Decoding the Gurus

Christopher Kavanagh and Matthew Browne

A psychologist and an anthropologist try to make sense of the world's greatest self-declared Gurus.

  • 45 minutes 56 seconds
    Supplementary Material 24: Dialogos with Greek Gods, the Metaphysics of Pepe, and Red-Pilled Embarrassment

    Chris and Matt confront their inner demons, manifest their personal deities, and dive into the Onto-Logos.

    Supplementary Material 24

    00:00 Introduction

    02:32 Matt's Surprise Shaming

    06:39 Jordan Peterson's Inner Monologue Revealed

    10:04 Trump on Ukraine

    15:22 Sean Carroll explains US cuts to science funding

    16:47 Bleak Prospects for the US

    24:14 Aella vs. Arrogant Red Pill Man

    37:22 Be wary of Overcorrecting

    43:11 John Vervaeke meets Hermes

    52:59 False Dichotomies of the Spirit

    01:03:38 Entering into Dialogos with Matt's Inner Darwin

    01:07:39  Perspectival and participatory phenomenological identity transformation.

    01:09:20 Other ways of knowing spirits

    01:13:45 Materialists and their Monological Mindsets

    01:18:37 Welcome to the Onto-Logos

    01:24:06 Bad Faith Commenters

    01:29:35 Pageau and the Metaphysics of Pepe the Frog

    01:36:32 Next Book Review: Other Minds

    The full episode is available for Patreon subscribers (1hr 41 mins).

    Join us at: https://www.patreon.com/DecodingTheGurus

    Sources


    28 February 2025, 8:00 am
  • 33 minutes 22 seconds
    Supplementary Material 23: Content Shark Psychology, Rorschach Tweets, and the Art of Radicalisation

    Chris and Matt have their models exploded, the maps ripped up, and their minds blown as the Gurusphere expands into exciting new territory.

    Supplementary Material 23

    02:47 Chris Williamson blows our minds!

    08:57 Content Predator psychology and motivational posting

    12:28 Balancing the Scales

    14:07 Eric Weinstein the master of Rorschach Tweets

    20:26 Modern Sages Reunited: Bret Weinstein and Joe Rogan

    24:29 Open-Minded Joe Rogan

    34:26 Maybe prescriptions are actually bad!

    37:38 Andrew Gold expands into Race & IQ

    46:47 4 Warning Signs of Radicalism

    56:45 Monomaniacal Fixation vs. Pluralism

    01:05:26 Rejoinder: What if it is a diagnostic?

    01:09:43 Lex wants to join DOGE

    01:10:31 Lex's next world leader interview: Modi

    01:14:57 Matt's Final Thought: People contain multitudes

    01:16:57 Outro

    The full episode is available for Patreon subscribers (1hrs 19 mins).

    Join us at: https://www.patreon.com/DecodingTheGurus

    Sources


    22 February 2025, 9:00 am
  • 2 hours 58 minutes
    Chris Langan: The Smartest Person in the World with a 200 IQ!

    In this episode, Matt finally gets his revenge on Chris by dragging him deep into the eccentric world of Chris Langan—the self-proclaimed possessor of a 200 IQ and creator of The Cognitive Theoretic Model of the Universe, yet another grand unifying theory of everything. Langan presents himself as an intellectual titan, offering mathematical, social, religious, and philosophical insights so profound that mere mortals can barely grasp them.

    Prepare to have the mysteries of the universe, God, anti-God, angels, and demons unveiled. Consciousness, determinism, and free will? All finally explained. But that’s not all—somehow, it all connects to globalist plots, election conspiracies, vaccines, UFOs, and, of course, the devil pulling the strings.

    Join us for conservative pundit Michael Knowles’ therapy session with one of his idols-a man who reassures him that he is a very smart boy and that his fundamentalist Christian beliefs are, in fact, completely correct.

    If you thought Eric Weinstein was something, imagine him cranked up to 12. That’s Chris Langan...

    Also... get ready for Matt's double down on his Aussie food takes.

