WEBVTT 1 00:00:11.759 --> 00:00:16.399 Hello everyone, and welcome to Talk Nerdy. Today's Monday, July thirteenth, 2 00:00:16.480 --> 00:00:18.879 twenty twenty six, and I'm the host of the show, 3 00:00:18.879 --> 00:00:22.039 Doctor Kara Santa Maria, And as always, before we dive 4 00:00:22.039 --> 00:00:23.960 into this week's episode, I want to thank those of 5 00:00:24.000 --> 00:00:28.480 you who make Talk Nerdy possible. 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This week's top patrons include 18 00:01:08.840 --> 00:01:13.480 Chuck Blell, David J. E. Smith, Daniel Lang, Will Defrayin, 19 00:01:14.120 --> 00:01:20.560 David Compton, Brian Holden, Gabo, Jay Ulrica Hagman, Pasquale, Jilati, 20 00:01:21.239 --> 00:01:26.680 Rika Maharaj, and Joe Wilkinson. Thank you all. So so 21 00:01:27.400 --> 00:01:32.439 very much. All right, quick intro for this one. This week, 22 00:01:33.000 --> 00:01:38.159 today I had the opportunity to chat with doctor Zoe Nissa. 23 00:01:38.799 --> 00:01:45.000 She is an associate professor of anthropology at Purdue University 24 00:01:45.319 --> 00:01:49.519 and she has a brand new book out called Rarities 25 00:01:50.120 --> 00:01:55.359 Conservation Science in a Time of Unintended Consequences. So, without 26 00:01:55.439 --> 00:02:01.680 any further ado, here she is doctor Zoe Nissa. Well, Zoe, 27 00:02:01.799 --> 00:02:03.480 thank you so much for joining me today. 28 00:02:04.519 --> 00:02:06.560 Thank you for having me. I'm really excited to be here. 29 00:02:07.079 --> 00:02:07.359 Yeah. 30 00:02:07.400 --> 00:02:10.520 So I'm excited to talk about your new book, Rarities 31 00:02:10.639 --> 00:02:16.199 Conservation Science in a Time of Unintended Consequences. And of 32 00:02:16.280 --> 00:02:21.319 course there are many many times of unintended consequences throughout 33 00:02:21.360 --> 00:02:25.360 the history of conservation science. But before we even dig 34 00:02:25.680 --> 00:02:29.199 into that, I would love to just to know a 35 00:02:29.199 --> 00:02:32.360 little bit more about you and your work and kind 36 00:02:32.400 --> 00:02:35.120 of how you got to the place of putting so 37 00:02:35.280 --> 00:02:40.120 much effort and you know, gosh, I I was gonna say, 38 00:02:40.159 --> 00:02:42.080 I know how much work it is to write a book, 39 00:02:42.120 --> 00:02:45.520 but I still haven't done it. It's like I'm wanting 40 00:02:45.599 --> 00:02:48.319 to do it, but I don't have the bandwidth to 41 00:02:48.520 --> 00:02:52.719 do the work. Because I speak with authors and especially 42 00:02:52.800 --> 00:02:57.599 scientists who are authors every single day about just gosh 43 00:02:57.680 --> 00:03:01.080 about how much it takes from them. So let's get 44 00:03:01.080 --> 00:03:05.159 into maybe your work before the book first. 45 00:03:05.360 --> 00:03:10.000 Yeah, yeah, I'll maybe start. I'll start actually in the present, 46 00:03:10.000 --> 00:03:12.800 which was and then I'll work backwards. But when I 47 00:03:12.800 --> 00:03:15.439 finished the book and my tenure case had gone through 48 00:03:15.560 --> 00:03:17.800 like that first, you know, I don't know what. It 49 00:03:17.840 --> 00:03:19.840 was a Thursday or Friday night when the announcement came 50 00:03:19.879 --> 00:03:22.520 out and I showed up in the living room. My 51 00:03:22.560 --> 00:03:25.759 family's watching TV and I sit down and they suddenly 52 00:03:25.840 --> 00:03:27.439 look at me and they're like, what are you? What 53 00:03:27.479 --> 00:03:30.599 are you doing here? I'm like, I'm watching TV. Like 54 00:03:31.560 --> 00:03:32.479 what you're doing? 55 00:03:32.479 --> 00:03:33.039 What are you? 56 00:03:33.120 --> 00:03:33.360 Ill? 57 00:03:33.479 --> 00:03:34.639 Like, what's the matter with you? 58 00:03:35.439 --> 00:03:37.319 And I was like, you know, this room is nice. 59 00:03:37.439 --> 00:03:40.560 I should sit in this room more. I should do 60 00:03:40.639 --> 00:03:42.919 this more. So. I don't think I had sat in 61 00:03:42.919 --> 00:03:44.879 my own living room in front of the television in 62 00:03:45.280 --> 00:03:50.439 many years. Many years. Oh man, Yeah, that's a warning 63 00:03:50.599 --> 00:03:55.240 depending on how how involved your book gets. But yeah, 64 00:03:55.280 --> 00:03:58.199 I had kind of a strange and winding road, and 65 00:03:58.199 --> 00:04:01.639 I think you'll appreciate this probably in your own biography. 