Roger Payne & Jonathan Gottschall - What Is Most Needed Now - Finale

Ben Folds (0:00)

Today, on Lightning Bugs. If I go to talk to, say, Congress about art spending, I'll always get comments from the Peanut Gallery like, why don't you go talk about something important? Why don't you go talk about something that puts food on the table?

And because of that attitude, I felt like I would like to spend a year pointing out that our ancestors wouldn't have gotten from the middle of the food chain to the top of the food chain without ideas, without creativity. But you two stuck out because after my conversations with both of you, I felt like there was suddenly an imperative in the equation for me. Not just that, oh, it's important that we're creative.

But that the survival of people on the planet actually might come down to how we communicate and get on the same page about how to set the course correctly. Hi, if you're enjoying listening to Lightning Bugs, please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts. It helps a lot. Hello, fellas.

So, let me do all the official stuff first. You're listening to Lightning Bugs, conversations about creativity with me, Ben Folds. My two guests today are repeat offenders here on the show, and I'll read their bios for you. Really, neither one of them...

The bios don't cover it, but we'll go there anyway. First of all, Dr. Roger Payne. Dr. Roger Payne... I see him down there, but you'll see him other where. Dr. Roger Payne was born in the USA, is best known for discovering that humpback whales sing songs, and that the calls of fin and blue whales evolved to be heard across oceans. He's now retired from Ocean Alliance, which he founded and spent 50 plus years in doing research and working for whale conservation. He has led over 100 expeditions to all oceans, studied every species of large whale in the wild, and started the longest continuous study of known individual whales' southern rights. It is now in its 53rd year. Together with the students, many now leaders in whale research, he pioneered several of the benign research techniques now used across the world to study the behavior of free-swimming whales. He has published books and papers on his many honors and this many, sorry, I'm a musician, so I'm gonna just get through this. I might have to sing it to get through. He pioneered several benign research techniques now used across the world to study the behavior of free-swimming whales. He has published books and papers, and his many honors and awards include a MacArthur Fellowship, a UNEP, UNEP, Global 500 Award, a Knighthood in the Netherlands, and Oxford University's Dawkins Prize. That's a lot of stuff, and there's way more than this. Now let's move over to Jonathan Gottschall.

Jonathan Gottschall (3:25)

Ben, could you do my biography first? I don't have to follow that act.

Ben Folds (3:29)

I know. Here's your opening act there, Jonathan.

And Jonathan says, he wrote this, Jonathan does neat stuff. I don't know. His mom wrote that.

Jonathan Gottschall, praised by Steven Pinker as our deepest thinker about the powerful role of stories in our lives. Jonathan Gottschall is a distinguished fellow in the English department at Washington and Jefferson College. His writing at the intersection of science and art has been covered in depth by the New York Times and New York Times Magazine, Scientific American, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Oprah Magazine, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Science, Nature, and on shows like Radio Lab, Morning Edition, National Geographic, Star Talk with Neil deGrasse. Is it deGraw or deGrasse? DeGrasse?

Jonathan Gottschall (4:25)

DeGrasse.

Ben Folds (4:26)

Sorry. I've only read that. I haven't listened to.

And the Joe Rogan Experience. That's Rogan or Rogan?

Jonathan Gottschall (4:33)

Rogan.

Ben Folds (4:33)

Sorry.

Jonathan is the author or editor of eight books, including The Storytelling Animal, How Stories Make Us Human. I loved that one. The Professor in the Cage, Why Men Fight and Why We Like to Watch. The Story Paradox, How Our Love of Storytelling Builds Societies and Tears Them Down. And that's his newest book. And you should get that.

It's an important book.

So, now that I've introduced these two fellas, this is my last, at least for a while, I'm going on hiatus, so this completes one year of my podcast. And I started this thing, really trying to do my small part in elevating the value or the perceived value of creativity and ideas. And the reason I thought that was important and interesting to me is because I constantly go to bat for arts education. And I find that in the real world, in the company of grownups, and it's like politicians, creativity, no matter what they seem to say, by their actions and the way people seem to view creativity is it's art made by silly little people at the margins that wear weird clothes for our amusement.