What value should we put on being polite?

How important is it to be civil?

And alternatively, how can civility and politeness and niceness be used to avoid real conversations,

to avoid genuine disagreement, to avoid constructive dialogue and exchange. Can civility and

politeness be a way to dodge confrontation, to avoid discomfort? And in a way to disrespect the

person we're speaking to by allowing their bullshit to fly when really, if we respected them,

we wouldn't.

It's time for us to start practicing a little more than we do, the type of conversation

that isn't banally civil and polite, nor overtly hostile, a conversation that stretches us,

that challenges us, and that feels occasionally

just a little, yes, uncomfortable.

Today on the show, where do you even start with Scott Barry Kaufman?

He has the number one psychology podcast in the world.

It's called, believe it or not, the psychology podcast.

So you can tell right there in the name that it's a podcast and it's about psychology and then

there's a definite article, The Psychology Podcast. Scott is fantastic. I've heard him around

the traps a great deal because he's a terrific popularizer of science, but he's no lightweight

hackish popularizer. He is known in the psychology community, in the intellectual community,

as someone who's done groundbreaking work on redefining intelligence. He has a PhD in cognitive

psychology from Yale. He's the author of a number of books, one called Wired to Create,

unraveling the mysteries of the creative mind, discover one called Wired to Create, Unravelling the Mysteries of the Creative

Mind, Discover the Ten Things, Great Artists, Writers and Innovators Do Differently.

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