Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard - Nancy Segal (on twins)

Episode Date: August 20, 2025

Nancy Segal (Deliberately Divided: Inside the Controversial Study of Twins and Triplets Adopted Apart) is an evolutionary psychologist, behavioral geneticist, and author. Nancy joins the Armchair Expert to discuss whether there’s anything predictable about a twin who comes out first, why in twin studies differences are not deficits, and her work with the Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart. Nancy and Dax talk about the unexpected reason identical twins are more alike that any other pair of people, the concept of inclusive fitness to explain differential genetic behavior, and why doppelgängers can be an effective test for criticism of twin research. Nancy explains her argument that twins fundamentally challenge how we think the world works, the remarkable fact that children born on the same day to two sets of identical twins are genetic fraternal twins, and why only identical twins raised apart are able to see themselves in a life unlived.Follow Armchair Expert on the Wondery App or wherever you get your podcasts. Watch new content on YouTube or listen to Armchair Expert early and ad-free by joining Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Start your free trial by visiting wondery.com/links/armchair-expert-with-dax-shepard/ now.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondry Plus subscribers can listen to Armchair Expert early and add free right now. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts. Or you can listen for free wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome, welcome, welcome to armchair expert experts on expert. I'm Dachshepard and I'm joined by the Duchess of Duluth. Hi. Hi. Do you feel more sinister when you're taking on that moniker?

No, I feel responsible. Oh, you do? I feel the weight of royalty on my shoulders. Oh, it does. Heavy wears the crown. That's right. Heavy is the head that wears the crown. Heavy's the head.

Nancy Siegel is an evolutionary psychologist and a behavioral geneticist, but most importantly, long time coming. She specializes in studying twins. Mary Kate and Ashley types. I feel like twins is almost tied with Sim for us. As much as we talk about it. Yes, as much as we've needed an expert, but didn't have one for a long, long time. I mean, this is long overdue.

She has several incredible books on the topic. Entwined Lives, Born Together, Reared Apart, Accidental Brothers, Deliberately Divided, so this one is awesome. As we all know, Twins is really the only way we can learn about human behavior. Well, and especially if they're, ideally, if they're separated. So we get to learn a lot. But yes, it's incredible. I'm so glad we got to talk to Nancy.

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Hello, I'm Alice Levine. And I'm Matt Ford, and we're the hosts of British Scandal. And for our next series, we're bringing you the story of April Ashley. She was a trans trailblazer, a model and a socialite who lit up Paris and London in the 1960s, until a newspaper cruelly outed her and ended her career. But that is not the scandal.

Not only had April transformed her outward appearance, she'd also climbed the social ranks, from a Liverpool slum kid to a lady, married to an aristocrat. And you know you're in for trouble when the tofts get involved. Yes, when the marriage went sour, her divorce triggered a monumental question before the courts. Is it possible to legally change sex?

Follow British scandal wherever you get your podcasts and binge entire series early and ad-free. on Wondry Plus. Any beverages? I just wanted water, but I was offered everything. Oh, good. I don't take sparkling because I'll burp during the talk. Oh, yeah.

I love that. And coffee. I don't do well with caffeine. You don't. No, I don't. Okay, already, we're in your research, weirdly. Oh, we are. Yes, because I'm a humongous consumer of caffeine,

and I was delighted when I took a 23M-me test to see it say, you're someone who would like caffeine more. And I felt the absolution of guilt. Yeah, well, I don't know if that would actually absolve you, but at least it would help you understand. There we go. Yeah, I suppose if you have a genetic marker for road rage, it doesn't get you out of your responsibility.

No, it doesn't. But keep in mind that genes are just predisposed. They don't determine. Yes, yes, yes. Very important. Can we start in Boston? Yeah. Place of your birth?

Yeah. Yeah, what kind of child did you have in Boston? I was born in the Boston lying in hospital, and I was born six weeks early. You know, I'm a twin. I have a fraternal twin sister, and I nourished my way out first. You did? Yeah, naturally. And I was only three pounds, 11 ounces, and she was four pounds, seven.

We moved to New York City when I was five. Okay. To a building with lots and lots of friends. We lived near the school. What did mom and dad do? My dad was a lawyer, and my mom didn't go past high school, but she was very bright lady. and she worked as a dental hygienist once we got into the junior high school. Already you mentioned something, and I'm curious,

does any pattern emerge between fraternal and or identical from arriving first? Is there anything predictable about what baby comes out first? The only thing predictable about when baby comes first is that the firstborn twin, if it's a natural delivery, is in much better physical shape because of the way the uterus contracts. The second born twin is more likely to have some sort of difficulty, even demise. higher mortality. Because they're in there longer. It's not so much that they're there longer. It's the process of being delivered. Right. I guess that meant being delivered longer. The first one has already caused chaos. The delivery changes the uterus. You know, because

human females are not built to have two babies or three or four. They're built to have one. And so when you put two in there, that complicates matters. So they generally are the healthier of the two. There's a lot of circumstances that can affect that. But basically the first one has a better chance. But my sister was actually the healthier twin. She went home after two days in the incubator. I took up a residence of a month. And I mean, it was really kind of nice. I had my own room. Sure, sure, sure. And I was spoon fed. The last bit of single attention you'd ever get. Yeah, I know. So with the healthier start, did they tend to have 1% better educational achievement, income, any of those downriver things? Not with twins raised together. But you do see that with

twins raised apart, which I've studied for many, many years. Yeah. And sometimes you do see that the twin who's adopted by the better off family has more educational resources, better health care. But the question also becomes, does that make a difference in how they turn out? My feeling from studying lots and lots of twins is that as long as they're raised in middle-class homes with enough resources, parental attention, care, all that sort of thing, your genes will predispose you to a certain group of people, places, events, things that are compatible with who you are.

As a great example, we studied a pair of British twins, one raised. in a very educationally active family and one raised in a family where education was not a high priority. But the second twin loved to read, got herself a library card, and when the twins met at the age of, I think, 34 at the University of Minnesota, they

had the same IQs, they read the same books, by the same authors. They met at the University of Minnesota as part of the Minnesota study of twins raised apart. Roger. Extreme environments, though, if twins are separated, can overwhelm genetic potential, as I know from my studies of these switched at birth Colombian twins.

I'm in my office one day. I get an email from this woman who's Colombian, but a social worker at Columbia University. And she tells me, I've heard of your work. Do you know that in Columbia now, there was a set of identical twins born in one place, and identical twins born in another place, and somehow they exchanged places.

I knew right away I was going to Bogota because this was the case that I have never heard of before. Unparalleled potential here with what you studied. Not only was the two sets of twins switched apart, But it was a pair of unrelated of the same age that I call virtual twins because they give you a pure sense of environmental influence because they're the same home but different genes. But one pair was raised in the lively, rich city of Bogota and the other raised in this very rural area called La Paz. Do not confuse with La Paz, Bolivia. This is La Paz, Colombia.

It's the middle of nowhere. I went to visit them there. We took a car from Bogota to Veles. And from Veles, you take a four-wheel drive to someplace else. And then you put in a pair of boots and you walk for an hour. I had a choice of hiking or riding a horse. I'm thinking, which is less dangerous? Probably the mud.

So, I mean, there's nothing. Then all of a sudden, there's a house with three different sides on it. And I see our lunch being cooked outside. How would you like a freshly slaughtered cow on sticks? So that's what we had for lunch. But the whole process of this study was fascinating. And I have a book that came out in 2018 called Accidental Brothers, where I document not only the research findings, but also just the impressions I had.

It was absolutely amazing to see the similarities and the differences. But when I say that extreme environments, because the guys up in the country didn't go past the fifth grade, whereas the guys in the city went to college and had advanced certificates and the guys in the country had a lot more physical activity, I guess. And in fact, that reminds me we did a fascinating study on them on their vision. And it turns out that the guys in the city had much poorer vision than the guys in the country. And people thought it was well because they're reading computers and all that. It wasn't that.

It was that the guys in the country were out in the fresh air. No artificial lights, no sunglasses. But what was interesting was, so usually when I see twins raised apart, the rear-de-part twins do very similarly an ability test. These guys did more like the unrelated brother they were raised with because it was an extreme environment where the two guys in the country simply didn't have the education. Yes, let me ask you this.

Were the unrelated twins closer to one another on all the? these tests than their identical twin? Yes, they were. And see, for someone like me, a fraternal twin who I can see genetics all over the place, and someone who has studied twins raised apart, the findings initially shocked me. But it's good for me because I'm very genetically predisposed to genetic explanations. And so to see something where the environment of an extreme nature overwhelmed was just a good lesson and gives me much more appreciation for environmental experiences. Yeah, it's been interesting. The period of time that you've studied this, the goal keeps kind of flip-flopping as new scientific advances come. So I think we should start at the beginning. From Freud till twin studies, almost, the main consensus among psychologists was we are a product of our nurture, that all of our behaviors can be kind of explained by how we were brought up and how we were nurtured. And your studies start to poke at that. It wasn't just our studies that started poking. There were pokes before that. And in my book, Born

Together Reared Apart, I talk all about this and how these developments sort of led to the perfect time and place for the University of Minnesota twin study. Was that the first? It was actually the fourth or fifth reared apart twin study. There's a whole legacy of these things, but it's the best one. Yeah, the biggest. For a lot of reasons. But there began to be some advances in medicine. For example, they were able to link certain conditions like phenocetinuria to genes. What's phenyl cantonoria? Fetal catenuria is a recessive condition where a child is unable to convert

phenylalanine into tyrosine, which you need for normal metabolism. And so there's the build of phenolenein in the brain and that can cause mental retardation. Okay. It can be treated if you just give them a phenylalanine-free diet. Wow.

Yeah. How heartbreaking to learn that after the fact, probably. Yeah, but now we're able to treat this. So at any rate, people again to see differences between different breeds of dogs, different mouse strains. You could train an animal, for example, to avoid noxious noises when you paired it with food, but when you paired it with something else, it wouldn't work. So people began to see the constraints on the environment.

It just wasn't a full explanation. Then there was a case study of reared-depart twins done by Paul Popano in, I think, the 1920s. And these twins, Bessie and Jesse, they were so much alike, despite their separate. rearing. So all along there were these developments where people were just realizing environment does not explain everything and genetics absolutely plays a role. But resistance to genetics came about because of the Holocaust, the Germans trying to make value judgments among different types of groups based on their different genetics. And also then there was the women's movement of the 60s and civil rights. And so discrimination or value judgments on

different groups of people was not something that you welcomed. And then there was a lot of rejection of sex differences too. But what I tell my students is, and I use the quote from this very famous evolutionary biologist Theodosius Jubtansky, that differences are not deficits. Differences are just differences. And if you attach a value judgment to them, well, it's not appropriate. Now, we know, for example, that males tend to do better in visual spatial activities, females, and verbal. So maybe if I'm lost in a cave, I might value visual spatialization a little more. or if I need someone to help me in a difficult law case where you have to do a choreographic dance

of verbal gymnastics, maybe I'd prefer a female. But in general, you can't say, and depending upon circumstances, certain talents are going to be more valuable. But at any rate, so twin studies began to gain popularity after, of course, Joseph Mangala. He was a German doctor who came to Auschwitz-Burkenau, the concentration camp in Poland.

