Plain English with Derek Thompson - Breathing Is Easy. But We’re Doing It Wrong.

Breathing Is Easy. But We’re Doing It Wrong.

06/14/24 • 54 min

3 Listeners

Today’s episode is about the science of breathing—from the evolution of our sinuses and palate, to the downsides of mouth breathing and the upsides of nasal breathing, to specific breath techniques that you can use to reduce stress and fall asleep fast. Our guest is James Nestor, the author of the bestselling book 'Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art.'

If you have questions, observations, or ideas for future episodes, email us at [email protected].

Host: Derek Thompson

Guest: James Nestor

Producer: Devon Baroldi

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If you have questions, observations, or ideas for future episodes, email us at [email protected].

Host: Derek Thompson

Guest: James Nestor

Producer: Devon Baroldi

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Previous Episode

The News Media’s Dangerous Addiction to ‘Fake Facts’

1 Recommendations

What do most people not understand about the news media? I would say two things. First: The most important bias in news media is not left or right. It’s a bias toward negativity and catastrophe. Second: That while it would be convenient to blame the news media exclusively for this bad-news bias, the truth is that the audience is just about equally to blame. The news has never had better tools for understanding exactly what gets people to click on stories. That means what people see in the news is more responsive than ever to aggregate audience behavior. If you hate the news, what you are hating is in part a collective reflection in the mirror. If you put these two facts together, you get something like this: The most important bias in the news media is the bias that news makers and news audiences share toward negativity and catastrophe. Jerusalem Demsas, a staff writer at The Atlantic and the host of the podcast Good on Paper, joins to discuss a prominent fake fact in the news — and the psychological and media forces that promote fake facts and catastrophic negativity in the press.

If you have questions, observations, or ideas for future episodes, email us at [email protected].

Host: Derek Thompson

Guest: Jerusalem Demsas

Producer: Devon Baroldi

Links:

"The Maternal-Mortality Crisis That Didn’t Happen" by Jerusalem Demsas https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/05/no-more-women-arent-dying-in-childbirth/678486/

The 2001 paper "Bad Is Stronger Than Good" https://assets.csom.umn.edu/assets/71516.pdf

Derek on the complex science of masks and mask mandates https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2023/03/covid-lab-leak-mask-mandates-science-media-information/673263/

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Next Episode

The Radical Cultural Shift Behind America's Declining Birth Rate

We've done several podcasts on America's declining fertility rate, and why South Korea has the lowest birthrate in the world. But we've never done an episode on the subject quite like this one.

Today we go deep on the psychology of having children and not having children, and the cultural revolution behind the decline in birthrates in America and the rest of the world. The way we think about dating, marriage, kids, and family is changing radically in a very short period of time. And we are just beginning to reckon with the causes and consequences of that shift. In the new book, 'What Are Children For,' Anastasia Berg and Rachel Wiseman say a new "parenthood ambivalence" is sweeping the world. In today's show, they persuade Derek that this issue is about more than the economic trends he tends to focus on when he discusses this issue.

If you have questions, observations, or ideas for future episodes, email us at [email protected].

Host: Derek Thompson

Guests: Anastasia Berg & Rachel Wiseman

Producer: Devon Baroldi

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