This View of Life

Increasingly, policymakers, investors, and advocates recognize that the neoliberal theory of economic organization – laissez faire – is a failed experiment. However, certain areas of law – particularly antitrust law are still beholden to false econometric notions about how markets operate, which influences legal interpretation, case precedent, and ongoing debates about reviving antitrust’s role in the political economy. Can Multilevel Cultural Evolution provide a new paradigm for anti-trust law, along with the rest of economics? Denise Hearn is a writer, advisor, and project catalyzer who works with investors, policymakers, and organizations who want to use their power to support a living and equitable future. Hearn serves as a Senior Fellow at the American Economic Liberties Project and co-lead of the Access to Markets initiative. Hearn also serves as Board Chair of The Predistribution Initiative which aims to improve investment structures and practices to address systemic risks like inequality, biodiversity loss, and climate change. Denise co-authored The Myth of Capitalism: Monopolies and the Death of Competition with Jonathan Tepper — named one of the Financial Times’ Best Books of 2018. Her writing has been featured in publications such as The Financial Times, The Globe and Mail, Stanford Social Innovation Review, Responsible Investor, and The Washington Post. Hearn currently authors the Embodied Economics newsletter.   David Sloan Wilson is one of the foremost evolutionary thinkers and gifted communicators about evolution to the general public. He is SUNY Distinguished Professor of Biology and Anthropology Emeritus at Binghamton University and President of the nonprofit organization Prosocial World, whose mission is "To consciously evolve a world that works for all."  His most recent books are This View of Life: Completing the Darwinian Revolution, Prosocial: Using Evolutionary Science to Build Productive, Equitable, and Collaborative Groups (with Paul Atkins and Steven C. Hayes), and his first novel, Atlas Hugged: The Autobiography of John Galt III.

J. Arvid Agren's book The Gene's Eye View of Evolution (Oxford University Press, 2021), is a highly praised scholarly account of the concept of selfish genes, which Richard Dawkins made hugely popular in 1976. Dawkins himself calls Agren's book "the most thorough reading of the relevant literature that I have ever encountered...he gets it right." But what does this mean? In this nearly two hour conversation, I take a deep dive with Agren into the history and current status of the selfish gene concept. You might be surprised by how much we agree upon and how much the concept of selfish genes has been scaled down, compared to its original pretensions. 

Max Beilby and Steve Colarelli discuss the application of evolutionary psychology to Human Resource Management. They cover Steve’s academic career, and his books No Best Way: An Evolutionary Perspective on Human Resource Management and The Biological Foundations of Organizational Behavior (which Steve co-edited with his colleague Richard Arvey). They also explore the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic on the world of work. Stephen Colarelli is professor of psychology at Central Michigan University. His research is concerned with how evolutionary theory and evolutionary psychology can influence how we think about, conduct research on, and manage behavior in organizations. Max Beilby is a professional organizational psychologist as well as a member of the Human Behavior & Evolution Society and the Association for Business Psychology. Max has written extensively for This View of Life Magazine and is a member of TVOL’s Business Action Group, which is focused on understanding and improving business from an evolutionary perspective. Anyone is free to join and take part of our networking events, discussions, and collaborative projects.

Kurt Johnson wears many hats--a distinguished evolutionary biologist, a leader of the Interspiritual Movement, an authority on the scientific career of the novelist Vladimir Nabokov, and most recently co-author of the anthology Our Moment of Choice: Evolutionary Visions and Hope for the Future. It was Kurt who introduced me to the Interspiritual Movement and who I invited to join me on my visit to converse with H.H. Dalai Lama last year. In this podcast, we discuss what my new novel, Atlas Hugged, adds to transformative change efforts in the real world.    --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

Brian Boyd is a renowned evolutionary literary scholar (The Origin of Stories), biographer of the novelist Vladimir Nabokov (1,2,3), and 2020 recipient of the Rutherford Medal, New Zealand's highest academic honor. He is the perfect person to discuss my first novel, Atlas Hugged, and the interplay between fiction and the real world. In the second half, we also discuss Brian's biography-in-progress of the legendary philosopher of science, Karl Popper, who pioneered the study of epistemology from an evolutionary perspective.   --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

David Korten is the renowned futurist, author of When Corporations Rule the World and The Great Turning among many other books, founder of YES! Magazine, and a prominent member of the Club of Rome. There is no better person with whom to discuss the world-changing theme of AH in relation to catalyzing positive change in the real world.   --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

