Dr. Gad Saad is a professor of marketing at Concordia University and a trailblazer in applying evolutionary psychology to consumer behaviour. He s the best-selling author of the book The Parasitic Mind, a fearless critique of ideological extremism, and the host of the popular YouTube series The Sad Truth. Loved by his fans for his wish and championing of reason and science, and perhaps equally loathed by his critics who disagree with his takes on society and politics, Dr. Saad s a fierce advocate for free speech and intellectual freedom.
00:00:00.000Welcome to a special interview on Counterpoints with me, Melinda Nusifora.
00:00:27.360Dr Gad Saad is a professor of marketing at Concordia University and a trailblazer in applying evolutionary psychology to consumer behaviour.
00:00:38.620He's the best-selling author of the book The Parasitic Mind, a fearless critique of ideological extremism and also the host of the popular YouTube series The Sad Truth.
00:00:49.300Loved by his fans for his wish and championing of reason and science, and perhaps equally loathed by his critics who disagree with his takes on society and politics, Dr Saad is a fierce advocate for free speech and intellectual freedom.
00:01:08.440Dr Saad, thank you for making time and joining us here on Counterpoints.
00:01:12.500Well, I'm delighted to be with you. Thank you for having me.
00:01:16.600You published The Parasitic Mind back in 2020, but it's still being talked about and critiqued across multiple platforms as if it's a new release.
00:01:28.020Why do you think it continues to resonate with readers?
00:01:31.260I think it's because many of the parasitic ideas that I discuss in the book, and I'd be happy to expand on why I use the term parasitic, still hold true today.
00:01:43.820Many people thought that with the victory of Donald Trump, many of these ideological parasitic ideas would somehow cease to exist.
00:01:52.580But it took between 50 to 100 years for these ideas to proliferate, first in academia and then in every nook and cranny of society.
00:02:01.080So it's going to take a lot more than just Donald Trump coming for a second term for all of this nonsense to disappear.
00:02:07.980So I think that's why it's still so relevant.
00:02:10.380So do you think that you could be in for another 50 to 100 years of people expanding on your psychology then for you to or for society to maybe come back to what you would consider a sense of normalcy?
00:02:25.520I mean, I'd like to think, fingers crossed, I'd hope to think that it won't take as long to eradicate those ideas.
00:02:34.780And maybe it might be worthwhile for your viewers and listeners to get a sense of what I mean by parasitic ideas.
00:02:40.980So, for example, postmodernism, which is a philosophical framework that was developed in academia, say, about 50 years ago, purports that there are no objective truths.
00:02:52.400Everything is shackled by subjectivity.
00:02:54.620Everything is shackled by idiosyncrasies, by personal biases.
00:02:58.660Well, if there are no objective truths, that's how you can get up is down, left is right, war is peace, slavery is freedom, men are women, women are men.
00:03:07.640Because there are no objective metrics by which we can judge reality.
00:03:11.440Cultural relativism is another idea pathogen, which basically says, who are you to judge the conduct of people in other cultures?
00:03:21.080Social constructivism is another idea pathogen.
00:03:23.640It basically says that we are born with empty minds, we don't have biological imperatives, and it's only socialization that makes us who we are.
00:03:32.600So this cocktail of departure from reason has led us down the abyss of infinite lunacy.
00:03:38.300So hopefully it won't take 50 to 100 years to redress the ship.
00:03:42.420But as I said, it'll take a lot more than an anti-woke president to set things straight.
00:03:48.580So one of the first parasitic thoughts you mentioned there is around truth.
00:03:54.900And the quest for truth is something that you talk about a lot.
00:04:50.160You know, my background is in mathematics.
00:04:52.100There are axiomatic truths that are inviolable.
00:04:55.340So, no, we're not always shackled by subjectivity.
00:04:58.800By the way, you couldn't get up as a scientist in the morning to do your work if you didn't think that there were objective truths to be discovered in the natural world.
00:05:08.760Now, truth can change in science, right?
00:05:11.640What was true 300 years ago, we've revised it.
00:05:17.680But epistemologically speaking, there has to be truth.
00:05:20.960Otherwise, all scientists are wasting their time.
00:05:24.500Where do you think this idea of fake news plays into the idea of truth then?
00:05:30.840It's almost as if now we have politicians and if they don't like the way that perhaps something's being phrased or something's put to them,
00:05:44.660Well, there are all sorts of ways by which people who are in power seek to eradicate those pesky other folks who might be attacking their foundational ideas, right?