66 00:04:02.240 --> 00:04:06.879 I started actually an astrophysics and that was my first 67 00:04:06.879 --> 00:04:09.159 degree at the University of Toronto, and it was it 68 00:04:09.240 --> 00:04:11.599 was kind of like the Canadian system is a little different. 69 00:04:11.639 --> 00:04:14.960 They've got kind of like almost this like extra duty major, 70 00:04:15.199 --> 00:04:18.839 you know, like that's even more more intense than a 71 00:04:18.879 --> 00:04:21.160 regular double major or something like that would be. And so, 72 00:04:22.319 --> 00:04:23.480 you know, I say it was kind of like a 73 00:04:23.519 --> 00:04:29.240 math a math degree really mostly. And the reason I 74 00:04:29.279 --> 00:04:31.920 did that was that space and science were really kind 75 00:04:31.920 --> 00:04:34.120 of my happy place. It was like, you know, when 76 00:04:34.120 --> 00:04:37.439 people say, imagine a beach, you know, feel relaxed, like 77 00:04:37.439 --> 00:04:39.079 at a yoga class or something. I was like, I'm 78 00:04:39.120 --> 00:04:42.439 not there, not on the beach. I'm looking up at 79 00:04:42.680 --> 00:04:45.519 the stars. I want to I want to see the infinite, 80 00:04:45.600 --> 00:04:49.000 you know. But the as I was in that program, 81 00:04:49.079 --> 00:04:52.439 I kind of had all of these questions that I 82 00:04:52.439 --> 00:04:55.079 couldn't really answer, and I was I was finding myself 83 00:04:55.079 --> 00:04:58.839 at the library a lot, you know, looking at like 84 00:04:59.199 --> 00:05:02.839 the origins of how the Greek figured out the number system, right, 85 00:05:02.959 --> 00:05:05.199 or the invention of the zero, which was a big 86 00:05:05.240 --> 00:05:09.560 point in mathematics, and just how did people put things 87 00:05:09.959 --> 00:05:13.639 that happen into numbers, you know, and then what's the 88 00:05:13.639 --> 00:05:16.000 fallout of that? You know, because that allows us. That's 89 00:05:16.040 --> 00:05:18.600 really powerful. It allows us to describe certain things in 90 00:05:18.639 --> 00:05:22.160 a certain way, and it also takes away things. And 91 00:05:22.199 --> 00:05:25.360 so I had that kind of worry as a young person. 92 00:05:26.600 --> 00:05:28.600 And you know, I had some professors who were like, 93 00:05:28.639 --> 00:05:32.079 you know, you're okay at this writing thing. You seem 94 00:05:32.120 --> 00:05:34.720 pretty good at this writing thing. Can you write this 95 00:05:34.839 --> 00:05:37.079 technical manual for us? Can you join this project? Can 96 00:05:37.120 --> 00:05:39.319 you do these things? I started doing some kind of 97 00:05:39.360 --> 00:05:42.720 science writing for the student magazines and things like that, 98 00:05:42.759 --> 00:05:45.360 and they're like, you know, you're actually asking these kind 99 00:05:45.360 --> 00:05:48.839 of really interesting questions, and I think physics may not 100 00:05:48.879 --> 00:05:49.079 be the. 101 00:05:49.160 --> 00:05:50.519 Path for you to. 102 00:05:52.040 --> 00:05:55.560 Answer those kinds of questions. And the final kind of 103 00:05:55.560 --> 00:05:57.800 breaking point was actually I'm dating myself here, but the 104 00:05:58.240 --> 00:06:01.720 Hubble Space Telescope team came and this was at the 105 00:06:01.759 --> 00:06:04.079 time there was a lot of debate around whether the 106 00:06:04.160 --> 00:06:07.040 universe was gonna and you know, it started in this 107 00:06:07.120 --> 00:06:09.120 big bang, Was it going to end in a big crunch, 108 00:06:09.240 --> 00:06:10.959 Was it going to all kind of collapse back together 109 00:06:11.879 --> 00:06:14.439 or not, or keep expanding forever into this kind of cold, 110 00:06:14.519 --> 00:06:19.720 slow death. And they were using this telescope to do that, 111 00:06:19.879 --> 00:06:24.600 and these very very smart and lots of very very smart, 