Episode Transcript
[00:00:14] Speaker A: Hello, welcome to Call It Like I See it presented by Disruption. Now, I'm James Keys, and in this episode of Call It Like I See it, we're going to take a look at some issues going on at the southern border where we have large numbers of migrants showing up and no clear plans on how to deal with all the people.
And later on, we're going to discuss an interesting analysis on how the human brain works, which details how the brain or how the analogy of our brains working like a computer is simply misguided.
Joining me today is a man who you can find in his Mitsubishi eating sushi, bumping Fujis Tunde. Ogunlana Tunde. Are you ready to show them the way? You rock when you're doing your thing?
[00:01:04] Speaker B: All I can say is yes to all that.
[00:01:07] Speaker A: All right. All right. Well, that's why. That's why you're here, man.
Now, we're recording this on April 19, 2021, and I want to jump right into our discussion today. We've seen reports explaining that In February of 2021, U.S. customs and Border Protection encountered more than 100,000 migrants. And at the southern border, many of which, like over 9,000 were unaccompanied minors.
Now, regardless of what someone thinks on issues like immigration or asylum or just in general on humanitarian causes, clearly anyone can acknowledge that this is just a lot of people. And the logistical challenges in handling something like this during a pandemic, no less, are immense. So, Tunde, what are your general thoughts on what's happening at the border?
[00:01:58] Speaker B: You know, I don't think my thoughts are much different now than they would have been if you asked me a year ago, three years ago, five years ago, you know, I think so.
[00:02:07] Speaker A: The pandemic doesn't really change much of your overall.
[00:02:10] Speaker B: I would say this in terms of the pandemic and all that. I mean, I always feel like it's a shame for the people at the ground level who are doing the heavy lifting. In this case, I would say the customs border patrol agents, because they're the ones really dealing with all that on the front lines. I mean, you're right. There's a global pandemic, and they're the ones who have to be our kind of guards at the gate, literally. And then the second thing is why I feel bad for them specifically as just people that work in a large institution called the US Government is they keep.
They're used as kind of the bludgeon, the weapon of our are policymakers.
So they, they also have been lurching over the last few years from system to system and different things coming from the top, no matter who's in charge. And so I think that that's why I'm saying that and I know we'll get into this more. I think we look at this whole issue from the wrong direction as a nation because we're so worried about our own egos and winning our own battles in terms of who thinks what's right, Republicans or Democrats here domestically, when we're not looking at it, that there's a difference between the laws like immigration laws that say what our country is going to put up with legally or not, which I think is definitely needed for every country versus the idea of migration and human beings migrating over large land masses because they're trying to get away from something else.
And I think that because we don't kind of address both, and especially the second one when we have these general conversations, I think that the conversation never goes anywhere because somehow it's almost like we expect the hard working people and their border patrol kind of agency. Like you said, 100,000 people is a lot of people. Yeah, I mean, I don't know how do you stop that when you've got, you know, 10,000 border agents or whatever it is? I'm just saying that that's why I just think it's sad that this topic seems to be more of a political football to score points by our politicians and both major parties.
There's more of those kind of folks in charge than there are adults saying, hey, let's just sit down and start talking to our country and the American people in an honest way about how are we going to address these issues.
Because I don't think we can ever
[00:04:39] Speaker A: stop it over overstate it though. I mean, I don't think that there's more of those kind of folks. I'd say that those folks are kind of loud, but there are, I mean it seems like there's adults in the room that are trying to come up with real solutions here. I, I don't know, I haven't seen it. I just, I think that the bigger issue is that there are no good solutions, you know, like, I don't think that.
[00:04:56] Speaker B: Well, I think that's part of the solution though is to acknowledge that this, this is not never going to go away. There's never going to be a time that you have the number one economy in the world, the world global superpower, and that people from poorer nations aren't trying to sneak in the only. I mean, I lived in Australia and they had an issue with what they called bull people. These were people that's like we do here in South Florida with the Cubans and the Haitians that risked their life to come, you know, through the Gulf of Mexico and all that. They had the same thing from the poor Southeast Asian countries. You had people getting on rafts and boats trying to get into Australia. And some made it, and a lot didn't, unfortunately. And they had the same debates in that country.
Once the people got to the country, there was a certain group of Australians that said, you know, we should have mercy on them and pity it's so bad where they came from. At least let's let them kind of chill out here and then we can figure it out.
And then there was another group that said, no, send them back, and they're not allowed here at all. And so that's why it's just. This is more of a human thing that, you know, we've seen throughout human history when migratory patterns. But that's my point. Even an island continent country like Australia still has these issues. So I think to your point, like, instead of trying to act like there's a wand that can be waved by either side of this debate in American politics, that's what I mean by having an adult in a room. Both leaders in both parties need to just come and tell the American people, this ain't gonna get solved how anybody thinks it should be, because this is messy and we're never gonna shut the whole border down and all that. Cause that's almost impossible with the landmass we have. And clearly we're not gonna let everybody in and just do, you know, just let everybody roam free in the US Just coming in here, you know, with unchecked. So there's gotta be an equilibrium. But that equilibrium won't be perfect because we're dealing with bunches of people. That's all I'm saying.
[00:06:38] Speaker A: I mean, I think that it just overstates.