00:05:56.820And so, in the worst-case scenarios, we kill people who don't think like us.
00:06:02.220In the West, luckily, we're not quite there yet.
00:06:16.160So, for example, when someone comes out with some idea about settled science, I will repost or retort by saying, which is the true statement?
00:06:26.860Can men menstruate or can men not menstruate?
00:06:31.800And so, the idea that there are absolute settled science truths is a very dangerous idea.
00:06:38.820What's beautiful about science is that it is always autocorrective.
00:06:42.560We're always seeking to better approach truth.
00:06:45.540So, anybody who tells you that they have a complete hold on what is true or not is probably a fan of Orwellian reality.
00:06:53.980When you talk about hard truths, maybe, in society, what do you think are some of the hardest truths that society is having trouble swallowing these days?
00:07:07.840My original idea of writing The Parasitic Mind came to me nearly 30-plus years ago when I first finished my PhD and I was trying to incorporate biology into an understanding of human nature.
00:07:25.700I was shocked to see that so many of my social scientist colleagues thought that I was insane.
00:07:31.640How dare you argue, Professor Saad, that human beings are shaped by biological forces?
00:07:37.680Apparently, biological forces apply to every species on Earth except one species called human beings.
00:07:46.020I mean, somehow, when you are a consumer, you are no longer purview to your biological imperatives.
00:07:52.560And so, this is probably, at least in my academic career, has been the most difficult thing for my academic colleagues to swallow, namely that we are not just a cultural animal, we're also a biological animal.
00:08:08.000Do you believe in nature versus nurture?
00:08:11.560Is it one or the other or is it a mix of the both?
00:08:18.300And let me, I mean, what you just said when you said it's a mix of both.
00:08:22.560Actually, that's called the interactionist framework.
00:08:25.520If you start and you want to bake a cake, before you bake the cake, each of the ingredients are separated.
00:08:33.160There's the butter, there's the sugar, there's the flour, and so on.
00:08:37.180Once I bake the cake, if I were to tell you, please point me to where the eggs are or where the sugar is, you wouldn't be able to because now it's been baked into this inextricable mix called the cake.
00:08:50.980So, for most human phenomena, we are an inextricable mix of our biology and our environment.
00:09:04.080Nurture exists in its form because of nature.
00:09:08.460So, yes, it is true that men and women are socialized into their roles, but they are socialized into those roles precisely because of biological imperatives.
00:09:19.140So, it doesn't exist outside of biology.
00:09:21.700We are taught what we are taught because of biology.
00:09:24.360Staying with biological imperatives, as you call them, why do you think that the subject of gender has generated such an impassioned response from people on either side of the argument?
00:09:42.660Why is it that one issue that seems to be the topic that people can't get past or continue to go back to?
00:09:51.740There are several answers to that, but I'll start with one manifestation of what you're asking.
00:09:57.380So, take, for example, equity feminism.
00:10:15.600Then radical feminists come along and say, well, in the service of squashing any sexism in society, let us now promulgate the idea that men and women are indistinguishable creatures.
00:10:29.560There is nothing that men could do in a superior way to women or vice versa.
00:10:35.240All sex differences must be due to social construction.
00:10:40.280And therefore, by promulgating this idea, hopefully it will allow us to battle sexism in society.
00:10:46.420Well, I always remind people that in the service of a noble goal, we don't murder and rape truth.
00:10:52.620So, I can walk and chew gum at the same time.
00:10:55.700I can be all for equality of the sexes while also recognizing that men and women do have evolved sex differences.
00:11:03.900Why does it matter to you or to me how someone else identifies?
00:11:12.700Isn't that an issue for them and not an issue for us?
00:11:21.240So, I went up in front of the Canadian Senate to give some expert testimony in 2017.
00:11:29.960At the time, Canada was debating a bill called Bill C-16 that sought to incorporate gender identity and gender expression under the rubric of hate speech laws.
00:11:40.140And I said, look, to your point, I believe that anybody should live free of bigotry and have a dignified life.
00:11:48.480And so, sign me up for that laudable goal.
00:11:51.480But again, in the service of that noble goal, we don't get to murder and rape truth.
00:12:02.040That doesn't mean that I need to put gender pronouns next to my bio.