112 00:06:24.720 --> 00:06:27.439 very prestigious people in the room, and I'm like in 113 00:06:27.480 --> 00:06:30.959 my early twenties, and they were making this very strong 114 00:06:31.040 --> 00:06:35.000 argument about the fate of the entire universe based on 115 00:06:35.319 --> 00:06:40.040 this graph and the error bars so exceeded like where 116 00:06:40.079 --> 00:06:44.839 the measurements were. And I was like, I'm like twenty, 117 00:06:45.360 --> 00:06:49.079 you know, two, and this makes no sense to me. 118 00:06:49.120 --> 00:06:51.079 These people are sort of taking it seriously. Like if 119 00:06:51.120 --> 00:06:52.720 I did this as an undergrad try to make this 120 00:06:52.800 --> 00:06:55.600 kind of argument, no, I would, you know, my professor 121 00:06:55.600 --> 00:06:58.439 would fail me because I don't have enough data, right, 122 00:06:59.120 --> 00:07:02.959 And I didn't understand yet because I hadn't taken a 123 00:07:02.959 --> 00:07:05.879 lot of philosophy or anything like that, that the fact 124 00:07:05.920 --> 00:07:09.160 that our data is really our arguments are really underdetermined 125 00:07:09.160 --> 00:07:11.720 by the data. It was not a concept that I 126 00:07:11.759 --> 00:07:13.800 had yet in my repertoire. But but that was what 127 00:07:13.879 --> 00:07:15.959 I was kind of confronting, and I went, you know what. 128 00:07:16.560 --> 00:07:18.240 I looked around the room at all these people, and 129 00:07:18.240 --> 00:07:20.480 I thought that I need to understand this. I need 130 00:07:20.480 --> 00:07:23.560 to understand what the heck is going on here and 131 00:07:23.680 --> 00:07:27.879 why why this is happening. So I got my start there, 132 00:07:27.959 --> 00:07:30.759 but I started to move to the social sciences and 133 00:07:30.759 --> 00:07:33.600 starting to try to understand science itself as a system 134 00:07:33.800 --> 00:07:37.120 and as a social practice and as a community and 135 00:07:37.680 --> 00:07:40.480 the people that are involved with science and that have 136 00:07:40.519 --> 00:07:44.240 a stake in science. So I ended up going to 137 00:07:44.279 --> 00:07:50.279 graduate school for for that. Maybe the other part of 138 00:07:50.319 --> 00:07:53.519 my background that would be important to the way that 139 00:07:53.600 --> 00:07:55.720 the book looked is that I'm the first of my 140 00:07:55.759 --> 00:07:59.959 family to go to college. And when I was applot, 141 00:08:00.519 --> 00:08:03.199 my my dad actually he was here for Father's Day, 142 00:08:03.279 --> 00:08:05.720 so I saw him recently and he was like, yeah, 143 00:08:05.759 --> 00:08:07.839 I remember that talk that I gave you. 144 00:08:08.720 --> 00:08:08.879 Uh. 145 00:08:09.079 --> 00:08:10.480 He just sat me down and he said, you know, 146 00:08:10.680 --> 00:08:14.399 people like us don't go to school. You're done school. 147 00:08:14.519 --> 00:08:18.040 You went to university. Like you're done. You've already got 148 00:08:18.040 --> 00:08:21.959 one degree that's more than any anyone else has ever gotten. 149 00:08:22.759 --> 00:08:25.639 People like us go to work. You're you're smart enough. 150 00:08:25.639 --> 00:08:29.040 Apparently you're making poor life choices, but you're smart enough. 151 00:08:30.040 --> 00:08:32.840 He choices to cost money to make money. 152 00:08:33.279 --> 00:08:36.120 Yeah, Like, it's time to go make some money. It's 153 00:08:36.159 --> 00:08:40.559 time to get a job. And he was convinced that 154 00:08:41.120 --> 00:08:44.799 by applying to graduate school in the United States. I 155 00:08:44.799 --> 00:08:46.159 think he thought I was going to be kind of 156 00:08:46.200 --> 00:08:49.360 like trafficked or something like He was like, they're going 157 00:08:49.440 --> 00:08:53.320 to take your passport away, like you work or something. 