    Links


    21 February 2025, 9:00 am
  • 35 minutes 6 seconds
    Decoding Academia 32: Do Babies REALLY like good guys?

    In this episode, Matt and Chris take a look at a recent developmental psychology paper on the social evaluation of young babies. Do they display a preference for agents who are nice to others or could they care less at the babbling age? This is a large-scale, multi-lab, preregistered replication effort of a rather influential paper so it ticks all of Chris' Open Science boxes, but how does Matt react? Is he stuck in his pre-replication crisis paradigms? Join us to find out and along the way find out about baby Matt's psychotic tendencies, how cats feel about cucumbers, and how Matt narrowly escaped being eaten by a big ol' crocodile.

    Paper Reference: Lucca, K., Yuen, F., Wang, Y., Alessandroni, N., Allison, O., Alvarez, M., ... & Hamlin, J. K. (2025). Infants’ Social Evaluation of Helpers and Hinderers: A Large‐Scale, Multi‐Lab, Coordinated Replication Study. Developmental Science, 28(1), e13581.

    Original Study: Hamlin, J. K., Wynn, K., & Bloom, P. (2007). Social evaluation by preverbal infants. Nature, 450(7169), 557-559.

    Decoding Academia 32

    00:00 Introduction

    00:59 Matt's Close Shave with a Crocodile

    03:15 Discussion on Crocodile Behavior

    05:13 Introduction to the Academic Paper

    06:18 Understanding Registered Reports

    07:49 Details of the Replication Study

    12:07 The Many Babies Study

    18:23 Challenges in Developmental Psychology

    20:35 Original Study and Replication Efforts

    26:27 HARKing and the QRP problem in psychology

    34:24 Discussing the Results

    36:58 Exploring the Red Ball Experiment

    39:38 Forest Plot Analysis

    41:19 Infant Preferences and Social Evaluation

    43:24 Failure to Replicate the Original Study

    47:06 Exploratory Analysis and Moderators

    50:03 Interpretations and Implications

    54:21 Evolutionary Perspectives on Social Behavior

    58:34 Prosocial Evolutionary Speculation

    01:05:10 Psychopathic Baby Matt

    01:06:28 Concluding Thoughts and Reflections

    01:11:20 Comparative Psychology on Snake Hatred!

    The full episode is available for Patreon subscribers (1hrs 15 mins).

    Join us at: https://www.patreon.com/DecodingTheGurus

    20 February 2025, 6:15 am
  • 1 hour 4 minutes
    Supplementary Material 22: Tim Tams, Nazi Salutes, and AI Demonology

    We immerse ourselves in the Dark Side of the Gurusphere and come out forever altered by what we've seen and praying for an escape from this demon-haunted world.

    00:00 Introduction

    01:38 Reverse Culture Shock in Australia

    11:01 Tim Tams and Food Progress

    12:14 Russia Today endorses Lex's statements on Zelensky

    19:20 Elon Musk's Controversial Gesture

    38:31 Destiny's (Most Recent) Controversy

    01:02:12 Bryan Johnson vs. Andrew Huberman: Civility Insights

    01:14:21 Sacriligeous Sycophancy: Bill Ackman and Sam Altman

    01:15:55 Jonathan Pageau's Stargate Theories

    01:26:52 Escaping the Demon-Haunted World

    The full episode is available for Patreon subscribers (1hrs 30 mins).

    Join us at: https://www.patreon.com/DecodingTheGurus

    Sources


    12 February 2025, 9:45 pm
  • 51 minutes 40 seconds
    Gurometer: Peter Thiel *Patreon Preview"

    'Tis a New Year (sort of), and amidst all the chaos in the world, we thought we'd offer a small glimmer of light by making this Patreon episode available to everyone! If you enjoy it, consider joining us on Patreon—or not, it's your call!

    In this episode, Matt and Chris scry through the portents and ponder the apocalyptic insights of the tech and finance titan Peter Thiel. We all know that Thiel is an urbane gentleman of great refinement with a collection of revolutionary ideas but does he make the Gurometer sing? Tune in to find out—and, as a bonus, learn more than you ever wanted to know about the intricacies of academic grading systems.

