Something You Should Know - Scientific Mysteries that Make No Sense At All & How to Stop People From Manipulating You

Episode Date: June 21, 2018

Want to feel REALLY good? Watch this YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHiKxytbCWk. It’s a dull and boring video about folding towels and will make you (or at least many people) get chills and give you a “brain orgasm.” Why? No one really knows for sure but I’ll explain what is known about it as I start this episode. How could 95% of the universe be missing? Why is it that science can’t quite explain why we need to die or how free will works? Michael Brooks joins me for a fascinating discussion on things that baffle science. Michael holds a PhD in quantum physics and is author of the book 13 Things that Don’t Make Sense : The Most Intriguing Scientific Mysteries of Our Times (https://amzn.to/2JSTD17) and he is co-host of the podcast series Science(ish) which looks at the scientific issues raised by popular culture fiction such as Hollywood films and TV. A lot of the time you use the word “that” in a sentence, it is totally unnecessary. Oh, and so is “totally” as in totally unnecessary. I’ll have a list of words you probably use that you don’t really need to – in fact you really shouldn't. https://www.themuse.com/advice/15-words-you-need-to-eliminate-from-your-vocabulary-to-soundsmarter# You may have people in your life who “gaslight” you. It is a form of manipulation and it is very toxic. Therapist Robin Stern, author of the book, The Gaslight Effect: How to Spot and Survive the Hidden Manipulation Others Use to Control Your Life (https://amzn.to/2M8RzyP), joins me to explain how it works and how to defend yourself from gaslighters.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today on Something You Should Know, there's a really boring 18 minute YouTube video you should watch because it may be the best thing that happens to you today. Also, there are several things you would think scientists should probably know that baffles them completely. Well, the thing that I think shocks most people is the fact that 95% of the universe is missing. We actually only know about 5% of the universe, which is the kind of stuff that we're made of. And this is such a long-standing mystery. Then there are many words you likely use when you write that you don't actually need.

And do you have people in your life who make you feel bad or stupid or ignorant when you talk to them? That's the gaslight Effect. The Gaslight Effect describes what happens to you when you begin to second-guess yourself because you've allowed another person to define your reality and to erode your sense of self, your confidence, and your judgment. All this today on Something You Should Know. As a listener to Something You Should Know, I can only assume that you are someone who likes to learn about new and interesting things and bring more knowledge to work for you in your everyday life. I mean, that's kind of what Something You Should Know was all about. And so I want to invite you to listen to another podcast called TED Talks Daily.

Now, you know about TED Talks, right? Many of the guests on Something You Should Know have done TED Talks Daily. Now, you know about TED Talks, right? Many of the guests on Something You Should Know have done TED Talks. Well, you see, TED Talks Daily is a podcast that brings you a new TED Talk every weekday in less than 15 minutes. Join host Elise Hu. She goes beyond the headlines so you can hear about the big ideas shaping our future. Learn about things like sustainable fashion, embracing your entrepreneurial spirit, the future of robotics, and so much more.

Like I said, if you like this podcast, Something You Should Know, I'm pretty sure you're going to like TED Talks Daily. And you get TED Talks Daily wherever you get your podcasts. Something you should know. Fascinating intel. The world's top experts. And practical advice you can use in your life. Today, Something You Should Know with Mike Carruthers. So, I just finished watching. Well, I didn't finish it. I watched most of it. It's an 18-minute YouTube video on how to fold towels.

And it's narrated by a woman who barely speaks above a whisper. And about 2 million people have viewed this thing. And it's not because people really need to know how to fold towels. You probably mastered that a while back in your life. Instead, people watch it because an increasing number of people report experiencing something called Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response, or ASMR. It's a whole body tingling sensation that listening to a soft, monotonous voice can trigger. ASMR is a neurological experience that causes people to experience what has been termed

a brain orgasm. It's a tingling, pleasurable sensation similar to goosebumps that begins at the head or neck and works its way throughout the body. The most common triggers of this sensation include educational videos, like how to fold a towel, having your hair cut, yeah, I've had that, I've had that kind of tingly sensation when I've had my hair cut, feeling empathetic, enjoying music or art, listening to slow enunciated speech, and experiencing close personal contact. It feels so good that people keep re-watching this incredibly dull video

just to have that experience over and over again. What's interesting is that science doesn't recognize this as a real thing. It doesn't ever appear to have been studied or written about scientifically. And it doesn't happen to everyone. It is a self-reported experience, meaning some people say it happens to them, doesn't happen to everyone, and no one really knows what it is or why.

