Episode 245 Scott Adams: Asking Your Opinion on the Title of my Next Book
Date: 2018-10-04 | Duration: 40:48
Topics
1st 25 Minutes: Brainstorming book title suggestions with viewers Escaping your mental prison President Trump’s rally comments on Ford FBI report on Kavanaugh investigation is done Activist judges and the left changing the rules without permission Are Conservatives more action oriented than Liberals? Encouraging voter registration and voting
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## Transcript
## [Book Title Brainstorm: Escaping Your Mental Prison](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWN6Ni8zYy4&t=6s)
Hey Janice, hey Frakker Dave, Dan, come on in here. I’ve got a quick question for you. Good news—I don’t know, is there good news? Here’s a question for you; I want to put this out here. I’ve got a few book title names and I want to run them by you.
The topic of the book, which is not anywhere near finished, but the theme of it will be ways to know essentially if you're thinking clearly and ways to escape your mental prison. It's a book on how to escape your mental prison, how to get past the psychological blocks that are really more like illusions, and how to be more effective. That's the topic of the book: how to get out of your mental prison.
I don’t think I want "prison" anywhere in the title. I was thinking of something like *Escape Your Mental Prison*, but I don’t like "prison" in the title. Then I was thinking of something about how to find the Golden Age—*Escaping Your Mental Prison*. I don't mind putting "prison" in the subtitle, but not in the title. Some people said *The Golden Age* sounds like a history book, so that would mislead people.
The third suggestion is *Slap a Filter on It*. If you can imagine a filter and just slapping a filter on it, most of the chapters would work with that because most of it is about teaching you a trick so that you can slap a new filter on your reality. You can see past your mental prison and have a filter where you can find the doorway to the prison.
What do you think? I don’t want anything with "jail" or "prison" in the main title. I might put it in the subtitle, but what do you think of the idea *Slap a Filter on It*? I’ll wait for a moment to see your comments. This is—somebody suggests I title the book *I Am Not Sam Harris*. Yeah, nothing. I’ve been rejecting anything with a jail or prison; I don’t want that anywhere in the main title, but it might be in the subtitle somewhere. I don’t want "mental chains"—that's all prison. I want to get rid of all the prison, chains, and handcuff words in the main title.
Somebody suggests *Prison Prison Prison Escape*. People who don’t follow directions—although I assume that was sarcastic, but it was funny. Don’t say "slap"? *Free Your Mind* is a little too ordinary. *Mind Woke*? Somebody says they like *Shake the Box*. It’s a good title, but it doesn’t fit the content as well as it should. "Slap" sounds imprecise. *Do You See the Filter Now?* It’s something that you understand which changes how you look at the world, so the filter is a mental filter.
How about *Mental Filter*? How about *Brain Filter*? *Slap a Filter on It* was the suggestion. I’m looking for ideas. "Too violent"? You might be right about that. *Mind Filters*? It just doesn’t sound active. I want a title that is not one or two boring words. "Two movies"? I use that too much in *Win Bigly*, so I need something different.
We don’t like "slap." *How You Miss Things*, *Release Your Bonds*, *Woke Prison*, *Switch Your Lens*, *What Have You Got to Lose*, *Mental Filters*. People have already done *Mental Floss*. *Fill Your Filter*, *Biden Filter*, *Change Your Filters*, *Filtering Your Reality*, *Be Ron Filter*, *Change Your Channel*, *New Color Pill*, *Think Bigly*. *Think Bigly* is not bad at all because of my last two books, but I don’t want "Bigly" though because that’s a Trump thing.
*Think Bigger*, *Expand Reality*, *Idea Jump*, *Power Wash Brain*, *Mind Screening*, *Pulling Back the Curtain*, *Mental Filter*, *Matrix*, *Opening Your Perceptions*. What’s wrong with "slap"? Some people thought it sounded a little violent. Maybe in this day and age, that’s true. *Filter Framing*, *The Art of the Filter*, *Reframe*. "Reframe" is a good word to consider. *Switzerland's Escape*, *Mental Prism*, *Mental Flossing*, *Shredding Your Filter*, *Porta-Filter*, *Switch Your Filters*, *Become Unfiltered*, *Unleash Your Potentials*.
For those of you looking for greater entertainment on this Periscope: *Mindset Filters*—that's a little too Mike Cernovich. *Red Pill* is overused. *Break Down Your Brain Box*, *Mind Filter*, *Big Thinkly*, *Reframe Your Brain*, *Reprogram Yourself*, *Think Bigly*, *Sky Defy It*. For those of you just joining, the book will teach you a number of techniques to reduce the illusions in front of you so you can more clearly see reality and escape your mental prisons. It’s about escaping your mental prisons, but I don’t want any kind of prison or chain reference in the title.