158 00:08:53.360 --> 00:08:55.159 You just had no idea. And I said, I think 159 00:08:55.200 --> 00:08:57.080 they're going to pay for me to go to school, dad, 160 00:08:57.240 --> 00:09:00.600 And he was like, no, no one pays something to 161 00:09:00.639 --> 00:09:04.399 go to school. You're you're you know, like you're even 162 00:09:04.440 --> 00:09:10.519 dumber than I thought you were. So those two perspectives 163 00:09:10.519 --> 00:09:14.600 of having having not had that in my background to 164 00:09:14.799 --> 00:09:16.919 you know, university as a as a thing to do, 165 00:09:17.159 --> 00:09:20.679 and then coming from a very different kind of scientific 166 00:09:20.720 --> 00:09:26.720 tradition initially, where you know, you are supposed to be 167 00:09:26.840 --> 00:09:31.519 extremely quantitative and extremely objective, objective, and the objects of 168 00:09:31.559 --> 00:09:36.480 study are are literally light years away, you know, really 169 00:09:36.720 --> 00:09:42.000 shaped how I then started to encounter conservation, which was 170 00:09:42.039 --> 00:09:44.679 not actually what I started was initially going to study. 171 00:09:44.720 --> 00:09:49.120 But I got this uh fellowship at the University of Minnesota, 172 00:09:49.840 --> 00:09:52.399 which has a really amazing, amazing group of faculty there, 173 00:09:52.399 --> 00:09:55.159 and it was with a zoo, and I was like, 174 00:09:55.879 --> 00:09:58.720 I don't know anything about zoos. I mean, they're cool, right, 175 00:09:58.759 --> 00:10:01.080 but I was like, what what am I going to do? 176 00:10:01.120 --> 00:10:03.799 I never even took any biology, Honestly, I escaped all 177 00:10:03.840 --> 00:10:06.360 biology in high school. I never took any of it 178 00:10:06.440 --> 00:10:11.679 in college and my first time behind the scenes at 179 00:10:11.679 --> 00:10:16.840 the zoo watching these scientists, these conservation biologists and veterinarians 180 00:10:16.879 --> 00:10:20.039 and all kinds of folks and how they thought about 181 00:10:20.080 --> 00:10:24.919 their work and how much they really, really really cared 182 00:10:25.559 --> 00:10:28.240 for their for their for their animals, their animal population, 183 00:10:28.879 --> 00:10:32.919 and we're so invested in in what their science was 184 00:10:33.000 --> 00:10:34.919 doing and why it was doing it, you know, what 185 00:10:34.960 --> 00:10:37.600 it was for that It just it astounded me. It 186 00:10:37.639 --> 00:10:39.919 was really really cool to see. So that was kind 187 00:10:39.919 --> 00:10:44.080 of the kickoff many years ago to what what became rarities. 188 00:10:44.919 --> 00:10:47.320 I love that and thinking about it's funny thinking about 189 00:10:47.320 --> 00:10:50.879 me kind of sitting across across the internet from you actually, 190 00:10:50.960 --> 00:10:54.600 but sitting across from you and having this conversation, you know, 191 00:10:55.960 --> 00:10:57.200 it feels. 192 00:10:58.879 --> 00:11:03.320 Timely. In a lot of the episode that will have aired. 193 00:11:03.399 --> 00:11:05.360 It's so weird when we podcast because we have to 194 00:11:05.399 --> 00:11:07.320 time travel a little bit. But the episode that will 195 00:11:07.320 --> 00:11:11.919 have aired the week right before this was an interview 196 00:11:12.200 --> 00:11:17.120 with Jessica Riskin, who is a historian of science, talking 197 00:11:17.159 --> 00:11:21.159 about Lamarque and evolution and sort of the zeitgeist of 198 00:11:21.200 --> 00:11:21.679 the time. 199 00:11:22.879 --> 00:11:26.960 And I just finished just like very kind of. 200 00:11:26.879 --> 00:11:30.200 Serendipitously a book by Lydia Pine, who I've also had 201 00:11:30.240 --> 00:11:34.519 on the show before, who's a historian and anthropologist but 202 00:11:34.600 --> 00:11:38.679 specifically usually focusing on science called Endlings, which is all 203 00:11:38.720 --> 00:11:42.159 about the last of specific species and how we tell 204 00:11:42.240 --> 00:11:49.559 stories about conservation and how we tell stories about species loss. 205 00:11:50.000 --> 00:11:52.200 And so it's I feel like I'm in this really 206 00:11:52.240 --> 00:11:54.519 interesting position where, even though this is not something I'm 207 00:11:54.639 --> 00:11:59.120 usually talking about and thinking about, it's sort of been 208 00:11:59.159 --> 00:12:01.159 on the tip of my mind lately, which which makes 209 00:12:01.159 --> 00:12:06.399 me excited for our conversation. So, so tell me a 210 00:12:06.399 --> 00:12:09.679 little bit about you know, we got to sort of 211 00:12:09.720 --> 00:12:12.440 how you, I guess, chose your degree path and and 212 00:12:12.519 --> 00:12:19.240 I mean very in a very meandering way, this specific story, 213 00:12:19.480 --> 00:12:23.600 like this book rarities, and the idea of talking about 214 00:12:23.600 --> 00:12:30.519 conservation science but situating it really in the sociologic or 215 00:12:30.559 --> 00:12:32.799 anthropologic kind of landscape. 