The Unexplained - Howard Hughes - Edition 417 - Matt Richtel

Nov. 1, 2019 - The Unexplained - Howard Hughes

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Edition 417 - Matt Richtel

California author/researcher Matt Richtel fears we are getting "addicted" to technology with bad consequences for everyone

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	Across the UK, across continental North America and around the world on the internet, by webcast and by podcast.
	My name is Howard Hughes and this is The Unexplained.
	Thank you very much for being part of my show.
	We are well and truly embedded within October and staring down the barrel of winter.
	And dare I say at this point, I think some of the shopping TV channels actually have been selling Christmas stuff for months now, but Christmas is not too far away.
	I don't even want to go there.
	Maybe you're really excited.
	I'm just, I'll love it when it gets here.
	I just don't want to think about it now.
	Thank you very much for all of your emails, by the way.
	Keep them coming.
	And when you get in touch, tell me who you are, where you are, and how you use this show.
	It's nice to hear from you.
	The website is theunexplained.tv, designed and created by Adam from Creative Hotspot in Liverpool.
	And while you're at the website, sending me a message, if you'd like to make a donation for the show, that would be great and help all of this to carry on.
	Thank you very much if you've made a donation recently.
	Now, the subject for this edition of The Unexplained is one that is very close to my heart and everything that I do.
	It is the subject of technology and the way that we deploy technology in our lives.
	And whether we have maybe reached the stage, or maybe we're knocking on the door of the stage, where technology is beginning to drive us rather than it being our servant.
	You know, maybe technology is becoming, what did they used to say about drink?
	Drink is a good servant and a bad master.
	Are we reaching the stage where it's becoming problematic, at the very, very least for us?
	The technology now is becoming something that dominates our lives rather than something that enhances our lives.
	It's an interesting philosophical point.
	Not many people are talking about this now.
	One of the people who is, is Matt Richtel in San Francisco, USA, in the heart of Silicon Valley.
	This man is a Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times journalist and best-selling writer of mysteries and thrillers and a lot of factual stuff that is based on research and concerns technology and the world in which we live.
	I'm not going to say any more now.
	We're going to cross to San Francisco, USA, hopefully on a good digital connection and say hello to Matt Richtel.
	Matt Richtel, thank you very much for doing this.
	Thanks for having me, Howard.
	I really appreciate it.
	Now, Matt, talk to me a little bit about you because you are a writer and this is, I mean, it's not unique, but it's not the norm.
	You're a writer of fiction, but that fiction is rooted firmly in fact.
	So talk to me about you.
	Well, I think I am rooted firmly in fact myself, although I have a vivid imagination, so reasonable people could disagree.
	Let's see, about me.
	Well, I live in San Francisco with my wife and two kids, a dog named Uncle Mort and a cat.
	And the relevance of Uncle Mort is while he is only four, we named him Uncle Mort when we got him as a rescue because he looked to us like an ancient member of the British Parliament.
	And we thought he looks like he's both wise and wry.
	And so that is how we named our dog.
	That is our closest connection to the UK.
	Well, then he has to be a member of the ancient Parliament because I don't think we've got anybody wise and wry in our current Parliament.
	And that's for definite.
	You know, I tried to pick my words carefully because native to your land, I felt I should show the proper respect.
	No, you're absolutely in order.
	That's absolutely fine.
	But yeah, you keep him in the past because I don't think he'd like the present.
	But that, as we say, is a whole other story and not the subject of this particular conversation, as they say.
	Now, the bits that you're not telling me, though, come from your biography, right?
	Matt Richtle is a Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times journalist and best-selling writer of mysteries and thrillers.
	His books are, according to your bio, fast-paced, character-centered stories in which things are not always as they seem.
	That sounds fair?
	That sounds entirely fair.
	And to go directly to your question, you know, I think that you were asking is, yes, I am a New York Times reporter, which seeds me with all kinds of substance and information.
	And sometimes the fiction writer in me likes to go a little bit beyond, to be a little bit speculative, to explore what might be in ways that I am not permitted to, nor should I do in the pages of the New York Times.
	And so I guess you might say that there's a near science fiction component to my fiction, and I don't think it's often all that far-fetched.
	Right.
	Specifically, I was caught by your book, A Deadly Wandering, and the thoughts of technology, which is a subject you picked up in a number of places, and it sounds like it's very dear to your heart, and it's dear to my heart, too.
	The idea that is growing in many people's minds, I'm not sure whether it's common among every generation or how it's spread around, that technology is beginning to get, as they say, the whip hand over us.
	When we should be in control of technology, we are starting to have a problem.
	And that is the story, certainly, of the book A Deadly Wandering.
	But it's also something that's close to your heart.
	Talk to me about that feeling.
	Yeah.
	So, first of all, to be very clear, A Deadly Wandering is a true book.
	It is the story of a 19-year-old young man who killed two rocket scientists while he was texting and driving.
	And it explores the rise of attention science, which, believe it or not, began in Britain after World War II or during it, as your early neuroscientists were exploring what happens to our brains when we multitask.
	This is extremely close to my brain, my habits, the way I see the world and the world I'm steeped in.
	And Howard, the reason for that is I am based here in Silicon Valley and I am watching the ways in which technology is impacting us as individuals and a society, and it is no less than profound and world-changing.
