On Purpose with Jay Shetty - Walter Isaacson ON: The Importance of Living a Curiosity-Driven Life & How To Develop It

Episode Date: April 12, 2021

If On Purpose inspires you, Jay’s exclusive Genius workshops and meditations will take your life to the next level. Go to https://shetty.cc/OnPurposeGenius to learn more. The world has been forever changed by the simple question: What if? What if Leonardo Da Vinci never painted the Mona Lisa? What if Steve Jobs never started Apple? What if Jennifer Doudna never pursued gene editing? On this episode of On Purpose with Jay Shetty, Jay speaks with acclaimed author and journalist, Walter Isaacson, about his new book, Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I am Yom Le Van Zant and I'll be your host for The R Spot. Each week listeners will call me live to discuss their relationship issues. Nothing will tear a relationship down faster than two people with no vision. There's y'all are just floppin' around like fish out of water. Mommy, daddy, your ex, I'll be talking about those things and so much more. Check out the R-Spot on the iHeart Video app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen to podcasts. The one you feed explores how to build a fulfilling life admits the challenges we face.

We share manageable steps to living with more joy and less fear through guidance on emotional resilience, transformational habits, and personal growth. I'm your host, Eric Zimmer, and I speak with experts ranging from psychologists to spiritual teachers, offering powerful lessons to apply daily. Create the life you want now. Listen to the one you feed on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Brendan Francis, NewNum. Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. and to really understand it, try to get invited to a local's house for dinner, where kind of trying to get invited to a dinner party,

it doesn't always work out. Ooh, I have to get back to you. Listen to not lost on the iHeart radio app or wherever you get your podcasts. We all overcome some obstacles. We all feel like outsiders at times, you know, maybe there are a few of us who don't have any insecurities, but I've not met any. And so I think we have to know the insecurities instead of

ignoring them. Hey everyone, welcome back to on purpose, the number one health podcast in the world thanks to each and every one of you that come back every week to listen, learn and grow. Now it's not often that I get to sit down with someone whose work I've studied as deeply as our guest today, but some of the books that I recommend the most in my life that have been life changing for all of you when you're saying to me, Jay what's your favorite books? A number of them come from today's author. So today's guest is none other than Walter Isaacson, who has been a journalist and author

and professor of history at Tulane. He's the past CEO of the Aspen Institute where he is now a distinguished fellow and has been the chairman of CNN and the editor of Time magazine. Walter is the author of bestselling biographies on Leonardo da Vinci, Einstein, and Steve Jobs, and has a new book out today

that we're called, which is called, The Code Breaker, Jennifer Doudna, Jean Editing, and the Future of the Human Race. Walter, I'm so excited to have you on the show. Like I said, your biographies on Steve Jobs and Einstein particularly go down as two of my favorite books of all time. And this one has been the most intriguing read. I was not expecting you to do this, but thank you so much for doing the show.

And Jay, thank you for all you just said. Yeah, I mean, every word. I put the Steve Jobs biography into my top three books of all time. Well, that's because of Steve Jobs. I just tried to report and he's the one who led the interesting life. No, absolutely. But you captured it splendidly and beautifully. But I wanted to start somewhere a bit more wildcard. Well, try, I wanted to ask you that I've noticed that you have a keen interest in basketball

and you Retweet these little basketball videos all the time. When did you fall in love with the sport and who's your team? I just actually liked the New Orleans Pelicans. So I'm very much a New Orleans person and I'm in mourning about Drew Brees retiring from the Saints. Love Zion and the Pelican. So I can't really help you as being a brilliant, I'm not going to do the final four for you, and I'm not going to do any brackets. Who's been your favorite player all the time?

Oh, geez. You know, my favorite player in some ways was Bill Bradley, from many reasons, including a wonderful book about him that John McVee wrote, which is about a sense of place. I also, I mean, obviously Michael Jordan, when I was editor of Time, and he was in that last, it was gonna be his last series of games, and they were in the playoffs,

and it was a Sunday night game. And Time Magazine had to go to press on a Saturday night, but I knew he was going to win. I don't know if you remember that Sunday night. I knew he was going to win and on Saturday night I did a cover. We did a cover at time and I, you know, authorized it. It's a beautiful picture of him and says, we may never see his like again. And then I had to stay up on Sunday night

biting my fingernails, but of course he won the game in the last few seconds. And I knew he would. That's incredible. That's when you had to predict the news, right? You had to predict the outcome when you were making decisions and papers. You got it right, but there was plenty of interesting events

of fake news there. But I don't go on podcasts and tell you all the times I made mistakes. I'll just tell you the time I got it right with Michael Jordan. I love it. I love it, Walter. Well, like I said before, you've written some incredible biographies and I can't wait to talk about the code breaker today as well.