He gathered twins and dwarfs and anybody with a medical condition, and he exploited them for his own purposes. He was fascinated with twins. I actually went to 1985 with the remaining Holocaust twins to their 40th anniversary reunion. And I have a wonderful little annotated collection

of photographs I took there that I published about two years ago. So Joseph Mangala gave twin research a really, really bad name. And so it kind of stalled for a while but made a comeback in about the 1980s. Once people began to realize that you needed genes to explain certain things that you couldn't explain otherwise.

Then people began to get a little more receptive. Now, there still was rejection and criticism for many, many, many years. Again, what I always tell people is, you can study, you can read, you can learn, you can make yourself better, but we're not going to have everybody being the same. No. And we need the talents of different people in order to survive as a population. Our variation is our strength. Exactly.

So I was a graduate student at the University of Chicago, always interested in twin studies. and I'm going to tell you now how I got into twin studies. And then let's also talk about evolutionary psychology. We will. So just briefly how I got into this and how I made it just the most glorious fun career of my lifetime, the only career. So I was an undergraduate at Boston University.

I was a psych major. I liked psychology. No topic set me on fire until I was a senior and I was an abnormal psychology class and my professor said that we had to write a personal essay on some aspect of development. So I decided to write about separating twins in school. And I found that I love doing that.

I loved the literature, I looked, everything about it, and that was it. I was hooked. That was my field forever and ever and ever. I was always interested in twin studies. I was working on a twin study for my doctoral thesis. And then in 1981, Professor Bouchard organized this Minnesota study of twins raised apart, which was launched by a pair of twins called the Jim Twins, Jim Lewis and Jim Springer in Ohio. Isn't that great?

They're both Jim. They don't have the same last name. Yeah. They're the gym dreams. They were both named Jim. Oh, because they were separated. And they were each named Jim by their adoptive families. Whoa.

And so they met when they were 39, and they were so similar in so many ways. They both bit their fingernails to the nub. They both had light blue Chevroletes. They both were woodworkers. They both worked in McDonald's. I mean, you could name a million things about them. But the craziest is they both married Linda first, got divorced, and married Betty. And then married Betty.

And then one of them divorced Betty and married Sandy. And so I imagine the other. Betty was pretty nervous, especially if a Sandy came around. The odds of all that are so incalculable, because even if they both want the same thing, the notion that they would both meet a Betty. Well, the beauty of Reared Apart Twins is that they give you new hypotheses about why things happen. You can say that Betty and the Sandy and the Linda and all that were completely coincidental. Maybe there's something about the name that attracts them. I don't know.

I wrote a paper about what people call coincidence. I don't think it's coincidence. I think that there are better scientific explanations for why twins have these similarities. And, you know, we all have our own habits, ways of doing things. I think it's a function of who we are in large part. How do you explain two identical twins raised apart who never met to their 40s, and they both washed their hands before and after using the bathroom? Fear of germs, this need to be clean.

Another pair of twins we met, they met at 25. They both used bril cream. I mean, who didn't in those days? Right. But they both used a very rare brand of Swedish toothpaste called Vaddy Makeum. Now, that's impressive. Yes. Who cares?

First of all, it's impressive if you remember the name of the toothpaste. Let's just add that. Vaddy Bacon? Vattie Macom. I said it so many times. Why would they do this? So let's think about why. Maybe they like the unusual name, makes them different than other people.

Maybe something about the taste. Maybe they have affiliations with Sweden. They like the Swedish culture. I think the toothpaste was not made with fluorides, so maybe that's what they wanted. But it gives you all these different ways of thinking about things. So a common occurrence doesn't interest me,

but a rare one does. Yes, a rare one does. Yes. And that's where I think the genes make a difference. We had these twins who like coffee warm but not hot. There was a pair that like their coffee cold. Yeah. And why is that?

Maybe they're afraid of burning their tongue or they like the sensation. But see, this gives us ways of thinking about things And rather than just saying, oh, it's chance or oh, it's random. Yeah. Okay, so I think most people understand evolutionary biology. They understand Darwinism to a degree. In general, when we were studying evolution, we were thinking of mostly how we developed

as this species, not so much emphasis put on our psychology. How does evolutionary psychology emerge and what is it attempting to answer? So with evolutionary psychology, basically when you think about it, the evolution of the mind, you think about complex problems that we as a species had to solve if we were going to survive. And so those people who figured out the solutions would pass them on and the people who would adopt them are the ones who would survive and the ones who didn't would not. So let's think about, for example, fear of snakes. That's a very easy explanation and an example I can give you. People are afraid of snakes, even if they've never had any exposure

to a snake. But the people who were afraid of snakes way back were the ones who survived. They didn't get bit by snakes. They're the ones who survived. So they passed on these genetically based potentials to their ancestors, which is why we're afraid of snakes now, even if we've never even seen them. That is interesting. People who aren't afraid of snakes, can we say that maybe they come from a line that wasn't exposed to many snakes to begin with? It's possible. Or maybe these are more risk-taking behaviors. There is such a thing to be said about risk. Sometimes the risk, you have great benefits. It's part of mate selection quite often. It's a mechanism within evolution. Yeah. You have big loud feathers that attract predators.

That's disadvantage in the wild, but it's a big advantage in mating. But I'm scared of snakes, and I'm not thinking like, well, snakes are in India. Oh, big time. This gives you a new way of thinking about why you are the way that you are. Yeah. Okay, so quickly for anyone who's confused on fraternal versus identical, fraternal twins are two different eggs and two different sperms that get fertilized and then you're a person and you have the same genetic similarities as you would, a normal sibling. It's not increased at all because you were in the womb at the same time. No, fraternal twins do tend to be somewhat more alike on average than ordinary siblings and why? Because they're the same age. Yes. So they're part

of the same quote-unquote generation. But identical twins result when a single fertilized egg divides within the first 14 days after conception. And these twins share all their genes. Now, having said that, there are exceptions because there can be mutations along the way. But nevertheless, despite these, and despite the fact that being in a womb for identical twins,

actually is more conducive to differences in similarities because they can develop these mutual circulation systems or one literally bleeds into the other. So while people say, oh, sharing a womb makes you like, it doesn't. It makes you more different. So to me, the fact that identical twins are as alike as they are, is pretty amazing, given that there are all these

factors that are trying to make them different. And they're not exactly alike. Whenever we look at twins, we find differences between them, but they're still overwhelmingly more alike than fraternal twins or any other pair of people. When did kinship genetic theory come out? That was with Hamilton in the 70s. Kintech genetic theory is that we are predisposed to be altruistic towards individuals with whom we perceive as having genes in common with us. So that means that you would be predisposed to be nicer, say, to a mother than to an aunt, or to an identical twin than a fraternal twin, or to a cousin versus someone unrelated. Although with cousins, you don't share a high proportion of genes with them,

so it's hard to know who a cousin is. Now, Hamilton extended this further to a concept called inclusive fitness. And inclusive fitness is that it pays for me to be kind to you because you share my genes. So I'm getting my genes out in the population through you, but I also get my jeans out through me for any child I create. This gets into Richard Dawkins and Selfish Gene Theory, that really genes are evolving, not the species. So it pays for me to be reproductively active, but I get a boost if I get my genes out through you. Yes. You do have to then think about it's not just the survival of the individual animal, it's the survival of the genes.

That's what you're seeing. It's misleading a little bit. Of course, none of this goes on at the conscious level. I don't think to myself, well, my sister and I have fraternal, so I won't be so nice to her. If I'm identical, I'd be nicer. This just does not go on at the conscious level. But what it does is, I think it's maintained at what we call the proximate level, which is the here and now, whereas ultimate refers to genes. at the proximal level, it makes me feel happy to do good things for my sister, makes me happy to do good things for my parents. It gives me pleasure. And I think that that is what maintains this kind of differential treatment of different relatives. How does the concept of in-groups are more empathetic to themselves than they are to out-groups?

And if you look the same, it's easier for you to empathize with another person. What about when you're identical? It seems like there would also be a very nice. extension of the self when you look so similar. There could be the genetic aspect, but then there could also be this, you truly can see yourself and the other person because they are you. Yeah, this whole theory is not perfect, obviously. You can certainly make mistakes. And there's a whole field of study of doppelgangers, people who look alike and are unrelated. And I've studied them. I find them absolutely fascinating for a lot of reasons.

Oh, tell me. Well, doppelgangers are people who happen to look alike. And the way I discovered this, there's a photographer up in Canada, he was a doppelganger, he found his lookalike, and he began to be fascinated with this and developed the whole project called I'm not a lookalike. That's his name of his project, but they are lookalikes. Anyway, it occurred to me that these kinds of people would be a great way of testing a certain criticism against twin research. So the criticism is that identical twins are alike in personality because people treat them alike based on their appearance. Yeah, that's a good theory.

Well, I don't agree. It makes sense at one level, but personality is in your brain that's not in your face. So I decided to test out how similar these unrelated lookalikes were in personality and compare that with twins raised apart and twins raised together. And actually, the best comparison is twins raised apart because lookalikes were raised together.

And identical twins raised apart, share genes, share their resemblance, are raised apart. And so I said, if my data support my hypothesis, then it's the case that identical twins are treated more alike, but it's because they evoke the same treatment from those around them. Yes. Right. So I did this study, and we replicated it twice with different personality questionnaires, and I was dead on right. The correlations were something like 0.02 for one case and 0.04 for the other. So doppelgangers aren't going to have the same? No, personality. No, they're not. And what makes me a little bit sad is that we had these websites now.

for looking for your doppelganger. And I think that the people who scour those websites are those who are looking for something in their life, and they're not going to find it. I also did a study of these doppelgangers in terms of their social closeness to their newly found double. And they're not close.

A few are, of course. I'm starting to think it's more types than it is actual one-for-one correspondence between features. I was going to say, yeah, a six-two guy is going to have some predictable outcome. Yeah, or at least people might perceive it that way. But the doppelgangers are fascinating, and unlike identical twins raised apart who are close when they meet and become closer over time, the doppelgangers are not close when they meet,

and they become less close over time. Oh, wow. Yeah. I mean, it just fits the genetic expectations perfectly. Interesting. Now, you point out in your TED talk to this neat concept where twins fundamentally challenge how we think the world works. Like, we're supposed to be all individual.

and just seeing them kind of threatens our understanding of the world. And I wondered, does that vary between countries that prize individuality versus those who don't? More collectivist society? Are they less enamored with twins are intrigued? As far as I know, people are enamored with twins everywhere. And I don't think anyone who's really looked at it in terms of individualistic versus collectivist societies. One could certainly test that, and I think it would be a very interesting thing to test.

But people everywhere are fascinated with twins. I've never gone anywhere. I mean, I've traveled a lot of different countries. I just came back from Greece, for example. They have a democracy there. The whole reason I was there was an invitation to a twin conference. People celebrate twins, and when they hear that I'm a twin, I mean, suddenly they're all over me.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I actually think I'm kind of low on the twin-type totem pole because I'm only a fraternal race together. Oh, my God. You're boring. Thank God I have a sister, not a brother. But actually, I should really qualify that statement. And that is that twin research would not be what it is today

if you didn't have fraternal twins. because the classic twin comparison is identical versus fraternal. It's not so much the identical twin similarity. It's their similarity relative to fraternal twins. That's where the information comes from. Okay. So you did numerous studies, and one of them was to test cooperation between identical twins versus cooperation between fraternal twins, and it was a very interesting outcome.