TVOL guest host Max Beilby talks with Andrew O'Keeffe about his work helping leaders make better sense of the human dimension of their role, so that they can work with, rather than against, human nature. Max and Andrew also discuss the coronavirus pandemic, and its potential long-term impacts on working practices.    Andrew O’Keeffe is director of Hardwired Humans, a consulting firm that helps organizations design their people strategies to fit human instincts. He is the author of Hardwired Humans and The Boss. Andrew’s background is in senior HR roles with IBM , Cable & Wireless Optus and in professional services. He began his career in industrial relations in the mining and manufacturing industries. He holds a Bachelor of Economics from The University of Sydney. Andrew has a close connection with Dr Jane Goodall and the Jane Goodall Institute (JGI). When Andrew runs leadership programs at zoos, he does so in collaboration with JGI. And over the last decade when Jane Goodall has visited Australia, she and Andrew have joined forces to speak to business leaders about the importance of our social instincts (Dr Goodall talking about chimps, and Andrew talking about humans).   --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

What was the study of nature like before Darwin? It was an integral part of the Enlightenment and was avidly pursued by early Americans such as Thomas Jefferson and the portrait artist Charles Willson Peale, who created the most famous museum of the Revolutionary era. Lee Dugatkin is both an historical scholar of the period and an eminent evolutionary scientist. His newest book on Peale’s museum, Behind the Crimson Curtain: The Rise and Fall of Peale’s Museum, helps to situate “this view of life” against the background of centuries of intellectual thought.    --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

Max Beilby and Nigel Nicholson discuss the application of evolutionary psychology to the world of business and management. They cover Nigel Nicholson’s academic career, his books Managing the Human Animal (marketed in the United States as The Executive Instinct), Family Wars, and The “I” of Leadership. They also explore the impacts of the pandemic on the world of work. Also mentioned is Nigel's Harvard Business Review article, "How Hardwired Is Human Behavior?" Nigel Nicholson is an Emeritus Professor at London Business School, where he has had wide-ranging involvements in research, executive education and business. Nigel writes, teaches, speaks and advises on leadership, family business, biography and legacy, executive development, management in finance, and interpersonal skills. Max Beilby is a professional organizational psychologist as well as a member of the Human Behavior & Evolution Society and the Association for Business Psychology. Max has written extensively for This View of Life Magazine and is a member of TVOL’s Business Action Group, which is focused on understanding and improving business from an evolutionary perspective. Anyone is free to join and take part of our networking events, discussions, and collaborative projects. --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

In the last 30 years, evolutionary theory has undergone explosive growth in studying humans as a fundamentally cultural species. David talks with Alex Mesoudi about this field of cultural evolution and how it is bringing a full view of humanity into inquiry and building bridges across disparate fields of science. Alex's book, "Cultural Evolution: How Darwinian Theory Can Explain Human Culture and Synthesize the Social Sciences" --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

In this bonus archive episode, David talks with evolutionary psychologist Robert Kurzban about his book, "Why Everyone (Else) Is a Hypocrite: Evolution and the Modular Mind" which shows us that the key to understanding our behavioral inconsistencies lies in understanding the mind's modular design. Modularity suggests that there is no "I." Instead, each of us is a contentious "we"—a collection of discrete but interacting systems whose constant conflicts shape our interactions with one another and our experience of the world. --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

Rita Colwell pioneered the study of microbial ecology and genetics and served as Director of the National Science Foundation during 1998-2004. Her new book A Lab of Her Own: One Woman's Personal Journey Through Sexism in Science tells two evolutionary stories. The first is the story of her career studying microbial genetic evolution, including diseases such as cholera and anthrax. The second is the story of cultural evolution and the lack thereof, such as entrenched sexism in science and the reluctance of the medical establishment to embrace new  ideas. My conversation with Rita uniquely weaves these two themes of her book and life together into a single braid.   Other Referenced Materials: "Ages of Discord", Peter Turchin TVOL podcast on education with Peter Gray "Diffusion of Innovations", by Everett M. Rogers  --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