I think it overstates. I mean, I don't think that there is an equivalency, I would say. But I will say, like to me, what stands out to me like this, as you point out, I do think that you're correct, that this actually reflects that, our perception at least, and that that's borne out in reality from a number standpoint, in many ways. Just that our economy is so strong and that our standard of living is high enough on average, at least, that people in places where the economy isn't as strong or where the standard of living isn't as high or where there's more violence or just more bad things going on in life around you, where this would be a desirable place to be. So I think it's better to have this problem than mass exodus of people, because that says something about our country, you know, like, hey, yeah, it's good enough here relative to other places that people are net are coming here versus leaving. So I think we start there and saying, okay, well, we're doing something right enough that this is appealing to people in other situations to come check it out. And I look like this reminds me. It's different because it's not in black and white and everything. But this to me just seems like Ellis island type stuff. Like when we look to these old black and white things and there's all these boats showing up with all these people, and what Ellis island represented in many respects is a way to deal with all these people showing up. It's like, all right, well, we got all these people showing up. Let's direct them to one place. Let's check them out from a health standpoint. Let's get them. Let's get paperwork on them and see what's going on. Because at the time, the country was dealing with that, like saying, all right, we'll let them in for the most part, you know, at least, you know, to some degree. So that kind of decision on how you wanted to deal with it then informed how you would actually administrate it. And so I think you're right in the sense that we haven't maybe, I wouldn't say there's an equivalency, but you have maybe one side with unrealistic talking about unrealistic stuff and the other side having more compassion, let's say, but not really saying coming out and saying, okay, we're trying to let people in, or we're trying to keep people out, but just kind of saying, oh, well, we're not really giving a clear articulation of what direction they're going so that then we can set up some administrative mechanisms to deal with that. And on one hand, I understand it's a complex issue. There's multiple factors going on, and you would want to deal with it in multiple ways. But on the other hand, it's like, look, we got to call a shot here. We got to say we're not letting anybody in right now, or we're going to let people in at this rate or that rate. And then, you know, try to deal with the overflow in other ways. But that, to me, it seems like then Again, I guess I'll say I disagree with you less than I thought I did, that we haven't had a such a clear articulation of what we as America, how we're going to handle this. We've had people come out and say things, you know, like, like I think just in the news right now, George W. Bush is out there saying, hey, immigration, people wanting to come here is a good thing. You know, that's a, we can leverage that into a strength, which I believe. I think that that's 100% true in the sense that a lot of well established countries have problems maintaining population. Like, if you got more people coming in, those people are obviously motivated. They got up and left everything they knew. And so I think that's a net good thing you can leverage to your advantage. But if we're not going to do that, we got to come up with some workable solution to deal with maybe, and we'll get into this, maybe some of the root causes of why so many people are coming, or at least from an administrative standpoint, make it so we're not just, I think the worst case scenario, what we're in as far as how we're dealing with it is when we just lack any kind of humanitarian aspect to it or enough of a humanitarian aspect to it. You don't want people coming here and then us treating them like animals. I mean, that to me is the worst possible thing. And so we need to come up with some better solution. That's why I look at like the Ellis island thing was just like, okay, well that was a solution. It wasn't. It might not have been, you know, the best possible thing in the world, but it was something. And it was like, okay, you come here, you go there. If, for example, now it's like, hey, you come here, you go to Rio Grande City or whatever, we set up some spot, you everybody go there and we deal with everybody there. And then you're not trying to deal with all this stuff everywhere. Maybe that works out, maybe it doesn't. But by and large that the disorderly aspect is kind of what stands out to me.
[00:10:56] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean that. It's definitely true that I never thought of that, but that's an interesting concept. Some sort of Ellis island style, you know, center, I guess you would call it at the southern border to kind of vet people and have it more central. I mean, I guess that is what they have, a big border.
You know, we've, a lot of us have seen the footage of, you know, the traffic going, you Know, in and out from the US And Mexico, and it's a pretty big, you know, area.
The question is, I think, you know, not to stay on that topic, but I think that's a lot easier when you're talking about ships coming over the Atlantic because they got a port somewhere. And so it's got to be a centralized thing. I think the problem with this is everyone's just kind of.
They either go through one side of the desert, the other side of the desert, the Rio Grande river, you know, depends on where they're getting smuggled up. And then you got all these different, you know.
[00:11:45] Speaker A: Well, it would be how you set up the incentive. If you say, and you broadcast, like, look, if you come here, you got a chance of getting in, and if you don't come here, we catch you, you're not getting it. Like, if you say, you would create an incentive for people to go there as well.
[00:11:57] Speaker B: I don't want to speculate because, you know, listen, we got to also assume that whatever message we put out from here may not, you know, be like that game of telephone. It may not be received down there the same way we send it. I mean, you know, you gotta, you gotta look at it that way. But this is just a messy topic that is not gonna be that. The problem is is that the way we talk to each other as Americans now is in not even 30 second sound bites anymore. It's like TikTok, it's all three, four, five seconds.
So you've got a couple things right? And you mentioned about treating people humanely. So it seems that Americans have been kind of conditioned to choose between. They either got to be altruistic and have more of the merciful way of looking at this, which is, you know, let's maybe take a look at those countries. Let's use the soft power of the US let's try and make the help those countries make their conditions better, maybe give more resources to stop people from leaving their country or going over their borders through other countries. Because remember, most of the migrants coming over the border, at least now in this current wave, are not Mexicans.
[00:13:03] Speaker A: Correct.
[00:13:03] Speaker B: They're from other countries south of Mexico. And so, you know, I'm pretty sure as a nation, Mexico also doesn't like 100,000 people kind of just coming through randomly. And so there's ways that the countries at the government levels, militaries and all that can work together.
And so some people will say, okay, that's one way to solve it.
[00:13:23] Speaker A: Other people might say, just to add into that point, I think the, they're primarily coming right now from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador has been what a lot of the reporting has been saying, but go ahead.
[00:13:34] Speaker B: Yep. So.
And then others would have more of a punitive way of handling it, which is, again, that's, that's why we vote and we vote in politicians and then they, they kind of make decisions. So it's interesting that we just have these recent change in power here in the US So you've had the former administration, which had more of that punitive.