	And yet, and yet, and yet, there are countless people who will tell you that progress, progress, as you would say in the U.S., is always a good thing.
	And, you know, in every instance, in most instances through history, you can see that it probably has been.
	But there is a growing sense, and I think that's just what you said, is that the progress that we are seeing at the moment may not actually be to our benefit, but may in fact, in some ways, unless we deal with it, be to our detriment, yeah?
	You know, this is the way I think of virtually every major industrial leap, whether you think of the advent of the car, which led to multiple deaths on the road, but was nonetheless a very big progress,
	form of progress, the industrialization of food, which led to more calories, to more people, but it also led to junk food, which has created obesity, or the rise of the mobile device, which has transformed communications and business interpersonal lives, but it has led to an immense change, often to the detriment in how we relate to each other and to ourselves.
	So in short, when you have these magnificent, gigantic changes, they often come with a dark side.
	And this is the final point I'll make, Howard.
	The issue with technology is, to your point, it is so often heralded and marketed as unobtrusive progress that we are sometimes missing the dark side of it.
	Hmm.
	Yeah.
	And do you think that that is down to what you might call, what a social scientist might call, generational change?
	In other words, as I've said often on radio shows that I've done, and this is not to downgrade or to disrespect the current generation, but they've been brought up on technology, so consequently, they perhaps do not see its potential hazards, problems, and risks.
	Well, I'm torn on this, Howard.
	Number one, I don't want to disagree with the host, the eminent host.
	No, you've got to do.
	I mean, that's half the point of coming on here.
	You have to.
	Well, the other part I was going to say is I want to start a pretty good wrangle here.
	But I actually think that quite to the contrary, the problem is spread across generations, and it is very simple for adults or older people to blame younger people.
	But the reality is that we are all swept up in this, and it is not purely a generational factor.
	Yeah, yeah, I mean, I think one of the things I was trying to say is that the younger generation, younger than me, and I suspect younger than you, they're natives to this.
	They've grown up with this.
	It is in their blood.
	You and I are running to catch up with them constantly.
	I mean, again, I want to say yes and no, but the yes to your broader point, but the distinction I want to make is the real challenges that come with technology, and I've addressed this in some very fun ways.
	I should tell you about the book Dead on Arrival, which is a piece of fiction in a second.
	But the real risks have to do with attention.
	They have to do with focus.
	They have to do with giving away our privacy and our agency.
	And that crosses generations.
	It doesn't matter that we're trying to catch up.
	The real truth is we use our devices just as compulsively as do our children.
	And therefore, on the grandest level, the problem is spread across generations.
	But I've heard people who are, well, they tell me they're experts in the field, say that, well, all of this preoccupation and the fact that, look, I am as guilty as anybody else.
	I am hooked on my, first of all, I was hooked on my computer 20 years ago.
	Now I've never got my smartphone out of my hand to go on the train to work.
	I'm checking constantly.
	Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and this is, you know, bad, I know, but I do it.
	I wake up in the middle of the night.
	I want to check email.
	I want to see what's going on in the world.
	Now, people who know about these things tell me from time to time that that is just a blip.
	That's a glitch with new technology.
	It's because it's so new and novel and because it's become so much of a part of our lives.
	Once in 10, 20 years from now, it's completely embedded within us.
	It'll all become really ho-hum and we won't do so much of this.
	You don't sound like you agree with that thought.
	I 100% disagree.
	Look, I think few have studied the science as closely as I have.
	The book you mentioned, A Deadly Wandering, is a nonfiction book that shows in clear terms through the backdrop of this deadly car crash, the way the technology plays to our deep neurological impulses.
	And if I might, Howard, I'll give you a way to think about this that involves cave people.
	I want you to, Howard, to do this exercise, I want you to picture yourself as a cave person.
	You got it?
	So this is you just a lot hairier.
	That's the cave.
	It's not much of a stretch.
	I can do it.
	What are you?
	Are you a member of British Parliament?
	Well, no, thank you.
	Play to my audience.
	I think I do a better job than most of them.
	Sorry.
	Anyway, I'm a caveman.
	Got it.
	You're a caveman and you're staring at a fire and you get a tap on the shoulder.
	Are you able to ignore the tap on the shoulder from behind?
	Well, no, because it's fight or flight, isn't it?
	You've got to turn around and deal with it.
	Is it opportunity or threat?
	Is someone warning of a lava flow?
	Is it a potential mate?
	Is it food?
	Is it a warning of a tiger in the brush?
	Well, it's threat until you know different.
	Well said.
	When your phone buzzes, it is the functional equivalent of a tap on the shoulder from anyone anywhere in the world.
	It is your spouse.
	It is your boss.
	It is your child.
	It is the promise of some, you know, some wonderful opportunity or some threat.
	You are on the most mechanical, fundamental, reptilian level, duty-bound to check it.
	This is point one I would make to you about how compelling your device is.
	May I add yet another layer?
	Go ahead.
	Do you ever buy a lottery ticket?
	Oh, I do.
	Not very often, and I never win.
	Okay.
	For those who do, for those who enjoy gambling, they may appreciate this.
	For those who use a slot machine, the reason those devices work is called intermittent reinforcement.
	It means that you occasionally get something good, and so it reinforces the habit of trying even when you often lose.
	What does this have to do with your cell phone?
	Here's the reality.
