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Adrenaline Junkies · Why We Do What We Do

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: You're listening to Why we Do what we Do. Welcome
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: to Why we Do what we Do. I am your
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: thrill Seeking host Abraham.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: And I am Your dar Devil host Shane.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: We are a psychology podcast. We talked about all of
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: the things that humans and non human animals do, and
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: sometimes we talk specifically about the ways that they they
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: risk their lives in an attempt to have fun.
• 0:38
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so today we are talking about risk taking, thrill seeking,
• 0:42
  Speaker 3: deared deviling. We are talking about people who are considered
• 0:45
  Speaker 3: adrenaline junkies. And actually, this is really good timing because
• 0:48
  Speaker 3: I just watched a video of somebody in a snowboarding
• 0:52
  Speaker 3: competition who just did a twenty three forty wow for
• 0:55
  Speaker 3: the first time in competition, which is a lot of spinning.
• 0:57
  Speaker 3: Like it makes me sick do thinking of even doing
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  Speaker 3: like a you know, a seven twenty So the amount
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  Speaker 3: of spins this guy did is kind of absurd.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, just just watching it, I think would make me nauseous.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, I will woooo, Like I did that when I
• 1:11
  Speaker 3: was like when he was spinning, and then he landed
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  Speaker 3: it and it was great.
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  Speaker 2: He landed it perfectly, which was amazing.
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  Speaker 1: Wow. I feel like that would look just like a cartoon.
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: Someone's spinning that fast.
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  Speaker 2: It really did.
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  Speaker 1: Well. Anyway, thank you for joining us. If you are
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: here for the first time, then welcome. This is not
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: an episode or a podcast about snowboarding, but we will
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: be talking about the exciting things that people do in
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: this episode at least. But anyway, as I said, we're
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: happy to have you here, and I hope that you
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: enjoy what you hear today. And if you do enjoy
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: it and you would like to support us, then you
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: can do that by heading over to our merch store,
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: joining us on Patreon, leaving us a rating and a review,
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: or telling a friend, and I'll talk more about that
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: at the end of this discussion. If you are a
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: returning listener, all of those things are still true for you.
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: Welcome back, Happy to have you, and I hope that
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: you have fun with this topic as well.
• 2:02
  Speaker 3: Yes, so today when this episode comes out, it comes
• 2:05
  Speaker 3: out on February fifth, twenty twenty five, and we like
• 2:09
  Speaker 3: to celebrate holidays on this on our days of release.
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  Speaker 3: We like to help you celebrate them as well, and
• 2:14
  Speaker 3: today is officially Disaster Day on the backs of that.
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: Right now, LA is dealing with some devastating fires. So please, please,
• 2:23
  Speaker 3: please do everything you can to support the local community.
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  Speaker 3: Donate money, donate clothes, donate time, whatever you can donate,
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: and get it out to those folks because they need
• 2:32
  Speaker 3: it desperately right now.
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: I thought that January twentieth was disaster Day.
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  Speaker 2: It's Hio.
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: And I kind of was. It is also the Feast
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  Speaker 1: of Saint Agatha all along.
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  Speaker 3: I hope it's not eating Saint Agatha. I hope it's
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: eating four or in honor of Saint Agatha.
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: But yeah, not a cannibalistic feast.
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: It's hard to tell these days. I don't know if
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  Speaker 2: the news is AI or not that's true.
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: I would not feel very comfortable pushing a cannibalistic holiday.
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  Speaker 2: No, we avoid that here.
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  Speaker 3: We are a non cannibalistic podcast over here at Why
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: we do what we do.
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: It is Global School Playday. That's fun.
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: Sure, sure, I mean fun for somebody. It is International
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: Clash Day. I guess.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: I hope that's in reference to the clash and not
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: actively classical people.
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  Speaker 1: I thought maybe it was like a fashion clashing.
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  Speaker 3: Oh maybe that too. Anything's better than like conflict, I guess,
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: is what we're saying.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: It's also Move Hollywood and Broadway to Lebanon, Pennsylvania Day.
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  Speaker 2: It's very specific.
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  Speaker 1: Wow that that feels like there was somebody with an
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  Speaker 1: agenda behind that one.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. I feel like there's tax cuts all the time.
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah. It is National Chocolate Fun Do Day. Can't be
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: mad at that?
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  Speaker 2: Nope, nope. But you can't be mad at National fart Day, which.
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: Is today, particularly if you're on an elevator. It is
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  Speaker 1: National Girls and Women in Sports.
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  Speaker 2: Day, Yes it is. It's also National Primrose Day.
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: It is National Signing Day. I'm not sure why, but
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: is that signing like asl or sign like signing your name?
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  Speaker 3: Yes, okay, great. It's a National weather Person's Day.
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  Speaker 1: When I glanced at that, I thought it said Weatherspoon's Day.
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  Speaker 1: I was like, Recee Weatherspoon gets a whole day.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, I'm fine with that. I mean that's what
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  Speaker 2: her birthday is, all right.
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: World Animal Reiki Day, look but do not touch. Yeah.
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: Yes, yes, it is World Natella Day. Amazing that that
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: has its own day.
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: It is World Read Aloud Day, preferably at a library.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, yes, love that. It's also African Heritage and Health Week.
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: It is Children's Authors and Illustrators Week.
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  Speaker 2: It's Dump your significant Jerk Week.
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  Speaker 1: Oh hey, I remember that from last year. That makes sense.
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  Speaker 1: We're coming right up on Valentine's Day.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, yes, we are.
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  Speaker 3: Ugh.
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  Speaker 1: It is Feeding Tube Awareness Week.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, it's also Intimate Apparel Market Week.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, sure. It is National Apprenticeship Week.
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  Speaker 2: I like that. It's American Heart Month.
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  Speaker 1: Oh, I've been eating one of those. It's Library Lovers Month.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, and it is also Black History Month. So yay, celebrate, celebrate, celebrate.
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  Speaker 1: Word All right, now, we do like to share those
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  Speaker 1: holidays with y'all and recognition of the fact that, like,
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  Speaker 1: people got stuff going on, and that's cool, but that's
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  Speaker 1: actually not why we are here. In fact, as we mentioned,
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  Speaker 1: we are here to talk about the doing of exciting things,
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  Speaker 1: except to the point at which it seems like that's
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  Speaker 1: all you do. You are just so committed to the excitement,
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  Speaker 1: to the thrill, to the adventure of it all that
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  Speaker 1: you just can't help yourself.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, And so we are talking about this idea of
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  Speaker 3: folks that are addicted to the thrill, those adrenaline junkies.
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  Speaker 3: And so to start off, I think it'd be fun
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  Speaker 3: to share a quote from world renowned thrill junkie, thrill seeker,
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  Speaker 3: daredevil extraordinaire man who skidies without a parachute, Travis Pastrana,
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  Speaker 3: please share, And here's a quote that.
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  Speaker 2: He says about all this.
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  Speaker 3: He says, quote, most people in our field are very overconfident,
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  Speaker 3: so you always believe that you can do more than
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  Speaker 3: you can. But fear is what makes it exciting, what
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  Speaker 3: keeps us on our toe, It keeps you on your toes.
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  Speaker 3: People that are truly fearless, they'll be hurt before they
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  Speaker 3: ever get good enough to do it.
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  Speaker 1: End quote fair enough. Yeah, So if you're too excited
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  Speaker 1: about being excited, then you might not appreciate the excitement,
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  Speaker 1: But if you are scared to death of the excitement,
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  Speaker 1: then you will be in it, Yes, in a good way.
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  Speaker 3: And we will talk about how that can happen as
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: we explore this topic.
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  Speaker 1: Or something like it at least. But to understand how
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  Speaker 1: someone can can get hooked on their own adrenaline supply,
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  Speaker 1: we first must understand what they're even addicted to. So
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  Speaker 1: adrenaline or Epinephyrine is a hormone produced by your adrenal
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  Speaker 1: glands designed to prepare you for stressful or dangerous situation.
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  Speaker 1: So this is like, this is a hormone our body
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  Speaker 1: produces naturally, like we we just we make it.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, we're gonna go into the interesting history of adrenaline
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  Speaker 3: and how adrenaline is actually a trademark term and not
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  Speaker 3: the actual term. So we're gonna have a lot of
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  Speaker 3: fun with that. But let's start with the actual origin
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  Speaker 3: of the word adrenaline. The term comes from the Latin ad,
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  Speaker 3: which means on ad and then in ren are e n,
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  Speaker 3: which means of the kidney. Oh so what, I guess
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  Speaker 3: maybe we should explain that your adrenal gland is actually connected.
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  Speaker 2: To your kidneys. It's related to your kidneys.