But how did you get into actually writing about geniuses, icons, innovators, because it's a real toss to get so intimately deep into someone's life and be able to share their life in such an authentic way. How did you first find that fascination and then secondly develop the skill in the art of storytelling? Well, I come out of Louisiana here and I had a mentor, a novelist named Walker Percy, not that famous, but a great novelist. He said that two types of people come out of Louisiana, preachers and storytellers. He said, for heaven's sake, be a storyteller.

The world's got far too many preachers. And I think that's the best way to tell a story, even a story about gene editing and RNA vaccines, is not just doing an analytical story or opinion piece or whatever, is instead, say, let me tell you a story. And you make it a journey of discovery. And so what I like to write are journeys of discovery about creative people.

Now, in my career, I've known a lot of smart people, but at a certain point I realize smart people are dime a dozen, they don't amount to much. You have to be like Steve Jobs and think different. And so what is it that makes people creative? And so with any of my subjects, we go hand in hand on a journey, and I'd almost call it an adventure in which we say, okay, here we're going to go through this together, we're going to grow, we're

going to learn things, and we're going to see how the creative process works. So if I have a aim, it's what is creativity and how do people achieve it? And the best way to do it is not, say, here's seven lessons to creativity or the twelve secrets to creativity. I don't, those books don't appeal to me. What appeals to me is the way the Bible does it, it's the way biographers have always done it, is let me tell you a story and you explain creativity through the journey of a person, whether it be Ben Franklin, Steve Jobs, or Jennifer Dowdna, or Leonardo da Vinci. Yeah, absolutely. No, I love that. That's such a great answer. Obviously, some of these people you've actually spent time with and some of them,

of course, you didn't spend time with. What's the difference between that opportunity? What's the difference in the process? Because I can imagine that not spending time with someone and researching their life is far more difficult, but at the same time, it's quite challenging to be so intimate with someone without judging and projecting your own view of them onto them. So how are you able to balance both of them? Yeah, you do. When you spend a lot of time with somebody, you bond with them. And in some ways, even though Steve Jobs had a lot of rough edges, I tried to put it in such a context because I so thought he was an amazing person, that I said, okay, he drove people mad, he drove them crazy, but he also drove them to do things

that they never knew they would be able to do. And when you're able to walk alongside somebody actually in real life, like I did with Steve Jobs or with Jennifer Dowden, you know about a thousand times more than you can ever know about a Ben Franklin or Leonardo where you're looking through notebooks and looking through letters to figure out what happened. I mean Steve Jobs would spend hours going over his iPod playlist with me. And even like on the iPod, why the curves or the chamfers on the case would done the way

it was for the fingers and he chose, so I mean I just knew a zillion things about everything he did. The interesting thing about doing with Jennifer Dowd is we were doing it in real time. It wasn't like me saying, explain to me, you know, what it was like to start Apple in the garage or what was Wozniak like when you first met him. When I was doing Jennifer Dowd, things were happening in real time. She had turned her attention, you know, to fighting the COVID epidemic. And I would be with her in her lab,

or I'd be on her Slack channels, or I'd be, you know, lurking at her Zoom meetings. And so the book, actually, I hope unfold as if you're part of a drama that's unfolding for all of us in real time. Hi, I'm David Eagleman. I have a new podcast called Inner Cosmos on I Heart. I'm a neuroscientist and an author at Stanford University, and I've spent my career exploring

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Yeah, that's such a special thing about this book, actually, because you're right that when we remember events or people in hindsight, it's always clouded with hindsight. There's always a different skewer, a different perception, whereas I definitely feel less in this book. You're absolutely right. That would generate for doubt. And also an individual that we don't know so much about.

So I remember seeing her Ted Talk back in 2015. That's when I first come across her and then when I saw your book, I thought, oh wow, this is incredible, but it's also someone that we all don't know much about outside of the fields that she's the number one expert and innovator in. When did you start working with her and when did you get fascinated by her work? Well, I got fascinated about 10 years ago with the life sciences because I had done the physics revolution with Einstein, the digital revolution with Steve Jobs, and I realized that the revolution that will affect,

you know, the current time, the first half of the 21st century, and our kids, will not be the digital revolution, but the life sciences revolution. So as you said around 2015, she was doing the TED Talks, she also came to the Aspen Institute where I worked. And I realized she would be a very good central character

because it was not just about the gene editing technology of CRISPR. It was about the fact that even as a young girl, she had been reading things like the double helix and wanted to become a scientist. But her school counselor says, well, no, girls don't become scientists. And so she pushes on that.

