What's Our Problem?
A Self-Help Book for Societies
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Narrated by:
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Tim Urban
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By:
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Tim Urban
About this listen
From the creator of the wildly popular blog Wait but Why, a fun and fascinating deep dive into what the hell is going on in our strange, unprecedented modern times.
Between 2013 and 2016, Tim Urban became one of the world’s most popular bloggers, writing dozens of viral long-form articles about everything from AI to colonizing Mars to procrastination. Then, he turned his attention to a new topic: the society around him. Why was everything such a mess? Why was everyone acting like such a baby? When did things get so tribal? Why do humans do this stuff?
This massive topic sent Tim tumbling down his deepest rabbit hole yet, through mountains of history, evolutionary psychology, political theory, neuroscience, and modern-day political movements, as he tried to figure out the answer to a simple question: What’s our problem?
Six years later, he emerged from the hole with this book. Narrated by the author, What’s Our Problem? is a deep and expansive analysis of our modern times, in the classic style of Wait but Why, packed with original concepts and sticky metaphors. The book provides an entirely new framework and language for thinking and talking about today’s complex world. Instead of focusing on the usual left-center-right horizontal political axis, which is all about what we think, the book introduces a vertical axis that explores how we think, as individuals and as groups. Listeners will find themselves on a delightful and fascinating journey that will ultimately change the way they see the world around them.
Anyway, he wanted to say a lot more about all of this, but there was a word limit on this book description, so just go listen to the book.
©2023 Tim Urban (P)2023 Tim UrbanListeners also enjoyed...
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Black Americans have long been shackled to the Democrats. Seeing no viable alternative, they have watched liberal politicians take the Black vote for granted without pledging anything in return. In Blackout, Owens argues that this automatic allegiance is both illogical and unearned. She contends that the Democrat Party has a long history of racism and exposes the ideals that hinder the Black community’s ability to rise above poverty, live independent and successful lives, and be an active part of the American dream.
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Thought provoking!
- By Girl with curls on 09-16-20
By: Candace Owens, and others
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Democracy in Black
- How Race Still Enslaves the American Soul
- By: Eddie S. Glaude Jr.
- Narrated by: Kevin Free
- Length: 7 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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America's great promise of equality has always rung hollow in the ears of African Americans. But today the situation has grown even more dire. From the murders of black youth by the police to the dismantling of the Voting Rights Act to the disaster visited upon poor and middle-class black families by the Great Recession, it is clear that black America faces an emergency - at the very moment the election of the first black president has prompted many to believe we've solved America's race problem.
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The Dysfunctional Mindset of American
- By Paul T. on 07-09-16
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The Reckoning
- Our Nation's Trauma and Finding a Way to Heal
- By: Mary L. Trump PhD
- Narrated by: Mary L. Trump PhD
- Length: 5 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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The Reckoning will examine America’s national trauma, rooted in our history but dramatically exacerbated by the impact of current events and the Trump administration’s corrupt and immoral policies. Our failure to acknowledge this trauma, let alone root it out, has allowed it to metastasize. Whether it manifests itself in rising levels of rage and hatred, or hopelessness and apathy, the stress of living in a country we no longer recognize has affected all of us. America is suffering from PTSD - a new leader alone cannot fix us.
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Focus of racism using her uncle as a mirror
- By Amazon Customer on 08-18-21
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It's Dangerous to Believe
- Religious Freedom and Its Enemies
- By: Mary Eberstadt
- Narrated by: Margaret Winston
- Length: 5 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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In It's Dangerous to Believe, Mary Eberstadt documents how people of faith - especially Christians who adhere to traditional religious beliefs - face widespread discrimination in today's increasingly secular society. Eberstadt details how recent laws, court decisions, and intimidation on campuses and elsewhere threaten believers who fear losing their jobs, their communities, and their basic freedoms solely because of their convictions.
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Not about Freedom of Religion
- By A. A. Gunnarsdóttir on 01-29-19
By: Mary Eberstadt
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The Age of American Unreason
- By: Susan Jacoby
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 14 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Performance
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Combining historical analysis with contemporary observation, Susan Jacoby dissects a new American cultural phenomenon - one that is at odds with our heritage of Enlightenment reason and with modern, secular knowledge and science. With mordant wit, Jacoby surveys an antirationalist landscape extending from pop culture to a pseudo-intellectual universe of "junk thought".