It was. You're talking about my puzzle completion studies, yes. I got the idea for that because I was visiting the home. of a woman who had four-year-old fraternal twins. And I saw those kids fight over that puzzle like you wouldn't believe. And I realized what a great thing for my doctoral dissertation. And I thought, how would my sister and I have done this? And I think what would have happened there is because she's so much bigger than I am,

she's bigger and she's stronger. I think she would have taken the whole thing to her side of the table. But anyway, I'd like to do semi-naturalistic studies, which is where you bring the same thing to the same homes, but it's still something that the twins would do. anyway, work on a puzzle together. So I brought this puzzle, same puzzle, put it down exactly as it was. The kid sat on one side of the table, and I just said to everybody, solve it together. The identical twins were like a beautiful, coordinated synchrony.

Really? They faced each other. The puzzle pieces were gently placed and no fighting and happy smiles, and they were quite good at it. They finished it faster than the fraternals, as I remember right. But the fraternal twins did one of two things. Either one child completely took the pieces over to her side of the table. Or some people took a few to their side, and they took a few to their side. And of course, you couldn't do the puzzle. So then I remember one little boy snatched the puzzle from his sister. It was really quite amazing. I would sit there with my breath held because I would tell the mothers, you can't come in because mothers would say, oh, play

nicely. If mothers said we'd play nicely, I'd kill that mother. One of the most amazing things I saw were two fraternal twins and one kid put her arms like this and took all the pieces over. She's solving and the other little girl's kind of going, I want to be part of it. Then the little girl finally looked up to the camera, did this to me? I mean, it was, that's the one that I showed all my lectures. It's absolutely amazing. Stay tuned for more armchair expert, if you dare. Searchlight Pictures presents the roses.

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corruption and magic. Binge all episodes of The Mystic and the Mayor exclusively and ad free right now on Wondry Plus. Start your free trial. in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or the Wondry app. Now, there was overlap. There were some identicles that weren't that cooperative and some professionals that were.

But the information you get about human behavior comes from the many, not the two. Do you think potentially the fraternal twins are seeking individuality a little bit more? They're already being lumped together so much in life that I could imagine them being like, No, but we're different. Whereas identical twins, sorry. The ship's sailed.

Exactly. Actually, Monica, I think is the absolute reverse. Because with fraternal twins, they don't have to try so hard to be individuals. They look very different. They are very different. They have different tastes and preferences and things like that. And it's very easy for parents to treat them differently. Now, some parents will lump them together, but usually the twins can't be lumped. Yeah. Now, with identical twins, they will tell you that they are separate individuals. And a lot of times, they don't even see the similar.

It's quite striking when you hear that because you see two identical people. I remember a mother who brought her little girls to my lab. Now, she brought them on different days. Fraternal, she said, and this was a biology teacher. And then I'm thinking second day, why is she bringing the same girl back? And I realized these were identical twins. And she thought they were fraternal? Yes.

Yes, how often does that happen? Because pre-genome mapping, you couldn't have found out. Hospitals don't routinely do DNA test in which they should for all same-sex twins. Because the same behavior can have different interpretations if twins are. identical or fraternal. If identical twins are quite different to something, say an ability test, maybe one child has a problem. Fraternal twins, are they very different? Could be their different genes. So I'm all in favor of that. But parents are more likely to think identical twins are fraternal than fraternals are identical. And that's because they're so sensitive to subtle differences

between the children that they don't even see the similarities. Which is great. That's what you would want from your mother or your father, to see you as an individual. But I think parents of identicals have to reach a kind of happy balance because after all, this is a special relationship and the twins tend to be very, very close to one another and they want to be together. And so to separate them all the time may not be what they want or to make them do different things all the time is not what they want. Yeah, you probably have this fear as a parent as all parents are fearful, like, oh, I got to make them independent. They can't go through their whole life together. I have to break them up and make them find their own way. And I could see what your fear would motivate you

to do that. Yeah, but I think that parents can stay sensitive. I think that parenting is so important when it comes to just being vigilant and paying attention to children. And I often tell parents, you don't bring up your child. Your child brings you up because parents find that what works with one kid doesn't always work with the other kid. I love what you say that parents of one child are generally environmentalist. Environmentalist. And parents of two are geneticists. Couldn't have been more true for me. You just described us to a teeth. For two years, we were like, we're crushing this. She's already potty trained. She talked before everyone. You took pride in that. This is the product of our hard work as parents. And then Delta arrived and we're like, oh, no, this girl's

completely different. The people I think are the best informed parents without even book learning are the parents of fraternal twins because they've got kids at the same moment and they can just see how different they are. I'll tell you, honestly, they know more about human behavior and development than a lot of my colleagues. A lot of my colleagues kind of give lip service, yes, genetics, but it's only environment. I know no one would two kids would say that. And another fascinating thing is that rear-de-part twins, they often think that their behaviors are environmentally influenced until they meet their twin. And suddenly they do a complete revision of everything they thought about.

It's quite striking. Okay, so your work, along with all the twin stuff, is I imagine one of the main sources that we get to lead us more to embrace that, at best, this is a mix of nature and nurture, and it might be more nature than we think it is. I wonder, you must have seen three identical strangers. Of course I didn't. Yes, it's so great. And as a parent, it's an interesting experience to watch it.

The premise for people who don't know, triplets are separated at birth and they slowly start discovering each other in their early 20s, I think at college. 19. At first, you're going through all the similarities, right? They smoke the same cigarettes. They like the same t-shirts. And when you're a parent, you're going, well, it's even the point. I don't even have really a role in this.

But as the doc unfolds and they do a great job of it, you learn, oh, no, there's a lot of nurture also going on. And so that, to me, brings up the question of how. How do you correct for the kind of confirmation bias that's just so right in that you're going to bring together two separated identical twins? You're naturally going to focus on these similarities that are peculiar to defy explanation, the same toothpaste from Switzerland. And you're going to miss tons of ways that they're completely different because you're in search of it. You're wrong. Okay, great.

We did not focus on the similarities. They came up. We simply looked at a lot of different measures, medical measures, psychological measures, physiological measures. Like intelligence, athleticism. A lot pressure. I mean, all kinds of things. We let the data just tell us what happened. And quite frankly, we were surprised at how similar the twins were. We expected things like in social attitudes and religiosity, there'd be differences, but they were very similar.

And when you think about it, see, the early studies in twin research looked at religiosity. what is that, how much you participate in religious activities, how spiritual are you? But they study children, and that was the mistake. They study children who are under the thumbs of their parents. So they're going to do what they're going to do. So the identical fraternal twin differences never emerged. When you study adults who are free to choose, then the genetic factors start to emerge. So when we say that behavior has genetic influence, it certainly does.

I think that nature certainly plays a role, but what happens is that more behaviors than we previously would have thought have a genetic influence, like social attitudes, like religiosity. Reactions to films. Now, three identical strangers. Let's get back to that for a second. I love that movie. And I wrote a book about that unethical twin study that they were part of. In the 1960s, there was a psychiatric consultant, Viola Bernard, who worked with Louise Wise Services where mothers would come and they would leave their babies. These were single Jewish moms. And if they had twins, this consultant said twins should be separated because if they grow up together, then they're not going to be able to individuate. There was no literature to back that at all.

There was a doctor named Dr. Peter Newbauer, who knew Dr. Viola Bernard, who was the consultant, and he decided to study these twins. And the parents who had one twin who told your child's in a child development study, but they were never told that it was a twin study. And this all came out later when the triplets met. I was fascinated with this, and everyone came up to me and said, you have got to do the book on this. And I was hesitant because I knew that it was going to be controversial, but I knew I was the best person in the world to do it. So I did it. My book deliberately divided came out in 2021. But anyway, everyone thinks that it was Viola Bernard's idea to separate the twins and that Peter Newbauer then took advantage of the situation and studied them. I'm not so sure.

I have a feeling that maybe he wanted to study them because he always thought about it and he was seeking a reason to separate. I think that's a possibility. I'm putting that forward with no real hard evidence. There were five sets of identical twins who were in this study and the one set of triplets. In fact, one set was actually dropped,

which was such bad science because they were adopted at very different times and at different birth weights. But that's not good science. You keep in the different ones. Anything's inconvenient you don't get to just throw out. Of course not. you're going to buy your data that way.

The Minnesota study of twins raised apart, we looked at fraternal twins too, which was a new thing. The previous studies had not done that. And I will say that in this unethical study in the 1960s, they studied the identicals, but they separated the fraternals and didn't study them. Oh.

You have to ask yourself why. Of course, fraternal twins would not have a problem with individuation so much because they look so different. Yeah, you would think you'd be using it as a control group, but you're not even studying it, so it's not. And there were at least four or five sets of fraternals that we know about. The identicals,

met like the triplets, confused identity. But fraternals are not going to undergo that, so they're never going to know. There are probably fraternal twins running around out there that we'll never know that they were twins. And I will say that maybe you don't know, but another movie came out about this situation called The Twinning Reaction.

Oh, no, I haven't seen it. Yes, it's an excellent movie also. It got less attention. I was asked to be a consultant on three identical strangers, but I'd already put my loyalties in this other one. Okay. But I am in the other one. I'm a very loyal person.

What's that one called again? The twinning reaction. And if you need a link to it, I can send that. It's out. It's a fascinating movie. Oh, I would love that because I love three identical strangers. I thought the reenactment and that was superb. It was very accurate and exactly as it happened.

I know a lot about those triplets. So now, here's what I'm saying about the full arc of this exploration, which is fascinating. Initially, identical twins that are separated provide this really unique opportunity to demonstrate the power of your DNA, your genetics. At that time, when you start, we have not mapped the genome, so we can't do a genetic test. But now we can. Now we can look at genes. We're starting to learn certain genes are predictive of a lot of different things.

I said the caffeine thing. Misophonia is one that comes up on a genetic test, right? Many, bendy things. Yes. The value of twins almost flips at this point because now, as opposed to bringing them back together, seeing the similarities to prove the genetics have a role in this. Now you're bringing identical twins together to see. see these differences that have emerged in pursuit of proving how powerful the epigenome is,

which becomes the kind of new area of exploration. So let's talk about the epigenome. I see what you're saying, that twin studies have a kind of different function now than they had in the past. Yeah. When the Minnesota study was in play, that was 1979 to 1999. We brought in the twins and studied their behavior. And now you can actually look at their genes and you can get all different kinds of things. So a study like we did would probably not fly right now. although I do all kinds of studies with twins. I will say that even though we're in an era now where we're looking at the molecular side of things,

I think there's no substitution for actually having a pair of flesh and blood twins in front of you and watching them. There are so many things we still have to study. Now, when we talk about the epigenome, we're talking about genetic expression and how that can change based on circumstance. And this is where identical twins can be enormously valuable.

This is where it's so important for learning about other people, non-twins. people have this wrong impression that twin research is for twins only it's not it's a model for understanding human behavior writ large right okay suppose one identical twin has alzheimer's the other one does not we've seen cases like that and so what is it that turns on the genes for one and not on the other other one why is it that one identical twin is homosexual one the other one isn't you have that yes is there a gene or a group of genes it flips on is it some hormonal exposure i've studied identical twins where one undergoes transsexual reassignment surgery? Oh, no kidding. Why does one identical

female twin feel like a male from the age of three and the other one does not? Yes. Why is that? I mean, these are things that we can understand. So now, think about schizophrenia, 40% similarity rate in identical twins. Why is that? And we can look at the epigenome. We can look at birth factors. We can look at brain structures, lots of different things. And there's probably not just one explanation. There's probably many, many explanations for this. Yeah, what are some of the explanations that you found looking at that? Because when I went to this college and I had an abnormal psychology class, and they were explaining that schizophrenia in particular is a genetic predisposition, but then there's a

stressful event in this window of time that can activate it. So it could be a stressful event. It's diathesis stress theory that you have a predisposition, but if you're not stressed, it may never be expressed. They find differences in brain structure where one identical twin has it and the other one doesn't. One of the most fascinating cases was the Janane quadruplets. Do you know about that case? No, tell us. Oh, this is an amazing case. This came out in 1963. At the time when genetics didn't basically exist in people's psychological themes, and everything was environmentally oriented.