*Mind Shake*, *Shake the Brain Box*, *Think Clearly with Filters*, *Persuasion Filters*. It’s not really a book about persuading anybody; it’s about removing your own filter. *Third Eye*? Somebody likes *Think Bigly*. It is the most catchy, but "Bigly" is a Trump word and I don’t want to leave that impression because this is not a Trump-specific book. This is not about tweaking the simulation. *Refine Your Mind*, *Electrify Your Reality*, *Through the Veil*. How about *The Trouble with Tribbles*? *Filter Hex*, *Reframe Your Brain*. Let me make sure that one’s down there. *Win Simply*, *The Adams Filter*. That’s not terrible. *The Adams Filter*—let me write that down.
*Feng Shui for Your Mind*, *Soaring Neurons*, *Unlock Your Mental Filter*, *It’s All in Your Mind*, *Dr. Risky Escape*, *Clean Your Light*, *Smoke is Gonna Go*, *Crusher*, *Mindless*, *Seeing the Elephant*. *Seeing the Elephant* will be in there. *Deprogram Yourself*, *Reframe Your Filter*, *Turn Your Brain Around*, *The Dilbert Illusion*, *Solution Filter Reality*, *Unlock Your Buried Potential*. *Simultaneous Sip*? It doesn’t really say what’s in the book, but I like it as a title. *Sifting Through Your Simulation*, *Reprogramming the Simulation*, *Persuading Your Reality*, *The Simulation Stimulation*, *Brain Peel*, *Open the Pod Bay Doors*, *Free Yourself*.
How about just *Filters*? That’s not bad. It’s funny—why did I think it had to be two words? Whoever said just *Filters*—not bad. I’m seeing a lot of people saying *The Adams Filter*. I wonder if that would work. *You Are a NPC (Non-Player Character)*. *The Filter Fixer*? Too many Fs. *The Mind Filter*, *Brain Sip*, *Open the Blinds*, *Filter Swaps*, *How to Filter Everything and Still Think Bigly*, *Unlock the Adams Filter*.
Here’s what I like best so far: *The Adams Filter*. I wonder why I like that? Could it be because it has my name in it? Or I like just *Filters*. I’ll still put a subtitle, but I’ll work on that separately. *Free-Thinking Shades*, *Filters Filter*, *The Adams Filter*. *The Adams Filter* tells you that it’s a way of seeing things. If you just say any kind of "filter," people don’t quite know what the idea is, but if you say *The Adams Filter*, it is immediately obvious that it’s someone's way of looking at the world.
It could be *The Adams Filters* with an S, but that’s confusing. *Atomize Your Mind*, *Brain Smoothie*, *Brain Farts*, *30 Days to Luxurious Hair*, *Unlock Your Mind*. "Unlocked" is still like a prison. *Brain with No Walls*, *Limitless*, *Brain Refilter*, *The Brain Integral*, *Adams Persuasion Filter*. That’s sort of what *Win Bigly* was. No to *Adams Filter*? *Filters* is great? Take this choice: if you had to choose between just the one word *Filters* or the more complete *The Adams Filter*, which of those is better?
*Thinking Filters*, *Control the Simulation*, *Break Your Barriers*, *A New Paradigm*, *Filter the Flip Side*, *Forehead Slap*. Make it wrong so people discuss it—there’s a trick to that. *Filter Freak*? That’s not bad; it’s a little too close to *Freakonomics*, but I like where you’re going there. *I Think You Have a Filter, Bro*. It looks like there are more people who like... it’s not a book about systems over goals. *State of Mindlessness*, *Filter Free*. The trouble is that I’ve been told that *Filters* by itself feels like an Instagram reference.
It looks like we’re maybe even between people who like *The Adams Filter* and people who like *Filters*. The trouble with just *Filters* is that it won't make sense, but *The Adams Filter* immediately tells you what you’re going for—but it’s a little narcissistic. *The Golden Filter*? I like where you’re going with that. By the way, how amazing is this that I can brainstorm with 1,200 people who are focused on the same topic? God knows why there are so many people who would be willing to participate, but I’m very grateful that you are.
*The Filters Filter* makes you think of photography. *Rose-Colored Filter on Your Mind*, *The Trickle-Down*, *The Adams Coffee Filter*. *The Coffee Filter* is not bad, or *The Adams Coffee Filter*. I could have a natural chapter that actually works perfectly with the book that would be a coffee filter chapter. That actually works. *Unfiltered*, *Mindfields are Forever*, *Coffee with Filters*. *Adams Lens*? I like *Adams Unfiltered*. *Adams Unfiltered* sounds like I’d be giving my own opinions about all kinds of stuff and swearing a lot.
## [Writing Tip: Sticky Words vs. Wisps of Air](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWN6Ni8zYy4&t=1086s)
*Through the Filter with Scott*. You’re going to put us all in the acknowledgments, right? Of course, I’ll mention you all in the acknowledgments. *The Golden Coffee Filter*, *Adams Coffee Filter*, *The Distilled Mind*, *Simultaneous Filter*, *Free Your Bio*, *Reality Unfiltered*, *BS-Proof Your Mind*, *Life Lenses*. *Life Lenses* is hard to say, though. I don’t like it; "lens" is an unsatisfying word.