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  Speaker 3: That's where it is in your body, which I didn't
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  Speaker 3: know when I was doing this these notes. I went, oh,
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  Speaker 3: that's interesting. So these small, triangular shaped glands are attached
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  Speaker 3: to the top of your kidney and belong to your
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  Speaker 3: endocrine system. Now, there are other organs that are included
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  Speaker 3: in the system, like your hypothalamus, your pineal gland, your
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  Speaker 3: pituitary gland, your thyroid gland, your testes, your ovaries, you're pancreas,
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  Speaker 3: they're all over your body, your endocrine system is a
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  Speaker 3: system that operates all over your entire organ system. So
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  Speaker 3: bodies are weird, right, aren't they neat?
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  Speaker 1: They are neat. That does make it feel like a
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  Speaker 1: pretty important system because I need those parts of my
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  Speaker 1: body to be alive.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, all of them?
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  Speaker 1: Okay, great? So adrenaline was I guess identified and more
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  Speaker 1: or less discovered in eighteen ninety seven. Before that, we
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  Speaker 1: mostly just thought that the tiny mice on wheels in
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  Speaker 1: our body had woken up in the morning and started
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  Speaker 1: running to give us the energy we needed. You know,
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  Speaker 1: tiny mice, They are tiny wheels. We are automaton. Yes.
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  Speaker 1: John Abel, an American pharmacologist and America's first full time
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  Speaker 1: professor of pharmacology, coined the term epinephrine from the Greek
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  Speaker 1: epi meaning upon and nephros meaning kidney, and adrenaline couldn't
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  Speaker 1: be used because it was a registered trademark in the
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  Speaker 1: United States at that point, So we needed a new name, yes,
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  Speaker 1: for like a natural thing?
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  Speaker 2: Yes exactly.
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  Speaker 3: Isn't that fun that we can't even use names because
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  Speaker 3: things are things are trademarked.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, so law makes discovery more complicated.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, it does. Now.
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  Speaker 3: Whenever an organism experience is some type of danger, whether
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  Speaker 3: due to a known condition or some unknown instinctual danger,
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  Speaker 3: like some kind of unknown circumstance. The glands will respond
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  Speaker 3: to signals from the pituitary gland, which is only reacting
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  Speaker 3: to the hypothalamus. And it's just basically like a wet
• 9:44
  Speaker 3: game of telephone, Like your system has to like phone,
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  Speaker 3: like your system has to operate and like connect all
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  Speaker 3: these different things to happen. So it takes a little
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  Speaker 3: bit for your adrenal gland to actually start pumping out epinephrine.
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  Speaker 1: It feels like playing water gun tag, but the water
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  Speaker 1: guns are filled with like apple juice, so it's very sticky.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's very sticky. It's gross. Bodies are also gross.
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  Speaker 2: They're cool, but they're gross.
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  Speaker 1: Word. So this gland then produces cortisol, and a lot
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  Speaker 1: of people just call this the stress hormone. And you
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  Speaker 1: can thank this thing for all of your stress. That's
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  Speaker 1: it does serve an important biological evolutionary function. Stress is
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  Speaker 1: not inherently a bad thing, although it can happen too
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  Speaker 1: much in many cases. But anyway, cortisol effectively works as
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  Speaker 1: an alarm system in your body, signaling everything that we
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  Speaker 1: should be on high alert and ready to move. It
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: is the intruder alarm going off, well not necessarily a truder,
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  Speaker 1: but like it's a warning warning, like bad things are happening.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, kind of like ADS.
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  Speaker 3: So we're back, sorry to surprise you with ADS and
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  Speaker 3: raise your cortisol up. Hopefully we will bring it back
• 11:01
  Speaker 3: down with our lovely velvety voices. Now, while the gland
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  Speaker 3: is pumping this stuff into your system during a time
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  Speaker 3: where you have to do something like make a phone
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: call or say hello to someone and really stressful, really
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  Speaker 3: dangerous situations, is also producing epineffrin and nor eperdefferent, and
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  Speaker 3: so these hormones increase heart rate and force the contractions
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  Speaker 3: of your heart, so your heart beats faster and harder.
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  Speaker 3: Not just that it's moving at the same speed, but
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  Speaker 3: it's also pumping harder, so it's pumping faster and more
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  Speaker 3: blood at the same time.
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  Speaker 1: The effect that this has is very important, and I
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  Speaker 1: think it helps underscore why we would evolve such a
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  Speaker 1: system in our bodies. When our heart beats faster and
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  Speaker 1: it essentially allows for increased blood flow which can then
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  Speaker 1: be directed to our muscles and to our brain. But
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  Speaker 1: relaxes smooth muscles and improves our glucose metabolism. Essentially, it
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  Speaker 1: tells you there's a problem adrenaline needs to make repairs,
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  Speaker 1: and it's sort of like you have all of the
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  Speaker 1: resources you need to react, act as quickly as you
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: might need to react to survive. So that's why it
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  Speaker 1: would make sense that, like, if this hormone kicks off
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: a system that like essentially prepares your body to be
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: able to react swiftly and dexterously, then that would be
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  Speaker 1: very good. For example, if you had to quickly save
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  Speaker 1: yourself from a dangerous situation such as a predator, or
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  Speaker 1: you maybe were about to fall, or something was coming
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  Speaker 1: at you, whatever it might be, you'll suddenly That's when
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: people talk about that sort of burst of strength, the
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: mom lifting a car off a baby type thing. Of
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  Speaker 1: our adrenaline kicks in, the cortisol kicks in, It gives
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  Speaker 1: us our heart starts pumping fast so that we can
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  Speaker 1: get the blood we need to do the things we
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: need to do because again, again we're machines.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it's really important and I want to
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  Speaker 3: give everybody a clear frame on what effectively happens. Right
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  Speaker 3: there is something that happens in our environment. Then our
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  Speaker 3: body pumps itself full of cortisol and adrenaline. And this
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  Speaker 3: is all happening before we do anything right. And I
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: want to be really clear, we have not yet lifted
• 13:04
  Speaker 3: the car, we have not yet gone skydive, but we
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  Speaker 3: have not yet done the thing that has given us
• 13:09
  Speaker 3: this kind of rush of adrenaline. This is all happening
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  Speaker 3: previously because what cortisol does, courtisol is the alarm. Then
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  Speaker 3: the adrenaline is basically your body making preparations in the
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: event that it needs to do something.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, it could happen like in reaction to us.
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  Speaker 1: Like I imagine if something caught you by surprise all
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: of a sudden, you are like falling off of a thing,
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  Speaker 1: like it would kick in and then you would start
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  Speaker 1: to have that experience as like a reaction to the
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: circumstances you find yourselves. But generally speaking, when we're talking
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  Speaker 1: about these recreational activities, right, it is happening before you
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  Speaker 1: have actually done anything right.
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  Speaker 3: Right, So let's ask this question because because people talk
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  Speaker 3: about being like addicted to the adrenaline rush and all that,
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  Speaker 3: we have to ask the question of can I get
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  Speaker 3: high on my own supply, and I think it's really
• 13:56
  Speaker 3: important to unpack a couple of things here. So first,
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  Speaker 3: it is often said that people can get high on
• 14:00
  Speaker 3: the rush or the feeling of danger or risk, and
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: that's colloquially we call them adrenaline junkies. Right now, I
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: want to point out something real quick, The term junkie
• 14:10
  Speaker 3: not so great. We should probably use something different, and
• 14:13
  Speaker 3: so from basically here on out, we're probably gonna use
• 14:15
  Speaker 3: the term thrill seeker.
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  Speaker 2: And we'll explain why. The term junkie.
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  Speaker 3: Today it is used to describe people who are struggling
• 14:21
  Speaker 3: with some type of narcotic or opioid addiction. But it
• 14:24
  Speaker 3: was originally coined and used in the nineteen twenties to
• 14:26
  Speaker 3: refer to people who would salvage scrap metal to pay
• 14:29
  Speaker 3: for their habits. So, people who were addicted to opioids
• 14:32
  Speaker 3: or to some type of narcotic people who would go
• 14:35
  Speaker 3: in and they would like go into junk yards and
• 14:36
  Speaker 3: they would actually salvage scrap metal to pay for their habits.
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  Speaker 2: They were called junkies.
• 14:40
  Speaker 3: Because they were going and finding junk and so that's
• 14:42
  Speaker 3: where their origin of that comes from.
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: I wonder if we could reappropriate the term to just
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: describe people who just like sifting through garbage, could call
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: them junkies.