	You would think if much of what you get is spam or irrelevant, it would discourage you from using your device.
	Quite the contrary.
	It compels you to wait for the good one.
	All of this, and I'm leaving out very material science, but I'm trying to give you a notion that what is happening with your phone is a deep neurological pull that exceeds the actual value or substance of the information in your device.
	This is much more about stimulating you than something else.
	So I disagree fundamentally that this is going to change unless, unless we wisen up in a way that says, I need to understand what this device really is.
	I want to be very clear, Howard.
	I know I'm long-winded here, but I'm not suggesting our devices are bad.
	I'm suggesting that they are more than we really understand.
	And until we come to terms with what they truly represent, we are not going to be able to use them in the most effective way.
	And how is this different from any other preoccupation or any other new thing that we've had in our lives for as long as we've been around?
	It's fundamentally different for two reasons.
	One is that it is with us everywhere.
	And I would here draw a distinction between your medium, radio and TV and the device.
	Practically speaking, we didn't have it every place we went.
	But there's a much more fundamental thing.
	And before I explain it, I want to tell you how TV and radio work with the brain.
	What they do is they give you a plot line, in effect, a story, and then they punctuate it with occasional explosions or exciting information.
	What TV has long done to the brain is said, oh, here's the story of a family, and you're caught up in the narrative.
	And then, well, when you lose your attention, you'll notice that there's an explosion, a car chase, something else to draw you in, a form of novelty.
	Are you with me so far?
	Yep.
	Okay, here's the difference.
	One, your device is portable.
	And two, the plot is about you.
	This is the plot of your life.
	It is so deeply ingrained in you.
	It is as if you took the best TV show of all time and made yourself the protagonist.
	Do not doubt how powerful this is as a neurological draw.
	Now, it would only be so addictive, I would conjecture, if you had somewhere in your brain wired the thought that you could make things better, the more of it you did.
	Well, I like where you're going with that, but I would just rephrase it a touch.
	It's not so much that you have a sense that things are better.
	It's a sense that the way your brain works is to be oriented toward novelty and stimulation.
	And the reason for that on the deepest reptilian level is, again, you must understand opportunity or threat to survive.
	And what happens when you get incoming stimulation is you get a dopamine squirt, a squirt of, it's not the right word exactly, but simplistically, adrenaline.
	And when the adrenaline comes in, you orient your attention to the device.
	So it's not that you believe that something better will happen.
	It's that your survival mechanisms are oriented to attending to novel bursts of information, particularly when they may be about you.
	I completely relate to all of this, and I relate to it because of what I said at the very top of this, that I use devices so very much.
	If I tell you that last night was pretty typical for me, I got home from work two o'clock in the morning because I do a late-night radio show at the moment, and I can't sleep after that.
	You know, I'm still high on it.
	I'm still buzzing, right?
	So I have to, what do I do?
	I'm lying there and it's dark and it's quiet and I go to my phone and I look at stuff on Facebook.
	What are people posting?
	What's going on in the world?
	Then I'll discover a video and it might be a video of somebody climbing a tall tower, a tower that it makes me sick to think of how high they've gone up.
	But I'm fascinated by the fact that these people risk their lives to go all the way up a TV tower to get to the very top and then you think they've got to get back down again.
	So you watch this thing and it may be 12 minutes long.
	Then when it finishes, irrationally, I find myself being offered another video, which is what happens, and I'll watch that.
	And then the next thing, I will find two hours of my life have gone by.
	And, you know, I want to know from you, do you think I've got a problem?
	Because I think I'm not alone.
	Well, the first answer is, do I think you have a problem?
	The answer depends entirely on what your objectives are.
	If your objective is to be entertained and maybe informed at the expense of sleep and rest, then I say go, brother.
	Have fun.
	Well, what I would say to you is, and this does not, let's take me out of the equation, but people who do this, and that's most of the population now, they start off wanting to know more.
	They start off Wanting to be entertained and to have their minds expanded, but then something else happens, I think.
	Let me, let me, yes, something else happens, and the broader level is, and then I'm going to make it more specific, but if you use your device in a way that is most enriching, you are making a slave of it in the traditional sense that your device is no different than a dishwasher, a car, any other automated slave that would serve your ends.
	But when you begin to follow it, when it begins to drive your behavior, then you are its slave.
	And I want to say something very, very significant here.
	My latest book is called An Elegant Defense.
	It's about the immune system.
	And I think it's out in the UK now, just in the last few months.
	One of the foremost elements of your health has to do with sleep.
	You have hit on a very specific point here that I just want to underscore.
	Lack of sleep affects your health and your mental health more so than any facet you can control in your life.
	If Howard wants to stay up late and watch videos, and that is how he defines his life and happiness, I say more power to you.
	But if Howard has different set of objectives, like I want to get up and be fresh for my show, and I want to be focused when I get there, and I don't want to be susceptible to a cold or the flu, then you have to enslave the device and not the other way around.
	I take your point on sleep deprivation.
	For most of my broadcasting career, they put me on morning drive, you know, where people can hear you.
	Breakfast time, as we call it here, it's the biggest shift.
	And since I was 21, that's where they've been putting me.
	And I know all about existing functioning.
	In fact, I became an absolute expert on it, functioning on two hours sleep.
