Richard Katz || Honoring the Wisdom of Indigenous Peoples

Doctor Katz received his PhD from Harvard University and taught there for twenty years. The author of several books, he has spent time over the past fifty years living and working with indigenous pupils in Africa, India, the Pacific, and the Americas. He's Professor Emeritus at the First Nation's University of Canada and an adjunct Professor of Psychology at the University of Scotsklan. Oh my god, how you pronounce that?

He lives in Saskatoon, sask a lot one? Okay, Now tell me how to pronounce it Skatchewan Saskatchewan satan and it means gently flowing river. Well, look, you're going to teach me and our listeners a lot today about indigenous populations and lots of nuggets just like that. You know how to properly pronounce lots of things, because as I'm reading your book, I come across a lot of things. I noted to myself, there's no way in the world

I'm going to be able to pronounce that correctly. So, yeah, you know, it's an interesting point, a Scott because part of what I've discovered in the various years that I've worked in indigenous cultures. It's very helpful to make the effort, eh, just as you are to pronounce the word, and people are very generous in terms of mispronunciations if you try. It's when you assume that the word is not worth even learning that they kind of feel, hey, what's this guy?

You know? If he hasn't if he can't respect the fact that we have certain words, why talk to them. So it's good that you try. And when you make mistakes. I've made mistakes in different parts of the world, people have fun laughing at your mistakes. It's part of the idea of how to work with people who are different from ourselves. That's the key. I love that and that's very clear that that theme runs through your whole book, that general spirit. Now, let's go all the way back.

Let's go in one fifty years back in time for second two even you know, we're going to get to your Harvard years because they're fascinating and the people that you ran into and I mean it's a legendary story, you know. But before that, you know what really got you interested in this topic, Like when you were in high school, for instance, did you have like a disposition toward acceptance and sort of understanding people who are different

than you. Well, this fascinating question. See the book started out Scott was going to start with the years even before high school, and I decided, well, I got to cut something out, so I cut off that material. But it's a very important question because how do we start to connect to a world that's so different from the one that we were raised in. And for me, as I look back when I was a little guy, you know, I can't say how old, but when I was a little guy, I experienced what I think a lot of

young kids experience was is flying. And I used to fly around the house and going through the doorways and banking my arms and so forth. I think a lot of kids have that experience, but they don't talk about it, and I, of course didn't talk about it because who was I going to talk to about So that was something that I can't say that I built on that experience, But when I look back on it, I realized that that was part of what it meant for me in

growing up. And then the other part, Scott, was I always felt a little bit on the outside, or maybe even a lot of on the outside, and having that experience of being on the outside, you look at things and you see the limitations of the world that you're living in now as a four and five and six and seven year old and so forth, And it's not very sophisticated, but it's a notion that there is another way of being. And you know, Scott, that's the key,

another way of being. Now. See we're talking and your people will not realize, but I'm looking into your apartment. Now. Your apartment is so different from mine. It's a very good way of living, and so's mind. But I see, and you can see you know if you were here that were in different worlds, and the whole point of knowing that there are different ways of being is so

importan but only known through experience. See when I first went to the Kalahari in nineteen sixty eight, I had never been to another part of the world in the same way. And when I went there in nineteen sixty eight to the Kalahari and saw the healing dance, Scott, I tell you I had never seen anything like that before. As you know from the book, I had experience with psychedelics Leary and Albert, that's part of my own training. But it was different. And the difference was we weren't

taking drugs in the Kalahari. People were just experiencing through the healing dance. A different world. And I used to think that, gee, maybe it wasn't fair that I had that psychedelic experience before I went there, because was it coloring what I was looking for? And I realized, no, it wasn't coloring what I was seeing. It allowed me to see what was happening. That's the difference, you know. Again, I said, was I kind of prejudging things? Oh, it's

all psychedelic, all that kind of stuff. No, my psychedelic experience allowed me to see that what was happening with changes and consciousness and spirituality was real, and so it was a gift. The psychedelics was a gift, even though I didn't pursue that as a life's work. Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, let's go back to nineteen sixty eight. Were

you at Harvard during that period? Yeah, See, I got my doctorate in sixty five, and that's when I had worked I'd worked with Ericson, and I'd worked with Murray and to some extent with Skinner was around in that time, and that was a revolution, that Skinner stuff. And you know, we were talking, you and I about Maslow. Maslow was

also very fascinated in his early years with behaviorism. So in nineteen sixty five I got my degree, and in nineteen sixty six or so or sixty seven, I was doing a postdoc and this guy, Richard Lee, was a friend of mine, walked up to me in the hall way literally and said, you know, I interested, You're interested in the psychedelic stuff, these states of consciences. Would you be interested in working with us, with a group of people that do this without drugs. You can imagine how