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I would love that some other.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: Terms that you might hear in association with this type
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: of behavior or patterning of behavior that might be better used,
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: because again of the issues around junkie, maybe is the
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: whole idea of daredevil, mad cap, thrill seeker, any others
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: that you maybe have heard that you would enjoy. So,
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: as we said, for now, the term adrenaline junkie has
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: far and wide uses, so we might use it a
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: little bit interchangeably in this discussion, but for the most
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: part we'll probably go more with like thrill seeker or
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: another term instead. Just and again, it's just I feel
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: like people hear this and they're like, oh, the PC police,
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: and I'm like, I mean, first of all, I don't
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: think there's harm in generally trying to not be a
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: dick to other people, So sure, I think that's okay.
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: But second, like it's also just not accurate. Like a
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: lot of these terms, they are a poor way to
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: communicate what's happening, and so we come up with better
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: terms that are better ways to communicate what's happening.
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: Right, That's exactly it. I mean, I think you nail
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: that perfectly.
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: Like, so, okay, what is a daredevil or thrill seeker
• 15:57
  Speaker 3: or any of these folks. So by definition, this is
• 15:59
  Speaker 3: a person who has a quote compulsive desire for excitement
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: and adventure end quote. And if we break that down,
• 16:06
  Speaker 3: I think what the word that carries the most weight
• 16:07
  Speaker 3: here is probably compulsive, like it's something that they can't help.
• 16:10
  Speaker 3: It's kind of something that's like sudden. Maybe it's like
• 16:12
  Speaker 3: they just it's like something that they have to do.
• 16:15
  Speaker 3: And that's not quite right either, but I think it's
• 16:17
  Speaker 3: still one of those things that's like interesting that that's
• 16:19
  Speaker 3: a compulsive desire inside of that.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: Yes, okay, we'll have to circle back around to that
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: as we get there, but to continue to elaborate on
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: this compulsive sort of desire that the people who are
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: considered these thrill seekers will report that they feel this
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: like pull, this this urge, this like something is drawing
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: them to do something daring or dangerous. In most cases,
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: it's referring to people who are doing these specific high
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: risk activities or extreme sports, and we mentioned some of
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: them already, skydiving, white water rafting, rock climbing, motorcycle or
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: car racing volcano boarding, So that is a one time
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: activity you don't need to do the second time. Don't, don't, don't, please,
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: nobody does this. Don't go volcano boarding. These are examples
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: of things people might do again and seek of the
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: buzz of adrenaline.
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: So real quick.
• 17:18
  Speaker 3: For those of you who are wondering what volcano boarding
• 17:21
  Speaker 3: actually is, volcano boarding is an extreme sport that involves
• 17:24
  Speaker 3: sliding down a volcano on a board. Riders will hike
• 17:27
  Speaker 3: up the volcano and then sit or stand on a
• 17:29
  Speaker 3: thin board made of plywood or metal to slide back down.
• 17:33
  Speaker 3: So it's basically just sliding down a volcano. Sometimes they're active,
• 17:35
  Speaker 3: sometimes they're not.
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: Okay, I'll men to say, don't do this with active volcanoes,
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: but I mean.
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, don't do inside of a volcano maybe too.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and definitely don't do it on actual magma.
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: Yes, it might be bad. It's bad for your health.
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: Again, that's a one time thing.
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: I feel like though, if you're like just writing a
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: board down a sloped surface, whether or not it happens
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: to be a volcano is not really an important distinction
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: in my mind.
• 18:05
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I think it could be thrilling regardless, I
• 18:08
  Speaker 3: give you're exactly boring towards a river of magma that
• 18:12
  Speaker 3: might be exciting and scary and maybe don't do that.
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah again advice. I mean, we're not really a geology podcast.
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: By not really, I mean not at all. But you
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: really can't even get close to magma before it is
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: like actively burning you. Like it's hot. It's so hot.
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: It is so hot, that is rocks that have turned
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: to liquid. It's it's so hot. Yeah, So like you
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: don't you don't even get close to this before. Things
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: are like way hotter than anything you've ever experienced before.
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: So it's not like anyway, just don't exactly.
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: So I thought as part of this episode, it would
• 18:54
  Speaker 3: be fun to share some quotes from people who are
• 18:57
  Speaker 3: considered well known thrill seekers. They are people who are
• 19:00
  Speaker 3: in the public guy or have been in the public guy,
• 19:02
  Speaker 3: who have shared some quotes about adrenaline and being addicted
• 19:06
  Speaker 3: to it and addicted to the thrill. So the first
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: one is from a one Johnny Knoxville, the expert. Yeah,
• 19:13
  Speaker 3: he says, quote, I pretty much operate on adrenaline and ignorance.
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: And if you have ever watched an episode of Jackass
• 19:19
  Speaker 3: or any of the movies. Then you know that these
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: guys do things and you're going.
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: Why would they do that?
• 19:23
  Speaker 3: And you can watch it from the safety of your home,
• 19:26
  Speaker 3: but know that they do this often.
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: And we'll talk more about Johnny Knoxville later.
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: The late Steve Irwin said quote, I get called an
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: adrenaline junkie every other minute, and I'm just fine with
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: that end quote. So there's that, Yeah, exactly. I mean,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: I did say late Steve Irwood he would definitely still
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: be alive today were it not for his activities, Yes,
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: but he did also know the risks going in so
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: I hope that I hope that he died happy.
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely.
• 19:53
  Speaker 3: Here's a quote that I don't think people would qualify
• 19:56
  Speaker 3: this person as a thrill seeker, but she also self
• 19:58
  Speaker 3: identifies as a thrill seeker, which is fun.
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: Quote.
• 20:01
  Speaker 3: The reaction to the public plays very important role, specifically
• 20:04
  Speaker 3: as a context for their performance stuff.
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: So here's the rest of the quote.
• 20:08
  Speaker 3: It gives us an adrenaline boost, especially when people start
• 20:11
  Speaker 3: to shout and clap their hands in time with music.
• 20:13
  Speaker 3: That really helps us to go on. And that is
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: from a one Simone Biles I've heard of her, Yeah,
• 20:19
  Speaker 3: most people have, right, and so she's she's got some
• 20:21
  Speaker 3: quotes about how adrenaline works in sports performance.
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: Yes, world record setting gymnast in the Olympics, Yeah, exactly,
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: who has like all these new moves named after her?
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: It's wild.
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, she's like the Rodney Mullen of gymnastics, right.
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah for the deep cut skateboard reference are until nineties
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: skateboarding culture? Yeah, yeah, the early two thousands yep. Okay,
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: So why do these thrill seekers continue to take on
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: these risks? This is a podcast where we try to
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: understand human behavior and the things that we do. So
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: we were at the point now where we have described it,
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: I think fairly thoroughly and taken some good survey and
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: sort of inventory of what there is to know about
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: the background here. But we also then want to ask
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: the question why are people doing this knowing that they
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: can experience great bodily injury or death. As I mentioned,
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: Steve Irwin famously died as a result of a sting
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: while he was handling a wild animal, which was something
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: he did a lot that was kind of his whole thing.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: But the crew of the Jackass movies, they have a
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: crewed a whopping twenty four million dollars and medical bills
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: which Johnny Knoxville specifically by himself accrued about eight point
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: six million dollars of those bills, including one from an
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: alligator byte and an accidental scalping.
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 21:49
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it's one of those things where you
• 21:51
  Speaker 3: kind of sit back and go, why would you ever
• 21:53
  Speaker 3: want to do that? Why would you ever put yourself
• 21:56
  Speaker 3: in that position? Yeah, Well, that's what we're looking at, right.
• 21:59
  Speaker 3: So what might actually be happening is not necessarily a
• 22:02
  Speaker 3: dependency on adrenaline. So when we talk about people kind
• 22:05
  Speaker 3: of being addicted to that risk, addicted to that thrill,
• 22:07
  Speaker 3: it might not actually be the adrenaline that's doing the
• 22:09
  Speaker 3: thing that's causing the person to be addicted. And to
• 22:12
  Speaker 3: be fair, addiction is a loose term here. If you
• 22:15
  Speaker 3: go back to our addiction suite, there is no DSM
• 22:18
  Speaker 3: categorization for addiction to thrills like that.
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: This is something that people, it's like they colloquially use.
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: So while the nature of the activities that thrill seekers
• 22:26
  Speaker 3: engage in are high risk and produce high levels of
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: stress and response, if there are fearful like Travis Pastrana
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: said earlier, neither of these things are actually rewards. Adrenaline
• 22:38
  Speaker 3: is not a reward. Cortisol is not necessarily a reward,
• 22:40
  Speaker 3: doesn't operate inside of our reward systems. What actually happens
• 22:44
  Speaker 3: is that the risky behavior, barring any adverse consequences like
• 22:47
  Speaker 3: serious injuries, and even then maybe yeah, maybe not, it
• 22:50
  Speaker 3: produces high levels of dopamine and rewards in the brain.