	But what I'm here to tell you is that you do that long term, and it has serious, serious repercussions for you, however good at doing it.
	And I am brilliant at it, you are.
	I would argue that it will catch up with you, however, here I am, and that's why I don't do as much of it now, and I work other times of the day.
	But I'm here to tell you that you may think in the short term it's not going to get you, but in the long term it is.
	Now, those people who are using devices, they're not getting up at 3.30 in the morning to do radio shows.
	They are living their daily lives that way.
	Again, this is where I have to say to people, I am no judge of anybody else or their behavior.
	I can only tell you what the science says about the choices you're making.
	If your choice is to entertain yourself or learn all the time on your device, that will lead you down one path of health and behavior.
	If you want, and I do understand that what I'm saying is implicitly appears judgmental.
	It is not meant to be.
	By contrast, if you set limits, if you understand that your device, in fact, is really about the relationship between your brain and stimulation and not about substance, then you can begin to make other choices.
	But there will be a lot of people listening to this who are better at managing all of this than perhaps you are and I am.
	And they say, I've got this all.
	It's like the drinker who says, I can go into a bar, I can have one drink, and then I go home.
	And, you know, some other people can't do that.
	Howard, sorry for interrupting.
	I doubt it.
	Because I look at the poll numbers, and I'll give you the most complete example of this.
	Again, these are United States numbers, so I don't want to make an unfair comparison to the UK.
	But the most extreme version of this conversation involves driving and texting.
	Look, when this all began, and I don't remember the precise numbers, but driving and texting, people would say that they would text and drive, let's say, I don't know, 30% of the time.
	Then in the United States, we got laws and we got knowledge about how dangerous that was.
	And you know what's happened?
	The numbers of texting and driving has gone up and the use of other technologies has risen, including Facebook, Instagram, videos, selfies.
	The point being here, there is no more dangerous time to use your device.
	Full stop.
	Well, let me just say here for our listeners in the UK who will know this anyway, there are very serious and quite rightly so penalties for doing that.
	I've driven on the M4 motorway, M3 motorway close to where I live.
	And I still see people, you know, when I get in the car, I turn my phone off.
	I always have.
	You know, whatever it is can wait until my journey is done.
	But I see people who don't think that way.
	I see truck drivers, I see taxi drivers, I see people going to work, whatever, driving along, and they have got their phones stuck to their ears.
	They're not using hands free.
	They're doing that, which I think is just dangerous and irresponsible.
	But there is something making them do that.
	There's no excuse for it.
	And my point being, Howard, when you say maybe it's just us, maybe others are being more judicious, that is not what the science bears out.
	It bears out massive use of this stuff in an uncontrolled way.
	And what do you think the difference is between people who use phones at the wheel?
	I mean, this is pretty obvious and basic.
	And let me say before I say what I'm about to say, that I think it's absolutely representative.
	I once saw a woman doing her makeup while she was driving along a British highway, motorway, which is only a year or so ago.
	And I thought it was the most irresponsible and crazy, mad, criminal thing that I've seen anybody do.
	But let me just say that it's completely wrong.
	But what's the difference between that and a person who enjoys a cup of coffee while they're driving along?
	Well, the difference has to do with the systematic nature of the behavior.
	One, you may have a cup of coffee on an occasional basis, or you may use it even daily on your commute, but that is not taking Up your brain space to do.
	That is a reflexive behavior.
	Talking on the phone consumes essential parts of your brain that would focus on the road.
	And we have to say, I'm being very BBC here, but we have to say that, you know, if you look at the letter of the law, that having a swig of a cup of coffee or whatever while you're driving along, that too is illegal.
	I just have to say that so our listeners know.
	But I'm sure they do anyway.
	Sorry, you were saying.
	If you're going to do BBC, I'm going to have to use bigger work.
	Don't worry.
	Look, I left the BBC back in the summertime.
	We're not doing BBC, but I just needed to, you know, once they get hold of you, all of those caveats appear in your system.
	So I wanted to put that there for common sense sake.
	Sorry, you were saying.
	I work for the New York Times, so I've got that gear as well.
	If we want to do caveats, we can do it until it gets dark.
	True enough.
	Okay, but the point is, bringing it back to the point that these technologies are addictive and they suck you in, you think, in a way, and science, you say, tells us in a way that previous technologies and previous distractions have not.
	Yes, I say yes to everything you said with one small exception, which is I personally don't use the word addictive.
	And the reason for that is that the way addiction is defined or has historically been defined has to do with the ability to see brain degradation from an addiction.
	For instance, if you use cocaine or heroin, you can see brain tissue degrade.
	So there's a technical distinction between addiction and, say, highly compulsive that is a little bit, as I say, technical.
	But yes, on the whole, I agree with what you're saying.
	We know that from people who abuse drugs that long-term drug abuse can rewire, hardwire the brain.
	Do you believe that's happening with technology, that there are irreversible changes being made?
	I don't think we know enough to know.
	And my own impression is that we have the capacity at the moment.
	This is, again, this is purely anecdotal.
	I want to be very clear in the BBC sense.
	I think we can reclaim our lives.
	If anybody has gone on a vacation that's listening and stopped using their device, they will begin to notice how less reactive they become, which suggests to me that it is possible to reclaim their lives.
	If they do go on vacation, they should read one of my books.
	Okay, no, I hear what you say, as they would say in a court of law over here.