And everybody else in the 1990s, it seemed in the field of biology was chasing DNA in the human-genome project. And she and a few women, like Jillian Banfield, said, actually, RNA is the more interesting molecule. And then, when she discovers how you can use RNA as a guide to edit our own genes, she has this nightmare that Hitler summons her and wants to learn how to use it. And so she becomes one of the leaders in the moral and ethical and policy debates. And the more I talked to her and the more I heard about her, I said, well, she's great

as a central character. Now, there are many other characters in the book. There's Feng Zhang and there's George Church and there's Emmanuel Sharpen-Chi. But Jennifer, as a central character, helps connect it back to the, you know, and the time when Watson and Crick wrote the double helix all the way through the current period

where day by day we're trying to create these new antiviral technologies and detection technologies using CRISPR. Yeah, I heard a talk about in that talk. I remember she was speaking about how scared she was about how gene editing could be misused and, you know, used unethically. But we'll get to that. Let's start by you explaining to us what CRISPR is, because I think for people to really understand the power of this book and the work that you're

doing, they really do need to understand about how central this is going to be in the next revolution, as you said. Right, and it's a pretty simple system, bacteria have been using it for a billion years. And then not all that smart. What they do is whenever they get attacked by a virus, and that war between bacteria and viruses is a worse war than even our war against viruses. So whenever a virus attacks a bacteria, or some of these bacteria, the bacteria take a small mug shot

of some of the genetic code of the attacking virus. The bacteria puts it in its own genetic sequence in these clustered repeated sequences, known as CRISPRs. If they ever have the virus attack them again, they got this mug shot, and they can use a tiny snippet of RNA as a guide to go and use an enzyme to chop up the attacking virus. So in other words, it's a immune system that bacteria have developed and can adapt to each new wave of virus. Well, that's really useful these days when it's happening to us.

But what's also useful is a Jennifer Doudna Emmanuel Sharpen-Jay with their colleagues figured out, oh, I can take that guide that's moving the enzyme to cut DNA. And I can reprogram it. And I can make it cut DNA whatever I tell it to. And boom, that was an aha moment in the lab because they said it could be used as a gene editing tool on humans. So when we talk about CRISPR-NAL, we're talking about a pretty simple system that simply has a guide

RNA and an enzyme that cuts DNA and it's a system to edit our DNA, a system to edit our genes. And explain to us how that editing system was used during the pandemic was being used right now because I think sometimes when you hear about these ideas, you kind of think, oh, that's a sci-fi movie, that's probably something that's gonna happen in the future or a lot of people's minds will postpone

that being practical, but it's being used right now. It's been happen in the future. A lot of people's minds will postpone that being practical But it's being used right now. It's been used in the last 12 months Well, it's been used recently to cure genetic diseases such as sickle cell anemia In my boat. There's a wonderful person named Victoria Gray and Mississippi. She suffered sickle cell her whole life She had crisper used on her blood cells and she doesn't suffer from sickle cell or all life. She had CRISPR used on her blood cells and she doesn't suffer from sickle cell now. There's a young kid, David Sanchez, 17 years old, loves playing basketball except for when he doubles over with sickle cell. And they say, okay, we could also edit your reproductive cells so your children will never have sickle cell. In other words,

we can make inheritable edits. It'll be passed down throughout the species. A Chinese doctor did that two years ago and made inheritable edits on embryos so that the resulting twin girls didn't have the receptor for HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. Now everybody, including Jennifer Dowd, was upset. We don't want to be making inheritable edits yet.

We don't know if it's safe, and we don't know if it's ethical. But now that we're being hit with a virus pandemic, I think people's minds are being open to, well, maybe using genetic edits to make us less susceptible to viruses, remind me again, which wrong with that? So we have to keep our minds open.

Now, in terms of the coronavirus, CRISPR is also being used more specifically for detection technologies. Both Jennifer Dowdner's group and her competitors out in the Broad Institute at MIT in Harvard have produced these small at-home testing kits, which will roll out in the next few months, that can test for any genetic sequence,

you know, in our saliva. You just have to spit into a low cartridge. And so you can say, do I have coronaviruses? Does my kid have strep throat? Is that cancer? Recurring. Is, do I have a bacterial infection? infection. It also can be used to directly kill viruses. With vaccines, we're using our own immune system and kicking them into gear to fight a virus if we get infected. That's okay, but our immune system, as we were finding out, are rather tricky and it would be better just to have antivirals and to use CRISPR the way bacteria do. That's not quite ready yet, but it's working in the lab and will eventually be the better way we fight viruses. What are the pros and cons that she sees that you were able to observe, and what were you shocked and surprised by, and what were you happy about as you saw this journey unfold?