    11 February 2025, 1:00 am
  • 3 hours 8 minutes
    Peter Thiel: The Techno-Apocalypse is Nigh

    In this episode, Matt and Chris tackle the big ideas—or at least the ones rattling around in Peter Thiel’s mind. Tech billionaire, venture capitalist, and political kingmaker, Thiel has long been a looming figure in Silicon Valley, known for his deep pockets, contrarian takes, and peculiar philosophical musings. But beneath the surface-level libertarian posturing, what does Thiel actually believe? And does it hold up to scrutiny?

    The decoders dig into Thiel’s recent interview on Uncommon Knowledge, where he waxes biblical about end times, interprets the katechon with all the confidence of a medieval theologian, and seamlessly blends venture capitalism with prophecies of the Antichrist.

    Along the way, they explore Thiel’s method of connecting historical dots with pure vibes, and his Jetsons Fallacy, the deep disappointment that the world looks more like The Office than a 1960s vision of the future. They dissect the Sensemaker Aristocracy surrounding him—with its reverent back-patting and strange mix of deference and obfuscation that turns tech moguls into prophets. They also highlight Thiel’s bizarre leaps in logic, from citing biblical prophecies to warning about one-world free-trade Communist government conspiracies and his confusing stance on technological progress—simultaneously lamenting stagnation while fearing we’re racing too fast toward Armageddon.

    Of course, no billionaire worldview would be complete without some COVID conspiracies, and Thiel delivers, crafting an elaborate Fauci Bioweapon Paradox in which the pandemic response was simultaneously overblown and also secretly justified because the virus was (obviously) engineered.

    So is Peter Thiel a visionary? A libertarian Cassandra? Or just a very wealthy man with a lot of half-formed ideas and a habit of mumbling them into microphones? Matt and Chris wade through the mess so you don’t have to. Stay till the end for the Revolutionary Leprechaun Theory of Western Civilization… if you dare.

    Links


    4 February 2025, 1:30 pm
  • 1 hour 20 minutes
    The Wounded Bird Lex Fridman vs. The Evil Ukrainian Bot Farms

    In this episode, we look at a recently released segment by Lex Fridman, where he reflects on his interview with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

    We examine Lex’s self-presentation as a Christ-like figure—someone who is willing to suffer, feign naivety and ignorance, and even risk his life in the name of world peace—all while maintaining an eight-hour daily study regimen and enduring relentless, unfair attacks from Ukrainian bot farms and war-loving critics.

    Like true sensemakers, we also entertain an outlandish alternative hypothesis: what if Lex is, in fact, an arrogant and biased podcaster—dismissive of criticism, oblivious to his political leanings, and adopting a “wounded bird” persona to elicit sympathy from his audience?

    Join us as we sift through the Zelensky's (supposed) failures, the bot farms, and the wounded bird theatrics to determine whether Lex is a hero for peace—or just another podcaster lost in his own narrative.

    Sources


    22 January 2025, 9:00 am
  • 48 minutes
    Supplementary Material 21: The emergency snake, thought = secularised prayer, and Love and War

    It's 2025, and the Gurusphere shows no signs of slowing down—so here we are, diving into some grim crossovers. This time, the bro-optimiser Andrew Huberman has teamed up with the chaos dragon himself, Jordan Peterson. Meanwhile, the ever-affectionate Lex Fridman finally scored an interview with Zelensky. Bret, however, remains preoccupied with Goliath's ongoing PsyOps.

    P.S. Matt broke his dongle so he's on the AirPods, we will be back to proper audio setup next episode.

    Supplementary Material 21

    00:00 Introduction and Farewell to America

    01:43 Memorable Encounters and Experiences

    03:48 Oldering & the Destruction of the Self

    08:35 The American Understander Issues his Verdict

    12:07 The Pageau Brothers, Jesus' Laugh & The Emergency Snake

    19:01 Bryan Johnson has concerns about Vaccines

    21:48 The High IQ Crowd and Trump's Greenland Plans

    27:44 The PsyOps Cyclops Strikes Again

    37:15 Huberman X Peterson: Optimising Christianity

    39:22 Secret Prayers and Bible Conversations

    43:34 Thougt = Secularised Prayer

    48:56 Huberman's Intelligent Design Argument for God

    55:49 Christian Optimising Stack

    01:07:56 Marc Andreessen on Vigor, Pride and Achievement

    01:13:30 Faux Heterodoxy

    01:19:24 Plain Steaks are the best!