So they were four identical quads born in Michigan. And they all had schizophrenia, but to varying degrees of severity. Wow. Yeah. And so a book came out called the Janane quadrublets. Now, Now, Janain is not the real name. Janine means dreadful birth or dire gene. Oh. And they were given the names NIMH, Nora, Iris, Myra, and Hester. After NIMH, the National Institute of Mental Health, and they were studied. Okay.

Now, I was privileged to know their real names because my first year in grad school, I wrote away to all these places to try to get a summer job. And I got a couple of offers, but the one I took was to be a research assistant on the study of the Janine quadruplets. At U of M? No, at NIMH. And so I got to read all the correspondence that they sent to the investigator, and I was coding it and looking for certain themes. I mean, it was a dream job.

Wow, that's so cool. I was thrilled about that. But they came out of a time when genetics was not a major explanation for psychopathology, so it kind of rattled the boat. Well, people were probably quick to say those parents did something, if all four of them turned out schizophrenic. I will say that there were still critics of genetics, but they're fewer and far between.

You can't explain certain things without reference to genetics. You just can't. Right. And so what was the explanation you guys felt most confident in about these varying outcomes of the same illness? Part of it had to do with how parents treated them in terms of their birth order. That's just one of many explanations. But I remember that there was a preferred pair and a non-preferred pair. The preferred pair was birth order one, birth order three.

And the non-preferred pair was birth order two, birth order four. And the fourth one was really, really sick. I mean, she was the sickest of all. So the second board didn't want to be with her. They think that part of her resentment came into play. Birth Order 3, who was paired in the preferred pair, she actually was less affected than others. And she actually married and had some kids in a road biography.

Oh, wow. But nevertheless, she had some strange behaviors. It's amazing that they were all so different. It could have been something epigenetic. We really can just speculate as to why they came out so different. Did they all get it at the same time? Pretty much. Yeah, because there's a window, right?

It's like from 17 to 25 or something. Most young adults, yeah, that's usually when it is. But they had strange behaviors even before, and there was some evidence of child abuse and things like that. Okay, let's drill down a little further on epigenome because what's really fascinating about this new field that we're learning more and more about epigenetics is it brings back Lamarckian evolution in a way

in that know your environment, your body could real-time respond, and although it couldn't alter your overall deal. DNA, it can certainly alter how the DNA is used. So far, there's a lot of people that believe you can pass that on. You can't. Talk about that a little bit. That's fascinating. So the fact that parents can pass on genes to children is well known, the fact that

they can pass on altered expression also can happen. We hear this about trauma quite a bit, that it seems to be transferable. It seems to be because if you look at Holocaust survivors, children have certain kinds of behaviors that are not typical. Some people say, well, it's because they're around their parents. but it could also be something passed down on the genes. It would be interesting to see if the orphans of those people had the same outcomes or similar.

Right. My understanding is that these epigenetic changes that are passed on eventually may fade over time as people have different experiences and things that's worth. But the DNA stays intact. Right. The epigenome's fluid and the DNA is fixed. That's right.

It is weird that Mary Kate and Ashley are fraternal twins and they look. Let's talk about this. But isn't that? That just turned up they've never taken a date. DNA test. I've seen many pictures of them, and I know they have a store on Los Angeles clothing stores. They're identical. I mean, there's no question about it. Oh, Monica, that was a slam-dye for me. There's no question. And I think they're doing a real disservice by not having a DNA test. Do we know for sure they haven't? Maybe they haven't. It's never come out. I don't

know. But I would bet my money on them being identical. Also, one's right-handed and one's left-handed. 25% of identical twins are opposite-handed. That's the same for fraternal twins, too. But still, their faces look a little asymmetrical to me, which is consistent with that. Listen, again, I dated one of them and I was around the other quite a bit, and I was fascinated by the fact that they were definitely identical

and definitely quite different. I found that endlessly interesting. You know what I find endlessly interesting, and I'm working on this right now in the book that I'm writing, is I'm interested in why someone like you might be attracted to one identical twin and not to the other.

And I'm also interested in the other way around why one of the twins finds one person attractive and the other one does not. I find that fascinating. And I think that maybe in the second scenario where you've got two twins and one is attracted and the other one isn't, they could have both been, but one sets up something, the other one kind of backs off. And the reason I say that is because I was in England to do a TV show. And a lot of times TV has these gimmicky little experiments, but this one was brilliant. They didn't realize how brilliant it was. So they had four pairs of identical twins in different rooms. And they brought in identical twin actors and actresses to meet these

twins as potential dating partners. And the twins found the same potential dating partners attractive. Not all identical twins are going to meet identical twins. You know, there's a limit. So I think that's what happens. But I will also say that I've studied identical twins who've married identical twins. It has to be very rare. It's not as rare as you think. A lot of them go to Twinsburg, Ohio, where they had these festivals in August, the Twin States Festival. And some of them go specifically to meet twins. And why is that? Because they want their spouse to understand

just how meaningful this relationship is so the spouse won't get jealous. And easier to marry the two. Like if you want to stay in constant contact but also get a partner, it's helpful if your partners are also in the same situation. And if you have babies, you've got a built-in babysitter too.

And then your children. Okay, we'll jump to that. Because I have a lot of fascinating things to say about the kids. I met these identical twins who married identical twins and I went out and hung out with them for a couple of days. And I assumed, naively, That didn't matter who you married. Everybody's genetically interchangeable.

Oh, I was really wrong. I picked this one. She's got a sweeter, gentler face. That meant a lot. I picked the one who was the first one. I picked the one who was the more dominant because I'm submissive and two dominants would hit each other

and submissives would never get in the long. There were real reasons why certain pairs went together. And I've read about a couple or so that met recently. And it's almost immediate who goes with whom. It's just amazing how it gets decided. When identical twins marry identical twins,

Of course, the children are legal first cousins, but the genetic full siblings. Yeah. And what is more common, though, is identical twins who marry unrelated people, and their children are genetic half-siblings. And in those cases, the aunt is the mother and the father is the uncle, if it's the twin mothers or twin fathers. Yeah, I do think that's confusing when your mom and aunt are identical. We interviewed someone whose mother died, and then their identical twin sister stepped in to help. And I thought, well, that's as good as it's ever going to get for somebody who loses their parent. And now one case I want to tell you about, and I'll come back to that, is I met one family with identical twins who married identical twins, and they had children on the same day.

Can you calculate the relationship between those kids? Can I calculate the relationship between them? Oh, so they were born on the same day. They have the exact same two contributing genetic pool. So they're the same person. No, no, no, no, no, no. They are fraternal twins. genetically speaking.

Oh, because they were in separate. They're not strictly twins because they didn't share the womb, but they were born in the same day to the same parents. The same sperm and ovum. Right. So they're like fraternal twins. Yes. Because you asked me, I was certainly way more attracted to the one I was with.

I think studying a situation like yours would tell us a lot about mate selection, about the very subtle things that spell the difference between loving and liking. Twins are ideal for studying mate. selection. Yeah. Don't you think some of this leads to just that attraction is environmental then? I don't know. I think attraction is too complicated to just attribute to one set of factors. Sure. Maybe it's a multiple layer. This smell. Yeah. Pheromones. I mean, we tend to like somebody who sort of like us, but not too much like us. Yeah. It's a lot of things. I did used to have a theory that people are attracted romantically to people who have some sort of similar features to them.

even if things are very different, like race is different or overtly they don't look the same, but once you really start looking, it's like, oh, actually, they both have prominent this or big eyes. You're very smart because we find that similarities attract, right? First of the feather. It's not that opposites attract. Now, the biggest features that attract people are values, things like that. Highen weight, not so much. The physical features, not so much, but it's values and educational levels. Those are really important. Okay, so you're about to say, a new book you're writing. No, I was going to study.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I study. We got from these twins married to twins. It's all framed with an evolutionary psychology. And so I hypothesized that identical twins would be more heavily invested in their identical twin sisters or brothers' children than would fraternal twins. And that's exactly what I found. Oh, wow. Yeah.

It's a behavioral genetic design to look at an evolutionary-based hypothesis. That's what I did. What was the construct of that? Like, how do you test for that? So what I did was I constructed a questionnaire that had 36 items in it, answering him out, does this child look like it could have been your child? How much time do you spend with this child? Do you think of this child is your own? Questions along those lines.

And the identical twins came out with higher scores than the fraternal twins did, which didn't surprise me at all. Yeah. Well, again, this is insanely anecdotal, but it's just been my own personal experience. My kids, well, one in particular is a little shyer, very slow to warm up to new kids her age. That's pretty consistent across the board. I have my cousin down with his kids. She knows their cousins. Immediately it's on.

There was none of that self-consciousness. The shyness is gone. It was stark. It's like, oh, my God, they just arrived. They don't know each other. And they're immediately at ease with each other. And I'm like, is this something genetic happening? That just wouldn't happen with a stranger entering the house.

It's hard to know. It could be just a meshing of personalities that the kids have. But one of the most striking things I ever saw was a reunion between identical female twins. They were born in China and they were separated because of the one child policy. One day I get this telephone call from the mom in Sacramento who told me she was raising a twin raised apart from China and the other twin was in a little town in Norway in the fjords. Whoa. Oh, what a different nurture. So here's what happened. About that time the BBC contacted me and said, got any good stories for us? I said, if you will fly the Norwegian family to Sacramento and fly me from Fullerton to Sacramento, you've got

yourself a story. And they did. And were you there for the first time they met? Oh, yes. Oh, my goodness. What was that like? And so the little girl runs out of her house and the little girl outside is jumping up and down. And then this other one comes out, looks exactly like her. And she starts jumping up and down. How old were they? Six. And of course, one spoke English, one spoke Norwegian. But I observed the kids playing and they played together like known each other all their lives. They somehow figured it out. And I had a wonderful picture that I took at the kids where they're standing back to back and they're holding hands. And I happened to go back to to Norway about eight years later for a conference in Oslo, but I went out to Freswick in the

fjords, and I positioned the same way, this most amazing time-loss photography, because the one who was taller before is a little taller now. I remember seeing them at age 14, where the other one can now speak English, and they would just leave the adults, and they'd go somewhere, and just talk, they had this world of their own. That's what identical twins do, and I think that many people envy that closeness. Yes, definitely. You probably never went down this path because it wasn't your discipline by maybe like linguists would be interested in this, but did you ever explore how much they can communicate? I think that's a fascination we have. It is a fascination. And I have not studied it systematically, but I've observed many, many cases. I've gone to twins' homes

or all say, who's going first? They look at each other. Suddenly one leaves and one stays. And what is transpiring there? I don't know. People call it twin language. It's really not a language. It's a system of communications, words, gestures, phrases that twins often evolve because they're so close together. Identical twins and fraternal twins will both do it. My sister and I have little games that we used to play sometimes, but the identical twins do it to a much greater degree. And it'll just be like they hold up an object, they give it a name. And it's very fascinating to watch it, but it's not a language. It's just a system of communication. And what it can do is delay the onset of normal language in twins. Oh. And so parents had to be mindful.

or that. Because if they spend too much time together, they won't be able to converse inappropriate ways with their peers or with adults. Oh, interesting. What a fascinating topic. I know. I'm kind of jealous that you got to study. You should be. Because I discover stuff all the time, new things all the time. I guess my last question about them is, do they over index and just self-esteem? I feel like if I had a built-in partner, that I would just be a little less fearful about the world in general? I think that's true to some extent because I've interviewed a number of twins

who say that they never had the peer pressures that other people had. They didn't feel like they had it conform to things. They were very comfortable with each other and need a lot of friends and felt very good about it. And I think along those lines, I've just been so impressed

with how selfless identical twins are. And what I mean by that is athletes, kids who run for student government, you'd think that everybody wants to win? It doesn't matter to them if they win or their twin wins. And I found that really hard to understand, stand it first. But it's true. I spoke to these twins who ran for student government and they both

ran as presidents. And they didn't care who won. They said, we will be president. They used a lot of whys. It's too bad the rest of us can't feel that. It's very special. It's a good thing to feel like a we as opposed to an eye. You're absolutely right. It's such a non-judgmental accepting relationship that you can be yourself completely. And what a luxury to be yourself and know that you're always going to be loved and always accepted. That's what people are really after. And I think that's what's driving people to find their doppelgangers. Probably.

