidence to the sea already have decided to choose the world with But if will be amplified, if we'll be supported by others,
we're going to reach and lasting sooner. So it can be done and it's not that difficult.
So yeah, we've been We've been going to like corporates, we've been going to universities, We've been doing a lot of webinars as well, and talking about how to have a hard conversation. How do you deal with what is Islamophobia? What is anti Semitism? How do we counter that? How do we make sure we have those conversations without falling into these tropes. And that's important because many of us, honestly, this expectation that everyone knows what is what is ridiculous.
We have hard questions to ask and I enjoy doing, for example, the Islamophobia training because I realized so many people go like, part of the discussion is people going so if I say this, so if I think that, but what about this idea? And you have an honest and transparent discussion and those you know, the teams, that intervention teams that Maos is talking about. That's what we're doing is going around saying we want to help instead of fighting and arguing and all of that, please invite us.
We can support you, We can be there for you in those kind of situations, and we have people who are the best at doing that. It's not fortunately, it's not just mouths and eye because that's not enough. There are others who are doing incredible work with us and incredible theams.
So tell me what you guys are doing right now then.
So now, after envisioning the future and sharing the dream of peace between the river and the sea and reaching a common ground and shared values, we are broadening our coalition. Now this is the third step, is to broad out coalition. So we walk on the ground between the river and the sea, and we are also being supported and reached. We are reaching out to international community like would lead there, like pop puances, but we are reaching out too many
more to broad out coalition of the future. This is what we are do talking about about a better future. And we have a world map, a blueprint, a plan how to reach this future, and we put some milestones. There are some milestones that we are going to. First
milestone is amplifier voices. Amplify our voices, share our tato, share this podcast, share our meeting, and the only ad with the Pope, so people, more and more people throughout the world will know that there are more and more people that believe that peace between the river and disease possible. And the second milestone is to build legitimacy to the priest process and to ask as reason myself to but also to our coalition members, build legitimacy as the leaders
of the future. And in order to also do that on the ground, we are doing in Israel the biggest piece event that was held in two decades. We oriented the biggest indoor arena in Tel Aviv, and on July first, we're gonna do event that is going to be branded It's about time. It's about time to make peaces. It's a people processed But we are also being supported and protected by some of the most influential people in the world.
And we're walking simultaneously in Palestine and in Israel, and we still Chrohnaze between us and in order if you won't wish and are ready to help and join us, join one of the organizations we mentioned before. We do so many webinars, we do so much walk on the ground and online, So join us and also and support us.
And I'll add only a couple of things. I agree obviously, every thing in the amplifying our voices. We are working and having short videos that will be released, some of them starting next month, of voices like oz and mine, and we need people to share those. We need people to amplify those to make sure they get to everybody. We're not just saying share my voice and US's voice. We want to make sure people know it's not just
the two of us. So please do that, and to do that, follow us, and we will keep you posted on it. I would say, invite us to invite your community and do a webinar with some of the people we mentioned. We have this one person who reached out to us a couple of months ago and she said, look, I don't have a lot of money to donate, I don't have a lot of things I can do, but
can I organize a webinar? And you know, I'll help you with the donation to do that, but I'm going to invite twenty of my friends, and those twenty that attended ended up, each one of them inviting their own friends. And this one person, starting with the twenty fifteen twenty people, is now reaching potentially hundreds of people, and who knows how many more because she took that initiative, and really
just people being willing to take an initiative. Our work is heavily focused on making our voices heard and educational and if we can everyone can help with that. And I think maybe maybe I'll just add one more thing. We both are travel entrepreneurs, right. We both want to invite people, which I know now maybe is a bit harder, although we are doing a couple of trips a year to just still bring people and listen to us. I found this poem and I want to read it and
Noma as if you heard it before. It's by something I'll class them, and it's about traveling, and I like it because it's it speaks kind of our story, but I think it speaks to everyone, and it says that they am killed.
My killer.
Rifling through my pockets will find travel tickets, one to peace, one to fields and the rain, and one to the conscience of a humankind. I beg you, my dear killer, don't ignore them, don't waste such a thing, but take and use the tickets.
Please.
I beg you to go traveling. And I love this ticket with this poem because Like I said, we both are travel entrepreneur. We're all about traveling, but the traveling. We want to encourage everyone who listening to us, regardless where they come from, even the killers of our loved ones, to travel like somethingle clossoms say, to travel to peace, to travel to the consciousness of a humankind, to travel to do something good and change even the meaning of what travel is.
Thank you both so much and together, let's keep amplifying the message as is.
You took my word the way. I just want to tell you that I love you.
I love you too, man, it's all I'm always happy when I see your face.
Thank you, bud It.
That was Aziz Abusa and Mao Zion, two extraordinary men. There are lots of opinions on the conflict in the Middle East, and there's no shortage of really tough and angry feelings. But to me, this feels like the mature conversation that needs to be had.
Now.
You may be surprised that I just did an episode on the Middle East conflict and didn't propose any.
Particular political solution. That is on purpose.
The Middle East has a particularly complex relationship, and this is evidenced by a fact that we've all seen that you can reach in and pull out many paths, many narratives from the history as far as what should happen next. Many of you will have opinions, conflicting strong opinions, and some of you will write to me and tell me that I'm blind, and that you know which side is
right and the other is wrong. I'll receive the arguments on both sides of this, and you know what, You're right, whatever your.
Opinion, You're all correct. There have been lousy, murderous, vengeful decisions on all sides of this. But the fact is we have human beings on all sides of this, and almost all of them are people who care about their families, who want to be with their friends and the sun and laugh, people who have dreams and hopes, and they
want to contribute and they want to play. And the reason I'm less interested in the emails from all sides telling me I'm wrong is because there's only one thing that matters, and that is where we go from here. Can we build a better future or not.
Some people on the extremes of both sides envision that the optimal future is the murder the total erature of the other side, and that's easy enough to come to that conclusion if your prefrontal circuitry is so suppressed that you see the people on the other side like objects, not worthy of all the consideration that we give other human beings.
But people like.
Azis and Maos are operating at a higher level.
Political solutions will come out eventually, but meaningful solutions are only going to come from people who start with a position of common humanity. It hurts, there's so much pain on both sides, but we have to find our way to this position of bravery if we ever hope to
get out of this mess. Maos and Azis are excellent examples of the height to which we all need to up level our dialogue if we want to work through tough problems as twenty first century citizens, because you cannot get to a solution if you are two people shouting each other from opposite sides of the negotiating table. Instead, the only way to get somewhere is to scoot your chairs around so that you're sitting with one another, both facing the problem.
So while it's felt that much of the world.
Is interested in separating people into binary categories, today's episode is about.
Asking the question of how we can expand our very limited internal models.
To take into account what we have in common, to expand our notion of in groups just a little bit so that we can actually simulate the emotions of the other person. And for those of us at a distance from the Middle East, how can we support two sides seeking threads between them which they can develop through hard work into bonds of friendship and eventually love, cranking up each other's prefrontal cortices so they can be seen once again as people with similar desires and a shared story.
Go to eagleman dot com slash podcast for more information. In case you're moved by what you heard from Azis and Moos, I'm posting several links for ways that you can throw your weight into their momentum. Please send me an email at podcast at eagleman dot com with questions or thoughts or ideas to help, and check out and subscribe to Inner Cosmos on YouTube for videos of each episode and to leave comments.
Until next time. I'm David Eagleman, and this is Inner Cosmos.