If we, if we, if we create a punitive environment here, when they get here, message may go back and it may deter future people trying to come to the country illegally. And that some, you know, people believe that. And that led to things like splitting the kids from the parents. And these issues we've seen now where you've got, you know, five, 600 kids still in U.S. custody and they can't find the parents. And so it's just interesting, the dynamics at play here. When you look at our culture as Americans, instead of saying like, we're going to have an immigration bill that just solves all these problems, let's just acknowledge too that this is probably like every other thing. It's going to be ongoing. You know, you're not going to solve this.
[00:14:34] Speaker A: Ebbs and flows, though. I mean, the current wave, people date it to like 2014, when we really saw this rise.
There have been weather events in that part of the world that have kind of led to.
[00:14:46] Speaker B: And what happened a few years before that, the great financial crisis. I mean, that's my point. It seems to be, but the same thing.
[00:14:52] Speaker A: But it wasn't as big of a problem then, though, is what I'm saying, though. So you can't just throw your hands up and say that this will always be with us. One thing I want to point out, I want to push back on you on though, is that there's a humanity part of this issue that should come, that should be primary. That is unlike something like taxes or something like that.
Taxes is an important issue in terms of how the spoils of society are going to be distributed, who's going to carry burdens and things like that. But here this ultimately is, and this is. I actually don't like it when we talk about this from a standpoint of immigration and like, this is a humanitarian issue. When you have that many people like these, this aren't people on private jets or anything like that. These people are getting up and just going, and they're coming to your border because whatever they're dealing with now they've decided it is worth taking this risk. They're not coming here because they think it's going to be. They're just going to walk in and get a job, like everything is going to be all good. But they're thinking the unknown of whether they're even going to get in is better than what they're dealing with. So we're dealing with a humanitarian crisis, and I think it can be addressed, but it just can't be addressed. If we want to address it in one of our traditional buckets that we're trying to put it in, like, oh, this is immigration or even this is asylum. I know you had mentioned a couple times, like, part of the problem is that our issue or how we define asylum and how we're administrating that is just kind of out of date. And so we're not able to keep up with what's happening now. But I think if you try, if you look at this as a humanitarian issue and not an immigration issue or an asylum issue or a national security issue, or if you, if you don't try to separate it out and actually look at it from a humanitarian standpoint, then you can actually address all of the points together because that's what you need in order to try to reduce this from, again, from a humanitarian standpoint.
Of course, you'll always have people who want to immigrate or, you know, migrant workers. We depend in part on migrant workers coming, working in fields and so forth. So you're always going to have that. But it's the overflow. It's the fact that on a, from a scale standpoint, this is huge right now. It's much bigger than it needs to be, or whatever a median would be that is more manageable and so forth. So what can, what are all the factors we can deal with? Some being down in the countries where we know the migrants are coming from, There's a reason the migrants are coming from those places and not other places. So what can we do about those places that we can make it so it's not so bad that the unknown, the risk is worth anything versus staying there and then also dealing with it on this end as well in ways that, again, approach it from a humanitarian standpoint. We want, okay, we do want some level of immigration or. I mean, I would look at it like that. Some people might say we want none. But then if you don't, if you want none, then we need to go down. Then we need to address outside of the country Even more, so to speak, because people are coming. This is one of those things that's like, it's demand driven, not supply driven, so to speak. So we, if we want to deal with the issue, we have to look at it from a bigger picture. I mean, that's, that's kind of the big takeaway I have. I did want to ask you along with that, like, what are your thoughts? I mean, if you want to expand more on what you were saying as far as asylum or immigration, like, as far as those issues, as far as how we can we discuss this now?
Where are you? What do you see as the opportunities for us to kind of try to make this better or to at least handle this better?
[00:18:21] Speaker B: I don't know, man. This is one of those where I'm definitely glass half empty guy today.
Because. No, because historically, this isn't like pure humanity stuff stuff. This is tribalism. This is all that. I mean, I'm not so utopian that I think people will get over this. I mean, we just saw this last decade all over Europe. I mean, we had a humanitarian crisis in Syria, right? Yeah, we had a massive war. We all saw the same footage on the Internet, you know, and on YouTube and on the news that people getting bombed, chemical gas going somehow, you know, large countries that aren't supposed to be using chemical weapons are using them and people getting hurt.
And you know, at the top, from the nation standpoint, you know, certain European nations stepped up definitely as the migration patterns took hold, as people were, like you said, they're escaping something terrible. And I think one thing that happens, that this is where I say the political class and the power structures in any countries. That's why I just know we started talking about our country. But think about the European nations. They got their own political stuff going and then they, you know, they begin to use this, these immigrants as political pawns on, I'm sure both sides of their kind of spectrums of their, their extreme views. And so that's what I'm saying with all this video footage, all that we know that people are hurting out there. And it's also like, that's what I mean. You have to have a certain level of dehumanization of these people for people to then not feel the empathy that is needed to be able to do what you're kind of suggesting. And I'll say that to say, like, think about it.
We're parents, right?
Imagine taking your kid, five or six years old, all this way somewhere in the middle of nowhere and then giving them to Someone else to go into another country where you have no idea. I mean, that's my point. Like if you think of everyone as an equal human being and that we have the same kind of general emotional state, so when you have a child, there's a strong attachment there, then like you said, that's why I come down on the. When it comes to that, that, that doesn't. And I want to be very clear, this is why this is such a nuanced conversation by me saying I have empathy with a parent coming over, you know, trying to get over the border with a 5, 10 year old kid. First of all, I don't believe people give their kids up to other people as like, you know, just to get paid and then somehow leave it. You know, they.
