Nature vs Nurture
My appearance on the Good Fight podcast with Yascha Mounk
I recently appeared on Yascha Mounk’s excellent podcast, The Good Fight. I’d been out with work colleagues the night before, so I was a little the worse for wear - aside from anything else, my voice was about an octave lower than usual. Despite that, Yascha and I had a fun, wide-ranging conversation. These are some of the many topics we covered:
Evolutionary psychology
The nature and nurture of individual differences
Sex differences, and why so many people are so uncomfortable with them
Why we might never fully close the gender gap in occupational representation
How IQ and personality predict life outcomes
Why political partisans hate the other side for views most don’t actually hold
The four traits political extremists on both sides share that set them apart from moderates
The replication crisis in psychology
If you want to read the transcript of our conversation, you can find it on Yascha’s Substack. Here’s the episode:
In Other News…
My favorite comedian, Jimmy Carr, mentioned my book The Ape That Understood the Universe in the latest episode of the Joe Rogan Experience. Check it out below!
Follow me on Twitter/X for more psychology, evolution, and science.
How You Can Support the Newsletter
If you like what I’m doing with the Nature-Nurture-Nietzsche Newsletter and want to support my work, there are several ways you can do it.
Like and Restack - Click the buttons at the top or bottom the page to boost the post’s visibility on Substack.
Share - Send the post to friends or share it on social media.
Upgrade to Paid - A paid subscription gets you:
Full access to all new posts and the archive
Full access to exclusive content such as my “12 Things Everyone Should Know” posts, Linkfests, and other regular features
The ability to post comments and engage with the growing N3 Newsletter community
If you could do any of the above, it’d be much appreciated. The support of readers like you helps keep the newsletter going.
Thanks!
Steve
Related Reading from the Archive
Here are some posts related to the topics Yascha and I discussed.
12 Things Everyone Should Know About Evolutionary Psychology
This is the latest post in my “12 Things Everyone Should Know” series. You can access the full collection here.
The First Law of Behavior Genetics
This is the first part of a five-part series about the Four Laws of Behavior Genetics and why they matter. I’ll be releasing one new part a month. In this first part, I’ll give an overview of the Four Laws, then do a deep dive into the First Law. The overview is free; the deep dive is for paid subscribers. Check out the other benefits of a paid subscription
A Billion Years of Sex Differences
I recently gave a professorial lecture at my university, focused on some of my theoretical work on the evolution of human sex differences. The following is a lightly edited transcript of the lecture.
12 Things Everyone Should Know About IQ
This is the second post in my “12 Things Everyone Should Know” series. You can access the complete collection here.
Imaginary Enemies
In this post, I’d like to tell you about one of the most fascinating papers I’ve read in the last few years. Led by the psychologist Victoria Parker, it’s about the causes and consequences of political polarization. Here’s my one-sentence summary of the paper:
Great conversation about sex differences with Yascha Mounk. Any chance you could post a PDF of the transcript here on your substack? The latter part of the transcript is behind a paywall on Mounk's page. Thanks for considering it.
I would love to have your list (with links) for which psychological findings replicate, which doesn’t. Maybe you’ve already written article about it. Got to check it out…