You know, we interviewed an identical twin and she was saying that she thought the gift of it is when you got into middle school and high school and you're trying out identity, she basically got to watch someone do experiments for her. Her sister would try a new hairstyle. And she could sit back and go like, well, that's how it'll work out for me. And she just took this role of like, yeah, you run the experiment and I'll keep what works. And I was like, oh, that's a neat strategic way. I read an article in the New Yorker magazine and it was about sort of the paths untaken and how we all can imagine how our lives would turn out if we'd married someone else or gone to a different school or taken a different job. The experiment that you're describing with different hairstyles, that's on kind of a low level.

But identical twins raised apart are the only people in the world who can really see themselves in a life unlived. Really, it's fascinating. Yeah, they meet out and go, wow, okay, so if I wouldn't have went to that school, this would have happened. I would imagine. I don't know if you know the case of the twins where one was raised Jewish and one was raised in Nazi Germany. Tell me that one. Jack and Oscar. They were born to a Romanian Jewish father and a German Catholic mother in Trinidad.

The couple met on a boat heading to Trinidad. And they had a little girl, and then three and a half years later, they had Jack and Oscar identical twin boys. When the marriage soured, Jack stayed with his father in Trinidad and was really. raised Jewish. And Oscar went back to Nazi Germany with his mom and was raised Catholic. And he was not a Nazi, as many of the newspapers will tell you. He was 12 years old when the war ended. He was in the Hitler youth, but he thought it was a great opportunity to play sports, go camping, not go to church. And so when they met, they met at 21 for the first time. And they didn't get along at all because they had very different political understandings. They couldn't speak the same

language. Had his brother been in a concentration camp or anything? No. The Jewish one had lived in Trinidad. Oh, sorry. And he had been to the Israeli Navy. So then they met again at 40 when the wife of one of them discovered the Minnesota study of twins raised apart. So by now the twins are 40 and they're thinking, let's give this a shot. And it turned out they had the most amazing love, hate relationship. But the most fascinating thing about them was that they both knew that had their positions been switched, they would have embraced the ideology and understandings that they currently despised. Yes. And I find that fascinating. And that's a very good example of an environment. Now, how did they handle their respective situations is interesting.

So Jack raised in Trinidad was afraid that somebody would discover his German roots, so he became very pro-British. And Oscar was afraid somebody would discover his Jewish roots, so he became very pro-German. The content was different, but the approach was the same. Right. Survival incentives. Yeah, yeah.

Stay tuned for more armchair expert, if you dare. Okay, my last question is, are there any cases of these twins reuniting and not carrying on with a relationship? Or they all develop a relationship? There have been a few, but every pair has been very, very grateful to have met the other one. They've learned so much about themselves, their medical history, where their habits come from. They've all been very, very pleased to understand their backgrounds. But there have been a few cases. I remember there was one where.

one was quite religious and someone wasn't and that didn't really work out very well yeah i heard this horrible sad story a friend of a friend when she was like six or seven i think her twin i believe identical was killed and she was talking about her life since then and how she has such a hard time in romantic relationships and she said i think i'm always sort of looking for her that's exactly what happens because you expect other people to have that same insight and acceptance and simply don't. And you're always testing this out. I have a long study going on of twins whose twins have passed away. And I do find grief intensity higher among the identicals and the fraternal. So it's another approach to the same class of questions we've been talking about all afternoon.

It's a devastating event. And many twins will tell me that they wish they had gone first. Yeah. Yeah. And I also, yeah, I could imagine you could be underwhelmed with a relationship. If you're an identical twin, like you've experienced a closeness that you would expect to be their romantic. and then wouldn't be and be a little underwhelmed with the experience. Absolutely. And some twins have said, we share things with each other that we'll never share with our husbands. And that's why I think for some twins, it makes sense to marry a twin because then they understand the situation.

Yes. I just want to go out on the one I read about, or I guess you discussed them in your TED talk, about the two women that were reunited, the giggle twins. This is my fantasy of if I discovered an identical twin at some point. What was their reaction to meeting each other? They were thrilled. And the interesting thing about the giggled twins was they only giggled

in the presence of the other one. They were rather shy women, but they would giggle uncontrollably when they were together. And this was a real problem. I was on a TV show with them once. And, I mean, they wouldn't stop giggling. And finally, the host really had to stop the segment because we weren't getting anywhere.

Oh, my God. They had a lot of similarities those two. They had a very crooked pinky finger. And they concocted a drink called Twin Sin. I can't remember all the ingredients, but I know that Luke Curisau was in it. And cream. And cream, yeah.

And you tried and you're like, this is not good drink. It wasn't quite my thing. And they were both very apolitical. They both met their husbands and dances. Were they separated and then? Yes. Oh, my God. I think in their late 20s or early 30, something like that.

Okay, I lied. It feels like more hijinks and funny business was going on in the fertility world in the 70s and 80s and that we've somewhat straightened this out. Are examples of this declining, separated identical twins? Does that happen as much now as it did in the 80s or 70s? It's a very hard question to answer because I don't know if it's any less, but I do think it's for different reasons.

Twins were separated, say, in Argentina during some political times. I just came back from Greece. Between 1960 and 1980, there were a lot of illegal adoptions going on where twins were born, the hospital would take one, tell the parents that twin had died, and sell it to a couple. Oh, my God. Those kinds of things go on. Do you know what is amazing?

is when people have IVF in vitro fertilization, they know the chances of twinning are higher. Now we're back to implanting only one embryo because they're better able to manage it. But when it began, they would plant two, three, four sometimes. But anyway, the very first case of twins, the mother gave away the little boy. She kept the little girl. And I'm thinking to myself, how do you do this? You know, when you paid all this money for it, you knew the risks. Wow.

And you obviously wanted a kid so bad you went through this process. Right. And so to have two is a blessing. Yeah. But there had been some mistakes. You still read about them. somebody's embryos get wrongly planted or they mix the wrong sperm with the wrong egg or something like that. Those things do happen. Or you find out it was your doctor's sperm. Yeah, that was a big thing in early IVF. But yeah, this like switched implanted a different embryo. I'll hit you with an

incredible one. They have not genetically tested their kids. But I have a friend who had a couple kids naturally. Then the wife had some complication during a delivery and she knew the uterus was going to be destroyed and they froze eggs and they had a bank of eggs and so they implanted one of the eggs and then this daughter is born then they have another kid with another egg then they have a kid again and the kid comes out and even me who's not the parent I'm like boy she looks a lot like I can't say her name but the older daughter and they're like yes yes and this continues to the point where they finally get a hold of the fertility doctor and said, is it possible that they're identical twins, that those two eggs had split?

Oh, I see what you're saying. So in the petri dish, something could have split. That is possible. They should do the DNA test. Yeah. They should. And can you imagine that would be the most fascinating study for you to ever approach? Now you have identical twins separated by like six years of age chronologically.

Still, I have criteria for what's an identical twin because I thought a lot about how twins inform our understanding of human reproductive cloning. And I would not consider them identical twins. Why? They don't share their birthday, and they didn't share a womb. And in fact, if you assigned that label to them, it could be a problem. Okay. But you'd still be interested in studying them?

Because my, I'm like, if this is real. I want them. Yes. Because if it's real, think about knowing what you will look like in six years your whole life is such a bizarre. Or if the older one made a terrible life choice. See, that's why when I talk about human reproductive cloning, I just wrote a big paper on this from a conference. Everyone raises these challenges, and there are certainly challenges that are legitimate. But in some ways, it could be a benefit because the parent, who's the donor, could maybe understand the psyche of the child and maybe help that child along to avoid different pitfalls in life.

So this would be an example where someone had a child, the child died, and then they cloned that child? No, the cloning of yourself. No, no. No, you just clone yourself. Oh, okay. Yeah. To make a baby that's you. Yes. Suppose you're infertile. suppose you're the last person in the family line. Yeah, what's your position on cloning yourself? Well, I have no problem with it because not if a group is going to do it. We can get women who are

70 years old pregnant with donated embryos. You don't see 70-year-old women running out to have children, do you? No. People are still going to want to have children the old-fashioned way. And if you clone yourself, at least you have some knowledge of what you're getting. I would want to clone myself, but I would say that's egomaniacal. Adoption is a great alternative if you've got an infertile couple, but it's still a bit of a risk. You don't know the genes you're going to get. This way, at least you know, I mean, it's not predictive because it's different generations, but still it's something. And I think that I'm fine with it. We have issues of safety and ethics and financing and decision making a lot. But I use the twin model to challenge the challenges that have been raised, which are just

provocative and emotionally driven. Yes, and probably religious undertones. Would you want to have What if I cloned your kid? Oh, Delta? You wanted a delta? Their youngest. That's also very interesting environment being raised with different parents. It's a similar thing. It's exactly similar thing.

I mean, it's kind of like twins raised apart. But remember, if you clone somebody, even the donor clones himself, it's not an exact replica, different generations. There can be cell errors. It's not exactly the same. Right. Rarely does your phenotype perfectly match your genotype? Yeah.

Yeah. Do you want to have yourself now? No. I don't know why. It feels egomaniacal, right? It does feel ego-maniacal. Like, I'm just going to make another one of me. You're already the challenge as a parent is to remind yourself they're not you.

They're not an extension of you. Let them be themselves. I mean, how hard would that be when no, they are you? Yeah. But can I ask you something? How many parents look at their children and say an extension of me? They do. They do.

They do. They do. They do. And one of the criticism of cloning is that you see the child's an extension. But I say ordinary parents do as well. Well, yeah, you're right. It's not different. It's not different, but it is compounded.

It is. It would be like, so you're definitely going to join the play in a couple years just, you know now. Maybe, maybe not. And then you get to find out, you could find out some terrible realities, which is like in my story, had I been supported as a kid, I have this aptitude for driving and as someone had paid for a race team, I would have definitely been a Formula One driver. And I could provide that for my kid and be like, oh, I guess I'd find out the hard way you were. Maybe the kid wouldn't have any interest in Carvassing. It's not the sport du jour. Yes.