Nevertheless, if it happens to you, it really feels good. There's a link to that video in the show notes. And that is something you should know. In the world of science, there are always new breakthroughs being announced. New research of what men in white lab coats have discovered that could change your life or your understanding of life. And it's all very exciting and interesting. But what you don't hear so much about are the things that have science and scientists baffled. Things that make

no sense at all. And that is what Michael Brooks knows about. Michael holds a PhD in quantum physics, but he works as an author and journalist. He's co-host of a podcast called Science-ish, which looks at the scientific issues raised by popular culture fiction like Hollywood films and television. And he's written some really interesting books, including At the Edge of Uncertainty and 13 Things That Don't Make Sense, the most intriguing scientific mysteries of our times. Hi, Michael. Welcome. Thank you very much. It's great to be on here. So what's interesting is not only that, of course, science doesn't know a lot of things,

there is much yet to come, but that science is aware of things that it can't explain, that make no sense. So rather than discuss this in the abstract, let's just dive in here with one of those things that baffles science. Well, the thing that I think shocks most people is the fact that 95% of the universe is missing. So we have these things called dark energy and dark matter that you may have heard of. And what they are is kind of placeholders. So when we're thinking in terms of the mass and energy of the matter that you may have heard of. And what they are is kind of placeholders. So when we're thinking in terms of the mass and energy of the universe, you know Einstein's equation, E equals mc squared,

where you can have a kind of energy that can turn into mass and mass that can turn into energy. So scientists think of things in terms of the whole sort of mass and energy of the universe. And 70% of that is a thing called dark energy, which is making the universe. And 70% of that is a thing called dark energy, which is making the universe's expansion accelerate. So we're actually in a universe that is not, you know, after the Big Bang, it isn't slowing down this expansion of space-time, it's actually speeding up. And the only way for it to be speeding up is if there's a source of energy within the universe. And we

don't know what that source of energy is, but it's somewhere, you know, around us, you know, within the space and time that we exist in. And this is an absolute mystery to scientists. And it makes up 70% of the known universe. And then actually 25% is a thing called dark matter. So when we look out at the way galaxies move and clusters of galaxies move, the way we see them move tells us that there's some stuff out there exerting gravity on them. But it's stuff that we can't see and that we can't seem to interact with in any way. And we've looked for it for decades and decades now, and we can't seem to find what it is. And this is now known as dark matter. So when you have those two things up, we actually only know about 5%

of the universe, which is the kind of stuff that we're made of. And this is such a long-standing mystery. So dark matter was first hypothesized in 1933. Dark energy sort of came onto our radars in 1997. And we have literally no clue what either of them are or where they come from. And since we're talking about outer space, let's keep our discussion there for a moment and talk about the wow signal. Because what's so fascinating is that with all the talk that you hear in popular culture about aliens and contact with aliens

and beings from other planets, science has been pretty strict in saying that there really isn't much there. There really isn't much to discuss about having made contact with alien beings up till now, except that one time back in the 70s. So talk about that. This is a thing called the Wow signal, and it came through in 1977. Basically, there was a big telescope in Ohio called the Big Ear. And it was just, you know, pointing out into space and listening for what we thought,

you know, might be an alien signal. So it was tuned to the frequency of the hydrogen molecule vibration, which is the most abundant molecule in the universe. So the thinking was that, you know, if aliens were going to signal at us, they would signal at that frequency to kind of let us know, hey, we, you know, we've spotted the most abundant thing in the universe as well. And then one night, this signal came in, and it immediately disappeared. You know, we never saw anything about it again, we just never saw anything like it again. But the guy who was reading the output of the telescope, and he was on it, did it on his kitchen table, it was a guy called Jerry Amon. He was looking at the printout of the telescope, and he did it on his kitchen table. It was a guy called Jerry Amon. He was looking at the printout from the telescope, and he saw this blip that was

exactly what an alien signal would look like. He wrote, wow, next to it. Wow, exclamation mark. At that point, it kind of became known as the wow signal. And it's extremely frustrating because the way the telescope works, you know, it wasn't chasing that signal around the sky and it wasn't moving like the sort of modern dishes that we have. It was just literally passing over the sky or the sky was passing over it, I should say. And, you know, we just saw that one signal. And then by the time the same patch of sky came around and that was an empty patch of sky, I think in Sagittarius. And there was nothing there, nothing out there, you know, no planets.