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Interesting, but explanation by redescription
- By T. Andrew Poehlman on 07-15-08
By: Susan Jacoby
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Suicide of the West
- How the Rebirth of Tribalism, Populism, Nationalism, and Identity Politics is Destroying American Democracy
- By: Jonah Goldberg
- Narrated by: Jonah Goldberg
- Length: 16 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Only once in the last 250,000 years have humans stumbled upon a way to lift ourselves out of the endless cycle of poverty, hunger, and war that defines most of history. If democracy, individualism, and the free market were humankind’s destiny, they should have appeared and taken hold a bit earlier in the evolutionary record. The emergence of freedom and prosperity was nothing short of a miracle.
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Put some gratitude in your attitude
- By Amazon Customer on 04-25-18
By: Jonah Goldberg
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The Death of Truth
- Notes on Falsehood in the Age of Trump
- By: Michiko Kakutani
- Narrated by: Tavia Gilbert
- Length: 3 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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We live in a time when the very idea of objective truth is mocked and discounted by the occupants of the White House. Discredited conspiracy theories and ideologies have resurfaced, proven science is once more up for debate, and Russian propaganda floods our screens. The wisdom of the crowd has usurped research and expertise, and we are each left clinging to the beliefs that best confirm our biases.
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Prescient Account of the Mechanics of Tyranny
- By Brian Price on 07-27-18
By: Michiko Kakutani
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The War on the West
- By: Douglas Murray
- Narrated by: Douglas Murray
- Length: 12 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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Performance
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In The War on the West, Douglas Murray shows how many well-meaning people have been fooled by hypocritical and inconsistent anti-West rhetoric. After all, if we must discard the ideas of Kant, Hume, and Mill for their opinions on race, shouldn’t we discard Marx, whose work is peppered with racial slurs and anti-Semitism? Embers of racism remain to be stamped out in America, but what about the raging racist inferno in the Middle East and Asia?
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Every Human (seriously, everyone) Read This!
- By aaron on 04-27-22
By: Douglas Murray
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Racecraft
- The Soul of Inequality in American Life
- By: Karen E. Fields, Barbara J. Fields
- Narrated by: Karen Chilton
- Length: 10 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Most people assume that racism grows from a perception of human difference: the fact of race gives rise to the practice of racism. Sociologist Karen E. Fields and historian Barbara J. Fields argue otherwise: the practice of racism produces the illusion of race, through what they call “racecraft.” And this phenomenon is intimately entwined with other forms of inequality in American life. So pervasive are the devices of racecraft in American history, economic doctrine, politics, and everyday thinking that the presence of racecraft itself goes unnoticed.
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A loose collection of essays
- By Texas Mama on 11-18-21
By: Karen E. Fields, and others
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The Fire Is upon Us
- James Baldwin, William F. Buckley Jr., and the Debate over Race in America
- By: Nicholas Buccola
- Narrated by: Prentice Onayemi
- Length: 14 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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Performance
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On February 18, 1965, an overflowing crowd packed the Cambridge Union in Cambridge, England, to witness a historic televised debate between James Baldwin, the leading literary voice of the civil rights movement, and William F. Buckley Jr., a fierce critic of the movement and America's most influential conservative intellectual. The topic was "the American dream is at the expense of the American Negro", and no one who has seen the debate can soon forget it. Nicholas Buccola's The Fire Is upon Us is the first book to tell the full story of the event.
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Sadly, the story is timeless.
- By Edward P. Cerne on 01-17-20
By: Nicholas Buccola
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Dog Whistle Politics
- How Coded Racial Appeals Have Reinvented Racism and Wrecked the Middle Class
- By: Ian Haney López
- Narrated by: Eric Yves Garcia
- Length: 12 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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In Dog Whistle Politics, Ian Haney Lopez offers a sweeping account of how politicians and plutocrats deploy veiled racial appeals to persuade white voters to support policies that favor the extremely rich yet threaten their own interests. Dog-whistle appeals generate middle-class enthusiasm for political candidates who promise to crack down on crime, curb undocumented immigration, and protect the heartland against Islamic infiltration, but ultimately vote to slash taxes for the rich.