00:12:09.220Because until 15 minutes ago, the 117 billion people who had existed on Earth seem to have been able to very easily navigate through the conundrum of identifying who is male or female.
00:12:21.960But it's only 15 minutes ago that a bearded guy who's 6 foot 4, 280 pounds has to put he, him next to his because he doesn't want to marginalise some transgender person.
00:12:32.480So, I can be both very socially progressive whilst ensuring that I don't murder and rape truth.
00:12:39.280So, an offshoot of the quest for truth is your assertion of the importance of being able to admit you're wrong.
00:12:47.860Do you think world leaders, as equally as your average person on the street today, has a problem with admitting when they're wrong?
00:13:03.900I'm smiling because it reminds me of a question that I was asked by a British psychiatrist.
00:13:10.880I had appeared on his show maybe a year ago.
00:13:13.520And he was the first host to ever ask me the following question.
00:13:17.120He said to me, I'm paraphrasing, I don't have his exact words.
00:13:20.340He said to me, what is the singular, you know, most surprising phenomenon that you have witnessed in your study of human nature and human behaviour in the 30 plus years that you've been a professor?
00:13:32.340And so, I paused for a minute and then to your question, Melinda, I said, probably the inability of people to change their opinions once it is anchored, irrespective of how much information I might throw at them.
00:14:17.120I argued that our ability to reason did not evolve to seek some objective truth, but rather it evolved to win arguments.
00:14:26.340So, as I provide you with evidence, hopefully to change your opinion, your reflex is to go, la, la, la, I don't want to hear it because I don't want to lose the argument.
00:14:36.340So, I think it's a very, very challenging and difficult task, never mind to change the mind of world leaders, to change the mind of my local, you know, barber.
00:14:46.960So, that's the challenge that I face every day in the public arena.
00:14:51.180What about challenging yourself in the regard of when's the last time you have admitted you're wrong or maybe changed your opinion?
00:15:01.120Do you equally find it as difficult as someone who's studied this for their career?
00:15:06.760I mean, it's tough to answer this question because it's going to seem as though I'm engaging in ego defensiveness myself.
00:15:13.160I'd like to think that if I am an objective truth defender, that if incoming information comes in that invalidates my positions, I will be more than happy to readily admit that it's time to autocorrect.
00:15:27.540But, by the way, I do that every time that I test a hypothesis in my scientific work.
00:15:34.960I've had many papers that I've published where the final findings turned out to be contradictory to what I had hypothesized at the start.
00:15:45.700So, if I am an honest academic and an honest scientist, it has to be baked into my epistemology that I'm open to change.
00:15:53.940Well, if and when that ever happens, I hope you come back on to CounterPoints and tell us all about it.
00:16:01.300Do you think the denial of truth, this ability to admit that maybe our opinions are flawed, has played a role in the polarizing nature of party politics that we're seeing these days?
00:16:33.560And I would even add a more pessimistic bent to what you just asked.
00:16:37.860Oftentimes, when you demonstrate to someone that their position is incorrect and you present them with evidence to the contrary, that only solidifies their position.
00:16:50.620So, I mean, imagine how disheartening that is, right?
00:16:55.660You'd like to think that if you take position A and I show you that it actually should be not A, that if you're an honest interlocutor, you'd say, okay, fair enough.
00:17:07.400You will even be more emboldened in your position.
00:17:09.940I mean, one of the things that is both exciting about the work that I do but also so disheartening is that when I engage people on social media oftentimes, I quickly realize that irrespective of how much information I share, I could never move them an inch, which is exactly the reason, Melinda, why I often refuse to debate certain folks.
00:17:32.320It's not because I'm too afraid to debate them, but I know it's a futile exercise.
00:17:36.940We're just going to talk past each other and no one is going to move one millimeter.
00:18:34.580It makes perfect sense that we be empathetic to the people that we are interacting with.
00:18:41.200Aristotle explained to us more than 2,000 years ago that all good things in the right amount, at the right place, in the right measure.
00:18:48.800So empathy is good, but when it targets the right people at the right measure and so on.
00:18:55.440Suicidal empathy is where you become so orgiastic in your metting out of empathy that it no longer serves a valuable objective.
00:19:05.380And so let me, if I may, draw an analogy.
00:19:08.560When I scan the environment for environmental threats, that makes perfect evolutionary sense.