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: And it's thought that the addiction is actually to dopamine
• 22:57
  Speaker 3: or sensations related to that experience, and that basically adrenaline
• 23:02
  Speaker 3: just primes the pumps, like adrenaline prepares you to receive
• 23:05
  Speaker 3: that sensation a little bit more. And actually some of
• 23:07
  Speaker 3: the literature will call thrill seeking sensation seeking as well.
• 23:11
  Speaker 3: And it's more so the feeling or that experience of
• 23:14
  Speaker 3: the actual activity or the result or the feeling afterwards,
• 23:17
  Speaker 3: the euphoria that people experience afterwards once they're safe. But
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: it's not the actual adrenaline that people get addicted to.
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: And arguably it's not like we don't get addicted to
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: dopamine either, right, as we kind of learned in those
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: addiction episodes, we don't really get addicted to things that
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: are biologically important for us or like part of our
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: natural biological system. We can pursue them at high frequencies,
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: but it is not the same kind of dependence or
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: even patterns seeking that we see and other types of
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: addiction where it seems like we will do so many
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: counterproductive things in the service of like a very particular outcome, right,
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: And it's like it is fundamentally different than like what
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: we're doing when we just enjoy a particular sensation or
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: you try to enjoy an episode but then it gets
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: interrupted by ads. All right, So, as you said, we
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: were talking about this whole idea of priming the pumps here,
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: this idea of like what what's actually going on with
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: the dopamine and the sensations that we sort of get
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: to experience when we're pursuing some activity.
• 24:32
  Speaker 3: Right, So let's consider something like base jumping. If you're
• 24:34
  Speaker 3: not familiar with base jumping, base jumping is effectively skydiving,
• 24:38
  Speaker 3: but off of like solid structures. Yeah, you jump off
• 24:41
  Speaker 3: of buildings or cliffs where there's like a you know,
• 24:44
  Speaker 3: a rock wall face stuff like that, Like just like
• 24:48
  Speaker 3: you don't jump out of a plane. So imagine this
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: for a second. You're standing on top of a building
• 24:54
  Speaker 3: with a working, most likely working parachute rig. You've got
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: your angles and you've got your dive. You know how
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: you're going to jump, how far out you're gonna jump,
• 25:01
  Speaker 3: where you're gonna move, and when you dive, you know
• 25:04
  Speaker 3: how you're gonna pull the cord, and then you sail
• 25:06
  Speaker 3: through the city to your targeted landing spot, whether it's
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: a parking lot where you have to run from cops,
• 25:11
  Speaker 3: or it's the bottom of a valley or canyon or
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: something like that. Right, there's lots of like different depending
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: on what your target is. All is well, and you
• 25:18
  Speaker 3: live to jump off another structure another day. It's kind
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: of nice, right, you've survived this thrill seeking moment.
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: If people have seen this before, you might have noticed
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: that base is usually in all caps with base jumping,
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: and that's because it's an acronym. Base stands for a
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: building antenna span, which refers to bridges and earth, which
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: is like natural formations, as you said, like a cliff
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: or a mountain, you know, some some natural formation of sorts.
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: Right, so fun, I've always wanted to go base jumping.
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: It does seem fun. I was actually just thinking. And
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: we'll get into this a little bit as we go,
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: but we've sort of alluded to it as well, that
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: like when I was very young, I fell out of
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: a tree, and well, I think many people would assume
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: that that would result in a fear of heights, and
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: actually is kind of the opposite. And I think this
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: is sort of similar to people like Johnny Knoxville and
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: some of these other sort of thrill seeking people. Is
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: that getting injured in pursuit of these if it's not
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: something that causes like irreparable damage, the effect can be
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: for some people the oh it's not as bad as
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: I thought. Yeah, Like I know what the outcome is
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: and like it's not pleasant, but it's also doable. And
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: so it's sort of like, can I achieve this thing
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: knowing that I could get hurt, believing that I won't
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: get hurt if done well enough.
• 26:41
  Speaker 3: Right, which is why Travis Pastrona can do a backflip
• 26:45
  Speaker 3: in a monster truck. Like that's where that started. He said,
• 26:48
  Speaker 3: can I do this? And can I do this safely?
• 26:50
  Speaker 3: And if I get hurt, I'll stop, But if I
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: or I'll stop for a little bit. Yeah, but I
• 26:54
  Speaker 3: think I could do this, and he was the first
• 26:56
  Speaker 3: person in the world who was able to backflip a
• 26:58
  Speaker 3: monster truck.
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: That'll be a part of what's going on for at
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: least some people in the thrill seeking space. But those
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: other things that might be happening here, despite having safety
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: precautions established it, these are very dangerous. I mean, you
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: might have a parachue, you might have backups, but at
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: the end of the day, if you're jumping off of
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: a building, you are taking on some pretty significant risks
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: and you've got some conditioning in place that tells you, like,
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: this is a dangerous situation. Fear of heights falling will
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: kill you, what if the shoot doesn't open the way
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: that it's supposed to. And in these situations like these
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: are things that people know going into it. That's basically
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: why they do it right. But that does mean that
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: when you get there and there is all of the
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: learning that has brought you to the point of understanding
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: I am now in a high risk danger situation that
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: will elicit your adrenal gland to trigger and then again
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: that sort of sets off this cascade of events with
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: all these other glands that spring into action that say
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: like get ready for survival mode.
• 28:04
  Speaker 3: Right, So your blood is getting pumped full of cortisol.
• 28:06
  Speaker 3: Your body goes, well, this is not a drill. We
• 28:09
  Speaker 3: gotta we gotta get ready some we got it. We
• 28:11
  Speaker 3: gotta set up right, and it starts producing all the
• 28:14
  Speaker 3: adrenaline to prepare yourself for this upcoming risky business. So
• 28:18
  Speaker 3: your body before you jump off that building, it is
• 28:21
  Speaker 3: full of cortisol and adrenaline and you are just ready
• 28:24
  Speaker 3: to go. And that's before you really do anything. Your
• 28:27
  Speaker 3: body is primed to dive. Plus when you do fall,
• 28:30
  Speaker 3: we're not really prepared for that, so that kind of
• 28:32
  Speaker 3: like boosts things up too, Like we're if you're falling,
• 28:35
  Speaker 3: that's not really a great that's not like an ideal
• 28:37
  Speaker 3: situation for a human, you know.
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: What I mean.
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, our evolved modes of transportation do not include air
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: travel by gravity.
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: No.
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: No, Like we will travel across land, we'll even travel
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: across water, and we can do those without the aid
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: of tools. Like we can walk, we can swim, But
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: moving through the air that we cannot really do without
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: the aid of tools, right, at least not if we
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: plan to survive the reaching the other end of that journey. Yeah,
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: So it is pretty unique to the language we've developed
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: around a culture of being able to even do this
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: sort of thing. Right, So, if adrenaline were an addictive substance,
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: because again we're talking about this biological process that occurs here,
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: if it were an addictive substance, we wouldn't need to jump.
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: We'd only need to prepare to jump. We'd only need
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: to essentially create the conditions under which we would begin
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: the sequence of events that would lead to the jump,
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: and then we would stop there because we got our hit, Like,
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: why take the additional plunge? You know? If it was,
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: like I'm trying to think of a good example, let's
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: just go with like alcohol, I guess of it was
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: like you drink alcohol and eat the bottle. I'm like, well,
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: you don't need to eat the bottle. You got everything
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: out of the alka out of the bottle that you
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: needed to the bottle at this point is pretty unnecessary, right,
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: That's sort of I feel like, if it were in
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: fact that we were we were trying to seek this
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: adrenaline thing, we all ne to go up until the
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: point that it would kick in, and that's before we've
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: actually taken any action, Right, Yeah, I like.
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: To your alcohol example too.
• 30:08
  Speaker 3: Another way to think about that would be like, okay,
• 30:10
  Speaker 3: like let's say you pour your glass of wine, but
• 30:12
  Speaker 3: you just don't drink it.
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, right, Like.
• 30:14
  Speaker 3: It's like you're like, that's enough, right, that would be
• 30:16
  Speaker 3: enough for it to work. But that's not what happens, right.
• 30:19
  Speaker 3: It is what happens after that really matters. So when
• 30:22
  Speaker 3: we lend safety and our cortisol levels start to dissipate
• 30:25
  Speaker 3: and our adrenaline starts to wane, we are left with
• 30:27
  Speaker 3: a really nice feeling of the from our reward centers,
• 30:30
  Speaker 3: like we feel good, we survived. We get kind of
• 30:33
  Speaker 3: a washing away effect as our stress levels kind of
• 30:36
  Speaker 3: slow down. You ever, feel like everybody's had that experience.