exciting that possiblity was. And then it turned out that there was some a need you see, we have to be very clear that we're not going to a place to satisfy our excitement, the wet our enthusiasm. There has to be a reason why you go to these other places. And it turned out that bushman people or Junpot people were being overrun by other forces of capitalism and trying

to kind of take away their lands. So my going there and talking about their healing dance enables them to speak with power to the people who are trying to see them as primitive. See in the sixties, that's where it was indigenous people are primitive. Can you define indigenous well? To me, yeah, it's a very important term because indigenous can mean like, for example, palm trees would be indigenous

to let's say warm climates. Indigenous to me means the first people to settle in their various parts of the world. Not see for example, Western psychology is indigenous to North America. That's not how I'm using the term. It's the first people to settle in different parts of the world, and all over the world they are indigenous people, all of them. Like for example, in India, we think of that in the hills and in India they're indigenous people we hardly

hear about them in Japan. They're indigenous people, particularly up north. So all over the world there are people who settled the land and the first settlers of the land. Yeah, thank you for defining that. So were you a postdoc at Harvard as well? I also did a postdoc, you know. Yeah, So, you know, your connection to Abraham Asol is very very interesting. You know, you came back from this visiting that community and the healing dance, and you showed him a video

or he showed him slides. Sorry, this is the sixties. Thea show him slides of the healing dance and what was his reaction? Yeah, it's a very wonderful lace. We'll talk a little bit about Abe right as well. Yeah. I think that was because he used to have Abe used to have these like Suarez, intellectual Suarez and the one that I wanted to talk about, which I do talk about in the book. Stan Groff was there as well.

Stan had just come over and was working down a spring growth and Stan made a little presentation of his work, and then I started to make a presentation of some of the things I had discovered and found in the Kalahari and the healing dance, and the healing dance which is described of the book is very powerful but also intensely physical experience. And many parts of the world, the spiritual trips or the spiritual journeys are physical. There's fasting,

there's sweating, there's working hard and so forth. And among the kalahar Asian Kosi, there's very it's a hard, hard dancing, hard breathing and sweating, and it's hard work. And I remember Abe, you know, he was kind of impressed. But the first comment he met is ge, they sweat a lot, and by that he meant it was a lower form for Abe, it was a lower form of consciousness transformation than he was used to, and he was writing about it was very significant to me that that was his response.

It was not dismissive, but it was placing that particular indigenous way at a lower level. And you know, in his hierarchy of needs at the bottom, our needs like survival needs, you know, food, shelter, and so that's where many indigenous people start in their journey to the spiritual things. If you're fasting, you're thinking about survival needs, you're hung you're tired, and oftentimes that's just the time, the sweat

lodge the same thing. You're hot, you're sweating. It's like demanding physically, and that's what releases the spiritual because from an indigenous point it's all connected. For Abe, you had to go through the physical to get to the real stuff. And from an Indigenous point of view, the physical is as real as the mental and the spiritual. Abe never

understood that. Yeah, well he did in the latter part of his life, you know, his revision that many people aren't aware of by putting transcendence at the top of a hierarchy. You know, it's kind of returned to the experiential aspect of human nature. He was very much into that peak experiences are very experiential, and he spent time. We really should should mention this because I know some indigenous populations are not so happy that he didn't talk

more about his own experience visiting the Blackfeet Nation. Is that correct? Blackfoot to nation? It's the Blackfeet peoples, I guess. Yeah. Yeah, So in the thirties and he spent some time there. He was very interested in anthropology, and he looked up to Margaret Meade and Benedict Ruth. Benedict you know, very much,

very much. So he had some influence there, and I was wondering, how much do you think that influence, you know, came back around again, so to speak, in the last couple of years of the life, once he got more into Eastern philosophy and Buddhism and Taoism, things like that. Yeah. Let me just say in the book, I write quite a bit about Abe, and I think I mentioned in incidentally to all the people who are listening. When you pick up a book, always read the footnotes. You a

lot of footnotes. By the way, every page of a foot the four footnotes is the personal things that you really care about, but you're not sure a lot of people will care, but you care about I find your footnote. It's very juicy. Yeah, exactly. That's kind of recommend that people. So the thing is that with Abe is that he had a great disadvantage. He grew up in an urban environment disconnected from land. And one of the things about indigenous peoples is it's a land based spirituality. Nature is

the teacher. So Abe had kind of like already a kind of a block. And then during the times that he went he went to the success a nation Indigenous people were looked upon even by people like Ruth Benedict and Margaret Meade as somewhat primitive, others very primitive. So Abe kind of like he took a risk to go there, but very influenced by Benedict and saw some very powerful things which he writes about. Remember I mentioned this to you, I Scott in this He's got a couple of papers

that I've seen in his journals as well. Yes, good, Yes, And he's written a couple of papers on that. You know, his idea of humans as more of a blank as not a blank slate, but as having an innate human nature. He said, was influenced to buy that visit. He actually went into it more into a sociological perspective on things, and came out of it saying, you know what, we are all kind of similar deep down. Yeah. Yeah, I mean they had that whole thing of you know, human

beings are you know, share these kind of similarities. But I think we have to understand what he went there. It was during the period when indigenous people were not highly respected. They were kind of seen as a curiosity and so forth, and Abe had to kind of work under that general zeitgeist that was going on at the time, so it was very good that he went there. Actually there were not many people. Now contrast that with Erickson, who also went to the Yurrok people and to Pine

