Pain of Uncertainty, Nearsightedness, Doctors Join Forces

Curiosity Weekly

Warner Bros. Discovery

Science

4.6 • 963 Ratings

🗓️ 31 August 2023

⏱️ 13 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Today, you’ll learn about the pain people will endure to avoid uncertainty, a possible link between nearsightedness and education, and a social media app that is helping improve the accuracy of doctors’ diagnosis decisions.

Find episode transcripts here: https://curiosity-daily-4e53644e.simplecast.com/episodes/pain-of-uncertainty-nearsightedness-doctors-join-forces

Pain of Uncertainty

“Humans will trade pain for useless information.” by Phie Jacobs. 2023.
- https://www.science.org/content/article/humans-will-trade-pain-useless-informatin
“Monkeys are curious about counterfactual outcomes.” by Maya Zhe Wang and Benjamin Hayden. 2019.
- https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332082380_Monkeys_are_curious_about_counterfactual_outcomes

Nearsightedness

“The Causal Effect of Education on Myopia: Evidence That More Exposure to Schooling, Rather Than Increased Age, Causes the Onset of Myopia.” by Xiaohu Ding, et al. 2023.
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10132316/
“Myopia: A close look at efforts to turn back a growing problem.” NIH. 2017, ‘
- https://www.nei.nih.gov/about/news-and-events/news/myopia-close-look-efforts-turn-back-growing-problem

Doctors Join Forces

“Experimental evidence for structured information-sharing networks reducing medical errors.” by Damon Centola, et al. 2023.
- https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2108290120
“One way to reduce medical errors? Connect doctors with other doctors.” University of Pennsylvania. 2023.
- https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/996099

Follow Curiosity Daily on your favorite podcast app to get smarter with Calli and Nate — for free! Still curious? Get exclusive science shows, nature documentaries, and more real-life entertainment on discovery+! Go to https://discoveryplus.com/curiosity to start your 7-day free trial. discovery+ is currently only available for US subscribers.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hi, you're about to get smarter in just a few minutes with Curiosity Daily from Discovery.
0:09.0	Time flies when you're learning super cool stuff.
0:11.0	I'm Nate.
0:12.0	And I'm Callie. If you're dropping in for the first time, welcome to Curiosity
0:15.6	where we aim to blow your mind by helping you to grow your mind. If you're a
0:18.9	lawyer listener, welcome back. Today you'll learn about the pain people
0:22.2	will endure to avoid uncertainty, a possible
0:25.7	link between nearsightedness and education, and a social media app that is helping improve
0:31.4	the accuracy of doctors diagnosis decisions.
0:35.0	Without further ado, let's satisfy some curiosity.
0:38.2	In a recent experiment, psychologist Stephen Bode from the University of Melbourne in Australia, strapped patients to a pain machine and offered them
0:46.2	information in exchange for bursts of painful heat on their forearms.
0:49.3	Okay, sounds kind of like the start of a horror film, maybe one of the saw movies, I'm not sure. I have so many questions, but okay, let me make sure I'm understanding it correctly. He would give them information if they let him inflict pain upon them.
1:08.0	Yeah, and he found that in about 75% of the trials,
1:11.3	at least on the lowest pain setting, people were willing to feel pain just to get some information.
1:16.0	Okay, yikes, so this must have been some pretty serious information, right?
1:22.0	Were they like nuclear launch codes or the winning launch? serious information was
1:30.1	was basically useless and they knew it were they like nuclear launch codes or the
1:24.5	winning lottery numbers or something? This is where the story takes a weird twist.
1:29.4	The information was basically useless and they knew it. Okay, hold on, people were willing to endure pain for useless information?
1:38.0	Yeah, so let me back up a little bit.
1:40.5	Between 2009 and 2015, a series of experiments with MacKac monkeys showed something pretty weird.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Warner Bros. Discovery, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Warner Bros. Discovery and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.