• 30:39
  Speaker 3: We're like, you've been like kind of high level stress
• 30:41
  Speaker 3: for a while. Then the thing that you were stressed
• 30:43
  Speaker 3: about happens, and then you are relieved, and you just
• 30:46
  Speaker 3: kind of feel like just a general sense of relief
• 30:48
  Speaker 3: that happens, right, like joy, relief, celebration, And that's just
• 30:52
  Speaker 3: happening in the biological parts of us. That's not happening
• 30:55
  Speaker 3: in the social context, right. That's not your friend's cheering
• 30:58
  Speaker 3: for you, that's not the praise. That's not the video
• 31:00
  Speaker 3: that you posted online that everybody's like, Wow, that was
• 31:02
  Speaker 3: really cool. It's none of those things. It is just
• 31:04
  Speaker 3: your body immediately after that event goes, oh man, that
• 31:09
  Speaker 3: was cool, I'm done. I feel okay, right like that,
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: and that in itself can produce some pretty powerful sensations.
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the part. So basically what we're saying is
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: that's the part that people are looking at for, not
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: the adrenaline thing. Adrenaline primes our bodies to be prepared
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: to receive the sort of thrilling conclusion which is accompanied
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: with dopamine, and it's that context that at the end
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: of the sequence of events that people are looking for,
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: not just the adrenaline part.
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 31:41
  Speaker 3: So, in addition to this kind of feeling that rewards
• 31:44
  Speaker 3: enter stuff, a lot of folks argue that it's actually
• 31:46
  Speaker 3: less about those hormonal changes in our body and more
• 31:48
  Speaker 3: about the sensation itself. So it's not necessarily about your
• 31:51
  Speaker 3: cortisol levels coming up and your adrenaline kicking in or
• 31:53
  Speaker 3: anything like that. It's really more about the feeling of flying.
• 31:57
  Speaker 3: When you're skydiving, it's the feeling of landing that first trick,
• 32:00
  Speaker 3: the first time you learn how to do a kickflip, right,
• 32:02
  Speaker 3: it's the feeling of landing a twenty three forty or
• 32:05
  Speaker 3: whatever the hell that spin was, right, Like, it's those
• 32:07
  Speaker 3: feelings and all of that that comes around with it.
• 32:10
  Speaker 3: So the thrill seeking might not just be about like
• 32:14
  Speaker 3: the hormonal changes. It's been named sensation seeking because choices
• 32:18
  Speaker 3: related to the sensations of.
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: Thrill seeking behavior are pretty unique.
• 32:21
  Speaker 3: Right, The feeling of following moving rapidly or along a
• 32:23
  Speaker 3: racetrack when you're in a fast card, defying death by
• 32:26
  Speaker 3: avoiding a serious gore from a bull, which is something
• 32:29
  Speaker 3: that Johnny Knoxville has specifically talked about. Avoiding getting gored
• 32:32
  Speaker 3: by a bull is pretty fun. All of these are
• 32:35
  Speaker 3: unique sensations that are produced by experiences that are unlikely
• 32:39
  Speaker 3: to be duplicated anywhere else.
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, very much so. So let's then think about this
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: in terms of what we might We always bring sort
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: of a skeptical lens to these discussions. We want to
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: start to understand, all right, what are the objective variables
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: that we can turn to that help us understand sort
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: of the relevant features and the important aspects of a
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: particular topic of like a pattern of human behavior so
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: that we can start to just understand why it occurs,
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: because we we want if we can rule out the
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: unimportant things, that makes it, i think easier to start
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: to understand, like the factors that do contribute to the
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: choices that we make in situations like this, And if
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: we could rule out like ads, that would be great,
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: but we do have to unfortunately include them.
• 33:35
  Speaker 3: So let's talk about a couple studies that are out
• 33:38
  Speaker 3: there that have not only just kind of maybe more
• 33:43
  Speaker 3: likely specified the difference between thrill seeking and other types
• 33:46
  Speaker 3: of behaviors, but also kind of unpack some of the
• 33:48
  Speaker 3: things that are happening. Right So, Burton and Simmons in
• 33:50
  Speaker 3: twenty thirteen describe the self control theory and what they
• 33:53
  Speaker 3: did was they apply and we're not going to unpack
• 33:55
  Speaker 3: self control theory right now. That's something that maybe we
• 33:57
  Speaker 3: just do a whole episode on if we could look
• 33:58
  Speaker 3: at that. But basically what they said was they examined
• 34:01
  Speaker 3: criminal behavior as it relates to thrill seeking. You'll hear
• 34:03
  Speaker 3: a lot of people say that they commit crimes because
• 34:06
  Speaker 3: of the thrill of the chase or the thrill of
• 34:08
  Speaker 3: the hunt or whatever. What they actually found was that
• 34:10
  Speaker 3: criminal behavior and thrill seeking behavior were largely independent from
• 34:14
  Speaker 3: one another. People were not committing crimes for the sensations
• 34:16
  Speaker 3: that were being sought after from thrill seekers. They're committing
• 34:19
  Speaker 3: crimes for a whole host of contextual reasons that were
• 34:23
  Speaker 3: mostly unrelated to thrill seeking. There were some same similar effects,
• 34:27
  Speaker 3: like you have stress levels and all those things, but
• 34:29
  Speaker 3: it wasn't the same type of motivation. And so what
• 34:33
  Speaker 3: they really kind of boiled down to and they actually
• 34:35
  Speaker 3: said criminals are rarely, if ever, engaging in criminal behavior
• 34:39
  Speaker 3: just for the thrill of it. It doesn't really happen
• 34:42
  Speaker 3: very often. So they're basically just saying motivation matters. And really,
• 34:46
  Speaker 3: I would say too, to add to that, context matters.
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And I think that's important because understanding that, like
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: some of the behaviors are, like it's very risky. Doing
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: crimes is very risky, Like you risk not only things
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: like being caught by police, being imprisoned possibly and definitely
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: you also risk your own safety by like people catching
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: you and shooting at you or stabbing you or hitting you,
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: I don't know whatever they're gonna do, Like they might
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: attack you when they catch you doing criminal things, and
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: that might also be very dangerous, Like if there was
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: a risk that at the end of a base jump
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: you were going to be thrown in prison or shot
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: at I think that would be even less likely to occur, because,
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: like the thrill that might come from surviving something dangerous
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: like that is not worth the risk of what could
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: happen at the end. That's like an unintended sort of
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: side effect of the thing that you're doing. So it
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: would have surprised me greatly if research had suggested that
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: these were similar things, because it's right, the risk of
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: the situation is very different. I was hearing about on
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: a podcast recently. They were talking about how the likelihood
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: of coyotes eating cats essentially in various urban areas and whatnot,
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: and I was like, cats are very poor prey, Like
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: they're very dangerous prey. You don't want to attack a
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: cat because they will fight back like hell, Like they
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: are not going easily. Like if you're going to go
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: after prey, most of the time when you're something like
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: a coyote, like you're going to go after prey that
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: you probably are going to be able to catch and
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: sustain relatively minor injury to yourself, Like a rabbit for example, Like,
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: sure they'll try and buy back, but they don't have
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: nearly the kinds of weapons that like cats do. Like
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: you attack a cat and you're going to get scratched
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: and bitten and like maimed severely. They are killing machines.
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: You do not attack killing machines. They're attack back. Yeah,
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: So anyway, that was just a huge side step here.
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: But I was just thinking, like, it does not make
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: sense to me that you would do something like that
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: risky in a very different sense, and the sense that like,
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: independent of the activity it's self, you could then be
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: put in further harm's way or have your freedoms taken
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: away if caught. And that's why criminal behavior didn't make
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: sense here. But there are more studies to impact. Yeah,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: we have Keen in twenty eighteen and their thesis found
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: that thrill seeking may be influenced by variables such as
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: risk aversion, status, consumption, innovativeness, and social media use. They
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: also reported the t type personality mister t that is
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: has helped sustain just kidding not mister tea has helped
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: sustain an extreme sports industry to the tune of two
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: hundred and fifty billion dollars annually. So it sounds like
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: there was a lot of hypothetical constructs proposed in that thesis,
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: but you know, it's it's a thesis.
• 37:45
  Speaker 3: So yeah, I mean, I think we'll unpack some of
• 37:48
  Speaker 3: the some of the more behavioral stuff on this too.
• 37:50
  Speaker 3: But like you'll see a lot of the research I
• 37:52
  Speaker 3: was pulling would describe thrill seeking behavior as T type personalities.