	Yeah, but look, going away with your communication device, I always find is a good thing.
	I did a radio show out of Liverpool a few months ago, and then I decided I got a few days off.
	I was going to drive all around Wales and stop at different hotels in isolated coastal parts of Wales, and I had a blast.
	I loved it.
	It relaxed me.
	It made me feel better than I'd felt for years.
	Of course, I backslid now.
	I'm back in London.
	But I had a great time.
	But I had my tablet with me.
	I had my cell phone with me.
	And I was always looking for 4G reception in these rural places to make sure that I could just make sure that everything was okay.
	But I promise you, I wasn't addicted to them.
	I put them in my bag most of the time.
	I think I had it in perspective.
	I think you sounds like you did.
	And I want to say science also backs up that during the period where you let your brain get away from those devices, you are probably synthesizing information and experiencing creativity at a heightened level.
	And the reason for that is that in order to synthesize information and in order to be creative, it requires uninterrupted flow of your brain.
	And when you are constantly nickel and diming your brain by checking your device, you actually are impinging your ability to form deeper thoughts.
	Now, I wanna Well, let me give you some science.
	So one of my favorite studies on this subject involves here in San Francisco at the University of California at San Francisco, which here is, you know, up there in the pantheon with like Oxford and your great institutions.
	One of the leading researcher here did a study with rats that involved measuring the flow of neurological activity using brain waves and was able to see that when a rat experiences something new,
	if then left alone to process that, the information traveled from its origin in the brain through the hippocampus, which is where you store memories.
	But when the rat moved from one new experience to another new experience, that neurological activity did not make it into memory.
	Similarly, we have seen in studies with humans that when you are regularly interrupted, when there is stimulation coming in, your learning and memory functions are less effective than when they are if you are left uninterrupted.
	I'll give you one basic way to begin to pull back your life from your device.
	You've heard those, do you guys have the phrase there like take back the night or take back the, you know, the government or do you guys have that phrase?
	I know, I've heard it on American radio and I know what you're saying.
	You know, I say this, take back the checkout aisle.
	This is my simple little bit of counsel for your listeners.
	When you're standing at the cash register at the store and you're tempted to not just sit in that moment but use your device, practice the habit of taking back seconds, milliseconds, even minutes from your device because it is in those moments when the flow of your mind actually begins to develop.
	And you are not allowing it to happen if you don't spend even a moment away From your device, geez, I think you're so right, and I'd never really thought about this.
	This is something I do all the time.
	We have a local supermarket in my area called Sainsbury's, one of the big supermarkets in the UK, and there's a big one a mile or two away from me.
	I often go there because it's just convenient.
	But I find a real problem that I always get annoyed at this.
	The cell phone reception at some of the checkouts is virtually zero.
	And then, so I can't, I'm standing there queuing, waiting to check out my stuff.
	And I always have to check my emails and stuff.
	I sound like a real addict here, but I check out my emails and things on my phone.
	But there are some of the checkouts towards the end of the store where you can't get reception.
	And I get peeved.
	But, but, but, but let me just, if I can just finish, but exactly as you say, in the moments where I can't get reception, I think about other things.
	Sorry.
	I just wanted to say, I hope I don't sound disrespectful, but I hope you hear your own voice because you very much do sound like an addict.
	I mean, it's a preposterous notion to think that you could be missing something vital in the time it takes to stand in that line.
	So I just, I understand.
	Look, let me not be holier than thou.
	I understand the internal battle.
	I face it myself all the time, and I have to constantly remind myself, you don't need to look at your device right now.
	You are stealing time from yourself.
	You asked me at the beginning of this conversation, tell us about you.
	And what I didn't tell you, and maybe you alluded to, is I have, for whatever reason, I've been very blessed to write a number of books, work for the New York Times.
	I write a lot of music.
	I find that my ability to produce things that make me feel good depends very heavily on having a free mind.
	And if I enslave my mind to things, it inhibits my capacities to do many of the things that feel very good to me and I hope are the stuff of productivity.
	Does this extend to other realms of the digital domain?
	I say this for a very specific reason.
	I'm sitting here recording this in a very humble kind of recording setting that I've built myself, okay?
	Now, a lot of the gear that I've acquired over the years, I've got reasonably cheaply through eBay, through an auction site.
	Let's put it that way.
	If I bought just a few basic things from a shop, then I'd be able to do this probably just as well if I bought the right things.
	But I've bought multiples of things through auction sites like eBay because they're available and they offer me a great multiplicity of things, of choices.
	So I've probably bought more stuff to do.
	I mean, it's all humble gear, but I've bought more gear than I probably need.
	Now, if I hadn't had a digital connection and there wasn't a website like that, I wouldn't have done that.
	Well, look, I think actually you've described a very positive scenario.
	This is where I think we need to laud technology.
	It is great that Howard does not need a massive broadcast studio to speak to people across the world and broadcast to people across his nation and elsewhere.
	Exactly.
	No, this has been the most empowering, democratizing thing.
	You know, if I decided to quit broadcast radio completely and I've been nearly there a few times, I'm not silenced.
	I would have been 20 years ago.
	I go on.
	Exactly.
	So this goes back to the very first point that I think we made.
	The industrialization of major technologies, whether the car, modern medicine, food, and now technology catches on because it has enormous, empowering, life-providing, happiness-giving potential.