They did a massive sweep for what might be military satellites or civilian satellites, anything that might have emitted this signal from that region of space. Nobody ever found anything. And so it remains a mystery to this day. You know, was it an alien spacecraft that was just passing by? Or, you know, I like to think of it as, you know, maybe it just sort of went into reverse. And you know how those municipal vehicles emit like a beeping when they go into reverse. Maybe that was what we, you know, we picked up.

We don't have a clue, but it's still out there as one of the big mysteries in science. But when you say that it was a signal that could be from aliens, what was the signal? Was it an audible signal? What was it exactly? What happens is it's basically an electromagnetic pulse. So you've got a radio receiver. The telescope, the big ear is basically a radio receiver. And so what it does is like a radio, it just picks up signals. And most of the time it's just hitting static and nothing interesting but then all of a sudden you just get this sudden sort of electrical spike in the antenna and that you know registers as a series of letters and digits as it was in the way that they were recording it so so you just when you get the

printout you just see this sort of peak effectively so free will is on your list of 13 things that that can't be explained but effectively. So free will is on your list of 13 things that can't be explained, but why? I mean, free will seems to be pretty self-apparent, that free will is free will. We decide to do something and we do it because we choose to do it. That's free will. I guess you had to ask that, didn't you? I did. I was destined to ask that. I've been meaning to ask that all my life. It's a very interesting topic. So, I mean, it's difficult. When we think of free will, I think, well, you know, I decided what I had for breakfast this morning.

You know, I decided that I was going to talk to you now. You know, I make all kinds of decisions about my life. So, it feels like I have free will. But when you sort of pare it right back to, you know, I'm going to make a decision about when I'm going to move my finger, and I'm going to decide and I'm going to consciously decide to move my finger at a certain moment. And when neuroscientists do this experiment and they wire up people's brains and they say, OK, whenever you're ready, move move your finger and they're reading the brain waves at the time and they can actually predict and this is an extraordinary thing up to seven seconds in advance they can read your brain waves and tell you basically when you've decided to do

it um so in another interesting experiment was done in germany where you you could decide whether you were going to touch a left or a right button effectively and and and of course people just sort of thought, well, you know, they made their minds up, right, I'm going to touch the left button and they touched the left button. But when they did the statistics from reading the brainwaves, they found that actually the signal was there before the people were conscious of the decision that they'd made. And so the inference that the neuroscientists draw from this is actually our brains do something and they kind of make decisions and then they tell us about them and then we assume that those decisions are our decisions. And of course, they are our decisions if you think of the brain is just part of you or there's nothing special within the brain that somehow is you being conscious. So what neuroscientists are finding is that actually we have a situation where we think we have free will. We think we're making decisions.

But actually what's happening is something is happening within the brain to make a decision between left and right or, you know, when to move a finger or, you know, maybe much more complex things. And those things are then fed to our consciousness effectively. And we then believe that we are making the decision to do them. But somebody reading your brainwaves could tell you exactly what you're going to so-called decide to do, seven seconds before you actually make that so-called decision. So we're finding there's a really sort of blurred boundary between what we're conscious of making a decision to do and what other people can absolutely predict that we're going to do so by looking at the brain wave so are you saying that okay you're gonna i'm gonna sit down and move my finger and i

don't know that that's what you're gonna tell me to do and then you tell me to do it and i move my finger and before you even told me we we going to be moving fingers, I'd already decided to move my finger? What it is, is that you make a decision about when you're going to move your finger. And I can watch your brainwaves and I can tell you when you're going to move your finger before you are conscious that you've made a decision that you're going to move your finger at that moment. I'm speaking with Michael Brooks. He's author of the book 13 Things That Don't Make Sense, and he is host of the podcast Science-ish. People who listen to Something You Should Know are curious about the world, looking to hear new ideas and perspectives. So I want to tell you about a podcast that is full of new ideas and perspectives, and one I've started listening to called Intelligence Squared.

It's the podcast where great minds meet. Listen in for some great talks on science, tech, politics, creativity, wellness, and a lot more. A couple of recent examples, Mustafa Suleiman, the CEO of Microsoft AI, discussing the future of technology. That's pretty cool. And writer, podcaster, and filmmaker John Ronson, discussing the rise of conspiracies and culture wars.

Intelligence Squared is the kind of podcast that gets you thinking a little more openly about the important conversations going on today. Being curious, you're probably just the type of person Intelligence Squared is meant for. Check out Intelligence Squared wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Jennifer, a co-founder of the Go Kid Go Network.