216 00:12:34.120 --> 00:12:36.720 What brought you to that storytelling? 217 00:12:37.679 --> 00:12:39.840 Yeah, that's that's a great question. Also, I'm so excited 218 00:12:39.879 --> 00:12:41.559 with the other conversations you're having. 219 00:12:41.399 --> 00:12:42.600 Because that's that's just great. 220 00:12:43.200 --> 00:12:47.879 I mean, back when I started this, uh, conservation was 221 00:12:47.960 --> 00:12:50.759 kind of booming as a field, but the perception of 222 00:12:50.799 --> 00:12:52.240 it I write, I read about this a bit in 223 00:12:52.240 --> 00:12:54.120 the book was that it was kind of vacuous, right, 224 00:12:54.159 --> 00:12:56.360 like it was just a bunch of people on a 225 00:12:56.360 --> 00:12:59.639 mission to save the world. And who appointed them, you know, 226 00:13:00.120 --> 00:13:02.600 pointed you in charge kind of thing. And in interview 227 00:13:02.679 --> 00:13:05.080 some of the some of the very early participants in 228 00:13:05.120 --> 00:13:07.200 the very early meetings in the seventies and eighties, they 229 00:13:07.200 --> 00:13:09.879 would say, we knew we were here to save the world, 230 00:13:10.120 --> 00:13:12.960 like it was on our shoulders to save the planet 231 00:13:13.000 --> 00:13:15.279 because no one else was. So they they definitely came 232 00:13:15.279 --> 00:13:19.000 in with this sense of mission. And these were primarily 233 00:13:19.840 --> 00:13:24.799 you know, middle class white American male biologists with all 234 00:13:24.840 --> 00:13:27.799 of the all of the you know, social perspectives that 235 00:13:28.120 --> 00:13:33.080 come along with that kind of positionality. And by the 236 00:13:33.120 --> 00:13:35.200 time I came to the field, you know, to study 237 00:13:35.200 --> 00:13:37.639 the field, it was it was well established, but still 238 00:13:37.639 --> 00:13:39.720 had this perception that it was kind of what was 239 00:13:39.720 --> 00:13:42.879 it really doing? That, wasn't it because biology was the 240 00:13:42.919 --> 00:13:47.559 study of life, So what exactly was conservation doing? And 241 00:13:47.600 --> 00:13:50.799 initially I thought I approached it like any good physicist. 242 00:13:50.919 --> 00:13:53.440 I was like, right, I need my initial conditions. I 243 00:13:53.519 --> 00:13:56.679 need to clear the ground here, I need to understand 244 00:13:56.679 --> 00:13:59.519 the entire field first, and then I'll figure out what 245 00:13:59.720 --> 00:14:02.240 case studies I want to look at, right, because I 246 00:14:02.279 --> 00:14:03.799 was thinking I was going to do kind of a 247 00:14:03.879 --> 00:14:07.360 lab ethnography is they're kind of called an anthropology. So 248 00:14:07.480 --> 00:14:11.039 take the methods of anthropology, but rather than apply them 249 00:14:11.080 --> 00:14:13.399 to a small scale society or a village, you know, 250 00:14:13.960 --> 00:14:16.320 you would go to a laboratory and just hang out 251 00:14:16.360 --> 00:14:18.320 for a year or two with those folks and understand 252 00:14:18.360 --> 00:14:20.679 them and their culture. So initially I thought that's what 253 00:14:20.720 --> 00:14:24.919 I was going to do. And as I started to 254 00:14:26.200 --> 00:14:28.840 kind of move around the field and talk to different 255 00:14:28.840 --> 00:14:33.240 people and visit these different sites, you know, over and over, 256 00:14:33.519 --> 00:14:35.080 I was getting these you know, I sort of saying 257 00:14:35.080 --> 00:14:37.480 the book, my weird file kept growing, these sort of 258 00:14:37.519 --> 