	And the question is, how do we learn to draw the line such that we get the best out of things without suffering the side effects?
	What we are awakening now is to the fact that this technology, when it is used as your slave, as it is being used by you and I right now, is so powerful and effective and wonderful in a sense.
	How do we can we get the best out of it while saying to the other stuff, you are junk food.
	I don't need you high caloric chip or processed food, but I can take the best out of the industrialization of food.
	I can take you car and drive from one place to the next in an efficient, personal fashion without killing somebody because I won't drink and drive or I will pay attention to the road.
	And I can use my technology to broadcast to a nation without having to stare down and walk into the checkout aisle because I can't avoid my email for 30 seconds.
	One of the things you say, and I quote, is things that have enormous power to serve us can also have enormous power to take advantage of us.
	If that is so, and I suspect it might be, do you think that's a deliberate plan by somebody or is that just a spin-off, a corollary of the technology?
	It's not a deliberate plan, although you should be aware of something.
	First of all, I don't think conspiracies work like that because I do think that human beings only gravitate to that which really serves them on a general level.
	No one thrust mobile phones down our throats.
	We came to them because they serve enormous purpose.
	But you must recognize the following.
	The companies in the technology world make their money from your attention.
	They have commodified and collected all of our attention and they sell against it.
	Your attention means nothing to them on an individual level.
	It means everything on a collective level, but it means nothing to them on an individual level, but it means everything to you on an individual level.
	There is a disconnect between the value of attention to them and the value to you.
	You have to command your attention.
	No, there's not a conspiracy, but yes, they want you on as much as humanly possible.
	But it isn't a deliberate plan, as some conspiracy theorists may say, not a deliberate plan to enslave us.
	It's just part of the business model and left to the free market unchecked.
	That, I guess, is how it will remain.
	Well, look, look.
	Unless we take power, unless we take charge of it.
	Yes, look at how the stocks measure themselves.
	How many people do we have spending how much time with our services?
	Full stop.
	I mean, look, it's true of the New York Times.
	Let's not be disingenuous.
	It's true of your radio show.
	It's true of Facebook.
	It's true of Google.
	We are fighting for your attention.
	You must choose.
	You must unenslave yourself and let your needs dictate, not the needs of a media company and not the needs of an automated program aimed at getting your attention.
	Aren't you just one lone voice shouting at the wolves in an isolated glacier in Antarctica, though?
	Everybody else is using the technology in the way that they're using it.
	Only you are saying that's not a good thing.
	That's the nicest thing anybody's ever said about me.
	I want that in my obituary.
	One lone voice.
	Blowing in the wind.
	I think you should have that on the masthead of your website, actually, but it's up to you.
	Wait.
	Speaking of my website, are we allowed to say it so I can steal some attention?
	Well, of course you can.
	MattRichtel.com.
	M-A-T-T-R-I-C-H-T-E-L.com.
	Come help me scream into the wind by myself.
	Okay.
	All right.
	Now, the book, A Deadly Awakening, as you say, it is a true story.
	And it's a very...
	Deadly Wandering is a true story about this 19-year-old Utah college student, Reggie Shaw.
	He's texting and driving with his girlfriend when he crosses the yellow lines on the highway and then kills two people.
	Yeah, two rockets.
	So what became of him?
	I mean, so basically, he deprived the world of two people who could have made an enormous contribution to it.
	What became of him?
	Yeah, what became of him is the essence of this book and story.
	And without giving too much away, again, I want to emphasize this is a true story you could not make up.
	He is a profoundly interesting character who lives in a small town in northern Utah.
	And he went through an emotional journey that is the stuff of the best TV shows in the world.
	And I'm not going to tell you the outcome other than to say that many people come to me and say I wept reading what happened to him and his story.
	And it made me think so much about how I use my devices.
	So I really don't want to give it away.
	Is he in prison?
	Is he in prison now?
	He was in jail.
	He was in jail.
	He is not in prison.
	Okay.
	We had a case here.
	You may be aware of it.
	It was a heart-rending case that I had because I was on air, on the radio in the area that this thing happened.
	But there was a truck driver.
	He was not paying attention.
	He was checking the music, I believe, on his device.
	And in the space of one second of his inattention, he crashed his truck into the back of a car.
	And a mother and three children died in this thing.
	And their lives, well, Ian, they've just been cut short.
	They've gone.
	And this guy is now in prison.
	I feel such sadness and fury.
	I have two young children.
	Please, if you're listening, please take care.
	It takes a millisecond.
	And the reason it takes a millisecond of inattention is because even if you look down or away or are consumed by just a second, it takes your brain even longer than that to reorient to the road.
	And you know, the police released the video from within his truck.
	He had monitoring surveillance video in the truck.
	And you can see him looking at the device, and then you hear the most chilling multiple bang.
	And the next thing, his life has changed, and those people are gone.
	It's a thing that, I mean, I'm getting upset talking about it because that family, they wouldn't have known what was coming.
	And the lives that they could have led, they can't lead now.
	And that is a case that's core to what you're saying, it seems to me.
	It's core.
	It's essential.
	It's quintessential.
	I mean, that truck essentially is a missile.
	And someone has to pilot it.
	So collectively, we have an issue to deal with here.
	I wonder how we set about dealing with it.