Ridge Lacota people. But Ericson, remember in Childhood and Society wrote about it, and that was between Abe and Ericson. Abe never wrote about it in a central way, but he carried that with him. But what I'm saying is like Abe also as a person, and this is very important, who are we as people? Abe was an intellectual. He was a man of the mind. He was not physical in any way. I'm kind of a physical guy. I love athletics, I love to run, you know. Abe was

just the opposite. He was a book person. His body he didn't know his body, and when working with Indigenous people, the body is very important. So Abe had the disadvantage of living in a time when Indigenous people were thought of as primitive. Abe had the disadvantage and living in a land based environment where the elements are well, yeah they you are in New York, right, And he had the disadvantage of being a mind person living in his mind.

In spite of that, he saw things in spite of that, you see, he was very perceptive and it sounded like he was a friend of yours. I mean, he was very encouraging him. So he was a dear friend who was very generous. I'll mention this though, and again I want people to know I had a lot of respect for him and I loved him, and so when I say things that sound critical, it's not to put him down.

It's to give some reality based. Abe was very much a guy who said the world was good guys and bad guys, and the good guys were the ones that were more humanistically. And he saw the people who were narrow minded and who were talking about humans as genes as the bad guys, and he was willing to fight them like Skinner. Yeah, yeah, he was to fight them. And I can say this. When he was there at Brandeis, he got the I think three or four job office just by picking up the phone that you should hire

this guy. That was the influence he had. Very generous. But also he was a guy that was a fighter, and if you didn't agree with him, he would fight you. There story that I could tell you see a believed in the goodness of human nature. And I write about this in the book. He said, bring together good minded, well minded, you know, like minded people who wanted to work together, and whatever their disciplinary background was, you could

come up with something beautiful. So you had a behaviorist, you had an animal psychologist, you had a humanistic psychologist, a cognitive bring them together and will have this beautiful department. You know what happened. He brought them together, Yes, and you know you're there, and they took over the department. They did. Yes, And this is how I met you through Jim Fatimin you know, who was there as well, and said that you and Jim were kind of the

troublemakers of the department. Yeah. Abe, see we were there. We overlapped Abe and I overlapped a year. And then when Abe left, Jim took over Abe's position, you see, Yes, yes, in California. Yes. So the thing is that Abe's idea of good people even though they come from different backgrounds didn't work because what happened was the behaviorists and the people they were the ones that came to the meetings and took over the department and forced out the humanistic element.

So there was some kind of disappointing experiences for Abe. You know, when he met the reality. But his connection with indigenous people I think is a fascinating part of his work. And you see, like for example, Abe was you could say, was imbalanced the mind. And one of the teachings that I talk about in the book is the importance of the circle and the medicine wheel, in which all parts mental, physical, emotional, spiritual have to be balanced.

And that was something that Abe was not really aware of because he was an intellectual. He was aware of that in theory, in theory and in practice. Like I say, you know, I love him dearly, but like I say, he didn't connect to his body. That was not part of the deal. The deal was in his mind and his philosophy and his his reaching out. And for example, you know that you know that as well. He really wanted to talk to Aristotle and Plato, I know, and

what a beautiful idea. But you see, that's skipping over Blackout and Lamed, you know, all those other people's cultures. He would have had a wonderful time if he could or relaxed, you see, and been with him. That's what I was doing, you know, Scott. I spent hours and days and months in different cultural settings, having very little idea what people were saying because they were speaking in a language just patiently waiting and waiting and waiting, and

the experiences of indigenous teachings are hardly ever verbal. Yes, no, I know, and I think that that comes through a lot in your book about how the modern day psychology has an oppression of this verbal sort of experimental paradigm, and you make that very clear in your book. I don't mean to, and we're going to get to that

in this podcast. I want to kind of close the chapter on this Maso thread because I think it is so important, and you're one of the very rare individuals on this planet who can still speak to this, so I hope you don't mind if I belabor it just

a little bit more. I want to give some credit here to Ryan Heavyhead and Marquise Blood heavy Hand and Narquise Blood who have done this analysis of Blackfoot culture and point out the difference between their conception of actualization and Maslow's notion of self actualation, which in my reading was not taken. It was adapted from his advisor Kurt

Goldstein or his mentor Kurt Goldstein. He adopted it, and Kurt Goldstein had the phrase self actualization, which was about his patients from that brain trauma and the amazing ability for people with brain trauma to reorganize and still have capacities. But I thought you could talk a little about what is the Blackfoot culture's notion of actualization? How does it differ? Yeah, this is a very important and I was just looking over my book. You know you had this experience, Hey Scott.