Right, and that's a good way to put it, because it was a journey that unfolded. What Jennifer feels now, just like what I feel now, and I hope what everybody feels now, is a little different than we felt two or three or four years ago. After she had the nightmare, she's gathering scientists and ethicists and religious leaders and saying, how do we stop inherited gene editing? How do we stop things unless they're really medically necessary? I think and you'll read in the book, there's no final answer here. This is a journey.

So instead of saying, you can't just turn to the last chapter of my book and say, let me see the answer key here to tell me what we should do. I think all of us have to have a feel for this technology, have a feel for our own humanity, for our own children, or nephews and nieces, or, you know, and say, all right, how do I feel? And I think our thinking will evolve, as even the pandemic has made it evolve, as for Jennifer and for me, thinking has evolved somewhat, I was totally against any germline, meaning inheritable gene edit.

And I was very much against any genetic editing, except for very clear, simple diseases. But even before the pandemic, when Jennifer gave those talks, you mentioned like the TED talk, or when I was talking about this in a chat room somewhere, I'd always have, and she'd always have, people come up afterwards or in the chat room, and they'd say something like, you know, I have a 12-year-old granddaughter, and I think she's going to die in three years, I've been told. She's got a degenerative nerve disease.

Can you get me in touch with Jennifer Dowdna? Maybe she can fix it. Or I've got a son, and the son has, you know, muscular dystrophy. And it's a simple gene mutation. Can that be fixed? So I think sometimes instead of saying, wouldn't it be immoral to use gene editing? I also have to get my mind in the other direction and say, wouldn't it be immoral not to use it in some cases? So I don't want to preach, as I said, their story tells in preachers. I'm just telling you a story, but you're gonna walk in this story with Jennifer Downe and many other people and say, all right, I get it, it's complicated. Maybe we should do simple diseases like sickle cell and muscular dystrophy, and cystic

fibrosis and tasex, huntingtons. Maybe there are other things we can do, including making us less susceptible to viruses. I think I would personally pause. It would be pretty easy to add height to your children or muscle mass. I mean, my Ostatin, as you know, can be regulated genetically. And so you could have more muscular children, if you decide. I'd draw the line before doing that, I think enhancements. I think rich people buying better genes for their kids than poor people is a horror that we have to avoid just like in Brave New World or Gatica.

And I think editing out the diversity of our species. I love the balcony behind me on Royal Street in the French Quarter here in New Orleans. I just look down and see people tall and short and, you know, black and white and Creole and, you know, various hues and fat and skinny and gay and straight and trans and, you know, sighted and blind and, you know, and I think, okay, the diversity of our species is a really cool thing. Let's not mess with that. A good way to learn about a place is to talk to the people that live there.

There's just this sexy vibe and Montreal, this pulse, this energy. What was meant is seen as a very snotty city. People call it Bos Angeles. New Orleans is a town that never forgets its pay. A great way to get to know a place is to get invited to a dinner party. Hi, I'm Brendan Francis Newt, and not lost as my new travel podcast, where a friend and I go places, see the sights, and try to finagle our way into a dinner party. Where, kind of trying to get invited to a dinner party, it doesn't always work out. I would love that, but I have like a Cholala who is aggressive towards strangers.

I love the dogs. We learn about the places we're visiting, yes, but we also learn about ourselves. I don't spend as much time thinking about how I'm going to die alone when I'm traveling, but I get to travel with someone I love. Oh, see, I love you too. And also, we get to eat as much.

And we're so sincere. I love you too. My life's a lot of therapy goes behind that. You're so white, I love it. Listen to not lost on the iHeart radio app or wherever you get your podcasts. I am Yomla and on my podcast, the R-Spot, we're having inspirational, educational, and sometimes difficult and challenging conversations about relationships. They may not have the capacity to give you what you need and insisting means that you

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Yeah, as soon as you get into the aesthetic enhancements, it's different for its use from serving. But yeah, it's such a subjective thing. One of the things that I love that you've helped me do personally and something that I like to encourage my listeners to do is to study people's lives. You know, I really believe as you were saying that the religious texts, the spiritual texts, they regularly introduce us to stories of people that we can study. I wonder what have you learned from Jennifer Daudner beyond, of course, the ideas of CRISPR and gene editing? What are some of the things you learned about the way she lives and the way she thinks that you may have started to

invite yourself or something that you admire and that you're passing on? What are some of those more softer aspects? One of the things is that creativity is a collaborative effort in innovations of team sport. And I realize that like Steve Jobs, she's very good at creating teams. Unlike Steve Jobs, she has a different method, which is she likes her teams to really like each other. She always, if she's going to have somebody come into her lab or be a postdoc or be hired, they have to meet everybody else

and there has to be a chemistry where they all click. That's one form of leadership and team building and it works for her. If you read Doris Karnes Goodwin's team of rivals or about Franklin Roosevelt or Steve Jobs, they often like to have more creative tension within the team. We know what, that works too.