00:19:15.460So, for example, if you and I, if I have the pleasure of meeting you, Melinda, in person, and I notice that you just sneezed into your hand, and then you put out your hand to shake my hand, I realize, oh boy, I better go and wash my hands after I finish shaking the hand of the lovely Melinda because she may have a cold.
00:19:34.380If I then spend eight hours in the bathroom because I have germ contamination, what started off as an adaptive reflex becomes maladaptive, and it's called obsessive-compulsive disorder, right?
00:19:48.120So when an adaptive process misfires, it becomes dysfunctional.
00:19:53.360That's my argument in suicidal empathy.
00:19:56.360Empathy is great when it is properly regulated.
00:20:00.220It becomes really problematic when it becomes dysregulated.
00:20:04.460And I know that you've admitted in interviews in the past that you're a bit of a germphobe, so I won't take offense that you spend eight hours washing your hands after I sneeze.
00:20:14.680Can you give me an example in modern society of where you think you see suicidal empathy?
00:20:21.000Right, so we can break it up either in domestic policy or foreign policy.
00:20:27.860Let me give you one or two, say, from domestic policy.
00:20:30.480To argue that all illegal immigrants have a right to experience the United States' liberties is a form of suicidal empathy.
00:20:45.800To say that MS-13 gang members should be more worthy of our empathy than American vets who might have lost limbs defending the liberties of the United States is probably suicidal empathy.
00:20:58.160To argue, for example, that all immigrants are equal in their proclivity to be able to assimilate into a host nation is suicidal empathy.
00:21:13.480There are some cultures that are more aligned with the values of the host society than others.
00:21:19.360And to recognize that doesn't make you bigoted.
00:21:22.300It makes you someone that has a functioning brain.
00:21:24.640And so, again, the reflex to be endlessly orgiastically empathetic, while it might make me feel good in the moment, it has some really dangerous downstream effects.
00:21:37.000Let's move on to truth and freedom of speech.
00:21:41.660You're a free speech absolutist, I think, if I'm interpreting that correctly.
00:21:46.680Are you concerned about threats to free speech either from censorship or self-censorship?
00:21:54.860Do you think there should be any limits to free speech?
00:21:58.540And is self-censorship becoming more of an issue than perhaps an overarching censorship by the government?
00:22:14.300I've had some very difficult realities in my childhood because we had to escape Lebanon.
00:22:21.140So I'm very much wedded to my Jewish identity.
00:22:24.340Yet I support the right of Holocaust deniers to spew their nonsense.
00:22:29.640There's almost nothing that could be as insulting and offensive as to deny the Holocaust.
00:22:34.240But if you wish to live in a free society, you have to be able to bear the imbeciles, the racists, the bigots.
00:22:40.360Where I draw the line as to what constitutes freedom of speech is already what's enshrined in the First Amendment, which is there can't be a direct incitement to violence.
00:22:50.060So I can perfectly say Judaism is one crock of nonsense.
00:22:57.700And I would say I support your right to say that.
00:22:59.940On the other hand, if you say, let's go on the corner of Broadway and 7th Street, and when the Jews are coming out of the synagogue, let's beat them up and kill them, then that becomes direct incitement to violence.
00:23:20.860That's the price you pay to be in a free society.
00:23:23.340Regarding your other point about self-censorship, I exactly agree with you.
00:23:27.380The greatest threat to freedom of speech in the West doesn't come from the government.
00:23:32.500It comes from creating a zeitgeist that causes people to self-regulate, right?
00:23:38.600So when the student says, you know, I don't feel comfortable saying that I like Donald Trump in a classroom because maybe my professor will downgrade me on my essay, that's the danger, right?
00:23:52.940So I don't think in the West the danger comes from, you know, the big Orwellian big brother stopping us from speaking.
00:23:59.620But if you create an environment where people are afraid to express themselves freely, then the fascists have won the game.
00:24:07.540There's a recent example that I want to get your take on.
00:24:13.100I'm sure, as I'm sure you've seen, you're very active across social media.
00:24:17.300Kanye West, or Ye, has released a new song titled Heil Hitler.
00:24:23.840Do you think it was wrong for Spotify and other platforms to ban it?
00:24:28.040Or do you think it should have been allowed online?
00:24:30.080I'm going, now I'm going to get tons of hatred from fellow Jews who are going to say, how dare you?
00:24:38.260I think that fits under my free speech absolutism, right?