	Because what you've said are things along the lines of you just need to realize this and maybe do a bit less of it and you'll be okay.
	And I think it's probably, like most things, it's more complex than that.
	Yes, it is more complex than that.
	So just to be clear on what we're talking about trying to reform, if we're trying to reform our road behavior, my honest belief, Howard, is what's going to change that is automated cars.
	I believe that, I don't believe we're going to be able to amend the behavior of individuals, but I do believe that people will eventually be much more comfortable with automated cars than they once would have been because they will be perfectly happy.
	And I will be perfectly happy, frankly, to sit in my car driven by the steering wheel and read and be productive or talk to my parents on the phone or my children than driving.
	I would have said to you two months ago that that would make me less of the person that I've been for all these years because my hands are not on the steering wheel.
	But I was driven home in an Uber car a few weeks ago.
	There was some kind of mistake and they gave me an executive car, which was very nice.
	But this car was conscious of its surroundings and the driver said, okay, you see that cyclist there, the car's going to break.
	And the car did it for him.
	You know, and that's just a tiny taste of what is to come.
	And I thought, What a great sense of reassurance you would feel if you knew that at all the times of your life, something else was in charge.
	Sorry, I'm talking too much.
	No, you're not.
	You make a great point, and I'm glad you brought it up because I will echo that.
	The first time I got in a Google driverless car when I was down at the company just seeing their experiments, I thought this is going to make me a nervous wreck.
	And pretty soon I thought, oh, that's fine.
	This is like being on a Disneyland ride.
	So I believe on the driving level, that will help us.
	On the personal level, I honestly say to people, this is going to come down to your capacity to declare what you want in your life.
	And I will say this also, it's very Machiavellian in a way, but to the focused go the spoils.
	If you have the capacity to use this stuff for your betterment, for your children's betterment through judicious use, you are likely to become a creative, more creative, more thoughtful, more synthesized thinker.
	And if you become overcome by it, then you're likely to become its slave.
	And I urge people to make good choices the way they would about food.
	Do you know, I sit at work with some of my colleagues, and they're mostly younger than me these days.
	And one of the things, and usually they start the conversation, is, you know, when was the best time?
	You know, if you could stop all of the developments that we've had, some of the crazy stuff that has happened in this world, when did things start to go off the rails?
	And my view has always been, I think about 1994.
	It was a great year, 1995.
	We didn't have cell phones.
	We had more access to communications.
	Computers were just coming in, but they did not dominate our lives.
	If I wanted to phone somebody when I was out, I probably had to find a phone box to do it.
	And it didn't really hurt me.
	And everything seemed to get done.
	And then we get to about 1997, and I got my first home computer.
	So did lots of other people.
	And then things just began to progress exponentially.
	And it seems to me that there's just a glut of everything.
	There's too much of everything now.
	And as a human being, and I think this is something that you talk about, isn't it, Matt?
	That we are not equipped as flesh, blood, and bones to cope with it all now.
	It's exceeded us.
	I think that's fair.
	I just want to say that I don't want people to think they lack choice.
	I do think it takes discipline, but on so many measures, the world is better than it has ever been in terms of fewer people, child mortality, childhood mortality, infant mortality, access to medicines and food, fewer people living in slavery.
	You know, we are not at world war right now, as we were twice in the last century.
	And that means our young men and women not sent off to die on a field or in a foxhole.
	We are better off in many ways.
	Can we command the tools that we have been given or invented?
	Can we enslave them?
	If we can, these can be the best of all possible worlds.
	You know, technology is, I think it was illustrated quite recently, a double-edged sword, really.
	There's some technology from China that allows people to be identified correctly, identification technology, just by the veins, the patterns of veins in their hand.
	And that will differentiate you from a billion other people.
	That sounded to me like great technology.
	But there is other technology that will lead to the things that you talked about.
	And there are things like deep fakes, for example.
	They're creating deep fakes, and eventually they'll be able to maybe replicate you and make you go and rob a bank.
	All of life is a balance, but there's a balance.
	There's a great use of technology.
	There's a use of technology that could become a problem.
	You know, if you want to think about this in maybe the most very stark sense, you can think of the origin of guns.
	A gun may have allowed a smaller person to fend off a bully.
	It may have allowed the police to protect, and it also allowed the bad guys to do whatever they would do.
	And so the term arms race seems incredibly applicable here.
	These are not guns in the sense that violence would be done immediately, but they are that powerful.
	Your ability to fake someone, to steal from someone, to protect someone, all of that has come into play.
	What will win out, I don't really know.
	Do the, and you kind of suggested here, maybe I'm doing you a disservice by saying this, but you sort of said, but it's in the nature of technology companies to use this technology to bring you in, to draw you in, to suck you in and get you constantly attending to the devices and looking at the adverts and doing all the other stuff, checking out the content.
	But do you think that they ought to have a little more responsibility than that and perhaps be legislated against or around in order to make them somehow, I don't know how you would do this, but control these things?
	I notice one thing that's in the news as I record this today.
	Facebook is trying an experiment, you may have seen this, to limit people seeing the number of likes they've got for posts because of the deleterious effects that constantly seeking likes.
	Here's my issue with the legislative side.
	It's not a philosophical statement one way or the other.
	I don't know how you legislate something moving so quickly.
	And I don't know how you would categorize what the legislation would be.