• 37:57
  Speaker 3: I heard tea behavior a couple of times which was
• 37:59
  Speaker 3: about like thrill seeking behavior, so like it was interesting
• 38:02
  Speaker 3: to kind of dive into that.
• 38:03
  Speaker 2: And this is more these are more recent studies.
• 38:05
  Speaker 3: These are like in the last ten years that they're
• 38:06
  Speaker 3: starting to kind of categorize this type of behavior under
• 38:09
  Speaker 3: that T type, which I was like, I mean, sure,
• 38:12
  Speaker 3: like I don't know that I have a particular use
• 38:14
  Speaker 3: for that, but I also don't really have a particular
• 38:16
  Speaker 3: I don't take any sort of umbrage with that. It
• 38:19
  Speaker 3: just kind of was one of those things I just noticed,
• 38:21
  Speaker 3: and I wonder if that's maybe people trying to get
• 38:24
  Speaker 3: buy in on that, or if it's or if it's
• 38:26
  Speaker 3: like widely accepted I don't quite know.
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: Yet spill the T type behavior.
• 38:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly, So Sarshar and colleagues, which is a fun
• 38:34
  Speaker 3: name to say, Sarshar, It is Sarshar and colleagues in
• 38:36
  Speaker 3: twenty nineteen talk about tea behavior or thrill seeking behavior
• 38:39
  Speaker 3: and it's relation to a number of factors. And the
• 38:41
  Speaker 3: study actually found that thrill seeking behavior was higher among
• 38:44
  Speaker 3: individuals who had what they described as a higher level
• 38:47
  Speaker 3: of psychological entitlement sure, which I thought was interesting. A
• 38:51
  Speaker 3: more flexible mindset like that goes back into like the
• 38:54
  Speaker 3: kind of innovativeness and creativeness and stuff like that, and
• 38:57
  Speaker 3: they generally had more stress.
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: The hubris of people who think that they're invincible is
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: what I hear in that.
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: That's yeah, that's pretty much what happens.
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, Speaking of variables, let's consider risk aversion
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: for a moment. As we mentioned, risk aversion only goes
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: as far as the competing reward will take it and
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: how susceptible someone might be to social pressures, among other factors.
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: Let's not use the example of criminal behavior like shoplifting,
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: as that's functionally independent of thrill seeking behavior. We'll do
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: a different comparison instead. But the risk aversion thing, in
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: case you're not clear from the word, just means like
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: risk averse means you will choose safer options, like you
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: are unlikely to be willing to give up something or
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: lose something. I usually it's lose something and this is
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: often talked about like economics type thing. But yeah, let's
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: unpack that.
• 39:46
  Speaker 3: Right, So we're gonna use the example of jumping off
• 39:48
  Speaker 3: a high dive into a pool. You know, I think
• 39:49
  Speaker 3: a lot of people can relate to the fear of
• 39:51
  Speaker 3: jumping from tall places and falling in all those things. Right,
• 39:55
  Speaker 3: So let's say you're at a pool with your friends
• 39:57
  Speaker 3: and you notice that they're jumping off the tie dive.
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: And they're having a great time.
• 40:00
  Speaker 3: You yourself, are generally nervous about heights and want to
• 40:02
  Speaker 3: avoid it, but your friends eventually talk you into getting
• 40:04
  Speaker 3: up there. And when you get up to the top
• 40:06
  Speaker 3: of the high dive, your friends are watching, which makes
• 40:08
  Speaker 3: you more nervous because they're watching, but they're encouraging you
• 40:10
  Speaker 3: to do a cannonball.
• 40:11
  Speaker 2: You jump and it is the most fun, so you
• 40:14
  Speaker 2: do it again.
• 40:15
  Speaker 3: In the scenario, there are a lot of factors that
• 40:17
  Speaker 3: push you towards what could be described as a thrill
• 40:19
  Speaker 3: seeking behavior. Jumping off of a tall structure into a
• 40:22
  Speaker 3: body of water, and one of those risk a version
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: is actually influenced by rewards like attention and peer and
• 40:28
  Speaker 3: peer praise and all that. So, like you might be
• 40:30
  Speaker 3: averse to risk, but I could almost guarantee that to
• 40:33
  Speaker 3: some pushing in some level, that your friend's encouraging you
• 40:36
  Speaker 3: in the peer pressure piece and the rewards and the
• 40:38
  Speaker 3: cheers that you get, especially after watching your other friends
• 40:41
  Speaker 3: get cheered on, is sure, yeah, maybe less than that
• 40:44
  Speaker 3: risk and make it less aversive for you.
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: Another point here is that your your fear of heights
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: is not quite as present for you when you're observing
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: friends and you're not being harmed, right, right, and so
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: it's just not as magnified. It's a little bit more muted.
• 40:59
  Speaker 3: Right, Like you're watching your friends jump, and you're watching
• 41:01
  Speaker 3: them they're all safe every time they land, their safe, right, So,
• 41:04
  Speaker 3: like you're watching that happen and you're going, oh, it's
• 41:06
  Speaker 3: not as dangerous, over and over and over again.
• 41:09
  Speaker 2: That's not that dangerous. It's not that dangerous.
• 41:10
  Speaker 3: It's scary, but it's not that dangerous anymore compared to
• 41:12
  Speaker 3: maybe what you had when you first walked in and
• 41:14
  Speaker 3: your friends are cheering everyone who jumps from the high dive,
• 41:17
  Speaker 3: which is a really cool social reward, Like there's something
• 41:19
  Speaker 3: If you are somebody who is really averse to public
• 41:22
  Speaker 3: spaces in like public praise, then sure that might not
• 41:24
  Speaker 3: be great, but getting cheered feels pretty good.
• 41:28
  Speaker 2: Sure. Yeah, So you're watching your friends get cheers and
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: you're like, oh, that would be nice.
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: And so you're sort of sitting there just observing. And
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: the longer you wait more the more your friends will
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: encourage you to jump as well, either supporting you. They
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: might be really encouraging, like you can do this, It'll
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: be great, or they might be teasing you and sort
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: of making fun of you, as friends are supposed to do.
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: I guess for not jumping in more or less trying
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: to coerce you into it. I guess it depends on
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: who your friends are.
• 41:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 41:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah, And as all that continues, risk aversion starts to
• 41:57
  Speaker 3: diminish more. Right, So you're seeing some successful jumps, you're
• 42:01
  Speaker 3: seeing reinforcement being delivered.
• 42:03
  Speaker 2: For those jumps.
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: An important point.
• 42:04
  Speaker 3: You're getting encouragement, you're getting some rules, Like all of
• 42:07
  Speaker 3: the stuff is happening, and as that continues on, it
• 42:09
  Speaker 3: kind of chips away and tears away at what you
• 42:12
  Speaker 3: originally thought was this really kind of you know, insurmountable task,
• 42:16
  Speaker 3: which was jumping off of a high dive, and those
• 42:19
  Speaker 3: repeated observations, specifically the repeated observations of your friends jumping
• 42:22
  Speaker 3: and succeeding shows you that that task is doable.
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: The more and more it occurs.
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: So you're watching this, you're seeing it happen, and you're
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: maybe starting to consider, Okay, I will go ahead and
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: do this. I've seen my friends do it. They're all fine.
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: Everyone's encouraging me to do it, or coercing me to
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: do it, whatever's going on. And so you start preparing
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: to jump, and then you're starting to get this bump
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: in your adrenaline, especially as you like take the first
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: step and then start climbing the ladder right.
• 42:50
  Speaker 3: And so after you jump, you get that rush of
• 42:52
  Speaker 3: all those biological rewards we talked about, paired with the
• 42:55
  Speaker 3: social rewards, and it just creates this kind of like
• 42:58
  Speaker 3: perfect context of going, oh, I this little bit of
• 43:00
  Speaker 3: a risk, and it really worked out. Let me see
• 43:03
  Speaker 3: what the next level is, Let me see or let
• 43:05
  Speaker 3: me do it again, let me do it a couple times,
• 43:06
  Speaker 3: because that sensation is pretty great, and some people don't
• 43:09
  Speaker 3: go so far as to go jumping out of planes,
• 43:11
  Speaker 3: but they may kind of find their level of risk
• 43:14
  Speaker 3: that is producing enough reward without producing all the risk
• 43:17
  Speaker 3: and producing the potential harms. So people do this to
• 43:20
  Speaker 3: some levels, maybe not to extreme levels in the spaces
• 43:24
  Speaker 3: that we talk about with thrill seekers or those dare
• 43:26
  Speaker 3: devils that we have talked about.
• 43:27
  Speaker 2: Like Johnny Knoxville and all that.