What I learned from Jennifer Ddner is you have to look inside yourself and say, what is my best approach at being a collaborator, a creative team builder, and I'm going to do it my way and be comfortable with it. I learned that I'm not a particularly great manager. I like teaching and I like writing, but when they ask me to run a big company like CNN, I'm not good at being the boss every day

and managing a lot of high maintenance people all the time. So I watch Jennifer Dowden and I say, well, play to your strengths here. Have creative small teams that get along well. And that's different from people are going to be managing huge enterprises with a lot of creative tension. But each is a way to make a contribution to creativity. I love that your answer is not singular.

It's not one dimensional. It's the idea that certain people liked creative tension in teams, and that's how they the idea that certain people liked creative tension in teams and that's how they succeeded and other people like creative chemistry and that succeeded because I often think it's so easy to be like this is the only way that teams could thrive and teams can be successful, but you're seeing from two phenomenal individuals and their teams that actually both have worked before. And I look at Ben Franklin. He wasn't the smartest of the founders.

That was Jefferson Amattisson, and he wasn't the most passionate. That Sam Adams or his cousin, John. But he was a team builder. He's the one who can bring them all together. And I really don't like those books that have on their cover the seven secrets of building teams or something, or, you know, creative team building and 12-year-old lessons. I think you have to learn that different

people do it in different ways. I did it differently at Time Magazine and CNN. Then, you know, other people did when they were running publications. But I learned from Jennifer, make sure you understand what you're most comfortable with and lead with that strength. Yeah, that seems to be a recurring theme, the idea of repeating strengths or emphasizing or going all in on your strengths seems to be a recurring theme. What was it about Steve Jobs that you think rubbed off on you? What part of that energy or abilities or skills or things you saw? Did any of it, if any of it, rub off on you?

Well, there are many lessons from the book. I wish more of them had rubbed off on me. I'd love to be more like Steve Jobs, or perhaps kinder and gentler at times. But one of the things that impressed me was his passion for perfection and for the product. When he was a young kid, his dad was building a fence around the backyard of the house, and young Steve was helping with his hammer. And his father said, we have to make the back of the fence. Just as beautiful as the front.

And Steve said, well, it faces these woods in Marshallland. Nobody will ever see it. Nobody will know. And his father said, well, you will know. And so Steve jobs, even when it came to the circuit board in the original Macintosh, wanted it to look beautiful, even though he had made the Mac into an appliance that the ordinary user couldn't open.

I mean, you know, it didn't have a screw, you could open up the back and see the circuit board. But Steve always felt that if you care enough about the beauty of the parts unseen, you're going to have a passion for making a great product. I think far too often people are trying hard to make a profit, or they're trying hard to get a product out the door, they don't

pause and say, I could sacrifice a little of the profits and even sacrifice a little of the rush, but I can make it really beautiful. And even in a small way, I mean, that's why I hold my books for a year, you know, longer than I need to, because I just want to go over and over again. You think, but in a small way, for example, the paper quality of the book, I kept pushing the publisher. I want color pictures throughout. I don't want it to be this little insert of things.

And I want high quality paper. I learned that with the Leonardo da Vinci book. And so this book, I said, you know, take it out of my royalties. We're going to split the cost of this, but I don't want you to charge more than most books. I want it to be, you know, less than most books, but I want you to use high quality paper, have color pictures throughout, a lot of pictures, because I just want people to feel the book and look at it and say, oh, that's a nice product. Even if they, you know, leaving aside whether I got the words all right,

I want the product to look good. I want, as Steve Jobs said, even the parts unseen. Most readers don't know the paper stock and the weight of the paper stock in the count. And I know that from the magazine world, the matting, and the coding and stuff. But they sense, even the parts that they can't fully see, they sense, okay, you tried to make it high quality. That's what I did with this book. And yeah, you don't charge more,

but you just say, it's gonna be high quality. Yeah, everyone who's listening to this, I am showing pictures of the books so you have to get the book in order to see the pictures. This one's great. I love this picture. Oh yeah, her and a lab holding the test tubes as a young woman.