	I do think you could tell car companies putting a 17-inch screen, touch screen inside your car that lets people interact while they're on the road is not a good idea.
	I do think you could say inside individual schools, no one can use a device.
	But legislating at a big level around something that moves so quickly, I don't discourage it because of a philosophical position.
	I just don't understand what that legislation would look like.
	I think we need to educate, extremely educate.
	I think that the tech companies need to be countered by some messaging that notes how deleterious this can be.
	And I suppose maybe it begins with a few people screaming into the wind.
	Well, you've done that.
	And is there any big point that I've missed in this conversation?
	I'm sure there are loads of them, but anything we haven't said we should have?
	No, this has been a wonderful conversation.
	I'm very grateful that you had me on.
	I didn't know what direction this would go, and I liked, for who cares what I think, but I thought it was, I hope you felt it was productive.
	How about that?
	Yeah, well, no, look, I'm concerned about these.
	Just as a human being, as a person, I love technology.
	You've heard that.
	I'm using technology now.
	God, it's empowered me to stand alone.
	I don't have to be bumped and buffeted by what it's like to be a person working in the media.
	And you know all about that.
	You know, ultimately, there's always a route for me.
	And the route for me now is because I'm empowered by technology.
	So if everything else failed for me and I could still speak and think, I can still do what I do.
	And that's great.
	Now, technology in the last 20 years has made that possible.
	20 years ago, that wasn't a possibility.
	So that is a good use of technology.
	But what I, for what my view is worth, and it's not worth very much, we've got to start thinking about these things.
	And truthfully, I worry because I don't think we are.
	Well, this is where it starts.
	This is where it started with everything from women's suffrage to drunk driving to not eating junk food.
	It started with people who felt like outliers having a conversation and changing a culture such that what was once done was considered in the now we look back and think that's absurd.
	And that's where we are now.
	So let's educate.
	But if this was any other issue, there would be a pressure group.
	I've just thought of one now in my head.
	Crut, CRUT, the campaign for the responsible use of technology.
	There isn't one.
	Well, look, there's not one as such.
	And the reason there's not one is there's so many economic factors pushing its heavy use.
	There are so many companies and entrepreneurs invested in us using more.
	And there's no real economic benefit to not using more.
	So that is a massive reality to be going in the face of.
	I'm just going to tell you your own economic reality to those listening.
	You control your destiny and to the focus go the spoils.
	If you are one of those people who can command your time, your own economic future, and that I don't just mean your job, but I mean economics broadly, your time, your resources, your ability to command your life, your happiness, even your longevity, if you look at your immune system.
	And again, that's in my immune system book.
	But all of that you can command by making your choices.
	It's your own individual economic and health future at stake.
	You must command it because there are too many economic forces working against you if you allow them.
	Okay, here comes the kicker then at the end.
	Well, there are billions of us on this planet.
	If we don't do these things, if most of us don't, what happens?
	Well, you know, here, again, I'm going to be a little bit optimistic.
	I think that the humankind has ebbed and flowed over time through lots of things.
	And, you know, there was a time, this is just a random example, but there was a time in Germany where lots of people followed someone and led to, you know, 100 million people dying or whatever the figure was.
	We can follow down dangerous paths and recover, and we recover because of an indelible human spirit.
	But sometimes it comes at an enormous cost before we learn.
	So in my ideal world, we would learn sooner rather than later and without catastrophe.
	Well, I'm trained not to say this, but I will say it.
	I sort of agree.
	Fascinating stuff, food for thought.
	And I think we've kind of kicked off a debate here that's going to reverberate around the world.
	You mentioned it in the middle of this, but what is your website?
	My name is Matt Richtel, M-A-T-T-R-I-C-H-T-E-L.
	And my website is matrichtel.com.
	I hope you'll, I would love if you drop me a note, if you go there and tell me just how wise and attractive you find me.
	Both of them.
	I'm sure lots of people are going to do that.
	You know, the fact we have to just underline here, and I'm being presumptuous enough to speak for you here, which I shouldn't do, is that we're not saying, I would be the last person to say, and you've heard why.
	And I'm sure you're not saying, we're not saying technology is bad.
	So if you're listening to this, please don't go away with that idea.
	Technology is good.
	Absolutely.
	But it's how you deploy it.
	100%.
	It's not kind of what you got, but it's what you do with it is an old saying, but it applies here.
	Matt Richtel, thank you so much.
	Thank you, Howard.
	Gratitude.
	Matt Richtel, and in this modern world, very definitely food for thought.
	I like to think that I give you stuff to think about.
	Certainly given me food for thought.
	And next time I'm queuing in the supermarket, perhaps I'm going to be able to keep that phone in my pocket.
	Not sure.
	I'm going to have to try it out.
	We have more great guests in the pipeline here at The Unexplained.
	Thank you very much for your emails.
	Keep them coming.
	Go to theunexplained.tv and don't forget the official The Unexplained with Howard Hughes Facebook page is live and needing your attention right now.
	If you'd like to give it some of your screen time, then I'd be a very happy man, okay?
	So like I say, more great guests coming until next we meet.
	My name is Howard Hughes.
	This has been The Unexplained.
	I am in London.
	Please, whatever you do, stay safe, stay calm, and above all, please stay in touch.
	Thank you very much.
	Take care.

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