Once you write a book, it's almost like you forget what you wrote. It's out. So I had to kind of go back this morning and read what did I write about this? And the thing is that those two guys that you mentioned, I'm glad you did, Ryan Heavyhead and Narcisa. Also it is Head is okay. Trying to do is to sort of say, yeah, Maslow is great,

but he didn't quite get it right. And what they're trying to say is that their notion of self actualization from a Blackfoot point of view, is self actualization in community the whole. Like, for example, you go up on a vision quest, You're going up on the vision quest as an individual. You come back and tell your story, but the story is then interpreted. How do you fit into your community? And how can you serve your community, you see. So self actualization is serving a community in

the way that's best. And what Abe I think was doing was self actualistion was a little more individualistic. So I think that's one of the ways in which they were feeling that his notion of self actualization had to

be sort of more community based. Another thing I think that they point out, and I think was differences that and certainly in his early work, Abe had this notion, you know, just that that one percent, you know that gets the growing tip, the growing tip exactly, And from an Indigenous point of view, the teaching is that each of us is open to the spark of the creator, each of us. There's not like a kind of a winnowing out and a kind of as you say, that's

a nice way and some the growing tip. I like that. Did he ever talk about that? Yes, yes, he used that phrase. Beautiful. I'm glad you brought that. Yes, because that changes from me elite to being explorers. Yes, yes, okay, But from an Indigenous point of view, we all are part of that transcendence. And when you go into a sweat lodge, for example, everybody is open to the creator,

to the spirits that come in. So I think that's the second part that and then a third thing is and I'm not sure how much Abe understood this about highierarchy, Okay, because you remember he did work with Harlow on dominance. And I just want to mention one thing about Abe that's very important. Abe saw himself always as a research, experimental guy. Data. He was data driven, and a lot of people think he was just coming up with these things, you know, through his own musings. No, he was committed

to research. And people don't appreciate They may disagree with the way he did research, but they don't give him enough credit for being very committed to an empirical approach. And he got that, I think from his work with Harlow, you know, and his work with the dominance. So I think that, you know, he's a very kind of complicated, very complicated guy, and he was a trailblazer. I think I mentioned to you a Scott that when he was elected president of APA, which is a great honored what

he said to me was he was nervous. You know why he was nervous. He was nervous because he was not sure they would consider him a psychologist. Yes, do you know what I was told dismissively. Yes, he was very insecure, And I was told by Michael Murphy of Esselyn Institute. He told me that they told him that when he was elected president, the prior president came up to him and said, congratulations on being the first philosopher elected president of APA. That must have hurt, that must

have stunned it heard him. You see, like I say, you have to be nervous when you give your presidential address. He was very like, as I say, deeply anxious, not just nervous about giving a talk, but existentially because you know, you spend your whole life trying to be a psychologist and change the field and so what, and then to stand up in front of all these psychologists fearing that they will think you're basically a fraud. That's what he felt.

And that was very troubling. And you know something, some people did think he was a fraud. Yeah, And calling him a philosopher was a kind way of saying some of them thought he was just a bs N. Seriously just coming up with a lot of really great He had a lot of great insights that hold up today.

I've been I have a paper coming out tomorrow. Actually internal humanistic psychology, where I test the characteristics of self actualizing people, and I found ten of his characteristics I'm really hold up quite well can be measured reliably and solidly. So you know, he had a lot of He was ahead of his time in a lot of ways. You know what I'm saying, Scott is his commitment to empiricism

is always overlooked. The reason is, for example, in his articles, he'll have let's say fifteen characteristics of self actualize and people say, well, wait a minute. You see mainstream western psychology wants to have three, yes, maybe four twenty Noe was saying, is these are things that exist. You see. The whole point of my book is like, let's get away from this notion that mainstream psychology has given us that we have to have the fewer the better, we

have to have discrete, dichotomous variables. Life is not that way. And indigenous perspective, what they talk about is the flow and the process and how boundaries evaporate. Hey, Scott bound the boundaries and the most important thing is the mystery remains. And Abe knew that. Yes, the mystery is a great point you make in your book and Abe really was interested in all that and the mysterious towards the end of his life. It really does seem like it came

full circle there at the end. You know, this might be considered one of the definitive podcasts in kind of tackling this controversy. So I wanted to just really get the core of this. Some people think that it's possible that he maybe stole from the reserve. My own personal opinion, and then I would like to get your opinion, because I've really thought of this through very carefully and read all of his work, is that he's not the type

of person who would steal or take credit. He was very generous in giving out his many mentors that he had and crediting them, you know, such as Ruth Benedict and Harry Harlowe as you say, and Alfred Adler, et cetera. He was very generous in giving credit. And that in my reading is that, you know, if anything he's at fault is not maybe mentioning that visit more or bringing in more indigenous psychology into his work, especially when he was coming up with a self transcendence. But my reading

is that it's probably unfair. I would say strongly it is unfair to say that his whole theory was somehow stolen from that population, because I can see the seeds of many aspects of this theory from his other mentors. So that's my own reading, and I'd love to hear what you think. I think you're right on, Scott. Let me let me see if I can your providers. M