Yeah, tell me a bit about her when it came to that moment in her life when she was told girls don't become scientists. How does she genuinely remember that moment or is she someone just completely unaffected by it? Or... Oh no, she was affected by it. She was affected by it. And you know what, you'll see in the book,

and I hope she'll forgive me for saying so. She's still got that streak of insecurity of having been a sixth grader until, no, you can't do this. And when she's in college, you showed that picture of her holding the test tube at the Pomona College Chemistry lab. She thought, well, maybe I can't do it. Maybe I should be a French major.

But she persists. And so that's another lesson in this book. And all the way through, we all overcome some obstacles. We all feel like outsiders at times. Maybe there are a few of us who don't have any insecurities, but I've not met any. And so I think we have to know the insecurities instead of ignoring them. Well, I think that's what really helped me

when I was reading your work on both Einstein and Steve Jobs was around the number of failures and rejections and setbacks and not just the ones that make it onto movies or not just the ones that get glamorized in Hollywood, but the deep understanding of just how crazy this is for someone to go through these events, that's given me a lot of confidence that whenever I face failures and rejections, I'm like, I'm on the same path as Steve Joseph's. Like, you know, it's the same feeling of I can relate as opposed to thinking, well, well, my life shouldn't have any challenges because Steve's didn't have

any challenges. Often we're not aware. When it comes to someone like Jennifer Dowdner, what are the biggest challenges she's up against today from the world of science? What are the challenges she's having to process from her own industry and her own work right now? Well, she's having a good year right now, having just won the Nobel Prize.

And somewhat of a surprise, it came rather quickly. It usually takes some decades to give a Nobel Prize to a field. And she's really reduced the amount of rivalry and competition with her rival team at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard because they're both working on CRISPR detection technologies. And I think it reminded all of us, including all the scientists, and I hope all the young readers and old readers of this book that sometimes when you're in a race, when you're in a rival,

when you're being competitive, that's great, it spurs you on. But then you get reminders that there's a noble reason you're doing this as well. There's a higher calling, helping humanity. And her setbacks are she still doesn't have that home testing kit totally approved and ready to be bought at your local drug store. So with science, there's always another hurdle to overcome, but the cool thing about science is the scientific method reminds us. You got to keep an open mind.

You're going to do an experiment and it's going to fail. And that means you're going to have to revise your theories. Well, you know what? We've been pretty bad at doing that in our politics and our civil discourse to be able to say, well, I actually have this belief in theory, but I'm seeing new evidence, so maybe I'll revise it. You know, we used to do that. Ben Franklin did that. That was the whole heart of his scientific method of forming a republic. Nowadays, we don't do that in our society as much

or a cable TV shout-choes as much. That's why we have podcasts, because people can actually think things through. Yeah, I love that as a cross-pollination of an idea and a methodology and of how things are processed. And I think that's such a deep lesson. When you're writing these books and mapping out people's lives,

what kind of measures do you have to take to not project your subconscious beliefs onto them and onto the book? Because I find like that must be, to me that sounds like one of the most difficult things to do is to, because you must have really learned the skill of realizing that there is no truth, there is only both people's perception of the experience. Would you agree with that, or would you say

there's always a fact? I don't know that we'll ever get to absolute truth at all times, and sometimes we think we get it to truth, and we have to revise it. And I just have to listen to all the different sides and look at all the different evidence. I hope I keep enough of an open mind. That somebody says, well, you actually missed this point. Here's some more facts. We calibrate a bit. But I grew up in a tradition of journalism that now seems antiquated, which is, it's not about me.

It's not about my opinions, I got to make sure I keep my opinions as far as possible out of the way, except for when I'm forming my opinions based on my reporting and the facts. So I'm not trying to say I'm coming at this with a bias, I feel that I've got to be objective and even though we'll never get it absolute truth and we'll never get it being absolutely objective, we can always say that's what we're aiming for. I think that's a really good answer to a difficult area. You do a lot of listening in your line of work. When you're

listening to people, you're observing people, you're researching, give us your best tip on listening and being present that people can actually use in their life, because that's a skill that you've obviously honed and developed to work with some of the most incredible people on the planet. How are you listening in such a way that you're truly understanding them? I think that's a skill we all need to learn. I think a skill that I have, if I may be so bold, is to claim it, is I'm good at getting people to talk. Whether it's a Jennifer Dowd, Nora Henry Kissinger,