I believe these people are escaping something that's terrible and that they're taking this chance and just like probably I would, if I had a chance to give my kid a better life and I still take it on the chin, I'll probably do that.
[00:20:58] Speaker A: I think that that is good, that understanding that is good for us to try to conceptualize how serious like people are doing that. It's like, okay, there must be some serious stuff going on that it's not. This can't be. There aren't any simple solutions. Kind of like you said earlier, where we're just going to wave a magic wand or pass one bill and then everything is solved.
[00:21:16] Speaker B: Like, this is the thing about it, James, we have. Forget about immigration. I don't want to change topics, but look at all the documented footage of, you know, let's just say bad actors on the law enforcement side here in the United States against unarmed people. You still got half the country that says, you know, there's nothing to see here or, you know, this a hoax or all that. Even though the, you know, the people that think that these mass shootings are fake. What I'm saying is I know that that's a smaller percentage of the population that's more on the fringe, but it's easy to see how then you can, you can kind of take the humanity out of this, the pain of, of people. Right? And, and that's what I'm saying.
[00:21:54] Speaker A: Like we saw why leadership would want to do that. You know, why certain some people will
[00:21:59] Speaker B: find, take advantage of, of, of that and drive wedges. And I think that's why. And, and, and, you know, going through and this. I'll get off my high horse in a second because I started looking at, I got interested in the history of immigration in our country. And I started looking like, look, this is in the 1910s, was the highest point of Italian immigrants, over 2 million, sorry, 5.3 million around that period. But then it says around the same period, about 1.5 million Swedes and Norwegians immigrated to the United States within this period due to opportunity in America and poverty and religious oppression in United Sweden, Norway. This accounted for 20% of the total population of the kingdom at the time. So my point is, is that unless you're Native American or African American, that goes back to a descent of, you know, having slavery in your history, everyone else came here of their own free will, of an accord, generally as refugees, especially if you're talking prior to, let's say, the Second World War. And I would say post Second World War, you had a lot of, you know, the ostracized minority groups that were left, you know, left after the war, like the Jewish population in Eastern Europe that also immigrated here that were basically refugees. And so, you know, that's the sad part about where we're at as a country today is because all of these Americans, you know, there's not a lot of Americans that can trace, you know, I would say all Americans. There's not a huge percentage of Americans that can trace their roots and their family coming off a boat somewhere prior to the Civil war.
So about 150 million Americans, their. Their ancestors came here after 1900.
So this idea, like everybody in history, whatever nation and all that has had these ebbs and flows and these ups and downs. So it's just, you know, that's what I mean, it's just fascinating when you look at the history, that there's always these tensions and, you know, these different generational times. And I think a lot of it, too, has to do with, like, we saw, whether it be, you know, 1930s Europe or post great financial crisis, that the next decade, you know, the last 10, 12 years here in the U.S.
our populism was driven a lot by the financial crisis. So it's like the same patterns in human history seem to kind of creep up. And then just like we saw with Europe, we have politicians here as well, that take advantage of that anxiety of change. And so, you know, that's why I'll go cry in a corner somewhere and,
[00:24:33] Speaker A: well, no, I mean, I'm gonna suck
[00:24:34] Speaker B: my thumb and get my blanket.
[00:24:36] Speaker A: Like, to me, just to piggyback on your point, Like, I look at it, to me, it seems like a strength. Like, I started this whole thing off with. I would rather be in a situation where you Got a whole bunch of people trying to get here than be in a situation where you got a whole bunch of people who are trying to leave. Because as you pointed out just when you were talking about it, like these people come from somewhere and usually they come from somewhere because they don't like their prospects. There's. And they come here because they do think that even though it's an unknown, just the concept, the idea of their prospects here are better. And that to me is something we should be proud of and we should welcome. Like this is like, you know, the NBA or the NFL. You look at a sports league, they don't say, oh well, if you're not from, you know, this country, then you can't play in our league. Or you like they want the best athletes or the smartest, most skilled people from anywhere in the world, wherever they come from. If you can do, if you, if you've worked hard enough and you want to do it, then come do it. Because we want to get the best of the best. It's not like there aren't basketball leagues all around the world, but the best of the best is here. So the people who are the best come here. And so it's not that dissimilar in this standpoint. If you are among the hardest workers, if you want to put in, if you, you know, if you think that if you were just given an opportunity and you could work your butt off, you could make it, then you're inclined to come here, then that would be great. That's what we want. That's what we want to foster. And so for us to run from that or for us to look at that and say that we shouldn't have that, I think it's very dangerous because that, that's the kind of thing that when countries start to fade, when countries start to falter, it's because they no longer get that refresh of energy, that refresh of drive. Americans are by and large more entitled. Immigrants come in with more of a drive and everything like that. They don't take for granted all of the things that we as Americans grew up with. And we have to make sure we become a self starter. But for someone who never had that stuff, that is not something you take for granted, that's something that you're willing to work for. And I mean, that's the kind of, we want to encourage that. I would think, you know, and I would think that you bring in more hard workers, that's going to raise the level of everyone, that's going to make Americans work harder. So, I mean, to me, it seems like something want to figure out a way to make work. But just because we wanna figure out a way to make it work doesn't mean, as you pointed out, that we just open the border. Like, we need a way to administrate this and we need to have a clear idea of what we're trying to accomplish. And that's what I think, as you pointed out, we're not getting that from our leadership in terms of, hey, here's what. Exactly what we're trying to do. Everything might be on hold with the pandemic. I mean, the pandemic you noted, for the people who are working for the government, that creates problems, but also for the actual people who. The migrants. Now, that creates problems as well.