Aslo is dead and he can't speak to this. So I think we should be as honest and as i as possible in if people, you know, I would hate you know, to die some days and someone say I stole something you know that I didn't do right. So yeah, yeah, let me just see if I can, because this is really important, and you're actually right if you talk to the people out there. My impression is, hey, let's get

rid of that guy who stole our ideas. No. No, my impression is, how come he didn't acknowledge more what he learned and he didn't get the full story. That's totally different and steal that's a different thing. Steal the ideas. If he stole the ideas, No, the ideas came actually from other people, whether Goldstein or you know or the Gestalt. No, I totally agree with an Abe. You know, that's not who he was. He was not someone who tried to rip people off, and you know something he had been

ripped off himself enough, Yeah, especially as a child. Yeah, okay, So I think what it was was so much that again the historical period, I think Abe and I didn't talk to Abe about this, but I knew him well. I think what he must have felt was that talking about that as a source of knowledge was really at that time so far from people's understanding that he felt it might lessen the impact of what he was talking about, you understand, yes, and so he held it in reserve.

But no, I don't think he stole that, and he wasn't. You know, he may have been naive, he may have been arrogant, right, say that he was, but he's not a guy that steals people's ideas. No, that's my impression. And it's great to get confirmation from someone who actually intersected his existence with Meso's existence. But you see, from an indigenous point of view, yes, we have to be very clear. Some people there will feel that that it

was stolen, and that a very I have to honor that. Yes, that's a feeling that they have and as has to be honored. I'm just talking about Abe, yes, you see, yes, And well I'm also interested in the truth, you know, and I think, yeah, that's a hard one. No, not not that it doesn't exist, but you see, we have to acknowledge that there could be multiple points of view.

And now I'm not doing a whole Trump thing, you know, but from the point of view of some of the people who are living there or maybe whose relatives or you know, grandparents talk to Abe, they might have a different view. But I'm talking about I'm going from Abe into the Blackfoot territory, not from the Blackfoot territory towards Aid, understand.

So it's very clear that other people might differ. And I think if you read the material from Heavyhead and so forth, I don't think it's an angry reading, you know, I don't there's this other aspectatic Twitter exchange that I sent you or it seemed angry, and oh yeah, I think that was unfortunate. I can very very much sympathize with the point that he could have brought it. But the same point could be made to anyone any living

psychologists today. Right, It's not I mean, to point the finger at Abe seems unfair, considering you could point it out a whole field of psychology. I mean, it's not like anyone else, any of the other mainstream psychologists at the time we're bringing in that. Do you see what I'm saying? Absolutely? And there are some people who've documented the incredible amount of influence Indigenous thinking has had on psychology that has been unacknowledged. So let's talk about that

for the rest of this podcast. I think yes, I mean, like there are teachings that occur in terms of whether we balance questions of balance, questions of spirituality. A lot of people don't acknowledge their sources. A lot of people, And you're right about Abe. He was careful, Like take, for example, the notion of synergy. Well, I've written about synergy, and the book talks about synergy. Abe was very careful

to talk about Ruth benardet. Yes, yes, And I'm very careful to talk about Ruth Benedict and Abe, and of course buck Minster Fuller, who started the whole thing, and who knows before buckmans you know, no ideas are our own, yes, And any psychologists you see like positive psychology, what do you think of positive psychology. I noticed that you didn't mention positive psychology at all in your book. I mentioned it, but in a fairly negative way. No, I didn't. I

must have missed it. That what positive psychology has done, Scott is to ignore ABE. I couldn't agree with that more. But I wouldn't say positive psychology has ignored ABE. I would say Martin Seligman, who is the founder of the field, has dismissed ABE. You know the founding of the field. But I know a lot of positive psychologists who may be in part due to the fact I can't stop talking about ABE to them, has acknowledged in their work

the huge debt. I'll give a specific example. Ken Sheldon has done really good work on trying to test some humanistic theories from Carl Rodgers and others, and has said how he's deeply influenced by maso self determination theory. Individuals DC and Ryan talk about their debt to the humanistic theories.