or who I wrote about years and years ago, or Steve Jobs, or I just sit there, sit there by his bed when he was ailing, and I can get him to talk. And one secret is, just let him talk. You don't have to ask a whole lot of long questions. You can just say, tell me about it. Secondly, you just have to be truly curious,

and all the creative people I know have a natural curiosity. And I think, I may say, I'm blessed with it, but so is I'm everybody on the planet. We're all blessed with curiosity. It's just sometimes we outgrow our wonder years. We lose our sense of curiosity. And that curiosity causes me to ask questions. I try to make sure that every time I ask a question, it's a very simple question. And I'm asking it because I'm actually curious to know the answer. And sometimes I'll ask a question of why did

you do that? And it could be an inventor, inventor could be a hedge fund manager. Somebody created an algorithm to beat the market or whatever. I'll say, why? Why did you do that? And they say, OK, because I can make money this way. Because I can do, I say, yeah, but why? Why did you do that? And I like peeling back the onion a bit

so that people have to say, well, I hadn't really thought about deeper motivations or whatever, but the only way those questions work is if you're actually genuinely curious. The best part about that answer is that it's available to everyone, as you said, about curiosity is, the skill is simply being curious curious as you rightly pointed out. It's, you know, everyone can ask that question to their friend, their family member, a mentor

and interesting person. We talk a lot about mentors on this podcast and being able to understand the most from our mentors and guides or teachers. And sometimes we think we have to have this phenomenal, mind-blowing question to ask that's going to be earth shattering. And the truth is you don't. The truth is you just simply want to understand more curiously. And I love that.

And I want everyone who's listening and watching to adopt that this week is to ask someone a simple, short question in their life so that you can learn something new about them or learn something different about them. So I love how accessible and practical that is. their life so that you can learn something new about them or learn something different about them. So I love how accessible and practical that is. Yeah, not all of us are going to ever have Einstein's mental processing power or Leonardo Da Vinci's artistic talent. But all of us, if we really want to, can be just as curious about things, about all the

wonders around us. And that pure curiosity led a graduate student in Spain to say, why do bacteria have these clustered repeated sequences? And Jennifer Dowden to say, well, what does the RNA do in order to get it to the right place to make the cut? And that wasn't done because they were trying in order to get it to the right place to make the cut. And that wasn't done because they were trying to make a gene editing tool, they were trying to make a vaccine.

They were kind of curious, like, whoa, nature is beautiful. Let's try to figure it out. Yeah. They weren't trying to necessarily solve something for a particular goal. It was the curiosity that led to it. Do you think that that's an approach that we need to encourage more in education, in the scientific and both spiritual fields? Is that something that we're losing? Is that something you saw more of when you were studying people of

the past or is that just a trait that comes along once in a while where you find an incredible icon like this who just thinks completely from a curious place as opposed to a consumer or a creative space of actually creating something tangible? I think the most important application of that is in our policy, meaning, you know, government funding, university research, whatever. And I think part of the message of this book is that basic research, curiosity driven research. We don't know where it's going to lead, but that's where you got to begin. And eventually, it'll lead to discoveries,

and those discoveries might lead to inventions, and those inventions might lead to inventions, and those inventions might be useful. When they were, you know, Einstein's colleagues were figuring out how do electrons dance on the surface of semi-conducting materials, and how does quantum theory apply to surface states? They weren't doing it to invent the transistor. But eventually when they figured out at Bell Labs, theoretical physicists, like John

Bardeen and William Shockley, who understand the quantum surface states of semiconduconducting materials, suddenly have changed the entire world by creating the transistor and then the microchip. That's true of my book now, which is this adventure to figure out how our molecules working in our bodies leads to things like editing tools and vaccines. Absolutely. Well, it's Riseson, thank you so much for spending time with us today to have this conversation. I want to encourage everyone who's deeply fascinated,

curious and intrigued, go out and get a copy of the code breaker. It's available right now when you hear this episode. And I truly believe that Walter, you're very humble and modest, and that makes me appreciate you even more. But you have a really unique ability to be able to really get into people's lives in a really deep and intimate way and take us on a journey through their life in a very 360-hole way. I feel like you're great at telling us about the whole person, rather than just the part

that's often the most popular part and I really value your approach and the way you do that. We end every interview with the final five Walter which is a fast five so you have to answer each question in one word or one sentence maximum. So if you're ready this is your fast five. Are you ready? Yeah, I'm not prepared. Yeah, definitely not prepared. Okay. If there's one person you could have dinner with, that's no longer with us. Who would it be? Leonardo, eventually. Oh wow. Because he was the person who most wanted to know everything you could know about everything that was

knowable and it's like, whoa, tell me about it. What do you think was the most interesting discovery he made through your research? I think his most interesting thing he did was connect the arts and the sciences. And that's an inspiration for Steve Jobs who convinced me to write about Leonardo da Vinci. That's what Vitruvian man, that naked guy doing the jumping jacks in the circle and square, is supposed to symbolize as the connection of art and science. And that's why the Mona Lisa has the most amazing smile, it's because he studied optics, he studied nerves, he studied perspective, and he was able to meld art and science to make the greatest painting ever. The second question, who alive would you most love to have dinner with?