It just makes everything.
Increases the degree of difficulty on everything.
But ultimately, what I think we want to try to harness this energy is basically my point. Like, it's something that, yes, it creates a challenge. It creates things that we have to learn how to deal with. And we don't go one extreme or the other. But this is energy that if we learn how to harness or if we're able to harness, we've harnessed it in the past in this country and we can harness this. This can keep us on a trajectory to be the best America that we can be. So, I mean, I know we want to keep moving, but I know you had one more point you want to make.
[00:27:47] Speaker B: Yeah, no, I was in doing some reading about what's going on in south and Central America. It Tunde on me, I mean, this is. We could almost do another show on this. It's actually pretty fascinating because. And that's why I'll just try and get through it in a minute or two.
It's really also. I mean, this goes into long roots because the thing I was reading went back to the fact that this, a lot of this also, these imbalances in South America and Central America go back to basically when Spain pulled out of its colonies in the late 19th century.
Because. And it's just a fascinating thing that basically the British and the Spanish had two different economic styles.
And with the British colonies, even though they had the monarchy in King George, they promoted the kind of free enterprise, private ownership of capital, all that kind of stuff.
And that that allowed America to be more of an entrepreneurial type of country. And I would say Canada by extension as well, because it had the French and the British influence. Spain, though, because the Spanish crown was a lot stronger still at that time, because, remember, France already had their revolution by, by, by the, let's say the year 1900.
And the British had already kind of diminished the role of the monarch and the parliament was a lot stronger. So there was much more of a culture of a democracy where the average citizen had rights. And of course, in our country we have the constitution and a Bill of Rights in Spain. And the culture that they promoted was more of a feudal system that mirrored the old European feudalism and kingdoms. And so what happened is once the Spaniards pulled out, unlike America and Canada, you had in South America much more of a, just a patriarchal society where, you know, the big landowners basically just passed everything down to the next generation. And then you had a lot of the Native Americans and indigenous and then, you know, at some point former slaves that were kind of just out there.
[00:29:50] Speaker A: And so the, the extreme, extreme, extreme inequality. No, I mean like extreme, extreme inequality.
[00:29:55] Speaker B: Yeah. And I would say this because that's almost what. I would assume that's what the Confederates States of America would have looked like had they seceded. Because basically what you had is, is the similar thing of like sharecroppers, but in, in South America, almost like peasants in the back when you had serfs. I mean, back in Europe where people in South America, they just work in a land, but they work in it forever because they can never pay off whatever the indentured nature of their, of their, of their existence is. So it just, that's what I just want to say. It's, it's interesting that they're still dealing with that. And that's. And it's kind of not a surprise that then every generation or two we're dealing with all these major kind of economic collapses and these different ups and downs in those economies, and then these people find themselves trying to come to our country.
And so that's where I would say, I mean, you're not going to change that in a week or even 10 years. But at some point, you know, I think that's where we could also leverage our soft power as a nation is somehow bringing more of our system to them in a different way. I mean, I don't know.
[00:30:59] Speaker A: Well, that's if we wanted to do it.
That's if we wanted to do that, though. And if we. Because if you recall when we did the economic hitman book, that was part of the discussion as well, was just that maybe our government would want to export some of our ideals, but our economic interests, our major corporations and so forth, multinational corporations were more interested in exploiting what was going on down there and keeping stability so that they could extract a lot of value, whether it be, you know, the chiquitas and the precursors to that and so forth. But so our interests as Americans weren't always aligned that we would like to make those societies more egalitarian. You know, we kind of liked it the way it was. It was easier to exploit. And so we would support leadership that would just keep people in line, not leadership that would improve the quality of lives of people. So not to say that, that we foresee this because of that, but just to say that that's one of those areas where depending on what you're trying to accomplish, you may or may not say, you may not want to, hey, let's, let's, let's, let's make it so the setup here is where they can create a more stable society for themselves.
Because if that's not. If we don't have alignment, that's what we want to do, then, you know, that may not happen.
[00:32:16] Speaker B: No, but that's. I agree. And that's where. I think that's why it's a kind of a constant push and pull and kind of tug of war between these two things. Because you're right, I would say a rebuttal to that old style of the way that we did things, let's say from the 50s, 60s, 70s and into the 80s was maybe something like the NAFTA idea of the 90s, this idea that.
And it worked in a sense.
[00:32:42] Speaker A: Right.
[00:32:43] Speaker B: It actually slowed Mexican illegal immigration. And like we talked about at the beginning of the show, most of the people coming to our border now are not actually Mexican nationals. They're from other countries.
[00:32:54] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:32:55] Speaker B: So what happened was the idea of nafta, the North American Free Trade Agreement, allowed companies like Ford and GM and General Electric and all that to, to, to open up plants, manufacturing plants and all that in Mexico without all the red tape that I guess the countries used to have.
And what happened is it created, it uplifted the general lifestyle in that country. But what happened is then 10 years later, the American populism starts and American citizens are upset at their politicians for doing that. And then, and so it's kind of. That's what I mean, that we as a population, as a culture in America don't see that connection, that symbiotic nature of if those countries are in poor condition, their people will keep coming here and in a way that we don't seem to like, but if we do try and improve their conditions, it naturally will take a little bit away from Us somehow. I mean, that's what I mean. Like the manufacturing jobs that left and all that. And so there's a balancing act that I don't know if it can ever be met, you know, just to have it perfect. That's kind of what I'm saying is at some point, and it might ebb and flow too over time. One, one style dominates the other and all that. But that's why I'm just. Not just us talking about it makes me realize how complex, complex and complicated this is. So.
[00:34:17] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, well, that's kind of.