    01:24:47 Jordan Peterson's Diet Struggles

    01:32:25 Lex Fridman's Interview with Zelensky

    01:37:52 Lex plugs Rogan's comedy club

    01:41:09 Elon Musk and Trump are anti-corruption!

    01:44:27 Critique of Lex Fridman's Interview Style

    01:46:07 Lex's dream and Russia's security guarantees

    01:53:25 Lex's Strategic Naivety

    02:05:12 Lex reads A LOT

    02:11:40 Lex and Putin predictions

    02:12:39 Lex will endure the attacks against him

    02:14:56 Wrapping Up & Patreon Love Bomb

    The full episode is available for Patreon subscribers (2hrs 16 mins).

    Join us at: https://www.patreon.com/DecodingTheGurus

    Sources


    10 January 2025, 7:00 am
  • 17 minutes 17 seconds
    Gurometer: Curtis Yarvin

    Back once again with the dark art of Gurometry, we turn our sights to the bad boy of Silicon Valley—the mulleted maestro, the edgy eejit, Curtis Yarvin. A legend in his own mind, but how does he rank on the Gurosity scale? Join us as we dissect his essence across 11 factors, from his revolutionarily mundane and incoherent ideas to his dazzling absence of charisma. Tune in as we feed this 'dark enlightenment' thinker into the Gurometer and reveal his true colours.

    The full episode is available for Patreon subscribers (34 mins).

    Join us at: https://www.patreon.com/DecodingTheGurus

    Curtis Yarvin: Gurometer

    00:00 Introduction to Gurometry

    02:27 Curtis Yarvin: The Man, The Myth, The Eejit

    04:43 Galaxy Brainlessness

    05:48 Cultishness

    08:32 Anti-Establishmentarianism

    09:55 Grievance Mongering

    12:43 Self-Aggrandizement and Narcissism

    13:30 Cassandra Complex

    16:21 Revolutionary Theories

    17:59 Pseudo-Profound Bullshit

    19:43 Conspiracy Theories Galore

    23:55 Moral Grandstanding

    25:50 Gurometer Scores and Analysis

    27:56 Bonus Point Attribution

    34:03 Final Thoughts on Curtis Yarvin

    2 January 2025, 9:00 am
  • 40 minutes 18 seconds
    Supplementary Material 20: Stolen Valour, Based Murder, and Eric Weinstein's Phonecall Problems

    In this end-of-year supplementary material, we unleash the hounds of war, battle through the discourse, and emerge alive but bloody and battered on the other side. Enlist now and join the fight.

    Supplementary Material 20

    00:00 Introduction and Ethnographic Insights

    01:38 Matt's Observations from Washington DC

    05:50 Smithsonian Museums and Star Wars Memorabilia

    07:48 Lego Creations and Gacha Collectibles

    12:13 Social Media and Blue Sky 'Culture'

    13:29 Matt's Contribution: Eric Weinstein's UFO Speculations

    21:21 Graham Linehan, Andrew Doyle, Jordan Peterson & Recognising Past Errors

    23:18 Jordan Peterson's Reflections on Vaccination

    28:59 Huberman's Upcoming Vaccine Series

    30:52 Taylor Lorenz and Stochastic Terrorism

    32:31 The Hypocrisy of Glorifying Violence

    36:29 The Problem with Political Violence

    43:48 Tim Kennedy's Exaggerated Military Stories

    55:09 Tim Kennedy's Response to Criticism

    01:07:37 Prebunking Criticisms

    01:17:20 Shane Smith at Vice is NOT A CONSPIRACY GUY

    01:21:27 Final Thoughts on Populism and Vibes-Based Reasoning

    01:25:18 Outro

    The full episode is available for Patreon subscribers (1hr 26 mins).

    Join us at: https://www.patreon.com/DecodingTheGurus

    Sources 


    27 December 2024, 6:00 am
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