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in welcoming the Search for the Silver Lining podcast to the Go Kid Go Network by listening today. Look for the Search for the Silver Lining on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get your podcasts. You know, just again yesterday, I had a listener email asking me about the toothbrush I use and have been talking about here on the podcast, the Quip toothbrush. Now, I know you think, well, really, toothbrush? Perhaps not the most exciting topic on the planet. But when you start brushing with a Quip toothbrush, I think you'll be impressed, maybe even amazed. Quip is an electric toothbrush that is a fraction of the cost of bulkier brushes, while still packing just the right amount of vibrations to help clean your teeth.

Quip's built-in timer helps you clean for the dentist-recommended two minutes with guiding pulses that remind you when to switch sides. And then they deliver new brush heads on a dentist-recommended schedule every three months for just $5, including free shipping worldwide. I just got my new shipment the other day. Quip is on Oprah's O-List, named one of Time's Best Inventions, and is the first subscription electric toothbrush accepted by the American Dental Association. Quip starts at just $25,

and if you go to getquip.com slash something right now, you'll get your first refill pack free with a Quip electric toothbrush. That's your first refill pack free at getquip.com slash something. Let me spell it for you. G-E-T-Q-U-I-P getquip.com slash something. So, Michael, I just want to be clear on this,

that it's not like, it's not that you looked at my brainwave and saw that I was going to move my finger before we even started talking about moving fingers. No, because it's actually there. You can watch what's something called the readiness potential in the brain. You can watch it build up so that the brain is going to move that finger. You can see that a movement is going to happen. And you can kind of see from the readiness potential when that movement is actually going to finally happen.

And the people who are doing the experiment report the time that they made the decision to move the finger. And it's actually well after the brain has already sort of made it happen effectively or set the thing in motion. So the issue is one of thinking that we've made a decision. But you can kind of see inside the brain and the clockwork of the brain, and you can see that the thing is already in motion well before you've made your decision to do it. And the hypothesis of where that comes from is what? So the hypothesis is that once you are in a situation where you aren't going to do something eventually, your brain is just doing it. There's nothing special. There's no sort of ghost in the machine.

There's no special you within there. So you are just your brain. And the idea that you suddenly are consciously making a decision to do something is the illusion. Actually, your brain is just doing something, and it kind of lets you in on it. So that consciousness of what's about to happen, you think you're in control of that. But actually, all that's happening, it seems from these experiments, is that your brain lets you in on it just before it actually happens. So is it that we don't know where it comes from? Or maybe the process of deciding what to do is a longer process, up to seven seconds longer, perhaps, than we think it is. Exactly.

Yeah. So obviously, there's something in our brains brains sets in motion this thing of like, okay, you're going to choose between left and right. And something in the brain chooses left or right. And then eventually it comes into our consciousness that we are going to choose, say, left. The thing is that I can read those brainwaves seven seconds before then. So it's before you're conscious of whether you've chosen left or right. I could tell you whether you've chosen left or right.

How does death not make sense? It seems pretty much, you know, well, you're alive and now you're dead. Well, you'd think so, wouldn't you? And it's an interesting kind of ongoing debate in biology. But actually, we don't have to die. There are plenty of animals like turtles, tortoises, whales, that seem to live and live and live for such enormous lengths of time. So we think that there's the kind of the theory where, you know, there's just wear and tear, and eventually your cells can't repair themselves. And there's a kind

of theory that says, well, actually, you know, there's no sort of biological advantage to death. When we evolved, we evolved for individual selection, not for group selection. So you would say, okay, well, you know, death makes sense because we've got to make room for the next generation. But there's nothing in the theory of evolution that allows an individual to kind of back off for the sake of the group or the sake of the you know larger society so you can't program it in so what you could say is oh you know well it's just wear and tear you know our telomeres don't don't repair so there's parts of our chromosomes that just kind of gradually degrade over time but actually they they're not

that linked to senescence and aging and things. So we don't have a good theory just for why things eventually become decrepit. It's sort of, and it all seems quite fixable. I mean, this is why a number of biologists who work in this area are working really hard to say, you know, basically, we seem to have some things happen. There's degradation in the DNA replication, the success of that errors creep in. But actually, there's no reason why an organism has to die. You know, you look at something like the naked mole rat, and you see, you know, it doesn't get cancer. It doesn't, you know, have these kind of errors that build up it seems to have repair mechanisms and so the you know the thing is that the death actually isn't necessary it isn't a necessary part of evolution and uh it's quite a

mystery and quite an interesting mystery and obviously a great one to solve um to say well you know maybe actually you know we don't have to put up with this you know maybe there's something that we can do that just puts this off because there's plenty of biological creatures that seem to not suffer from any kind of senescence at all. But even those creatures, those tortoises and things that live seemingly forever do die. I mean, eventually there is always an end.