[00:34:19] Speaker B: I'm tapped out, man. I could keep talking, but you don't
[00:34:22] Speaker A: know if you'd make any more sense.
[00:34:24] Speaker B: That's what I mean. Yeah, that's why I said this is like one of those real issues that as you see, I mean, we're talking about it a while and there's no good answer.
[00:34:33] Speaker A: And that's no. I mean, that's. I think that is the. But that's the acknowled that I think you have to start with.
What it is is that there are trade offs. And your point with NAFTA was a really good point because that did help with certain things and it caused other things. And so we have a trade off there. And so we're just not. We can't find silver bullets. What we have to do now, one, we have to focus on growing the pie. You know, obviously, like that's a big part. If we can grow the pie, then you can, and I hate to mix the metaphors like this, but you can have your cake and eat it too, to some degree.
[00:35:06] Speaker B: But the, that pun was intended.
[00:35:10] Speaker A: But no, if the problem that we have a lot of times is that we're so concerned about squeezing on to whatever we think we have right now that we can't open our eyes and our minds up to seeing how we can address these issues through growth, mindset things, you know, like the NAFTA thing or whatever. And so understanding that they're multifaceted, understanding that they are things that require solutions that don't just look at it from one angle or another. And then that there's, that there's trade offs and doing so with the starting and from the guidance of that this is a humanitarian thing more than anything else, more than an economic. More like it's a humanitarian issue. There are economic solutions, there are political solutions and so forth, and we should employ all those. But like I said, I think you got to start with the humanitarian aspect of it because ultimately part of the reason we are who we are is because we at least try to approach things from a humanitarian standpoint around the world. Now, you know, we don't always do that, obviously, but we at least try. We at least say that we do. And a lot of times people hold that against Americans or, you know, and that's. That's all well and good because America doesn't live up to what it says it's going to do all the time, but I do think that we at least have the ideals in place. We at least say that we're going to try to do free speech. We at least say that we're going to try to do equal protection, even if we don't always live up to it. But I do want to move on because we could talk about that endlessly and not really get to anything more substantive from a solution standpoint, because the devil's in the details. And like you said, the issue can ebb and flow, but ultimately, humans migrate. I mean, like, that's something that's been consistent for hundreds of thousands of years. So it's going to happen. You just try to manage, try to administrate and try to come up with solutions that are just more humane and, you know, keep things orderly to some degree.
The other thing we wanted to discuss today was something that you and I both found very interesting in pop culture. And just as we discuss things a lot of times with how our brains work there we've a lot of things that just in our culture that we. Where the brain. We tend to analogize the brain as working like a computer. You know, it has a processing part and storage for your memories and things like that. And so it's a help. It can be considered, you know, conceivably this can be helpful in terms of understanding how we think and how, you know. But what we were reading was an essay going into how that example is actually harmful and that our brains, at least in terms of how we understand them, how people who study them understand them, don't at all work like a computer. You know, it's not some storage mechanism. When you remember things, you don't remember an exact copy of it. You remember things from your perception. And one of the. I guess the big takeaway that I took from that was just how they're saying things that you experience change your brain in ways. And those changes then you can observe and go back through. And actually, that's how you can remember things like that. But it's actually, your brain is changed by all the things, not just what you Perceive, but how you perceive it and so, so forth. So it's a constant evolution which would fit in terms of how we see life in the world. But it's a constant evolution, more than a processor, a storage and, you know, things getting things working out like that. So Tunde, what was your, you know, kind of takeaway from something like this? Did you think, you know, how did you buy that the metaphor of a brain like a computer is bs?
[00:38:44] Speaker B: Yeah, I did actually.
This is a really, really good piece and I was really fascinated by it because I guess I've thought about some of this stuff and this person was able to, with the research and all that, put it into a structure where it makes sense.
One of the reasons they alluded to the scientists that did some sort of study on the chemical markers that are released on some species of snail when it's got some emotional state, like it's a very thing. And that's why I, I, I, I've never felt that we're exactly like a computer, because we're not a computer.
You know, we have chemicals and there's, you know, our brain secretes hormones and there's all these different things that make us who we are.
And it's interesting just to quote a little bit from the article.
She says computers really do operate on symbolic representations of the world. They really store and retrieve, they really process, they really have physical memories. And so what the, what the author was kind of saying is like point to me in a cell where there's like a data for a memory. And, and it's interesting too because what I found fascinating was like most things I think of, and I think, as in reading some of this stuff, I was reminded by the recent show we did on parents styles and how it translate to the emotional state of a child. Down, down when they grow up.
[00:40:18] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:40:19] Speaker B: Based on how they're parented. And you made an interesting point that you said kind of like we're all like prisoners to our childhood in a sense and how like we see the world now based on how we were brought up in a sense, without realizing it. And this article made me realize that in a similar way we're kind of prisoners to.
Let me see, prisoners. I would say this though. Prisoner like, like, like the research and the culture of how we understand ourselves were prisoners to the level of technology and things that we are at. Oh yeah, they go back to. Yeah, is like the, it says here then I'll quote a bit. The invention of hydraulic engineering in the third century BC led to the popularity of the hydraulic model of human intelligence.
[00:41:06] Speaker A: What this is, by the way, let me jump in, because what you're doing, you're talking about something that was very specific, that I thought was very cool as well. It was actually the next thing I was going to talk about in this article, which we'll put in the show notes, a link to it, this essay, I should say what they did is they went back through, through time. Well, they looked at a book, a 2015 book in our own image, where they went through and historically tracked the type of analogies that people use to describe how the brain worked. And so basically, whatever was the newfangled technology or the most powerful, strongest or impressive technology that we knew about, humans knew about at the time, that's how they would describe the brain. And so. Go ahead. But that's. So you're talking about the hydraulic.