It is slippery, though, because you're almost wanting to give yourself the life you wish you had. Which is what you do as a parent. But that's all parents do that. Yes. And you do that, and I did it. And then they don't want to do that because you want what you don't have. That's right. This is an unavoidable reality.

So anything else. No, that was wonderful, Nancy. That was so fun. We've been talking about twins for seven years. and dying to have an expert on. And you're just so perfect for that. Well, I'm glad. I had fun.

We hope you enjoyed this episode. Unfortunately, they made some mistakes. I hope it's not going to explode. Oh, I hope it does. No! That'd be so viral. Oh, that's true. There's a huge AC explosion.

Yes, that is true. That thing blew up. And then when all the smoke settled, your sides was shaved. That'd be your dream come true. That's your 11-11 wish. I'm trying to think of all ever have an anniversary that would warrant you. Or maybe if I'm, I get diagnosed to something terminal.

Don't say that. You couldn't shave your side. I can say so. I'm not doing it. Oh, you won't. Now because you, because of this, then you jink. I don't know where to knock. I don't know how to do it.

Deathbed wish, you won't shave the sides? No, because you, you implant. You wanted this. You made it happen. I'll blame you. Only if you're old. For your fun, new life. What? Wait do you see how your life takes off once you have that shave sides? You're going to be like going to different clubs and stuff. I am. You're going to have a whole new chapter of your life. I am very happy with my life. Speaking of that, I've been playing a lot of solitaire. I just learned it. With a deck of cards? Yes.

You just learned solitaire. Yes. And I'm still not sure I have. the rules 100% correct, but I love it. I've been playing it a lot and I told Eric that I've been playing a lot and he said, oh, I'm sorry, you know, as he is, as he does. It doesn't sound, when you learn someone's been playing a lot of solitaire, it does make you a little concerned about that. I know, but that's like a weird stigma.

If you're watching TV by yourself, no one says that. It's like the game by yourself thing really makes people upset. It does. Yeah. It makes me like feel like you're bored. No. And lonely. I know, but this is crazy.

This is crazy. And isolating. It's so wrong. It's like instead of what everyone else is doing is just staring at their phone and scrolling Instagram all day, I'm like, I'm going to get my brain going. Well, when Eric tells you, he plays video games all day, how do you? feel. Yeah, I don't like that. But I think that's, because that's like screen, like that screen time, yeah, if he was playing solitary for six hours a day on his phone. I mean, look, however anyone wants

to pass their time on this trip on, on playing at Earth. Yeah. That's fine. It does make someone feel sad in the same way that they, someone played video game six hours of the day. Whoa, but that's so, like reading a book is obviously going to be beneficial to you. So is solitaire. Solitaire is a game for your brain. Kind of? What do you mean? I mean, it's not that hard, right? Well, I...

And you get luckier now? Maybe I'm stupid. Like, I don't think it's that easy. In fact, it's not easy at all. I don't win, like, most of the games. Right. But it's not like there's some crazy way to play it, right? There's a...

Like strategy? Yeah, you kind of either get lucky with... I think there's a tiny bit of strategy. I think there's a tiny bit of strategy. I think there's a tiny, bit. I think people can be bad at it. Yeah, exactly. But I think you can be perfect at it pretty soon.

Are you doing three card draw or one card draw? Three. It's hard. Yeah, three makes it a little more challenging. Yeah. I didn't even know that's what it was called. Three card draw. Or one card draw. Rob, are you playing a lot of solitaire by yourself? I mean, my family was

big card game people, so I've played a lot of solitaire. And double Solitaire and Triple Solitaire. Because that's with other people. Yeah. And you have the Aces up top in the middle and you're kind of racing. Well, I stand corrected. It sounds like it's a pretty good time. It does.

I agree with them, though, that it does sound a little sad. This is upsetting. Yeah. You're right. If someone's watching TV, whatever. But minimally, or on their phone. If they watch TV, they could watch the same show as a friend and then they could chat about it. Whereas no one's

going to talk to you about your solitary game. Because it was just you, I mean, it's called solitaire. Yeah, because it's one player. Yeah, because it's solitary. Yeah, because instead of just sitting and watching TV or being on your phone. Or even a book. Why is a book better? So that's, yeah.

Because it's going to educate you, potentially. Not necessarily, but sure, maybe, maybe. All the ones I'm reading. What I do? I just read a bunch of biography. I know. I learn about a time period and I learn about an industry. It's very in you, okay?

Because, like, there's so much fiction. You're right. And but those, so even you're on all fours, you read it, you talked about it a ton. A lot of your friends read it. You guys got going about it. It was this whole social event reading that book. Whereas if you have solitary and someone else, like, I played two and go, did you, did you win? I guess.

Rob and I just had a great conversation. that was well okay that was you know yeah you guys did have that great conversation a second ago yeah it was really good and there's just no one's ever going to talk to you you're not going to bond with anybody over with the exception of this great conversation you guys just have bond over your solitary game or the video game you played because i wasn't playing the game with you yeah but so that's also a you thing like it's not about what i'm going to talk of the show on netflix It's not about everything I do isn't for a conversation. Right.

Right. It's to engage in my day. It is time for just you. That's nice. Yeah. It's lovely. Yeah. Oh, sorry.

I was just being honest. I really, I'm shocked because I actually really thought you were going to be like, God, Eric, like he just will say the craziest thing. And that's so silly. But it does. But it does sound. Rob, when you just hear someone's playing a lot of solitaire, does it make you sad or happy or neither? Neither.

That's the right answer. It doesn't need to make anyone happy and it doesn't need to make anyone sad. It's just something I've been doing. Like, I've also been watching Mr. Beast. Oh, you have? Mr. Beast Games. Beast Games. The Beast Games? Yeah.

And you like it? Okay, so I'm so behind, obviously, we're like months behind. Oh, yeah. Maybe a year, yeah. Yeah, but we, we, I had a dinner while you were gone. We missed you guys, but it was a friend pod dinner out, adults, so fun. And see, I have so much, I have so much interaction that I need some solitary time. Because otherwise the solitaire time is work.

So I need solitary time that's not those things. That's play. Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, maybe I'll try it. It's been a long time since I played solitaire. I mean, and to be fair, like, I've been also playing with people. Like, if I'm out with Jess or with Anna, sometimes we'll play together.

Right. Not dual, we'll, like, both be playing. Yeah, yeah. That's fun, too. Now, your phone is interesting. That's a good analogy. Yeah. Because in general, I also think your phone's kind of a time suck.

But it is. You do see things. We all see the same things on Instagram. So that's also a bonding conversation thing. Oh, my God, but it's bad for your brain. Uh-huh. And this is good for your brain. Yeah, potentially.

Your brain is working. Uh-huh. You are thinking. That's true. Problem solving. Oh, please hold. I forgot to put it. I'm re-entering, too.

Um, okay, anyway. So, beast games. Yeah, tell me. So have you watched it? I tried. I couldn't do it. Really? Yeah, I don't...

With the kids? I don't enjoy... Yeah, the kids watch the whole thing. Oh. I don't enjoy watching people have to make decision... Compromising decisions for money. I don't like it. But I understand the appeal.

Interesting. But I... Did you like Squid Game? Yes, quite a bit. And Squid Game, the... The reality show? Yeah. Yes.

Yeah. It's the same... It's, I mean, it's... literally is the same thing, except there's more money on the table here. He, it's the most money they've ever given out. And they have to do more dastardly things. Like, it's almost every round you have to betray people, right? Well, ish.

But that happened on squid games. Did it? Yeah, it did. Well, okay, so the beginning, sorry, spoiler. I mean, I'm not finished, so I can't really spoil very much. But the, right when they enter, there's like a thousand people there. or something. Is that right?

It's outrageous. The episode I saw where they're all standing in that grid. Yes. They're all standing in a grid. There's the chance

to win $5 million in this game. The most they've ever given out on a game show. In addition, there's a side challenge that happens where they could win a $1.8 million island, private island.

Wow. Yes. Probably more work than it's worth. So I won't spoil what happens there. But I am past that part. So, okay, at the beginning, they have the opportunity when they first arrive.

Before the game even starts, there's $250,000. And he says, if you want to go home now, go over there. If one person goes over there, they get all $250,000. If two people goes, they split it. If three, it starts splitting, you know? And some people, like, enough people did it so that it was like $21,000. each people got. Yeah.

I was like, fuck, yes. I, that is definitely how I'm playing that game. Right. Get your 21 grand and get out of there. Get out. You haven't wasted any. You got, that's literally free money. You haven't had to do anything.

You haven't had to hurt anyone or betray anyone or do anything physical. That's like 11-ish people pick that or 12 or something. Okay. So I was. Yeah, they're probably happy now a year later. Exactly. Well, yeah, but then it depends because there are other opportunities throughout to make money. Like one guy ends up, I think this is a person who really went out.

Obviously, someone who wins $5 million, great, right? But, and the person who wins the island, great. But there's still a lot of like stress and strife in that. Yeah. One guy leaves with $450,000 and kind of in this sort of easy-ish way. And I was like, that's, he really won. He won because he didn't have to go through much. Exactly.

And he's still got a big old chunk of change. Yes. Yeah. But I would definitely be the person who leaves first day, gets my money, something's better than nothing. Uh-huh. Bird and a hand's worth two in a bush. Yes, because also like the chances of nothing are so high.

Yeah. Yeah, 1,000 to 1. You got to get something. So that's how I would play. What would you do? Would you keep playing? No, I feel like I would try to get money midway through. Yeah.

I'm a pessimist, though, right? I wouldn't think, I'm not the type that'd be like, I'm going to win this whole thing. I don't have that mindset. Yeah, which is so weird. I know. You're mixed messies. I know. I'm this weird mix of competitiveness.

