Sentientism | "You CAN change other people!" - Howie Jacobson of Plant Yourself - Sentientism EP:87 @Sentientism | Uploaded December 2021 | Updated October 2024, 2 hours ago.
Howie (twitter.com/askhowie & plantyourself.com & askhowie.com/) is a coach & author. His coaching work with people & organisations focuses on leadership, values, productivity & health.
In Sentientist Conversations we talk about the two most important questions: “what’s real?” & “what matters?”
Sentientism is "evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings." The audio is on our Podcast: apple.co/391khQO & pod.link/1540408008.
We discuss:
00:00 Welcome
02:01 Howie's Intro
- Coaching & writing
- "Not a big fan of capitalism"
- Effective altruism through organisations
- "Helping people respond to reality"
- Not knowing "what's real?" or "what matters?" but let's try to work it out
04:54 What's Real?
- Growing up in a conservative Jewish household in New Jersey
- Culturally Jewish but "kind of atheist"
- Mother's history of the holocaust & kindertransport
- Father's "Jewish identity & socialism." Needling the Rabbi: "We have to rest on the Sabbath so now I have to walk up 30 flights of stairs?!"
- Being given "The Truth About the Bible" book. Bible inconsistencies & immorality
- "The Jews have learned to argue & doubt & question"
- "The Jewish people must survive" as a core commitment
- Einstein, Marx, Freud
- A militant zionist phase
- "It was safe." There was no danger to the ritual vs. sweatlodges
- A "safe, conventional, suburban religion"
- Attending an Ivy League college
- "There are smart people who believe in ghosts"
- Exploring parapsychology
- "There were serious academics questioning my worldview which was completely materialistic"
- Rejecting the exclusive tribalism & the simplistic narratives of religion but "There is a big effing mystery out there"
- Shamanic practices "oh honey, it's all bullshit"
- Being sceptical of our own perceptions & reasoning. Be open
- Predictive dreams
- Contextualism... "How is this working for me?"
- "Look for & assume positive intent... then act like it's true"
- Talking to trees, brambles as defences, mycorrhizal fungi as comms networks
- Narratives of dominion vs. "consciousness in everything"
- Arbitrary vs. narratives grounded in reality
- "Supposedly using evidence & reason we've destroyed the planet"
- Checks: 1) consistency with the natural world & 2) compassion
32:50 What Matters?
- Be nice to people
- Mother's experience of Nazi occupation of Austria. "The teachers & her so called friends were wearing Nazi armbands" & "Punch a Nazi"
- Father's labour organising. "Fighting for the little guy" as the central moral theme
- A story of a police horse being stabbed: "I thought 'what a great story' until I started considering the sentience of the horse"
- Us vs. them ethos. I'm lucky to be on the "right side". Realising "everyone thinks they're on the right side!"
- Mitchell & Webb's Nazi sketch "are we the baddies?"
- "I'm still a humanist in my heart... I'm a sentientist in my mind"
- Being vegan but not suffering emotionally when thinking about animal suffering. "What's important to me is how I act"
- Our emotions are easily manipulated (music, contact, stories)
- Vegan for health & env. reasons. John Robbins "Diet for a New America" (1987). Then part of the vegan community
- Dangers of imprinting on "wise elders"
- Gregory Bateson's "Schismogenesis"
- "I'm vegan now, the world hates me for it... I'm going to buy the whole thing"
- Teaching as a rebel
- "I''m an instrumental vegan"
- Indigenous hunting culture. Honouring animals. "I would eat animals under some circumstances... I don't see anything in the world that is anywhere close to that standard."
- Even good justifications don't erase the harm done to victims
- Species/biodiversity vs. individuals
- Romance vs. reality of hunting
- Biocentrism
- Intrinsic/instrumental moral consideration
- Ecocentrism: "The risk that individual sentient beings can be chewed up for the sake of the system"
55:43 A Better Future
- It's a problem if we have to deny our self-interest in order to be good
- "Sand Talk - How Indigenous Thinking Can Save The World"... "Western Civilisation is a self-terminating algorithm"
- "It's how the game is set up"
- "We don't have the models we need yet"
- Experimentation. It's OK to make mistakes
- Supporting vs. shaming each other (even re: Ivermectin)
- Being OK with ourselves. Safety vs. fight/flight. Stephen Porges' "Polyvagal Theory"
- Narcissism
- If I had all the power I'd change things... but I don't... I have persuasion
- Shame & remorse & denial
- Critic to ally. Shared positive intent
- Stories that make me feel good w/out dominating
- We can't stop w/systems that make "good people treating each other well" a privileged position
- Tipping points
Sentientism is “Evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings.” More at sentientism.info/. Join our "I'm a Sentientist" wall sentientism.info/wall/.