[00:41:50] Speaker B: Yeah, the hydraulic.
[00:41:51] Speaker A: The third century B.C. but, you know, go ahead.
[00:41:55] Speaker B: Yeah, no, basically. So they thought everything was kind of fluid because I guess, you know, like you're saying the hydraulic systems of the time were the most advanced technologies. And so really, humanity at that time pictured the body and human intelligence flowing like a liquid.
And that accounted for both our physical and mental kind of abilities. And then you fast forward to the 1940s when computational.
[00:42:27] Speaker A: No, don't skip the, don't skip the, like the 15, 1600s, when you start having mechanical. No, when you start having like mechanical years and stuff like that, like those things become prevalent in technology. And then some people start thinking the
[00:42:40] Speaker B: brain point about that.
[00:42:41] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:42:42] Speaker B: Think about if a lot of us have, you know, you can immediately remember the impact images, let's say, of some of those famous sketches from Leonardo da Vinci.
[00:42:51] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:42:51] Speaker B: And to your point, they do look very mechanical, like in the way that he also drew gears and, and machines and all that.
[00:42:58] Speaker A: Yeah, it's fascinating.
[00:42:59] Speaker B: It's fascinating. And then fast forward to now, you know, like we say post 1940s with the advents of the computer.
And then, you know, they, they. I won't go into all of it, but there was a psychologist named George Miller that By the early 50s, into the late 50s, they were writing books describing the human brain. Almost like a machine. And so.
[00:43:20] Speaker A: Like a computer.
[00:43:20] Speaker B: Yeah, like a computer. And so what I wanted to get to, there's a famous, what he's called a futurist. I always thought that's a cool title because that means all you do is sit around and think about the future. I want to get paid for that.
[00:43:30] Speaker A: You got to put it on your business card, man.
[00:43:32] Speaker B: I know.
[00:43:34] Speaker A: Futurist.
[00:43:35] Speaker B: Yeah, no, there's a guy named Ray Kurzweil. I know of him because I remember just several movies I've liked over the years.
He was the one tapped to, I think, even like Minority Report and some of those kind of movies. He was the one that was kind of tapped by Hollywood to kind of say, hey, how do you think this, this or this will look 20, 30, 50, 100 years from now?
So it says that, that Ray Kurzweil exemplifies this perspective, speculating about algorithms of the brain, how the brain processes data, and even how it super superficially resembles integrated circuit circuits in its structure.
And then it went on to talk about, you know, famous people like the late Stephen Hawking, who I have a lot of respect for and think he's a brilliant guy.
And they all think of these things.
They all look at the brain like a computer. And then they talked about that film from Johnny Depp in 2014, and how all these guys are thinking like, you know, maybe one day.
Yeah, like you could upload the brain. Yeah, yeah. And you could have immortality. And I started thinking about, like Europe comments like, are they making constellations out of just stars number one and number two? I thought about it like, it's another example as humans that we project a lot.
So we think that our brain works this way as it goes back to, like, the technology, because the most advanced things that we know of are computers.
[00:44:56] Speaker A: That's the thing. That's the thing. I think that you can. Let me say this real quick, because that's the thing that you can take from this, is that that, to me is the kind of proof, so to speak speak, that the brain is not like a computer. Because it's just how. It's an analogy, it's a metaphor. It's how we can understand it, how we can make it simple for ourselves, how we can make it understandable for ourselves. Because how it really works, we don't know. And so how are we going to describe something that we don't understand, how it works? Well, we use an analogy. And so what. The analogy that humans tend to use is whatever the most advanced technology is at that time. So it fits that we would do it like that, and it makes it feel accessible to us, but it's actually just wrong. And so.
But the answer, it's not like we're here saying it's wrong. It's actually this. Like we can kick around some of their theories, you know, that they've had. But I mean, to me, that's the biggest thing here that you can really take away is just like, wow. The metaphor that humans use to describe the indescribable for us is whatever is the most advanced. And hey, that's great. At least we're not using more rudimentary technologies to describe the brain. Our brains are fascinating.
You know, it's like, hey, I mean, if the computer is the best we got, then, yeah, let's describe it as that till we get something better. But no, I mean, I didn't want
[00:46:12] Speaker B: to cut you off.
[00:46:13] Speaker A: Go ahead.
[00:46:13] Speaker B: No, I think it's almost. I would look at the brain almost more like the planet Earth. You know, it's kind of its own ecosystem that has these equilibriums that, you know, when everything is kind of normal, it functions normally and okay. And if things are really thrown out of whack, then you're going to get an out of whack outcome. But they're so just like the Earth, right?
You know, there could, like krill, right? The tiny little. Or plankton, those little species of fish, I guess, but they're tiny and the whales eat them and everything else. And, you know, there's the idea that if those things were to get extinct, you know, within a decade or two, you'd probably have a collapse of the ecosystem in the world. But if you came here from another planet, you might not realize that krill and plankton were the most important things for, you know, one of the most important things for the ecosystem of the Earth. So I think our brain is like that, where it's so complex that there's probably a bunch of krill and plankton type of things in our brain that we have no idea even exist right now. Just because we haven't had the research and, you know, all that. And what's interesting too, as a part of the article I read that really also reminded me, it says that a wealth of brain studies tell us, in fact, that multiple and sometimes large areas of the brain are often involved in even the most mundane memory tasks. When strong emotions are involved, millions of neurons can become more active. That stuck out to me because I remember talking to a neuroscientist who was actually out of Israel, real brilliant guy, and his whole field of study was why do strong emotional events make deep imprints in our memory as opposed to, you know, when you don't have a big. And they, you know. So that could be ptsd. It could be if, God forbid, you're molested as a child or something. So those memories clearly define us as human beings. When, you know, the sandwich I had for lunch today, two years from now, I'm not gonna remember what that was. And so his whole study was like, you know, why does the brain remember that versus this? And I think that when I saw that part about emotion, it reminded me where like, like they said at the beginning of the article that a computer can store data and algorithms. And you've talked about this on other shows about how other ends really are programmed to do this or do that. But the part that I did, obviously we can't explain as humans yet and that we don't understand is the emotional side. That's what makes us so unique and gives us that consciousness. And what's interesting is there was a scientist that.