• 43:29
  Speaker 3: Most people don't take it to that level, right, but
• 43:31
  Speaker 3: all of us do some level of this on at
• 43:34
  Speaker 3: least to some degree. We have some level of engaging
• 43:37
  Speaker 3: in risky behavior and producing some reward that is commensurate
• 43:41
  Speaker 3: with our current context.
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that there is an element of this
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: that is because I sort of mentioned there's like a
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: habituation piece where you've done something that was maybe risky
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: and you were okay, or even if you got hurt,
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: it wasn't so serious that now you're like maybe I'll
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: be fine, and like you're you're okay with taking that
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: risk again because you've sort of whether or not you've
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: acknowledged explicitly that's your line of reasoning. You have you
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: have now received some amount of experience where the outcome
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: was not so bad, like what you could imagine was
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: worse than what actually happened or maybe even could happen,
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: which is like the case for me going out in
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: the ocean and my irrational fear of many of the
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: creatures out there, Like what I imagine happening was much much
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: worse than whatever actually has happened when I've gone out
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: and snorkeled and whatnot, even though I still get a
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: little bit of the fear built up. But anyway, I
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: think the point is that there is an element of
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: it that is some habituation, and I think there's elements
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: in here where we talk about this like the more
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: you do it, there's this whole like people being pulled
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: toward it idea, And the thing is like the more
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: you do anything, if there's any incentive, what's however, that's
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: built into it, because there's an inherent sort of enthusiasm
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: for the activity itself. The more you're kind of just
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: going to do that thing, Like we get this momentum.
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: We have these cues in our lives that have told
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: us time and time again, this is where you start
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: this activity and this feeling of familiarity of routine of
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: like repeated action where once you have done something, you've
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: done it again, and then you've done it again, and
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: then you've done it again. The poll is like, is
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: like that momentum piece. It's the how much have I
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: experienced this and I've had success or have had reinforcement
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: or I've had you know, some other positive experience here
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: that it's like, it's more about it can be as
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: much at least about the routine and the cycle as
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: it is the like specific outcome or the specific feature
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: of the thing. It's like, what am I going to
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: do today? This thing I love doing? Probably that I
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: do for fun, my hobby, my pattern, but the thing
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: I do socially, whatever it is, that can be a
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: thing that feels like a compulsion but is as much
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: tied to the sense of routine as anything else. And
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: I think that that is an overlooked part of I
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: guess you could call them habits, but things that like
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: people do a lot of.
• 46:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah, And I think there's that, and I think for
• 46:19
  Speaker 3: some people it's like a sense of accomplishment. I mean,
• 46:21
  Speaker 3: I referenced Rodney Mullen earlier, and you know the reason
• 46:25
  Speaker 3: I mentioned him is because he has created so many
• 46:28
  Speaker 3: of the tricks that exist inside of skateboarding, right, And
• 46:32
  Speaker 3: he talks about that he would go out on like
• 46:34
  Speaker 3: a they had like a court in his backyard, that
• 46:37
  Speaker 3: he would just go out and he would go at
• 46:38
  Speaker 3: like two, three, four, five in the morning and he
• 46:40
  Speaker 3: would skate in a street light and just skate and
• 46:43
  Speaker 3: skate and skate until he made up a new trick,
• 46:45
  Speaker 3: until he created some new thing. And like so he
• 46:47
  Speaker 3: I mean, the amount of bones he's broken, just like
• 46:49
  Speaker 3: every other skateboard is kind of absurd, right, But at
• 46:53
  Speaker 3: the end of the day, like he has a world
• 46:54
  Speaker 3: renowned he is like one of the most if not
• 46:56
  Speaker 3: the most influential skateboarder that has ever lived. And a
• 47:00
  Speaker 3: lot of that is just want it's habit to it's
• 47:03
  Speaker 3: a sense of accomplishment. He doesn't seemed to be the
• 47:05
  Speaker 3: kind of person that's like, yeah, I made I invented
• 47:06
  Speaker 3: the kickflip whatever, but like it is one of those
• 47:09
  Speaker 3: things where it's like I got to learn something new
• 47:10
  Speaker 3: and cool and exciting, not only about myself, but about
• 47:13
  Speaker 3: this thing, this hobby, this habit that I have.
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, and and I think that like there's an
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: element of for a while you'll be in the spotlight,
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: like for having done the thing. Like we mentioned like
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: the first time Tony Hawk landed a what was it
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: a seven? Nine hundred? Okay, now there are people who
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: break it all the time, but someone had to get
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: there first. And I think sometimes like just breaking a
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: record or doing something new in and of itself, whether
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: or not, like that ends up being a record that
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: is broken by someone else, Like right, it is the
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: fact that you did something new, like that's cool, like
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: you should like people can still appreciate that they they
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: helped kick off this whole new arc of activities of
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: tricks that are whatever it might be in gymnastics, you know,
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: thinking of someone bials of moves that people will like
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: train on, like that will be a thing that they
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: practiced doing and it seemed impossible at first, but someone
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: had to be the one to sort of break ground on.
• 48:13
  Speaker 3: That, right, And I think to that point, for a
• 48:16
  Speaker 3: lot of this, we've been talking about thrill seekers, and
• 48:18
  Speaker 3: we've been talking about you know, extreme sports, but I
• 48:21
  Speaker 3: think you probably take at least some of these elements
• 48:23
  Speaker 3: and look at you know, explorers that are looking for
• 48:27
  Speaker 3: new parts of the world. Before we got on we
• 48:29
  Speaker 3: were talking about the space program and the Moon landing,
• 48:32
  Speaker 3: and the first people that had like the feeling of
• 48:35
  Speaker 3: going I'm gonna strap myself to a rocket and the
• 48:38
  Speaker 3: Moon program, like when we were talking about the Apollo
• 48:41
  Speaker 3: programs and stuff, the capsule was on top of the
• 48:43
  Speaker 3: rocket at the view were at the tip of the rocket,
• 48:46
  Speaker 3: and you're like, I'm gonna put this rocket on my
• 48:48
  Speaker 3: back and I'm gonna shoot myself in the space, something
• 48:50
  Speaker 3: that people are not doing often, people are not doing
• 48:52
  Speaker 3: very well based on some of our experiments, right, and
• 48:56
  Speaker 3: I'm gonna risk this, and there is like an inherent
• 48:58
  Speaker 3: risk in that. But I would I'd say that for
• 49:00
  Speaker 3: that particular thing, psychologists have been involved to make sure
• 49:03
  Speaker 3: that you're not just doing it just to get the thrill,
• 49:05
  Speaker 3: Like you're doing it because you're actually, you know, a
• 49:07
  Speaker 3: responsible person who can do it and the benefit is
• 49:10
  Speaker 3: the thrill of going into space.
• 49:11
  Speaker 2: But there is like a little bit of those.
• 49:13
  Speaker 3: Elements in those places where humans are just breaking ground
• 49:15
  Speaker 3: and doing new things that humans have never done before.
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, So I think that the circumstances that surround thrill
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: seeking behavior are complex and will involve like very personal
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: reasons and there's likely to be social influences as well,
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: and like social rewards and the social network. So I
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: think that's sort of one of the main take homes
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: here in terms of understanding how this shapes up, is
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: that it is maintained by a very complex tapestry of
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: circumstances both that evoke that kind of pattern, that kind
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: of hobby, if you will, as well as maintaining it.
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, I think you nailed it.
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: And then of course that like when we're talking about
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: biological processes, no one's addicted to this really not in
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: the sense of addiction. We're not addicted to adrenaline. We're
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: not even addicted to dopamine, and dopamine is a very
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: complex molecule, like a neurotransmitter that does a lot of
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: things that will probably need to spend some time unpacking
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: at some point, right, But like we get into patterns,
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: we get into routines and can that addiction is just
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: not productive. Like if we're going to understand the addiction
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: that comes with the dependence on things like many substances
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: and some activities like with gambling and whatnot, the non
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: biologically relevant things, then like we need to reserve what
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: that term means as it relates to those dependencies. Nobody
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: here is like tapping their veins to inject adrenaline or
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: to like and then not going and doing those hobbies.
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: In particular, there's a lot of factors going on in
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: the choice to do this right exactly, but only a
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: few factors going on in the choice to run ads,
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: mostly that they pay us money. All right, well, I
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: think that's what we have to say, mostly about adrenaline junkies.
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: Is there anything that you'd like to add before we
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: move on to our next sections.
• 51:11
  Speaker 2: No, I think that covers it.
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: Okay, Well, we have a little bit of a listener mail.
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: So this comes from Celaste who has emailed us before,
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: so thank you for writing in again. M Hm, Celestiriot, Haitiane,
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: and Abraham. I heard in your Stendahl Syndrome episode that
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: you're interested in discussing the phenomenon of frisons or frisons.