00:14:40.000 strange stories people were telling me of stuff that didn't 259 00:14:40.039 --> 00:14:43.519 work out the way they wanted it, to a tremendous 260 00:14:43.519 --> 00:14:47.360 amount of like personal and professional hardship, you know, people 261 00:14:47.440 --> 00:14:51.720 getting shut out of the field, people getting hacked, backlash, 262 00:14:51.840 --> 00:14:54.159 like just all kinds of things sort of happening to people, 263 00:14:54.840 --> 00:15:01.159 projects getting sabotaged by local communities, lots of backlash, Like 264 00:15:01.240 --> 00:15:03.240 just all these things that were happening that kind of 265 00:15:03.279 --> 00:15:05.919 got in the way of what seemed like it should 266 00:15:05.919 --> 00:15:08.159 be a fairly straightforward thing, and in some ways a 267 00:15:08.159 --> 00:15:13.039 fairly uncontroversial thing, right, which is just like, let's protect 268 00:15:13.480 --> 00:15:16.480 the environment upon which we all literally depend, right, Like, 269 00:15:16.600 --> 00:15:20.159 let's just not trash it completely, because it's where our 270 00:15:20.159 --> 00:15:25.360 water and our food come from. So yeah, So I 271 00:15:25.399 --> 00:15:28.320 started initially thinking that, let me just understand who's in 272 00:15:28.360 --> 00:15:31.480 this field, what they're doing, what's going on. But then 273 00:15:31.559 --> 00:15:33.919 very quickly it became this thing of like, whoa, there 274 00:15:33.960 --> 00:15:37.600 are these things going on, and how widespread are they? Right? Like, 275 00:15:38.000 --> 00:15:40.960 is this what is going on here? If the whole 276 00:15:40.960 --> 00:15:43.759 thing is kind of not always happening the way it 277 00:15:43.840 --> 00:15:47.399 was expected to, what does that tell us about science 278 00:15:47.519 --> 00:15:50.759 more generally? Right? And so by the end of it, 279 00:15:50.799 --> 00:15:52.320 I kind of was saying I was sort of writing, 280 00:15:54.240 --> 00:15:55.919 I mean, and it's in a weird way kind of 281 00:15:55.960 --> 00:15:57.720 I think of it as almost like a love story, 282 00:15:57.879 --> 00:16:00.240 Like what happens when the thing you love, you know 283 00:16:00.279 --> 00:16:03.200 that you love the most of anything, that you've sacrificed 284 00:16:03.240 --> 00:16:05.720 everything to love it and to understand it and to 285 00:16:05.799 --> 00:16:09.679 know it, and it's not working out the way you 286 00:16:09.720 --> 00:16:10.279 wanted it to. 287 00:16:11.559 --> 00:16:16.600 Gosh, yeah, wow, there's something very kind of existential and 288 00:16:16.799 --> 00:16:20.120 almost like eschatological about that I can't help, but you know, 289 00:16:20.720 --> 00:16:24.519 my psychologist's brain over here is like comparing that to 290 00:16:24.639 --> 00:16:28.360 this concept in mental health about like gripping things so 291 00:16:28.519 --> 00:16:31.960 tightly that they actually fall through your fingers. Is like 292 00:16:32.360 --> 00:16:35.840 really difficult balance that we have of holding things softly 293 00:16:36.399 --> 00:16:39.720 and of being nimble in an effort to change course 294 00:16:39.759 --> 00:16:40.840 when things aren't working. 295 00:16:41.360 --> 00:16:42.039 I think. 296 00:16:43.559 --> 00:16:45.840 There's so many things I want to get into with you, obviously, 297 00:16:45.919 --> 00:16:49.639 so many examples and stories of as you mentioned, like 298 00:16:49.720 --> 00:16:53.840 times when there's an intentionality and almost the opposite happens, 299 00:16:54.480 --> 00:17:00.360 or there's just things that feel very controllable, all these 300 00:17:00.440 --> 00:17:06.119 other unintended kind of runaway outcomes. When I think about 301 00:17:06.160 --> 00:17:10.480 this entire I don't even want to call it a 302 00:17:10.480 --> 00:17:13.200 field because it's so many different fields. But this entire 303 00:17:13.240 --> 00:17:17.000 area of even like inquiry and practice of how do 304 00:17:17.079 --> 00:17:23.359 we protect and save our planet from ourselves in a 305 00:17:23.400 --> 00:17:26.720 way knowing that we are the arbiters and the actors, 