#1151 - Sean Carroll

Joe Rogan (0:02)

Oh, wait a minute, are we going live?

Boom, and we're live. Mr. Carroll, how are you, sir?

Sean Carroll (0:12)

Very good to be back.

Joe Rogan (0:14)

Very good to have you back. So, you have a podcast now.

Sean Carroll (0:17)

I do, I've joined the ranks, you inspired me.

Joe Rogan (0:19)

Well, it's important. We need people like you out there.

You have, what, seven episodes so far?

Sean Carroll (0:25)

Seven episodes up, a few more in the can. Gonna try to dribble them out once a week for the first six months or so, see how it goes.

Joe Rogan (0:31)

Are you enjoying the process?

Sean Carroll (0:33)

I am, Mindscape, by the way, is the name for those out there in podcast line. Yeah, I'm loving it.

The thing that tilted me over toward doing it, because, look, I have a day job, right? I can't spend too much time doing this stuff. But what I realized, it was an excuse, a license to talk to people who are not just physicists, because I have intellectual interests that go way beyond just what I do for a living, and in academia, you're not allowed to take seriously anything other than your discipline, your job, right? I'm allowed to be talking about physics, but nothing else, but so now I can talk to historians and economists and philosophers and psychologists, and it's great.

Joe Rogan (1:09)

Well, you could have just gone to Evergreen State, and then you could talk about anything. Teaching a professor, you could just, if you're a professor, you could teach them dance.

Sean Carroll (1:17)

We have to break out of the system. We have to do it ourselves.

Joe Rogan (1:20)

Yeah, man, gotta break out of that system. So your podcast, you decided that this would be a great venue for you to just expand on subjects and just get into anything that you'd like.

Sean Carroll (1:32)

Well, you know, I have opinions about things, and I've never been one who said you shouldn't talk about things unless you're a PhD credentialed expert, right? I think everyone should be talking about everything, but you should know what your level of expertise is. So if you're not an expert, you should listen to people, and you should then make your own decisions, but you should first gather the information.

And so I don't feel quite like I can go, I have a blog, I can write whatever I want on my blog, but I can't really expound on my theories of economics, because what do I know about economics? But I can call up a very expert economist and chat with them on the podcast, and both I will learn something, and hopefully the listeners will.

Joe Rogan (2:10)

So you're going to just basically talk about anything?

Sean Carroll (2:12)

The shtick is we sort of try to pick an idea, right? So for the hour or whatever it is, I don't have your stamen, I can't do the two and a half hour thing. Just need more of these cavemen. I know, I need more nitrous caffeine in me. But for an hour, hour and a half, I'll get someone who's an expert and we'll dig into an idea and try to understand what's going on in sort of everyday people's language and how it fits into the bigger picture and things like that. And trying to mix up good old professors, which are my peer group, to sort of, I got some people coming out of left field, I had a professional poker player, I have a movie director coming up, a chef and things like that.

But basically, yeah, whatever I wanna talk about.

Joe Rogan (2:54)

That's awesome, so is this for your own edification, or are you just using it as just a platform?

Sean Carroll (3:01)

Yeah, I think that my, philosophically, I treat it like it's for me, right? I'm not gonna do guests or topics, or not do topics, because the people say so, right? There's plenty of people out there who don't want me to talk about anything other than physics.

Or at least nothing that involves politics or religion.

Joe Rogan (3:21)

Stay in your lane, bro.

Sean Carroll (3:22)

Very much, right. But I love talking about politics and religion, so guess what? I'm gonna talk about those things.

And then hopefully it finds an audience, right? And so I'm willing to listen to suggestions, but mostly I have to treat it like it's for me.

Joe Rogan (3:38)

Well, I think it's absurd to ask someone to not talk about things, if they're interested in those things.

Sean Carroll (3:42)