But I do share your frustration for certain aspects, is particularly the founding of the field and how it was founded as in a way that was pitted against a humanistic psychology or just dismissive of oh that was just the spiritual, you know, like non scientific field. Yeah, I do share that frustration nowadays with narrative research and narrative psychology is right smack in the middle of that whole

again empirical yeah wave. And to think of to dismiss abe as non scientific, that's the worst because that's what he faced when he wasracticing you're not a scientist, So to bring that up again, that's not right. But the whole notion, for example, from an indigenous point of view, and talking again about the book, one of the teachings is that we don't own knowledge. We share it. And one of the teachings is unless you share knowledge, it dies, you see, So none of it's original, Scott, what could

be original? It's already been said. We repackaged, we restate, we try to bring more relevance, but we don't create. We don't invent ideas, and from an indigenous point of view, we don't invent them because part of the task is to listen to the teachings that have come over the generations. The good elder will say, I'm only telling you what I was told. They won't say to you, I'm telling

you what I discovered. You understand now when they say I'm only telling you what I was told, they have proven it in their own lives, Like an elder will say to you, and this is what I mentioned in the book. Here's the story. If it makes sense to you, good. If it doesn't, don't take it. Test it out. You see, But it's not original knowledge. It's a story. Where does the story come from? The old people? You see, the old people? There is nothing new, Like when indigenous people talk,

did the sun ever rise in the west? No, So when you say look at the sun rising, yeah, people have done that for thousands and thousands of years. So Western psychology is very much into kind of like I've got a new theory. I've got a new thing, and you look at it. It's the same old stuff with a different label, and that's good. You also criticize measurement in a sense like the measurement of intelligence. Can you

tell me a little bit about that criticism? Well, look at that stems back to your Harvard days, and yeah, look at it this way I was with, I'll tell you a story about you know Howard Gardner? I do, yes, yes, seven intelligences. Okay, So Howard comes up to me before he really hit it big. You know, I've got this theory of intelligences. What do you think of it? So I showed me his draft. Oh looks good, I said, but what about I think you've left something out? I

think is how I said it. What do you mean what about spiritual intelligence? Oh? Yeah, yeah, but no, no, I can't do that because we can't measure it. And what I said to him is the fact that you can't measure it doesn't mean you don't mention it. But the preoccupation Like Carol Gilligan, she was another colleague of mine,

wonderful I love her right and wonderful person. Her theory took off when she developed some scales to measure the attitudes and the perceptions that she was studying and in stories. When she had a scale, it took off all of a sudden, so mainstream in psychology. Basically, you know, if

you can't measure it doesn't exist. And the thing that's really most perverse is if we can't measure it, it's only because we haven't developed the measures that are sophisticated enough, and eventually we will, right, So the notion of the mystery remains, which is a key part of the indigenous approach for the mainstream Western psychologists primarily, not all, but primarily is the mystery remains because we're not yet there

with a sophisticated method to find out what it is. Yes, that point is very well taken, but you do admit that measurement is a cornerstone of the scientific method. I mean to stay by measurement as Scott you see, Like, for example, if I tell you a story, a life story or a story from an Indigenous point of view, that's ultimate data. It doesn't need to be analyzed, it doesn't need to be questioned data. Now, I'm not suggesting that that's how science and psychology should proceed, but it

has to be respected. That's one form. See, I see multiple forms of research in science. Yeah, I know, I see what you're saying that there's certainly a tension there between that sort of narrative approach and you know, measurement needs to be generalizable, replicable, right, it has to have validity. Yeah, and you're saying those criteria do not apply to the indigenous population. And there are certain aspects of it, Okay,

certain aspects. I think it would be a mistake to say from an indigenous point of view, all we care about is stories. But what I'm trying to say is that different modes of scientific work and scientific process, one of which is stories that tell the truth about a person's life. And there's another part of doing science, which is an experimental paradigm, control groups, experimental groups and so and why not have multiple paths towards as you mentioned before,

the truth? Yeah, yeah, but respecting that there are multiple paths, and from an indigenous point of view, one of the paths that people really value is the story that one tells. You see, Yeah, I could see a skeptic saying that one can recognize the value of it without calling it science, Like science is a very specific meaning. How would you respond to someone and saying I mean, you see, but Scott, this is I mean, this is a great interview. Where where have you been all these years? But you see,

that's exactly the point. The word science has been co opted to refer to a particular set of you know, aparticular methodology in a particular set of and it's a power word. Validity, objectivity, reliability, These are power words. And what I'm saying is that if we keep science in that more narrowly I would call Western positivistic paradigm. We are taking all those power words and when we think of other ways of knowing, other ways of knowing. And one of the chapters in the book that's on the

research is called ways of knowing. And when I think of ways of knowing, then I don't think of science. I think of ways of knowing, one of which is the Western scientific method. Another is the narrative storytelling method. Another is the purely experiential method, in which you don't even you can't even say what happened. You see ways of knowing, and do you put them all within the rubric of the scientific method. Absolutely absolutely, Scott. That's where

you have an understanding of multiple worlds. Remember we started out when you were little what happened? Well, when I was little, I saw that the world I was in was not the only world. Now here's the hard part, Scott. Okay, do you believe who's doing the inner you? Right? But you believe, as some people do, that if we get more and more understanding, eventually we'll see. There's only one way I have to say to you. I'm not sure. Yes, I mean, you say something that really stuck with me.