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Narration like verbal water boarding
- By Mark Andreadis on 08-31-15
By: Ian Haney López
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An unknown perspective
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Terrible recording
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The Machiavellians
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This classic work of political theory and practice offers an account of the modern Machiavellians, a remarkable group who have been influential in Europe and practically unknown in the United States. The book devotes a long section to Machiavelli himself as well as to such modern Machiavellians as Gaetano Mosca, Georges Sorel, Robert Michels and Vilfredo Pareto. Burnham contends that the writings of these men hold the key both to the truth about politics and to the preservation of political liberty.
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Fine intro to an authentic science of politics
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What listeners say about What's Our Problem?
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Anonymous User
- 02-22-23
First!
This is great! I really love the representative descriptions of larger concepts so they can creatively interact. It’s an honor to be the first Audible review for what I’m sure will be recognized as an intellectually stimulating work. Cheers Tim, love thinking with ya
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8 people found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 08-21-23
A centrist manifesto in a world of extremism
I loved the thoughtful, thorough and balanced approach Tim took with the book (as he always does with all his blogs and scribbles). While the current societal/political challenges are unsettling and our fate as a society far from certain, what could give us a better chance to come through dark periods like this than research communicated in a straightforward voice (and drawings to match) like that of Tim?
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- Justin
- 04-12-23
Eye-opening
The way Tim articulates the reasons that our society is circling the drain. Its funny seeing the one and two starts on here. If that's you, you might be part of the problem that Tim's talking about.
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- Hugo
- 05-05-23
Great book about the zeitgeist
The book is read by the author and is accompanied with a PDF containing illustrations from the author as well which makes it helpful to comprehend some concepts and ideas. Highly recommended!
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- Joan
- 04-20-23
Our society needs this book
Best read of the last few years. I hope as many people as possible read this
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- Anonymous User
- 05-05-23
Incisive insight in a digestible format
Incisive insight in a digestible format. this book is a must read for anybody who wants to be honest in the way they conduct themselves and help reduce the growing gaps between political parties
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- Thomas Maufer
- 08-08-23
this was a thoughtful analysis of a hard topic
I'm a long-time fan of Tim's well-thought-out, in-depth writing style. He almost always teaches me something, which was also true here, with this lengthy work of nonfiction.
I think the narrative may have been too long, but I almost hesitate to say that because some of the more difficult aspects of the book needed considerable care and detail in order to make their points. I would love it if he could supervise the production of a condensed version of this, because I think that its length might be a barrier to other readers. I think he said it was in the order of 120,000 words. Wow!
I think that more people need the opportunity to consider these issues in a thoughtful way, not in a rage state of mind.
One comment I have is that his use of unfamiliar labels (like golem) challenged my flow to try to remember how those concepts were relevant in a given sentence. I understand that he needed shorthand, but at least in my case it formed a bit of a barrier to understanding.
It must have been difficult to write about the topics in this book, navigating a minefield of triggers. I know that this must have added length, to bring out topics with enough care to avoid persistently triggering people every few pages (or paragraphs). Overall, in my opinion, Tim's points were well considered and well made.
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- DVS
- 01-03-24
Well reasoned and researched
The initial portion of the book establishes a framework for understanding human beings on multiple levels which are indisputable. This is followed by evidence of the status quo which is rather sad. This book will be read widely by both sides, and may begin a return to our sensibilities.
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- Shawn G.
- 03-04-24
Thank You
Very illuminating. Thank you for writing it. I would love to see a physical book released.
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- Jenn Villalobos
- 11-12-24
Tim narrating?
My commutr companion between Sathorn and Ekkamai here I. Bangkok..I laughed, sighed, mehed my way through this book! highly recommend to listen to it if you want your tiny neurones to go into sinapsis overdrive! Listening from Asia the story of us políticas is mirror to the golems taking over the world
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