[00:48:41] Speaker A: Well, let me jump in because there was something I wanted to note on this, and I don't want to run out of time. I think one of the biggest takeaways, like the author did try to create a metaphor free understanding of the operation of the brain. And it leads into kind of what you're talking about. But he really dove into three elements that we observe what's happening around us.
We pair or, you know, like we compare things with something being that's not necessarily important with something that is. Which would go into what you just said as far as how things that stimulate emotional responses might be things that are more significant to us because of a pairing type of a thing. And then also one that we're all aware of is punish and reward, you know, like the feedback that we get and that our brain basically, if our brain operates to constantly do those things, to see things, or, you know, see here all that, to experience things, to pair things, and then to assign outcomes, then that does kind of give you a framework, which I thought was interesting. And whether that's true or not, it's very rudimentary. Obviously it's very kind of abstract. But I thought it was at least good that the author tried to kind of lay out something that was not beholden to our current state of technology in terms of how the brain works. And because that combined with the fact that our brains are changed by the experience more so than they store things, I thought was very interesting because just in my field, you know, like you have 10 people look at the same thing and they'll recall it in different ways, particularly over time, you know, and so that like, it can't be that we're all storing information in the same way. It all has to depend somewhat on how we receive things, because. And then how we, how it changes us or what it does to us because. And again, go into the emotion part. If you see something and it creates an emotional reaction in you, and I see the same thing, and it doesn't, then how our brains react to that is going to be different. So, I mean, to me, it's another one of those. It's just. It's endlessly fascinating because our brains are so complex. It allows us to be so complex, but it's just. It's something that we definitely are able to.
Just looking at it, we're able to look into this almost abyss and, you know, try to make sense of it the best we can.
[00:51:06] Speaker B: Yeah, no, that's a great point. And, you know, it's. That's why it is that complex. There's no, you know, we don't know, we don't know. And I think that's what started thinking too about this when I was reading about those scientists. And that's why not to. Not to take away the massive respect that they all deserve, like guys like Kurzweil and Stephen Hawking. They're brilliant people that have helped humanity with their minds and their innovations, their discoveries. However, I do think that they fall into traps, just like the rest of us do. And I think that everyone's looking for.
I shouldn't say everyone. The Buddhists aren't. But I think in our culture, we have this thing with that. We have to find immortality, we have to find some solution outside of ourselves or whatever is here. And I thought about how people talk about space.
Like, people like, oh, you know, we got to go to Mars, we got to do this and that, you know, And I almost sometimes feel like people say that because they. It's almost like they want to deflect and avoid just the hard work that needs to be done to keep the Earth safe. You know what I mean?
And I feel like some of this stuff too, like, you know, wishing that you could download or like you said, upload, I should say, your consciousness or your memory to something. You know, these to me is all signs of vanity. Like, I don't want to live forever.
I don't want my consciousness out there forever. This journey is finite, and I'm okay with that. And I just feel like. Like it's like this. Fantasies that we have as humans now. It's like people are going to try and make the brain into a computer that somehow you can program it and do all this and put a motherboard in there and all that. And it's just like, I think that's where it's like people will get disappointed again, just like, you know, over, over time. Like, you know, this, this may not be done that way. And then one of the things I know we want to wrap up is the author did interview one scientist who I thought gave a great answer because the author asked, how long do you think it'll be until we can really understand this memory thing in the human brain? And without hesitation, the scientists said, probably at least 100 years. And I thought that was a good, honest answer because, I mean, I could say that that might be too soon, but understanding where technology is going and all that and the ability to see into the brain, I mean, hundred years might be fair. Yeah, but, but it's just, I felt that was an honest answer, like, yeah, this ain't going to be anytime soon, like in our lifetimes that we might even know about this.
[00:53:32] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, it's. That's a guesstimate. It could be right, it could be wrong. But I think what it illustrates is that it's not close. I mean, we've, our technology has grown, our understanding of things has grown, but there's still plenty of things that we're sure we get wrong. I mean, and I always like to go back to the famous quote, I think it's, it's often attributed to Emerson Pugh, just that if the human brain was so simple that we could understand it, we would be so simple that we couldn't. And so I always keep that in mind because it's like, yeah, this is how we're understanding these things. So simplifying it doesn't seem to serve our interests when we see how powerful that stuff is. So, yeah, man. Ultimately, though, I mean, it was a lot of fun actually, to read through this and just kind of play around with some of those concepts because, yeah, it's not to knock people who had prior or who had understandings. No more so than you knocking Leonardo da Vinci because his understanding was defined by what the technology was or what was understood at his time. I mean, but it's just to see that evolution, to see that development of understanding of the use of the metaphor, so to speak.
And the clear illustration of how a metaphor is used in that way was just destructive and, you know, kind of opens up your mind to different possibilities. Possibilities.
So, yeah, we appreciate everybody for joining us on this, and until next time, I'm James Keys.
[00:54:50] Speaker B: I'm Tunde Golana.
[00:54:52] Speaker A: All right. Subscribe Rate Review. Tell us what you think and we'll talk to you next time.