306 00:17:27.759 --> 00:17:30.079 and that there are geopolitical forces and that there are 307 00:17:30.319 --> 00:17:33.440 you know, now climate change is like its own organizing force, 308 00:17:33.519 --> 00:17:36.039 and all of these different things I can't help but 309 00:17:36.079 --> 00:17:37.880 go back to. For listeners who have been listening to 310 00:17:37.960 --> 00:17:39.759 the show for a long time. You may remember that, 311 00:17:39.839 --> 00:17:42.440 like several years ago, I traveled to Namibia to give 312 00:17:42.480 --> 00:17:45.160 a talk about science communication, and you know, we all 313 00:17:45.200 --> 00:17:47.240 have these memories of these times where our eyes were 314 00:17:47.240 --> 00:17:52.400 really opened right where like we we shifted our perspective 315 00:17:52.440 --> 00:17:55.000 in a major way. And one of the things that 316 00:17:55.039 --> 00:17:59.759 I learned there, working with the people who have their 317 00:17:59.759 --> 00:18:01.480 boo's on the ground, the people who live there, who 318 00:18:01.519 --> 00:18:05.039 are from there, and especially in these like large sort 319 00:18:05.039 --> 00:18:08.759 of nature reserves where a lot of indigenous folks would 320 00:18:08.799 --> 00:18:15.680 live with wildlife, was the power of something like and 321 00:18:15.680 --> 00:18:18.359 I hate to say it, but trophy hunting, like this 322 00:18:18.480 --> 00:18:20.559 thing that I think historically, as a white person living 323 00:18:20.599 --> 00:18:23.640 in the West thought was just all bad. And I 324 00:18:23.759 --> 00:18:26.680 very quickly learned that trophy hunting was how they fueled 325 00:18:26.720 --> 00:18:31.079 their anti poaching patrols. And you know, trophy hunting was 326 00:18:31.119 --> 00:18:33.039 a tool that they used. They had a bull elephant 327 00:18:33.119 --> 00:18:35.640 that was knocking over a bunch of people's water. It 328 00:18:35.680 --> 00:18:38.759 was a burdensome animal, it was old, it wasn't breeding anymore. 329 00:18:38.799 --> 00:18:41.240 The people just wanted to kill it. Well, sell the 330 00:18:41.279 --> 00:18:43.319 tag to some rich white person from the West and 331 00:18:43.359 --> 00:18:46.240 make two hundred thousand dollars or however much they go 332 00:18:46.319 --> 00:18:49.559 for now and use that money to fund anti poaching, 333 00:18:49.839 --> 00:18:52.079 like I think in my mind poaching and trophy hunting 334 00:18:52.079 --> 00:18:55.400 were the same thing. And being there and learning that 335 00:18:55.480 --> 00:18:58.559 this complicated thing that feels bad was actually a source 336 00:18:58.599 --> 00:19:00.240 for very good And a lot of these animals have 337 00:19:00.279 --> 00:19:03.319 to be cold anyway, and conservation is not as simple 338 00:19:03.359 --> 00:19:06.200 as these animals are endangered, therefore we have to protect 339 00:19:06.200 --> 00:19:08.440 them at all costs. Because look what happened in Botswana. 340 00:19:08.519 --> 00:19:10.960 It just really opened my eyes to how complicated this 341 00:19:11.000 --> 00:19:11.400 all is. 342 00:19:12.119 --> 00:19:15.599 Yeah, absolutely well, and that care piece is so big, right, 343 00:19:15.640 --> 00:19:19.839 what drives someone you know, who presumably wealthy enough to 344 00:19:19.960 --> 00:19:22.519 have a lot of choices with their leisure time and 345 00:19:22.559 --> 00:19:25.279 how they spend their recreation money. But they're going to fly, 346 00:19:25.680 --> 00:19:29.640 you know, a continent away and shoot something, you know, 347 00:19:30.240 --> 00:19:32.160 and we don't tend to think of that as an 348 00:19:32.160 --> 00:19:34.839 expression of care. And one of the things I sort 349 00:19:34.839 --> 00:19:36.839 of argue for in the book is actually we need 350 00:19:36.880 --> 00:19:40.519 to think about those things as when you view it 351 00:19:40.559 --> 00:19:42.240 from a care lens, When you view it from a 352 00:19:42.319 --> 00:19:46.960 lens of this has real value, not just like intellectual 353 00:19:47.079 --> 00:19:51.200 or monetary value, but it has value value for people 354 00:19:51.519 --> 