Everything has an end. Well, you say that. I mean, they live ridiculously long times. And actually, there's various creatures that we've been watching and seem to live for hundreds of years. And it's not true that everything necessarily has to die. So there are ways of repairing, there are ways of lengthening lifespan. For instance, by caloric restriction is a famous one that's found in nematode worms, where you can restrict their diet and sort of expand their lifespan sort of three or four times over. And so there seem to be biochemical mechanisms by which you can avoid the standard sort of degradation that goes on.

So what I'm saying, I guess, is that actually, you know, we don't really understand what death is and why it happens. And of course, you know, we have this cultural view that, of course, as you say, everything comes to an end, all things must die. You know, culturally, that's how we think. But there are certain researchers working in this area, such as one is Aubrey de Grey, who's setting up a firm in Silicon Valley, who says that we need to actually just take these kind of what we think of as aging and inevitable disease. We need to start taking it seriously. He has a very interesting perspective where he says this is sort of ageism in that if young people get a disease, we do our best to cure

it. It's all over the newspapers. If somebody's dying at a ridiculously early disease, we do our best to cure it. You know, it's all over the newspapers. If somebody's dying at a ridiculously early age, we hate it. We think this is unnatural. And his argument is that any sort of disease and decrepitude is unnatural. And we should fight it, whether it's in a six-year-old or a 60-year-old, whether it's in an eight-year-old or an 85-year-old. You know, we should be fighting this. But even as life expectancy has gone up,

and on average we are living longer, the top age we don't make much progress on. The oldest person always seems to be about 125 years or older or something when they die, and there haven't been big breakthroughs there. It does seem as if at some point we do, we wear out. I think that's true. I think that's what we're finding. But I think his point, Aubrey de Grey's point, and other researchers looking into this are saying that actually, you know, we are starting to understand some of the degradation that's going on. We are starting to learn how we can avoid some of that and um for the last um 20 30 years we we are making progress

but of course you know what we've had is this incredible doubling of human lifespan over the last 200 years which has taken us into you know the 80s and 90s and so now we've got a whole new raft of diseases that we're actually having to deal with, things like dementia, Alzheimer's diseases, Parkinson's. We've got these things that are starting to happen to us just because we're living for longer and longer. I think that cancer is more prevalent basically because eventually you will develop some kinds of cancer because of errors that build up in your DNA. And so we're in a position where we're starting to come across

these diseases. So of course, it's quite early days, really, in learning how to deal with them and how to beat them. But there's no reason in principle that says, you know, we cannot beat these, you know, they aren't different to other diseases, they aren't different to other things that we've have managed to cure, you know, and if we have a kind of more positive attitude towards them, we may well be able to find, you know, ways in which we extend our lifespan quite radically. Well, it is so interesting to think about these things and ponder them, and if you want to hear about the other ones, because obviously we haven't talked about all 13, the book is called 13 Things That Don't Make Sense, The Most Intriguing Scientific Mysteries of Our Times by Michael Brooks. Michael is also the author of a book called At the Edge of Uncertainty,

which is a little different but equally interesting. And he's co-host of the podcast Science-ish, which looks at the scientific issues raised by popular culture fiction like TV and movies and such. Thank you, Michael. I appreciate you being here. Great. Thank you very much, Mike. Since I host a podcast, it's pretty common for me to be asked to recommend a podcast. And I tell people, if you like something you should know,

you're going to like The Jordan Harbinger Show. Every episode is a conversation with a fascinating guest. Of course, a lot of podcasts are conversations with guests, but Jordan does it better than most. Recently, he had a fascinating conversation with a British woman who was recruited and radicalized by ISIS and went to prison for three years. She now works to raise awareness on this issue. It's a great conversation. And he spoke with Dr. Sarah Hill about how taking birth control not only prevents pregnancy, it can influence a woman's partner preferences, career choices, and overall behavior due to the hormonal changes it causes. Apple named The Jordan Harbinger Show one of the best podcasts a few years back, and in a nutshell, the show is aimed at making you a better, more informed critical thinker.