• 51:32
  Speaker 1: I wanted to share that that word is common where
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: I live in southern Louisiana due to our French heritage.
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: Someone may say that they have the prisons because they
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: are worried about something or scared. Eager to hear your
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: academic review of it, keep on doing great work. Cool,
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: thank you, Celesti. Yeah, I did not know that, and
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: so we will definitely be including that in our discussion
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: of prisons, which we are currently working on.
• 51:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we should be recording that. I would imagine it'll
• 51:58
  Speaker 3: be recorded by the time this airs.
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, it will come out shortly thereafter. Yes, be
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: looking for that. And I appreciate the communication. And yeah,
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: So if you a listener, would like to write to
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: us as Celeste has done here and give us some
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: of your wisdom, we are eager to hear that sort
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: of thing. You can also tell us what you think
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: about adrenaline junkies or thrill seeking if you have experienced
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: doing that sort of thing, or tell us what we
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: got wrong. We were happy to take constructive criticism. You
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: can email us directly info at wwdwwdpodcast dot com and
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: riachus on the social media platforms. We're over on Blue Sky. Now.
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: We're happy to hear from everyone. We are going to
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: do something fun where we also recommend some things. But
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: before we do that, I have some credits to get through,
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: and part of that includes some advertising of my own.
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: I guess to you, which is that if you would
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: like to support what we're up to in our mission
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: in the podcast. One way you can do that is
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: to leave us a rating and review. And I think
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: one of the most useful ways to help a podcast
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: grow is to just tell someone else, post it on
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: social media, share it with the friends, just tell someone like, hey,
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: check out this podcast.
• 53:04
  Speaker 2: Uh huh.
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: That helps a lot, and it like helps the algorithm.
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: And if you left rating and review, that helps too.
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: If you subscribe, that means that you get our episodes.
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: If you really like to take the extra leap, you
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: can head of our tour web store and pick up
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: some merch because everyone loves podcast merch. Other than that,
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: you can join us over on Patreon and if you
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: do that then you'll get all kinds of bonus content,
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: AD free content early episodes. You get to join a
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: community of awesome people. And then I will read your
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: name because we appreciate those awesome people, and that is Mike,
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: m Megan, Mike T, Justin, Kim Brad, Stephanie, Olivia, Brian Ashley,
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: and Kiara. Thank you all as always for your support.
• 53:44
  Speaker 2: Ah You're the best.
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: I also need my team of people to help me
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: do this writing and fact checking from shaneon myself. Our
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: audio engineering and producing comes from Justin and our social
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: media coordinator is Emma Wilson. I was gonna mention, but
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: I forgot at the top of this that this is
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: a We've been doing this podcast now for nearly eight years,
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: and in that time we have largely been releasing these
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: deep dive episodes where we take about forty five minutes
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: to an hour or to unpack a topic, sometimes more,
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: and we just really try and thoroughly understand that topic.
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: And just around I don't know, fifty or sixty episodes ago,
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: we started releasing what we call minis, and so on
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: Mondays will we release these bite sized, very short episodes
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: where we take just sort of a quick glance instead
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: of a deep stare and right, we just briefly unpack
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: a topic. So check out those if you haven't already.
• 54:37
  Speaker 1: But I think that is all that I have to
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: say before we recommend some things. Is there anything you'd
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: like to add or anything I forgot before we make
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: our recommendations.
• 54:46
  Speaker 2: No, I think we're good.
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's do it all right. Recommendations recommending a TV show?
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: I am pretty sure that I recommended season one so
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: now I'm recommending season two. This is a TV series
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: called Silo. It is based on the I think it's
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: a Silo trilogy. But the first book in the trilogy
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: is called wol Wool and that is on Apple TV
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: Plus is where you can find the TV show. I
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: have started the book. I have not finished it. I
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: will report back once it is done. But I love
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: this show. I love it. I think it is one
• 55:29
  Speaker 1: of the most I think it is one of the
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: best shows on television right now. Personally, it is sort
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: of a dystopian sci fi ish type thing. It all
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: takes place in a future of humanity where we live
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: underground in a giant silo. Sure, so there's that. That's
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: essentially the premise of it. And like I said, I
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: just think it's a really great show. Rebecca Ferguson is
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: the main lead, although she doesn't come in until like
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: halfway through the first season or a few episodes into
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: the first season, and it's her and Tim Robbins are
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: sort of the two main, mainest main characters, but with
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: some great guest stars at various points of the show.
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: But yeah, strong recommend if you can get over to
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: Apple TV Plus and check it out.
• 56:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I love that. Great actors in that too. That
• 56:15
  Speaker 2: sounds awesome. Yeah, oh right. I'm recommending a video game.
• 56:19
  Speaker 3: And I'm recommending this because recently I decided to treat
• 56:22
  Speaker 3: myself to purchasing a PS five. So I have a
• 56:26
  Speaker 3: new gaming system, which I haven't had, like a like
• 56:29
  Speaker 3: a high a high, like a powerful I should say,
• 56:33
  Speaker 3: a powerful gaming system for some time. I've had the
• 56:35
  Speaker 3: switch with the switch is really fun, yeah, but it
• 56:37
  Speaker 3: doesn't have the same capacity as like a PlayStation. So
• 56:40
  Speaker 3: I got myself a PlayStation five and the first game
• 56:42
  Speaker 3: that I got that I fell in love with was
• 56:44
  Speaker 3: Red Dead Redemption two. And you might be going, Shane,
• 56:48
  Speaker 3: you are behind in the times, and you know what,
• 56:50
  Speaker 3: You're right I am. PlayStation five has been out for
• 56:53
  Speaker 3: several years, Red Dead Redemption has been out for many
• 56:56
  Speaker 3: years before that. But this game is a lot of fun.
• 56:58
  Speaker 3: The game follows a man named Arthur Morgan. He's part
• 57:02
  Speaker 3: of a cowboy gang. It takes place in eighteen ninety
• 57:05
  Speaker 3: nine and you're just kind of moving through this time
• 57:09
  Speaker 3: in America where you know, there's a lot of outlaws.
• 57:12
  Speaker 3: The wild West is kind of going on. You spend
• 57:14
  Speaker 3: some time robbing trains. There's lots of things that are
• 57:16
  Speaker 3: happening inside of this that are really fun. You get
• 57:18
  Speaker 3: to take care of a horse cool, you get to
• 57:21
  Speaker 3: go hunting if you need to. Like, it's really a
• 57:24
  Speaker 3: lot of fun and I've really enjoyed it. I've only
• 57:26
  Speaker 3: played like maybe two hours of the story, and the
• 57:28
  Speaker 3: story is huge and expansive, but I've only played for
• 57:31
  Speaker 3: a little bit and I just absolutely love it. It's beautiful.
• 57:34
  Speaker 3: The game is beautiful. It's like basically if Grand Theft
• 57:37
  Speaker 3: Auto were cowboys and not as mean, so like that's
• 57:41
  Speaker 3: the way I would look at it. And it's so
• 57:44
  Speaker 3: much fun. I have been having a blast onst so
• 57:46
  Speaker 3: strong recommend on that.
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: End fantastic and I've heard good things and it does
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: look like a very cool game. And congrats on your
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: new PS five.
• 57:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, thank you. My guy has a mustache. Now.
• 57:58
  Speaker 3: There's one of the mechanisms is you can just shave,
• 58:00
  Speaker 3: like you just go to your camp and you can
• 58:02
  Speaker 3: shave if you want to shave.
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: All right, Good to know, Good to know.
• 58:05
  Speaker 2: Interesting.
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: So Silo season two on Apple TV Plus or I
• 58:09
  Speaker 1: Dead Redemption two on at least on PlayStation. Is that
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: on other platforms as well, maybe an Xbox or something.
• 58:16
  Speaker 3: It might be, but I'm playing on PlayStation, so I
• 58:18
  Speaker 3: don't know. Okay, I'm a novice gamer.
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: Okay, that's a video game that is out there that
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: probably many of you have heard of. But those are
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: our recommendations and so you can tell us about those
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: two by reaching out to us. But I did all
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: of that part, so I think that we're ready to
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: wrap this one up. So I guess I'll just say
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: thank you for listening. This as Abraham and this is Shane.
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: We're out.
• 58:37
  Speaker 2: So yeah, you've been listening to Why We Do what
• 58:40
  Speaker 2: we do. You can learn more about this and other
• 58:43
  Speaker 2: episodes by going to WWDWWD podcast dot com. Thanks for listening,
• 58:49
  Speaker 2: and we hope you have an awesome day.