00:19:54.559 in this deep kind of emotional way, this connect you know, 355 00:19:54.640 --> 00:19:58.119 kind of connected way that changes the equation, That changes 356 00:19:58.160 --> 00:20:01.880 a lot of our sort of pilosophical ideas about ethics 357 00:20:02.200 --> 00:20:04.880 or how we think the economy runs, or what is 358 00:20:04.920 --> 00:20:07.839 in our rational best interests as consumers. Right, Like, once 359 00:20:07.880 --> 00:20:11.920 you add that piece, it really opens up a way 360 00:20:11.960 --> 00:20:15.480 of understanding why people do the things they do. 361 00:20:16.599 --> 00:20:20.079 Would you say that that is one of the kind 362 00:20:20.160 --> 00:20:26.839 of underlying themes the takeaways that you were interested in 363 00:20:26.839 --> 00:20:29.440 communicating in this book. I mean you did ultimately name 364 00:20:29.480 --> 00:20:36.119 it rarities, this concept of once something is scarce, once 365 00:20:36.200 --> 00:20:43.920 something no longer has ubiquity, it actually, in many respects 366 00:20:44.119 --> 00:20:51.680 goes up in value, which becomes simultaneously detrimental to its 367 00:20:51.799 --> 00:20:57.079 remaining population and also incredibly critical for the work to 368 00:20:57.720 --> 00:21:01.480 I guess not see it go extinct at the rate 369 00:21:01.519 --> 00:21:04.119 at least, like so many things are going extinct so quickly, 370 00:21:04.680 --> 00:21:06.720 Like this idea of what what does it mean for 371 00:21:06.759 --> 00:21:07.720 something to be rare? 372 00:21:08.759 --> 00:21:11.440 Right? Yeah, okay, so this is yeah, that is absolutely 373 00:21:11.480 --> 00:21:14.079 the part of the thing for sure, the heart of 374 00:21:14.079 --> 00:21:17.240 the book. So economists will often and I have this 375 00:21:17.279 --> 00:21:19.119 when I give you know, talks. You know, there's always 376 00:21:19.119 --> 00:21:22.519 an economist or often an economic student who will come 377 00:21:22.599 --> 00:21:25.200 up to me and say, yeah, well, as you know, 378 00:21:25.519 --> 00:21:30.640 as supply goes down, so this thing becomes less common, 379 00:21:31.279 --> 00:21:33.599 more rare, whatever you want to say. Of course, the 380 00:21:33.640 --> 00:21:37.400 price goes up, right, because there's fewer of them, and 381 00:21:37.680 --> 00:21:41.480 non economists and even some economists will confuse like that 382 00:21:41.599 --> 00:21:45.960 standard supply and demand curve, which is which is the 383 00:21:46.079 --> 00:21:49.279 total supply and the total demand in a market? Right, 384 00:21:49.319 --> 00:21:53.759 it's not about an individual's intensity of longing. Right. So 385 00:21:54.359 --> 00:21:56.920 we know this with a lot of consumer goods, right 386 00:21:56.920 --> 00:21:59.839 where we do these limited product drops and it's this, 387 00:22:00.039 --> 00:22:02.319 it's here now just for a little bit. There's it's 388 00:22:02.359 --> 00:22:06.119 a limited run, it's you know, it's whatever it is, sneakers, 389 00:22:06.920 --> 00:22:10.079 Pokemon cards, you know, you name it. We've we've we've 390 00:22:10.119 --> 00:22:14.400 created artificial scarcity, and marketers have figured out very well 391 00:22:14.400 --> 00:22:17.599 how to create artificial scarcity in a way to drive 392 00:22:17.680 --> 00:22:20.400 up demand for it. Right. So the intensity of someone's 393 00:22:20.440 --> 00:22:25.400 emotional attachment to something can increase with the with its rarity. Right. 394 00:22:25.519 --> 00:22:29.480 But but for economists there should there should be a 395 00:22:29.519 --> 00:22:31.920 point when you think about sort of larger market dynamic 396 00:22:32.000 --> 00:22:34.599 dynamics where you go, right, this thing has become too 397 00:22:34.640 --> 00:22:37.319 expensive for most people to afford. Right, it's like the 398 00:22:37.440 --> 00:22:39.680 it's like the thing you want to pot or shoot. Right, 399 00:22:39.680 --> 00:22:41.640 it's the I'm going to fly across, you know, to 400 00:22:41.839 --> 00:22:45.759 Namibia and shoot this bull elephant. Not most people can't 401 00:22:45.799 --> 00:22:48.480