Check out The Jordan Harbinger Show. There's so much for you in this podcast. The Jordan Harbinger Show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. There's nothing we don't cover. We are famous for rabbit holes, Disney themed games, and fun facts you didn't know you needed, but you definitely need in your life. So if you're looking for a healthy dose of Disney magic, check out Disney Countdown wherever you get your podcasts. Just as I suspect you have people in your life who make you feel smart and make you feel good about yourself, you may also have people in your life that, when you talk to them, they make you feel

stupid. They make you question yourself. They make you feel wrong all the time. There's actually a name for that. It's gaslighting. It's the way people manipulate you, and it's really fascinating. Therapist Robin Stern coined the term gaslighting, and she wrote a book about it called The Gaslight Effect,

how to spot and survive the hidden manipulation others use to control your life. Hi, Robin. So explain the essence of the gaslight effect. The gaslight effect describes what happens to you when you begin to second-guess yourself because you've allowed another person to define your reality and to erode your sense of self, your confidence, and your judgment. Gaslighting is a form of manipulation that consciously or unconsciously seeks to sow seeds of doubt in the individual who's being targeted or members of a group, with the hope that those people who are being targeted will ultimately question their own memory, perception, and sanity,

or even their character. So give me an example. Let's say you say to me, I'm going to meet you tonight at 7 o'clock. And I say, great. Then I show up, and it's 7 o'clock. And I say, great. Then I show up and it's seven o'clock and it's seven thirty and it's a quarter to eight and you are late and you apologize. And I say, no problem. And then it happens again tomorrow. And then it happens the next time. And I say to you, you know what? Really don't like the fact that you're keeping me waiting and you're late so much of the time.

And you say to me, what is your problem? You're so uptight about time. Who hasn't had that happen? Everybody's got that person in their life that nothing's ever their fault. It's your fault because you're like, you're so uptight about time. I love that. Exactly right. And so it's about deflecting responsibility, not taking responsibility. It's also about never really addressing the issue. I often tell a story that goes like this. I say to my friend, or you may say to your friend, hey, you know what? Really been trying to make plans with you and it's really hard. Did I do something?

Are you upset with me about something that happened or is there some reason that we're not getting together? Hey, come on. You are so sensitive. And you know what? Maybe I am so sensitive,

but that still doesn't change the fact that you haven't been wanting to make plans. It still doesn't change the fact that you haven't been wanting to make plans. It still doesn't change the fact that you didn't address what I said to you, right? And so things don't get resolved and things continue to stay in the loop where you, the victim or the target of gaslighting, are beginning to question yourself so that over time you're thinking, well, initially over time you're thinking, well, initially you might have been thinking, wait a minute, you didn't answer my question.

Over time you're thinking, you know what, I'm so sensitive. Maybe somebody else wouldn't be so uptight about that. Maybe somebody else would have just let it go. And it happens in any kind of relationship. The pairing that I've seen most often is women talking about the men in their life gaslighting them. But I certainly have seen women talking about their friends or men talking about women gaslighting them or people talking about their family members engaging in this kind of psychological manipulation.

So you've mentioned that this is a problem when things happen over time, which I suspect means that you can't make a big deal necessarily about one instance of this. If you're 15 minutes late, well, you're 15 minutes late. But if you're 15 minutes or half an hour late every single time, that's when it becomes a problem. You're exactly right, Mike. So the three stages that I identified after working with people for many years and noticing this dynamic were the first stage being disbelief, the second being defense, and the third being depression. So an example of disbelief is you're on a movie line or you're walking down the street and somebody says hello to you and you say hello back. And the person you're with, your boyfriend at the time, may say, or your girlfriend, why are you flirting with that person?

Or don't you see how he's flirting with you? And you think, God, he's being so silly. That's kind of crazy. And you dismiss it and you say, oh, don't be silly. That's not happening. But then every single time you go out and somebody says hello to you on the street, your boyfriend or girlfriend accuses you of flirting or tells you you're being naive if you don't know that somebody is flirting with you. And over time, you get caught up because the relationship is so important to you

because you believe in the person. In some way, you've given them power to assert their reality, and you start to defend yourself so now you've moved from disbelief like that's kind of silly to defense and you're saying don't be silly you know i'm no it's not really happening can't you see i'm just being friendly and i smile at people and i always like to be friendly and then when that continues over time and you're caught up in ruminating you're also beginning to stop reaching out to your social circles because they're arguing with you about your boyfriend or your girlfriend's perception.

And you're staying in the relationship and buying into that dynamic and you begin to get depressed. And in the third stage, you're almost trying to make his or her case. Well, I am actually flirting. Well, you know, can't, can I just own it? Like I really, I was smiling. Maybe, maybe I didn't realize I was flirting. He's probably right. And so that's a drastic oversimplification, but it is the progression. So in the first case, something happens and you're right. You're not making a big deal about it. It happened once.