Probably Elon Musk. I've actually, because of what I do, I've been able to have dinner with really interesting people, and I admire the hell out of Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, but I've actually been able to pick their brains before. Elon, I'd like to figure them out. Nice. What about what would you ask him? What do you think is the most fascinating discovery you'd like to make, Darryl? What are you curious about with him?

I would drill down on battery technology because I often find that truly being curious about something they're curious about is a way to connect. Absolutely, beautiful, I love that. All right, the third question. We're only on question three even though our of us like four questions already. Question number three is, what's the biggest thing you learned about yourself in the last 12 months? I can't remember whether Aristotle or Plato said it, but

you know, we're a social animal. And it's really hard for me to be locked down, but I need to be around other people. I recharge my battery by listening to other people. Beautiful. Question number four, as a prolific author, what's your favorite book? And if you can't give me one, you can have three. What are your top three favorite reads in your own life and your own journey? The movie goer by Walker Percy because it's about like any great book, including nonfiction.

It's about a person goes on a journey. And we're all on a journey. And that book gets it. And speaking of great journeys, Moby Dick. I think you could pick Huck Finn, but Moby Dick is the same sort of thing. And so is the Odyssey. It's a person goes on a journey.

And Moby Dick, it just grabs me because the detail and the curiosity and the passion. And a third book, James Baldwin, I've gotten into. And tell me how long the train's been gone. My dad wanted me to read it before he died. Wow, that's beautiful, thank you. And then the fifth and final question, if you could create one law that everyone in the world

had to follow, what would it be? Be nice. Simple, be nice. I love it. Everyone, Walter, Isaacson, a new book, The Codebreaker, available right now. Go and grab a copy. We will put the link in the description. Please, please, please go and read about Jennifer Doudnoy. I promise you you won't regret it. And to be honest, I do think this is probably the most challenging one for me in the sense that because it's happening right now, it presents so many more interesting conversations and questions in a way that I've never been challenging before. So thank you so much for all the work you've done Walter. I remain a fan and supporter and really love meeting you today

and appreciate your energy through the screen. I look forward to having dinner with you hopefully one day and again, I appreciate you so much. Is there anything else you'd like to share with our audience today that I haven't asked you about? You're a great interviewer. I think you know all the ways of being curious. So thank you and also you're good at following my one rule,

which is, you're very nice. Well, thank you so much. That means a lot coming from you. And I hope I can continue to learn from you. And yeah, I meant everything I said. So thank you so much, everyone. Please, please, please. Share this episode and also share on Instagram

and Twitter what you learned from this episode. When you're reading the book, share their pages, highlights your notes, we want to see what you're gaining from all of this incredible insight and wisdom that's out there. Again, a big thank you to Walter and we'll see you soon. I'm Jay Shetty and on my podcast on purpose, I've had the honor to sit down with some of the most incredible hearts and minds on the planet. Oprah, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Hart, Louis Hamilton, and many, many more. On this podcast, you get to hear the raw, real-life stories behind their journeys and the tools

they used, the books they read, and the people that made a difference in their lives so that they can make a difference in hours. Listen to on purpose with Jay Shetty on the iHeart Radio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Join the journey soon. When my daughter ran off to hop trains, I was terrified I'd never see her again, so I followed her into the train yard. This is what it sounds like inside the box car. And into the city of the rails, there I found a surprising world so brutal and beautiful that it changed me, but the rails do that to everyone.

There is another world out there, and if you want to play with the devil, you're going to find them there in the rail yard. Undenail Morton, come with me to find out what waits for us in the city of the rails. Listen to city of the rails on the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Or cityoftherails.com. I'm Danny Shapiro, host of Family Secrets. It's hard to believe we're entering our eighth season.

And yet, we're constantly discovering new secrets. The variety of them continues to be astonishing. I can't wait to share 10 incredible stories with you, stories of tenacity, resilience, and the profoundly necessary excavation of long-held family secrets. Listen to season 8 of Family Secrets on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you'll get your podcasts. or radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.