During our discussion group exploring TVOL's Third Way Series, What is Positive Deviance? There's a small chance that you know all about it and a larger chance that you've never heard of it at all. That's because successful cultural change methods have a way of emerging at a particular time and place, spreading to a degree on the basis of their success, but then coming up against boundaries, beyond which they remain unknown. So it is with Positive Deviance, which has been used to prevent child malnourishment in Vietnam, female circumcision in Egypt, and even improve an American pharmaceutical company's outreach to doctors. Our guide to this effective change method is David K. Hurst, a Management educator and author of The New Ecology of Leadership: Business Mastery in a Chaotic World among other books.  Sage Gibbons, budding evolutionist and TVOL's Marketing and Development Strategist, joins me as guest host as we explore what Positive Deviance teaches us about the Third Way and how a formal articulation of the Third Way can add value to Positive Deviance.  Referenced Materials: "Of Boxes, Bubbles, and Effective Management", David K. Hurst "From Life Cycle to Ecocycle: A New Perspective on the Growth, Maturity, Destruction, and Renewal of Complex Systems", David K. Hurst and Brenda J. Zimmerman "Enquire within: cultural evolution and cognitive science", Celia Hayes Evolution and Contextual Behavioral Science: An Integrated Framework for Understanding, Predicting, and Influencing Human Behavior, David Sloan Wilson and Steven C. Hayes The Power of Positive Deviance: How Unlikely Innovators Solve the World's Toughest Problems, Richard Pascale , Jerry Sternin, Monique Sternin  --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book  

Since the Third Way series is centered on entrepreneurship, even though it also applies to all forms of positive social change, it is only fitting for the capstone episode to be a conversation with Victor Hwang. Victor developed an evolutionary and ecosystem approach to entrepreneurship in his private consulting practice and served as Vice President for Entrepreneurship at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation between 2016-2019. Few people have played a larger role or have a more comprehensive knowledge of entrepreneurship in the 21st century and the need for it to follow the Third Way.   This episode has an accompanying article and is the Third Episode of This View of Life's new series, "Evolution, Complexity, and the Third Way of Entrepreneurship". --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

David discusses morality from an evolutionary perspective with analytic philosopher Peter J. Richerson. Peter is best known for his seminal work on cultural evolution with his frequent collaborator Robert Boyd. Their book, Not by Genes Alone: How Culture Transformed Human Evolution, remains a pivotal work in the study of humanity from a full-bodied evolutionary perspective. This is the second episode of a two-part series on morality out of the TVOL archives. Listen to the first episode with philosopher Simon Blackburn. Dive deeper with our special publication asking scientists and philosophers if there is a universal morality. --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

This interview was recorded almost 10 years ago at a workshop entitled, "Evolutionary Thinking and Its Policy Implications for Modern Capitalism". We have revived it from the TVOL archives for your enjoyment and think you will find its contents as relevant as ever. Geoffrey is a specialist in institutional and evolutionary economics, with a background in economics, philosophy and mathematics. His research has applications to the understanding of organizations, organizational change, innovation, entrepreneurship and economic development. Hodgson is also the Editor in Chief of the Journal of Institutional Economics and has published 18 academic books and over 150 academic articles, which he is the winner of the Schumpeter Prize 2014 for his book on "Conceptualizing Capitalism". Geoffrey also participated in our series, "Evolution, Complexity, and the Third Way of Entrepreneurship". You can read the in-depth written conversation or listen to his other podcast conversation inspired by the same theme. --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

David discusses morality from an evolutionary perspective with analytic philosopher Simon Blackburn. Along the way they cover whether functionality discredits altruism, the two sides of morality (thou shall not and thou shall), and the importance of intent for moral outrage. This is the first episode of a two-part series on morality out of the TVOL archives. Dive deeper with our special publication asking scientists and philosophers if there is a universal morality. --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

Again and again—including some of the previous episodes—the Nordic countries are identified as exemplars of good governance and the Third Way. In this episode, we hear directly about the so-called Nordic model from Nina Witoszek, Senior Researcher at the University of Oslo’s Centre for Development and the Environment, and Atle Midttun, a professor of Norway’s largest Business School, BI. Nina and Atle have become thoroughly familiar with viewing Norway through an evolutionary lens as participants of the Evolution Institute’s Norway Project. Nina and Atle's Sustainable Modernity (open access)   This episode has an accompanying article and is the Third Episode of This View of Life's new series, "Evolution, Complexity, and the Third Way of Entrepreneurship". --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book

What are ecosystems? Do they achieve some kind of balance in their natural state? Do they evolve in a way that can't be explained by the evolution of their component species? I take a deep dive with Tom Whitham into territory that is controversial even among the experts.  --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook

As part of TVOL's "Third Way" series of conversations, I explore the concept of "Development" as a type of cultural change effort with Scott Peters, Professor of Developmental Sociology at Cornell University. While many development efforts fail due to centralized planning, disruptive special interests, or having the wrong systemic goals, other development efforts have converged upon the Third Way.    This episode has an accompanying article and is the Third Episode of This View of Life's new series, "Evolution, Complexity, and the Third Way of Entrepreneurship".   --- Become a member of the TVOL1000 and join the Darwinian revolution   Follow This View of Life on Twitter and Facebook   Order the This View of Life book