It sounds so silly, and it's not really who you are. In the second case, you're defending who you are. And in the third stage, depression, you've fallen so deeply into this dynamic that you begin to argue his side. All of the examples that you've given to illustrate the point, and it's smart to do this, to illustrate points, are very black and white. There's no culpability on the one person. I mean, the guy that's accusing you of flirting is really being a jerk because you're not flirting.

But there's a lot of gray areas in real life where maybe, yeah, maybe you were a little too flirty this time. So it isn't always that black and white So it isn't always that black and white. It isn't always that black and white. And often the thing that, or the accusation that leads the gaslighting is something that's true of you. Maybe you were in fact flirting. Maybe you were more friendly than you might be if it were somebody who you didn't have that kind of energy with.

But to be slammed with or accused about something that you were doing, rather than your friend or partner saying, hey, you know what, I was uncomfortable with the way you looked at that guy. Can we talk about it? That's a very different conversation. That's a very different lead to a dynamic where then you're having conversation about what did he feel? What did I feel? What was I doing?

Gee, I didn't want to make you uncomfortable. Rather than you, rather than somebody saying, being on your side of the net and telling you what you were doing in a way that then you need to defend yourself. It's very hard to walk away from that dynamic. When you are caught up in wanting to make sure that your friend, your boyfriend, your girlfriend doesn't think ill of you, it's really hard to walk away. It's really hard to stop the power struggle and say, you know what, we're just not going to agree about this. Or, you know, maybe I gave him a little extra smile. It's okay. Do you think that people who do this, who gaslight, who manipulate this way,

know what they're doing? Or this is just their way of communicating that's very manipulative? I mean, what's the difference between influence and manipulation? Yeah, so that's a really good point. I'll answer it by starting with telling you where I got the title from. So in 1944, there was a very popular movie called Gaslight, starring Charles Boyer and Ingrid Bergman, where the husband in the movie diabolically manipulates his wife with the intention of ultimately stealing her inheritance and sending her to a mental institution. So in that case, he really was out to prove that she was crazy.

So he would literally manipulate objects in the house, and then she would notice that they were moved or they were missing and ask him about them. And he said, no, no, no, you're making it up. Or he would move objects and then ask her where they were, and she wouldn't know because he had moved them. And she began to think she was losing her mind, which is what he was telling her. Oh, you're so forgetful. You know you're not feeling well. You know you haven't been yourself. And over time, with all these missing objects and his manipulation, she began to think that, including the manipulation of the old English gaslight in the house, which is where the movie got its name.

And in that case, there is an intent to undermine the person. But often, it's not that intentional. It's often not that diabolical. It's just the way you learned how to do it. So when I'm uncomfortable, I can either take a deep breath, notice my feelings, name my feelings, manage my feelings,

and talk from that place of wherever I am or whatever I see is going on. Or I can completely deflect my reality by focusing on you and telling you what you're not doing right or the way you should be acting or something about you, undermining you rather than talking about myself. And oftentimes when somebody who's doing gaslighting is triggered, in order for them to regain their psychological stability, they will engage in this kind of behavior where they're controlling the dynamic by asserting that their reality is right and there's something wrong with you. Well, we all like to think our reality is right. It is right for us.

That's our reality. So, sure, we're trying to, we want them, it would be so much easier if the whole world would see it, see the world the way I see it, but they don't, it turns out. Sure. But then the person who's trying to gaslight will not be successful if you hold on to what you just said to me, which is, I'm going to see the world the way I want to see it. The first example that you used in our discussion here was the person who's chronically late, you know, and then gives you a hard time for bringing up the fact that they're chronically

late. And I've known people like that. I've known people who are chronically late, and know, and then gives you a hard time for bringing up the fact that they're chronically late. And I've known people like that. I've known people who are chronically late, and I've said something about their lateness. But that's an example of a behavior that's hard to break, at least my experience. And so I decided, you know what, the relationship is worth it to me. I know they're going to be late. They're always going to be late. And so that I took aside and I moved over here, and I don't make it an issue anymore because I know they're going to be late.

And that's fine with me because I'm willing to pay that price. Exactly. And there's nothing wrong with that because you've decided that whatever it means for that person is not either hurtful enough or intentional enough or is just about who they are and it's not about you. And you're going to look it aside. And that's your choice to make. Right? That's your choice to make. decided to have the conversation, and the result of that conversation was that person turned the tables on you and told you there was something wrong with you for even bringing it up, how would

you feel then? Well, I'd feel terrible. But there is a difference between gaslighting and, you know, if somebody says you're too flirty or you're always late, well, maybe it's because you're too flirty and you're always late. In other words, maybe this conversation is warranted. The conversation may very well be warranted. Honey, you know, what's going on that you're feeling so insecure? You know, I'm, I am, you know, I've always flirted with people. Like, why now? Or really tell me more.