Yeah. And I surrender easy. I feel like you would actually be very good in it because there's like, mine. you know there's like brain stuff and there's physical challenges yeah um one of them they're on a team and they like have to pull a monster truck like with their body yeah and get it over speed bumps and stuff um i think you'd like that one yeah yeah physical that sounds fun there's like sprinting anyway so but there is a lot of betrayal and then there's a lot of self-sacrifice and it was making me think a lot about that like the people who they just walk away

way to help other people. There's also, and I'm, because I don't think this is spoiler enough people I've heard about this, there's a challenge where there's four lines, there's all these people, right, four lines of them. And those are the teams. And then the four teams have to pick a captain from each team to represent the team, basically. And they go up and number amount starts increasing on the clock. a money amount. And they, if they press the button, they get to keep that amount of money

and stay in the game, but their whole team gets eliminated. Oh, boy. So they're picking people who are going to be like, no, I'm definitely, I promise I won't, I just won't press it. Yeah. And that's so much trust. How high do you think that dollar amount gets to? $500,000 a million dollars nobody presses it nobody pressed it I was so moved and like but then like later in the game I'm like then they leave that's probably why I don't like the game okay we're probably getting to the because you think it's unfair no I think I know I would be selfish yeah and I'd feel bad about being selfish and when I watch it it's just like like there are good people all these opportunities and I just picture me at 24 I know and if I could have had a million dollars and these strangers got nothing and I'd already convince myself they're not getting anything anyways I know like that's probably why I don't like it because I know I would probably be selfish but you probably wouldn't get

picked probably not or because do you think you'd be the type because yes you might be the type to press it, but would you be the type to be like, exactly? No, so wherever my shadiness on the spectrum exists, I'm a six or whatever. Yeah. Or like, I think I'd be unhappy with my decisions, but also I wouldn't, I wouldn't have the full line thing. It's like, let's put it this way. I, I, I don't want to say a regret because I just love, I love everyone I ever had sex with. I feel grateful for it. Great. I do. Okay. So I don't really have regrets like I want to take back. Right. But I recognize some girls liked me a lot and I heard a lot of girls. Okay. And I hate that part. Sure. That's nice. But then when I tell myself is, well, I've never been one

that was like, I love you. I'm in love with you. I want to be with like I've never. But were you saying it with like your actions? That's where it gets confusing is that I, we've already talked about this. I already have kind of a comfort level of talking about emotions and stuff. Intimacy. That I do think was misleading. I think it felt unique for some people in a way that signaled were in love. Right. I feel bad about that. Yeah. But also I feel good about the fact that I also was never deceptive, like a lot of dudes I know, that told girls they loved them, told they didn't have a girlfriend. Well, you didn't straight up lie. No, I told people if I had a girlfriend, I told people. But straight up lying is different than deceptive.

deception. Lying is a part of deception. No, I didn't deceive either. I didn't act like I was more into them than I was, which a lot of guys did. Sure. Like a lot of girls are like, he told me, love me. Yeah, but that's the lying. I never did that. That's lying. But if you with your actions showed love. Well, if I'm just being me. Right. I'm being authentic to who I am. I can talk on the phone for three hours. Like, yeah. For some guys, the only person they can talk on the phone for three hours to do is the person that they fall in love with right yeah so i have like a mixed bag of guilt about that sure i understand so but yeah i don't think you would be in front of the team i don't think and be like guys i i i'm the most honest person here i'm so selfless i never it doesn't

matter if that thing gets to five million dollars i'm not pressing you wouldn't say that no right no unless i really believed it and maybe i could maybe i could fall in love with everyone there right the way you do on a film set or something but do you think you would believe it and then get up there and be like oh no like i have again i was like i was stealing stuff i was i had bad i felt in entitled i know that was that's the other thing that's interesting is some of these people are like i meant to be here it's it's working out for me And I'm like, because all those people left on their own volition. Like, it's not you're meant to be here. It's people sacrifice for you and now you're here.

Yeah. And I don't like that, that there's no like, wow, a lot of people gave up a lot of opportunities for me to be standing here. Yeah. And I guess I feel like I've only stayed as moral as I have with a lot of effort. And I just don't need any situations tempting my morals. I'm just too insecure about my own moral compass then. Yeah. Not now I could play the game.

Well, yeah, obviously now that we, yeah, we can't think about when you have means. Like, obviously, that's a different scenario. I think about this all the time, though. It really is, like, I don't think anyone really even knows who they are in a sense. I agree. Like, I am, I'm the product of so much good fortune. I think a lot of people would describe me as super generous. I was also super greedy and wanted money so fucking bad I would have stole.

So in this abundance, I've been able to help a lot of people. Yeah. And I'm a version of myself now that I'm quite proud of. But I have to be honest about that I've been a situation where it's a lot easier for me to do that now. Exactly. So like, that's another thing. It's not really fair to judge the people in the situations who are really desperate. No, I know.

That's why this is complicated. That's why it's so interesting. It's like, I don't really blame a lot of the people who are, I mean, they're like, I'm here to win. And like, I understand that. That's why they're there. They're there for a game. Yeah. But there's also, like, invisible lines that are just getting crossed.

Like, they're these two brothers that there's this one game where they're broken up into threes, and then they have to go in this cube and decide one person has to leave. Okay. Or they all leave. within five hours to decide this, right? And in one of the cubes there is these two brothers and this like young girl

and they're so manipulative. So manipulative and horrible to her and like bullying and bad and I was like, I hate you guys. And I understand you're there to win but this is fucked up.

Like there are lines. Yeah. I guess what I'm saying is in this show was not, I'm not in judgment of the show. Oh, no, I know. Yeah. But overall, I think people are pretty critical of people in rough situations that have never been in those situations. And that's a little bit of a sensitive spot for me, right? I fully agree. Like when people are judging how people are acting in the fucking white trash neighborhood or in here, I'm like, yeah, you just, you're not there.

You really got to be there to. Yeah. I absolutely agree. I think over time, they're hearing. people's experiences and having my own. Like, I don't, there used to be, I used to feel like, oh, there are things I would absolutely never do. I would just never do them. It would never happen. Yeah. And now I don't think that.

I think there are scenarios in which I would do anything. Uh-huh. And knowing that is helpful because it gives grace to everyone else is doing stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But. So just when I see a situation that's been constructed to test people who are. Yeah. Vulnerable, it's hard for me to enjoy it.

I understand. But there is like, there is real, there are people, yeah, that are like, I'm going to go. Like, I'm going to go. I'm going to do it for these people. Uh-huh. And it's, that's beautiful. Yeah. And it is a sweet reminder that we can make those hard decisions.

We can make the decision to be selfless. Stay tuned for more armchair expert, if you dare. One of the guys who didn't click the million, he was like maybe going to, did he get kicked off or maybe he was about to get kicked out, whatever, something. And Mr. Beast was like, do you wish you had taken the million? Yeah. And he was like, I was happy with who I was before I was offered that. I'll be happy afterwards. And I was like, well, that's a great attitude, but heartbreaking.

I know. Then I really wanted him to have a million dollars. I know. I just want everyone there to get a million dollars. I know. But, yeah, and also just people, people are there for a lot of different reasons. There's like horrible, sad stories. There's just like, I'm here to play this game, which is,

I think, fine. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, then that becomes tricky. It's like, do they not get to because this other person has a, like, worse? Because they're single to trigger any of your... Not until now. Oh, well, I can see where... Oh, yeah.

It's like this single person versus a family. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh. Yeah, I know that's a zone for you. Yeah, that's not fair. Okay. So, I don't like that at all. Anyway, it's interesting.

It is. It's an interesting thought, like human experiment. Well, I'm swirling with all this because, again, as I've updated you several different times, I have really enjoyed being somewhere else for two months and really observing how everyone does everything. I've been finding it endlessly fascinating. Yeah. I mean, I really feel like I'm doing an ethnography on Nashville. Yeah, it's fascinating.

And I got into a fun conversation over dinner with Hayes, Huey's wife, about kids. And I'm like, look, I see that kids are raised differently here in the South. And I also see the value of it. And I also have a different kind of philosophy. What do you think the philosophy is there? Well, like there, most of the kids all say, they'll say Miss Christian or Miss, right? You always say miss or miss her. So that's like deference and respect for elders, which is lovely.

That's a great thing. I think I'm really good at assessing what a potential outcome is that I have to take very seriously and work backwards from that. I think I'm a good reverse engineer. So I'm like, look, I know Lincoln. I'm the same way. It was a big thing for me that my vote wasn't the same as everyone else's. I didn't understand why my being younger meant I had less value in any situation. It was very hard for me.

And when my dad wanted to break that spirit of mine, I just wrote him off. And it was so easy for me. It was hard for him and super easy for me because I'm so determined. And if you fuck with me and try to tell me I can't be who I'm going to be, I'll just, I'll go nuclear. Right. It's a character defect. I don't like that I'm this way. But again, again, again, when we've talked about this before, and I do want to say that you're not like your dad.

Your dad left you. There are lots of reasons for you to have a skepticism of his authority. Like, you are not like that. That's true, but I think I would have been the same even if he was better, right? Like, I think. I don't know. We don't know. I think if I get it in my head, you're trying to prevent me from having the experience I deserve to have here in my autonomy to choose my experience.

If I think you're standing in the way of that, then it's not hard for me to be away from you. It's so interesting, though, because, yeah, and, like, it might be a disservice to getting along with other people. Like, if it's just like, it's my way and I'm going to do it and I'm not going to listen, like. This is a character defect. This is not a virtue of mine. I know that this is a character defect. Okay. No, in my head, it sounds different than you just framed it, right?

For me, which is like, I'm not going to ask you to be anything you're not. And in respect, you're not going to ask me to be anything. I'm not, right? Like, I think I have an ethic in my mind that is very defendable. Right. But there's cooperation and there's, there's, there's, life isn't just we both exist in our, in our bubbles as we are. Like, there's compromise.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're not on islands. And you have to really trust that the person you're compromising with has your best interest in mind, whatever. Yeah. This is a character defect. Yeah, yeah, this is not a virtue of mine.

Right, this is interesting, yeah. But I think Lincoln has that ability, and I think her and I are both, we have the same condition, which is like we both think we have the best plan. We've thought this out for a long time, and here it is, and isn't that great? So I was like, I'm just working backwards from reality, which is if I tried to do this parenting style, call everyone miss and miss and miss. her act this way go up there no you know all this stuff yeah i just won't have a relationship with her she'll just she'll just write me off she won't she's not gonna bend i'm not gonna bend or break this girl nor am i gonna try to i now look it's totally different calculus with delta i don't have those similarities with her where it's problematic so i just go do you think you as a southern

kid who acted that way, did anything different than I did as this other kid? Did you drink and did you hook up with boys? Do all the things you weren't supposed to do? And I'm like, yeah, everyone does the same shit. I don't want my kids to lie about it. Yeah. That's it. All I'm after is like, I have some sense of what's really going on and they feel safe to let me in on that. And so it's a trade off. It's all the trade off. Yeah, my kids are probably more difficult at times in public like they're going to fight back and I'm going to have to hear their case in court but hopefully they're not they don't feel like they have got to hide stuff from me yeah and pretend there's someone other than who they are yeah and I don't think one's better than the other it's just like whatever

tradeoffs you are comfortable with yeah um and that's the one I'm comfortable with and it's it's all interesting I just I think it's all I'm just very aware of like I think so often people want to say this way's better or that way's better or they do it wrong there or they do it right here and I just look at it like oh yeah everything's got tradeoffs everything's got there's a ton of stuff that comes with that that's awesome I see it yeah it's enviable and then there's other stuff that I don't want and I don't it's not worth that cost but I don't know it's interesting and everyone's triggered in different ways by the different options out there I guess but like I don't like having to call adults, Mr. and Mrs.

and that type of thing at all. Yeah. Because it's also teaching kids that the adults are always right. That they like, they deserve just by the fact that they're adults, they deserve. That's my other baggage with it, right? Which is like, no, the adults I knew quite a few of them should not have been respected or trusted or listened to or obeyed. Well, right.

So once you've had that experience, you're like, that's not really a good policy. Yeah, when you get into a scenario where it's like you learn that all these adults are hurting children and they're teaching the kids to be like, yes, sir, like, that's a problem. You need to also be pretty clear that not all people are, deserve to be listened to or respect, but also like, to me, politeness. Politeness is a big Southern thing. Yeah. And I do think that's really important. I love it. I love it. It's, I think it's so important. Yeah, their little kids are always like, yes, ma'am, thank you, ma'am. And I love it. And they don't even have to, but to me, politeness doesn't have to do with, like, the authority. It's just like we're generally going to be nice to people. Yeah, we're going to be civil. We're going to be civil. We're going to be civil. Yes. We're just going to be civil and polite. Like when someone is serving you a meal, you say. say thank you.

That's a nice thing that happened. Like the manners, basic manners and politeness, to me is much different than like, you should respect your elders or you need to listen to everything they say and take it as the, you know, like that's a different thing. Yeah. But it gets convoluted. It does. It does.