You say there is no one way, only right ways. That's right, and I mean that stuck with me that phrase. And maybe it's also a guide for how to live your life. You know, you know what empathy means. I'm not good. See I've lived a lot of years and I still you look so young. Still, it's amazing. Listen, he met Maslho and Eric Erickson and you look like you're ready to go party. I have no party. I'm ready to go running. Yeah, I mean, it's incredible. Okay, listen, Scott.

The thing is that if you are willing to see the validity you see. The other thing is I respect what others are doing. Like, for example, guys like Richie Davidson. You know, yes, he's like right into that heavy duty scientific method. You know, great, because he's doing it with some sensitivity, you know, So why not different? And let me tell you something else. Okay. So Danny Muskler, the guy I work with, I'd write about this in the book. When he was growing up, his grandma said to him,

sit on this stump here and observe the gophers. We have gophers up here, you know, little things or and their gopher colonies and he would spend hours observing the key to any scientific method observation. See, so there are ways in which there are shared processes. I'm going to have to push back against that a second and see what you think about this, because can't observe individual observations

be wrong? Like so you know, let's say, giving a specific example, like there are people that say they experience God or that experience certain aspects of the universe that physicists then say, well, we've tested that and there's no evidence that that's true. Are you saying you would put both in the same level of certainty of probability of truth. I'd like to have I'd like to have them both in the room together and we'll all connect. Hey, different

ways of knowing, different ways of knowing. I'm not into I'm not into giving. Hey, I guess I would say, Scott, I'm not into a hierarchy of value. It's like pain. You know, some people say, hey, how could that person feel pain? They've got all the money in the world they need, They've got, you know, a great job. You know something pain hurts, Scott, you lose a child, you're a millionaire. You don't think it hurts you. See so I'm not into kind of saying one is better than

the other. Bring him in the room together, you see, Bring him in the room together, and that just enriches things. The notion of synergy I talk about is multiple ways of looking at things coming together in unexp afected ways to create a whole that's greater than some of the parts. That's beautiful. It's beautiful. And you know the other thing, Scott is you see the whole context of what we're talking about has to be seen within historical power structure.

At this point in time, May Scott, Indigenous people are being overturned, overrun, overpowered, and like even for example, and the whole genome thing, the genetic material is being robbed and they call biopiracy for them drug companies. I thought you're going to mention the Democrat Elizabeth Lauren. Oh, I don't want to get into that. Ya so ridiculous thing. But you see what's happening is they want to get isolate. They want to get genetic material that has not been contaminated. Yeah,

that mean isolated? What does that mean Indigenous? You see, so the whole political context and the scientific IQ testing, Scott, Indigenous people systematically score lower. Getting back to the IQ why IQ test is totally culturally biased, and getting back to the Howard Gardener thing. We don't measure spirituality because we don't talk about because we can't measure it with the measurements that are in Western psychology, you see. But if you don't use those, why not talk about spirituality?

It's what would I say? I would say to that that the test itself is not biased, but well, in

one sense it is. In one sense it is, and I'm with you in the sense that it is culturally like we are the ones that decided what kind of content, what kind of vocabulary items, what kind of you know, even like the Ravens matrices Jim Flynn has shown, it does have a cultural bias in a sense like if you never grew up looking at these kind of abstract structures, you're not going to know what to do with them as much as if you have a scientific, literate culture.

So I think in that sense you're absolutely correct. But it doesn't mean that that test is meaningless or not measuring some set of skills that are important, and one of the skills it measures is doing well, Yeah, doing well at university and certain like you say, spatial abstract things like when I went to the Carl Harry. You know, I'm a psychologist. I wanted to do a show some pictures, you know, because Murray was one of my mentors and he came up gat So I had some pictures. Now,

Charles Murray, let's be clear, Henry Murray, Henry Murray. A lot of people might know who Henry Murray is. Who's a legend at Harry. Yeah, so I had these pictures, hey, Scott, I showed them. What's the first thing they did. The first thing they did was to turn the picture around to see what was in back, to see the backside of the image. So the whole notion of a picture was not in their world experience. It was if it was a picture of a face, there's got to be

a back to the to the face, you understand. So in a very in a very kind of powerful way, giving a paper and pencil test itself, like I'll give you an example, okay. From an indigenous point of view, the way people are taught often is if you know the answer to something, you don't ask a person a question, or if the person knows the answer, like I wouldn't ask you a Scott, well, what is two plus two?

