Not too long before the pseudo religious organization known as “The People’s Temple moved to the remote jungles of Guyana in the northeast corner of South America where over 900 people killed themselves at the direction of Jim Jones in 1978, they were based in Redwood Valley, California, about 10 miles from Ukiah, the home of Radio Curious. In this, the second Radio Curious conversation with Shankar Vedantam author of “The Hidden Brain: How Our Unconscious Minds Elect Presidents, Control Markets, Wage Wars, and Save Our Lives,” we explore what compelled these people to kill themselves. We’ll examine what compels suicide bombers of the early 21st century to take their own lives and those of others? And are we, in fact, all susceptible to these ideas? The conversation with Shankar Vedamtam, recorded from his home in Massachusetts on May 17, 2010, began when I asked him to explain the attraction of cults, who are drawn to them, and why.
Shankar Vedantam is a national correspondent and columnist for The Washington Post and 2009-10 Nieman Fellow at Harvard University. This interview was recorded on May 17th, 2010.
The book Shankar Vedantam recommends is “Heart Of Darkness” by Joseph Conrad.