I didn't realize it. Did I do something that hurt your feelings? Or, hey, I'm not aware that I'm doing it. Thanks for pointing it out. Or, you know what, I don't agree with you, and you have a right to your opinion, but that's not the problem. The problem is really not whether you're flirting,

whether you need to take a look at that. The problem is what's actually happening between the two people. So in that co-created moment, you're telling me about myself without asking me. You're telling me either what I'm feeling or what my character is like or that I don't know how to think straight. When somebody begins to tell you about your experience or why you should or shouldn't feel a certain way, there's trouble in that dynamic.

Ultimately, though, do you find that gaslighters, when they're called out on it, will say, oh, geez, I'm sorry, or that they don't change, they don't even see it? 30%. 30% will apologize and say, my God, I had no idea I was making you feel this way. Yes, let's go to therapy. Yes, let me read the book. Let me recalibrate. 30% will stay the same. And 30% get angrier. Well, those are your odds.

One in three. Yeah. But I have seen people move away from this dynamic with a lot of intention, a lot of commitment to being their best selves, a lot of self-awareness, and a lot of practice. But it requires that decision to make each interaction a healthier interaction, to call the person out if they're intimidating you, if they're manipulating you, if they're spinning your reality. When that's happening and not wait until three days later. Well, as I said in the very beginning, when you describe the gaslight

effect and use the example of the person who's always late. I mean, I know people like that. Everybody knows people like that. And now it's good to be able to put a magnifying glass on that interaction and see what's really going on and the problems it can create. My guest has been Robin Stern. She is a therapist and author of the book, The Gaslight Effect, How to Spot and Survive the Hidden Manipulations Others Use to Control Your Life. And there's a link to the book in the show notes. Thanks, Robin.

Thank you, Mike. Whether you're writing a blog or sending an email or a tweet, there are a lot of words that you can do without. For example, the word that. That is superfluous most of the time. Find a sentence with the word that in it, and then read it out loud. Then read it again without the that and see if it works.

If it still works, then delete the that. An example might be, The boss told his employees that they were getting a raise. Or it could just be, The boss told his employees they were getting a raise. You don't need the that, so take it out. The word honestly. People use honestly to add emphasis. The problem is, the minute you tell your reader that this particular statement is honest, you've implied that the rest of your words were not honest.

The word absolutely. Adding this word to most sentences is redundant. For example, something is either necessary or it's not necessary, but absolutely necessary doesn't make it more necessary. The word amazing is overused to death. Amazing is synonymous with wonderful, incredible, startling, marvelous, astonishing, astounding, remarkable, miraculous, surprising, mind-blowing, and staggering. Maybe one of those words would work better. The problem is if everything is amazing, then nothing is amazing. Literally. Literally means literal.

Actually happened as stated without exaggeration. More often than not, when the term is used, the writer really means figuratively, not literally. Whatever is happening is being described metaphorically. No one literally waits on pins and needles because that would be very painful. And irregardless. Irregardless and regardless mean the same thing. Regardless has always been correct in the English language. The word irregardless pretty much bullied its way into the language because so many people use it. But regardless is preferred. And that is

something you should know. You'll find us on social media, LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter. We post content there that we don't put in the show. So if you like the podcast, you should be following us on social media. I'm Mike Carruthers. Thanks for listening today to Something You Should Know. Welcome to the small town of Chinook, where faith runs deep and secrets run deeper. In this new thriller, religion and crime collide when a gruesome murder rocks the isolated Montana community. Everyone is quick to point their fingers at a drug-addicted teenager, but local deputy Ruth Vogel isn't convinced. She suspects connections to a powerful religious group. Enter federal agent V.B. Loro,

who has been investigating a local church for possible criminal activity. The pair form an unlikely partnership to catch the killer, unearthing secrets that leave Ruth torn between her duty to the law, her religious convictions, and her very own family. But something more sinister than murder is afoot, and someone is watching Ruth. Chinook. Starring Kelly Marie Tran and Sanaa Lathan.

Listen to Chinook wherever you get your podcasts. Contained herein are the heresies of Redolph Buntwine, erstwhile monk turned travelling medical investigator. Join me as I study the secrets of the divine plagues and uncover the blasphemous truth that ours is not a loving God and we are not its favoured children. The Heresies of Redolph Buntwine,

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