That's an insult right now, from an indigenous point of view, if you find that someone asks you obvious questions or questions with obvious answers, what happens You become suspicious. So they interviewed people who took the IQ test, and you know, it starts out very easy, and some of the kids, because the questions were so easy, turn off and become suspicious. What's this? Why trying to do trick me up? I know that we all know the answer to that one. That's how I felt on the SAT. That's why I

did so bad on my SAT. Yeah, we're going to go. We're going to go with that reason. Oh gosh, who are having a conversation? Oh for sure. So you're also a psychologist by training, right, Oh that's right. Yeah, that's wonderful. Yeah we don't yell though not Harvard. Yeah. I went to yell too. Oh you did undergraduate. You know I had the best compliment for this book, I wrote. You know what the best compliment was? There was a psychologist.

I've done some work just recently with a thing called RBC where we have people who have mental problems, but are incarcerated. Right. And one of the psychologists over there read the book, and you know, he said, he said, I love the book and particularly the fact that as a psychologist I felt respected. Yeah, that was to me, that was a wonderful compliment, because you see, when you're writing a book like this for men, it's so easy

to make the bad guys. All psychologists are you know, they've done all what they're doing, they're they're worth you know, so forth. And I was trying because one of the teachings I got in the book was respect. Yeah, and that means respect for always right and as you said, always are good, not one way. That means we have to respect multiple ways of going about it, you see. And what you're doing is beautiful because you're pushing back, but you're also joining, Oh sure, which is which is

how we have to do. You know, we don't have to agree, but we have to respect. Yeah. I really like that a lot. You know, Just to wrap up here a second, you know, you talk about what psychologists you know, the way I visit there's actually a very

hopeful message here, right. You're actually saying that there's so much untaped potential among mainstream psychologists, that we could do so much more to increase interconnection, honoring the interconnections that define us, renewing synergies of multiple psychologies, multiple psychologies, right, things of that nature. You're saying that, you're not saying like, it's not just a critique of horrible, bad psychologists, but it's the way the way I read it is, you're saying,

there's so much more the field could be. Yeah, one little story, And because I think that's such an important point. So I was teaching some clinical psychology doctoral students and we had an elder come in, Mary Lee, wonderful woman, and I write about that in the book, and she talks about her traditional counseling and what she does is she emphasizes listening. She says, the kids I work with,

they want to have their story heard. So one of my students, after she left, one of my clinical psychology students said, isn't this kind of like Rogers? I mean, what's the difference, And I said, yeah, it's like Rogers, but there's a big difference. Rogers said listening is one of the components of effective counseling. Mary Lee said, listening is counseling Now now, hey, listen, Scott, you've been trained,

let's say for five years. I don't know what your orientation was, but the students I work with a lot of it, usually CBT or dialectical, you know whatever, big investment in that. And then to be told that the essence of counseling is listening, this is very hard and a little bit threugh. So I said to him, no, no no, don't misunderstand. The essence is listening. But still bring your

skill set. That's the enhancement, right, Bring your CBT training, bring your analytic training, but don't forget the foundation upon which you're all. Your whole work is listening. And that's an Indigenous perspective. Indigenous perspective is never give up what you know. It's to add to it. And I'm so glad you brought that up. Let me one more thing, which is I want people to know that in this book that the royalties author royalties are going back to

the people. So the way of encouraging, I'm trying to encourage people to get to the book because not only I think it's important teachings, but it can help to raise a little money. Because when I give back, let's say, five six hundred dollars to an elder who's living in the Kalahari. You have no idea how much that means. It's an incredible infusion that can help with basic survival kind of tasks. So I just want to what if people want to help even more? Like, let's say I

want to donate. I have this urge after listening to your you talk about your life's work, and I want to donate more money to that. Are there certain websites I can go to, like what can you do? The one thing I would mention a Scott because there's a lot of options, but the one I liked is the Kalahari People's Fund. Okay, I'll put a link to all

this in the show notes. Yeah, Kalahari People's Fund and started in the seventies focusing mainly on the Shuntwasi, but it's basic community development projects like for example, protection of land resources. It's a beautiful thing, Kalahari People's Fund. And from there a Scott one could go in many different directions. Yes, if you could send me a link to that, I'll put in the show notes. Yeah. Yeah, Look, Dick, I just want to say thank can I call you, Dick. Absolutely, okay,

thank you so much. I mean, I usually I just thank my guests, you know, thank you for being the show. But I feel like for you, just thank you for like your your existence, you know, you know, fifty years and showing and shining a spotlight on a very under well what would you say they're under? What population? Underappreciated, underappreciated, misunderstood, underappreciated under And yeah, so listen, I'll tell you too.

It's a real pleasure on this. This is fantastic and I wish can I get a podcast of this too? How do I do that? I want to I want to hear absolutely when I published this, I'll send you the link. Conversation we're having is great. Yeah, it's ready. I will absolutely send you the links out. Thanks again, Dick. Okay, take good care you too. Yeah, see you. Thanks for listening to the Psychology Podcast. I hope you enjoyed this episode.

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