Again, there's nice sides and then there's other sides where I'm like, yeah, well, you know, time will tell how all these. How everyone ends up. Yeah. Everyone will end up great. I mean, that's, yeah, everyone will be fine. But I'm loving it. Yeah.

Also, so I'm down there say, yes, ma'am, a lot and yes, sir. And I like it. It kind of, this is the other reality. It's like the thing you and I have debated in the past about like asking your future father-in-law for permission. It's like, I get that the premise is flawed for sure. And then I know the results of having done that, which is lovely. And I think a lot of the things fall under that category where it's just like, it's confusing. Like, do I reject the premise or am I rejecting the outcome of it?

Because those are both valid ways. It's content or utilitarianism. It's like. Well, the outcome for you. You like the outcome for you. And you like the outcome for her. Yeah, I can only judge it from me. When I call the woman, ma'am, at the gas station, I like the outcome.

you know yeah for you yeah yeah but but her yeah because she seemed seemingly liked it right yeah yeah so that's like but the premise of the asking the parents for the daughter's hand in marriage is about the daughter's reaction so if like if for me it's if if i am gonna if someone's gonna propose to me I want them to ask me. Yeah, and they'll have to. What do you mean? You can't get married without asking you. No, no, no.

Ask me, hey, is it important to you that I talk to your dad? Oh, not ask you to marry you. Exactly, that I talk to your dad or how do you, how do you want me to go about this? Yeah. And then I'd be like, not important to them or me. Yeah. And definitely if you're going to do it, which you sure, if you want, if that's important to you, fine. but you better talk to both of them.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Everyone's going to have their own rules for it. And it's just asking the woman who you're marrying what she wants. Right. As opposed to these men just making decisions on their own. That's where the premise is faulty. Yeah, you don't like the notion of the, it's the father's right to give the daughter to a man. Yeah.

And that is, I agree. And the husband's right to be like, like, I'm, I want. Yeah, so that's the premise, right? So that's what I'm saying. The premise is flawed. Exactly. But the act itself isn't, will you give me permission to marry your daughter? Because we both know I will, whether you say yes or no. So I'm not really asking permission. What I'm doing is saying, I'm joining your family and I'm coming with a big act of humility. And that's lovely. That's a wonderful thing. for someone entering a family to do. Yeah, we've just discussed this. Like, I, I mean, I just really don't understand why the mother wouldn't be involved in that is, like, wild. Like, if, if someone wants to marry, they can have a separate conversation with you, like a man-on-man fun conversation. Yeah.

But I'm entering your family is the whole family. And, like, it should, it should, there should be an equal, um, respect for the moment. mother in that scenario too. I think personally. And again, that's me. So I would make that clear. So all I would need is my husband to one just know me and know like that's right. That's what she would want. Or just ask like, hey, if I end up, if we end up doing this whole thing, like I would like to talk to your dad. And then I would say, great, you can do that. I would really like. if you talk to both of them and then you can also talk to my dad. I don't know, but I just think the woman needs to have a say and how that goes down.

And if I didn't, if my, if my husband went to my dad, I mean, I wouldn't honestly, I wouldn't like be mad. But also when I told my dad this, he was like, this is crazy. He didn't want anything to do with that. Yeah. It's like, why would they do that? For him, and he said, he was like, you need to, like me, Monica needs to do that. He was like, you need to come to us and say, hey, I'm like, this is serious with this person.

Can I marry? Not can I. There's no, they are under no illusion that they have permission. I don't think anyone is, you know. No, no. But they really are not. Like, they are not like, you owe us that. They're just like, you're our kid.

you are the one that needs to communicate with us, which was good for me to know, too, because I could see me be like, oh, yeah, we got engaged last month. Uh-huh. They'd be upset. And married last week. Yeah, we're married. Yeah, just different ways of being. So traditions are cultural and they're different and nothing's right or wrong.

Yeah. It is, to me, what's right or wrong is whether the people think it's right or wrong. That's at the end of the day, like... That's right. If everyone enjoyed the whole thing... Then great. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

All right. Well, I'm going to keep watching beast games. I'm going to keep playing solitaire. Okay, great. Happily. Okay, great. And I'm going to be excited for you that you're playing solitaire. It's a real good activity.

It's good for your brain. Yeah. And you're enjoying it. I am. Yeah. You're not very good at it, but... It's just that I miss it. It's like, wait, I could have moved this over a long time ago.

Oh, so you. You are seeing some room for improved. Yeah. Okay. And you know me, I like to be the best version of myself. That's right. And I'm impressed you're sticking with Majan because you're losing pretty consistently, right? No, Mahjong is not a game like that.

Like, you aren't going to win every game. If you win once, it's like great. Ever. It's hard. But you were just beat by a 10-year-old repeatedly. Three times. Yeah, yeah. That speaks more to her than it does to any of us.

That's impressive. Yeah, very impressive. Um, all right. Let's do some facts. Okay. All right. This is for Nancy Twins. Oh, what a fascinating episode. Twins, we're never going to be sick of talking about twins. Twins for the wins. Yeah, this won't be our last Twins episode, I'm predicting. We love this. There really aren't very many facts, again, because she provided them. I, I'm going to, like, you know, we talk about the Olsons. She feels like they're identical. You feel like they're identical. But I am obligated to say that they believe they're fraternal. It's on the internet that they're fraternal. Obviously, they haven't done any DNA testing. They have said they never did DNA tests, which means they actually just don't know.

They don't know. So that's what I'm going to, like, we don't know. Right. They don't know, but the twin expert and I know. No. And she's an expert and I dated one of them. So I feel like we're pretty qualified. No, you're not.

No, you're not. I do think they look so similar. I am going to give you guys that. You never knew when they were babies before nurture got involved. It's not like anyone in the world ever knew when they swapped them out on that show. You can't swap out fraternal twins and get that kind of consistency. But sometimes, maybe you can sometimes. They're definitely identical.

I agree. with her. Okay. Well, that's not definitely because this is a fact check. And I'm here to say we don't know. Okay. Okay. She quickly mentioned something about men being better at spatial awareness, which they are. A common test used to assess spatial ability involves mentally rotating 3D objects. Studies consistently show that on average men perform better on these tasks than women. However, this doesn't apply to all spatial tasks. Just the important ones. okay for example some studies show no significant difference between men and women on tasks involving spatial navigation or spatial working memory there's also she also said women are better women perform better conversely on verbal things tasks um i didn't look that up i was brainstorming about the difference between men and women a little bit because of course as we had guests christin and the other mom were like really bonding over over whatever new food everyone's supposed to eat. And, you know, it's like women really, they find out about quinoa, about a year before men do. And then they, you know, I forget what, what this,

oh, carmen, carmen, carmen, carmen, carmen. Cardamom. Cardamom. There, you know, they're going on about cardamom. Blake and are like, what the hell is cardamon? But I was thinking. Cardam's been around for so long. It's actually using Indian food constantly.

Yeah. And it's having a resurgence right now. You can get it in a lot of drinks and stuff. It's not like it was an add-on in the 80s, but now it's a pretty popular add-on. And I was thinking evolutionarily, it does make so much sense because when you live in an area and you're hunting, you're hunting the same three animals every single day. It doesn't change. But there are so many seasonal berries that are. in bloom then there's seasonal tubers that are in bloom then seasonal fruit like it makes sense that

women were way more on the lookout for whatever was new and in season whereas guys are just like i killed deer that's what i do i don't ever have i'm never going to be killing you know a unicorn there's not going to mean any new animals that pop up this season this is like this is what i hunt period done thinking i don't know i was just thinking about that has to be in the mix of explanation how all the women always know all the new things and all the dudes are like, what? What is the thing? Interesting.

It's also hard, though, because women talk to other women. Like, so some women are into it and then they're spreading the information to other women and then they know. Like, I don't know that ever, all the women are seeking that out. So, like, Kristen is constantly seeking that out.

Like, she's, like, always like. She's a gatherer. I mean, she's like a textbook gatherer. She's like surveying the land, what's out there, what could be better, what's more nutritious, what, you know, she's on, she's on the gather. Yeah, but she on the scale, like, you know, she'll send us the girls stuff about those things or like when the air was bad, like lots of stuff about the air. Like she's on top of that or she's really, she cares a lot about that.

It's just a scale, I guess. And, no, right. I mean, there's a huge spectrum among women for sure. And then there's a huge scale among men, but just on the average, those gaps are pretty enormous, you know. Yeah, for sure. Cardam is a good spice. Used in Indian food since the beginning of time. My mom cooks with it a lot. It's strong. It's a strong spice. Um, it's also used in some sweet things like cardam buns, uh, is a thing. And that's sweet. And then, like rice puddings. Yeah, yeah. Uh, so she mentioned a toothpaste that these two separated twins both used. That was random. That he make them.

It's an herbal toothpaste. Oh. If anyone wants to try it. Yeah, not crest, if anyone wants to try it. If anyone wants to be third member of this twin pair. Yeah, it's herbal. I looked up where snakes are the most prevalent. Countries with most snake species, Mexico.

Oh, most snake species. species that's right not overall volume ugh it never never understands me this is under world population review anyway mexico has the most species then Brazil then Indonesia then India then Colombia then a lot more but I won't go to 100 because I know how you feel and that's it it's just twins are interesting what can we say? Oh, they sure are fascinating. Identical copy of yourself.

I know. Would you want one or not? Yeah. Well. Wow. I don't want one. In theory, I want one because I want to know what it feels like to be that connected with someone. Like you in the womb with someone connected.

But in practice, I probably don't. I probably would feel competitive. But maybe you don't because you just love. them so much. It wouldn't be about my relationship with my twin as much as I'd be envious of having to split my attention with the rest of the world all the time. What do you mean? Like there's two of us. So whatever amount of attention exists for this version of a human, I'm splitting that in half. Does that make sense? Yeah, you might be a lot more subdued. You'd have no choice. Yeah. I would be like, I guess I'm not going to be able to be unique. There's already another one of me. You know, I have

terminal uniqueness. That's why I'm saying it wouldn't be a good. But it would actually be a good. It would be good. It would be like the cure. But also the irony is that unique, it is the most unique to have a twin, identical twin. Yeah, I guess you get a bump from being a freak show. You know, like people are going to be more interested in you for that aspect.

But I have a twin. His name's Aaron. that's he's a good twin okay yeah there's a really funny episode of friends uh Phoebe has a twin Phoebe lives with Rachel okay and Rachel is buying a bunch of stuff from pottery barn but Phoebe doesn't like the stuff from pottery barn she wants her stuff to be unique and vintage one of a kind um and so they go over to Ross's house to watch a TV movie or something something. And he also has a piece from pottery barn that Rachel had. She had lied and told Phoebe that it was unique and vintage and from the days of old. And so she freaks out.

And she's like, you have to cover this up. Like, Phoebe will see it. And she thinks ours is unique. He said, oh, it's because she's a twin. Twins are so weird. And she's like, no, she's not weird. She just wants her stuff to be one of a kind. And he's like, and he's, He says, you know what's not one of a kind? A twin. Yes, he's right. It's very funny. God, it's a great.

That one's called the one with the apothecary table. If anyone wants to watch that, I believe it's season maybe six. Okay, great. Everyone can look that episode up. Yeah. That's it. Okay. Love you, loved her, love twins.

Yeah. She was so cute. Love twins. We love twins. All right. Bye. Love you. Love you.

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