Everyone, Sentientist or not, is welcome in our groups. E.g: facebook.com/groups/sentientism.
Howie (twitter.com/askhowie & plantyourself.com & askhowie.com/) is a coach & author. His coaching work with people & organisations focuses on leadership, values, productivity & health.
In Sentientist Conversations we talk about the two most important questions: “what’s real?” & “what matters?”
Sentientism is "evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings." The audio is on our Podcast: apple.co/391khQO & pod.link/1540408008.
We discuss:
00:00 Welcome
02:01 Howie's Intro
- Coaching & writing
- "Not a big fan of capitalism"
- Effective altruism through organisations
- "Helping people respond to reality"
- Not knowing "what's real?" or "what matters?" but let's try to work it out
04:54 What's Real?
- Growing up in a conservative Jewish household in New Jersey
- Culturally Jewish but "kind of atheist"
- Mother's history of the holocaust & kindertransport
- Father's "Jewish identity & socialism." Needling the Rabbi: "We have to rest on the Sabbath so now I have to walk up 30 flights of stairs?!"
- Being given "The Truth About the Bible" book. Bible inconsistencies & immorality
- "The Jews have learned to argue & doubt & question"
- "The Jewish people must survive" as a core commitment
- Einstein, Marx, Freud
- A militant zionist phase
- "It was safe." There was no danger to the ritual vs. sweatlodges
- A "safe, conventional, suburban religion"
- Attending an Ivy League college
- "There are smart people who believe in ghosts"
- Exploring parapsychology
- "There were serious academics questioning my worldview which was completely materialistic"
- Rejecting the exclusive tribalism & the simplistic narratives of religion but "There is a big effing mystery out there"
- Shamanic practices "oh honey, it's all bullshit"
- Being sceptical of our own perceptions & reasoning. Be open
- Predictive dreams
- Contextualism... "How is this working for me?"
- "Look for & assume positive intent... then act like it's true"
- Talking to trees, brambles as defences, mycorrhizal fungi as comms networks
- Narratives of dominion vs. "consciousness in everything"
- Arbitrary vs. narratives grounded in reality
- "Supposedly using evidence & reason we've destroyed the planet"
- Checks: 1) consistency with the natural world & 2) compassion
32:50 What Matters?
- Be nice to people
- Mother's experience of Nazi occupation of Austria. "The teachers & her so called friends were wearing Nazi armbands" & "Punch a Nazi"
- Father's labour organising. "Fighting for the little guy" as the central moral theme
- A story of a police horse being stabbed: "I thought 'what a great story' until I started considering the sentience of the horse"
- Us vs. them ethos. I'm lucky to be on the "right side". Realising "everyone thinks they're on the right side!"
- Mitchell & Webb's Nazi sketch "are we the baddies?"
- "I'm still a humanist in my heart... I'm a sentientist in my mind"
- Being vegan but not suffering emotionally when thinking about animal suffering. "What's important to me is how I act"
- Our emotions are easily manipulated (music, contact, stories)
- Vegan for health & env. reasons. John Robbins "Diet for a New America" (1987). Then part of the vegan community
- Dangers of imprinting on "wise elders"
- Gregory Bateson's "Schismogenesis"
- "I'm vegan now, the world hates me for it... I'm going to buy the whole thing"
- Teaching as a rebel
- "I''m an instrumental vegan"
- Indigenous hunting culture. Honouring animals. "I would eat animals under some circumstances... I don't see anything in the world that is anywhere close to that standard."
- Even good justifications don't erase the harm done to victims
- Species/biodiversity vs. individuals
- Romance vs. reality of hunting
- Biocentrism
- Intrinsic/instrumental moral consideration
- Ecocentrism: "The risk that individual sentient beings can be chewed up for the sake of the system"
55:43 A Better Future
- It's a problem if we have to deny our self-interest in order to be good
- "Sand Talk - How Indigenous Thinking Can Save The World"... "Western Civilisation is a self-terminating algorithm"
- "It's how the game is set up"
- "We don't have the models we need yet"
- Experimentation. It's OK to make mistakes
- Supporting vs. shaming each other (even re: Ivermectin)
- Being OK with ourselves. Safety vs. fight/flight. Stephen Porges' "Polyvagal Theory"
- Narcissism
- If I had all the power I'd change things... but I don't... I have persuasion
- Shame & remorse & denial
- Critic to ally. Shared positive intent
- Stories that make me feel good w/out dominating
- We can't stop w/systems that make "good people treating each other well" a privileged position
- Tipping points
Sentientism is “Evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings.” More at sentientism.info/. Join our "I'm a Sentientist" wall sentientism.info/wall/.
Everyone, Sentientist or not, is welcome in our groups. E.g: facebook.com/groups/sentientism.