Let me teach you a little bit about writing. Here’s a little writing tip for those of you who are nice enough to—I’ll keep reading these, but there are some words that just lay there, and "lens" is one of them. *Lens*. It’s just like the air going by. Compare that to *Win Bigly*. *Win Bigly* is almost a solid object. You can almost feel it. *Win Bigly*—I think I could hold that in my hand and it would be kind of rubbery. But if you say "lens," it’s just like a wisp of air that comes and goes in your mind. "Lens" doesn’t have any structure. It’s not sticky; it won't stay with you.
*Everybody is Stupid, You’re Smart*. *Scott’s Guess Filters*, *Worldview Field*, *Raise the Lens*, *Through Adams' World*, *Twilight Filters*, *Filter Quilter*, *Adams Unfiltered*. *Pure Gold Filter*, *Filter Prosperously*, *No Filters Allowed*, *Filter Liberation Theory*, *Mocha Filter*, *Mind Games*, *Taking a Clear Lens*, *Simultaneous Sipping Without the Filter*.
It seems like "Adams" removes general applicability of your topic. There is that. There’s also a rule in persuasion and a rule that works for writing: if you’re writing fiction especially, you don’t want to give people a reason to not like you. Putting my name in it will give some people a reason to like it if they’ve liked anything else I’ve written, but it will give other people an automatic reason not to like it. It’s like, "Oh, I’ve got an opinion; I don’t need to hear his opinion." Probably *The Adams Filter* doesn’t work because I’m a little bit too polarizing. It would be better to take the focus off of me.
*The Filter Theory*. You know, I’m starting to like *The Coffee Filter*. "Filter" no longer feels like a word—we said it too much, didn't we? It's lost its meaning as a word. *A Keen Filter Theory*, *Change Your Mental Construct*, *Beyond the Filter*, *Filter Skelter*, *Take the Blue Pill*, *Filterism*. Something with "filter" that changes it to its own new word is always sketchy. Having a word that isn’t a real word gives people a problem because they can’t necessarily remember how to spell it. *Orthogonal Filters*—that would be the least likely title. *Hair Club for Men*? It's not the worst. *Scott Adams Filtered Me*, *He Filtered Me Up*.
*Think Freely*. We might have a winner here. *Think Freely*. That is now your current best suggestion. Somebody has to beat *Think Freely*, which plays very well with my last book, which was *Win Bigly*. So: *Win Bigly*, *Think Freely*. Pretty good. It’s pretty good. *Think Freely*. Wow, I think that’s it. I might hate it in five minutes. One of the problems with these titles is when you hear one that’s catchy and it sticks in your mind, you start thinking, "Oh yeah, that’s the one," and then you go back to it a day later and it doesn’t sound as good the second day.
*The Adams Filter* has the problem that it concentrates on me a little bit too much as a personality and it gives people a reason not to buy it. You never want your title to give somebody a reason not to buy it; that would be the ultimate title mistake. I’m seeing some love for *Think Freely*. *Think Freely* absolutely has more positive response than every other thing. Now I feel terrible because I didn’t see who it was who made that suggestion; I was so eager to write it down. If you’re the person who made that suggestion and you know who you are, be sure to send this to all of your friends and say, "He didn’t remember my name, but he liked my suggestion." That doesn't mean I'll use it because I have to check it with the publisher and make sure that it works, but *Think Freely* is really good. You will have to make sure there's no other book with that name and everything else.
## [President Trump’s Mockery of Dr. Ford](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWN6Ni8zYy4&t=1468s)
I think I got what I need. Let me talk about one topic from the news for those of you who are nice enough to stay here. The news is all worked up about the fact that the President mocked Christine Ford. Now, the interesting thing is that how you think about that has a lot to do with whether you think she’s definitely lying, definitely telling the truth, or we just can’t tell. Your opinion on his mocking really depends on if you've already made your decision whether she's a big ol' liar, completely honest and nothing but a victim who's trying to make the system better, or you just can’t tell.
President Trump’s assumption clearly is that she’s not credible, and he mocked her by mentioning the very things which show her to be less credible. At least you can make that argument. I think that was totally fair given that he’s quite certain she’s not credible. If you think she is, then of course it’s an ugly thing. But the people who say "there he goes attacking a woman again"—that might be the dumbest pundit thing anybody ever said. Think how dumb this is to say: "There’s the President attacking a woman." Haven’t we seen this President attack every male who’s come across his path? Hasn’t he attacked 100% of the men who opposed him in any way? Has he not mocked 100% of men who were on the other side in any context? All of them. He has mocked every one of them—male, female, black or white, old or young. He has mocked 100% of his serious critics that made any difference.
When I watch what I call "Rally Trump"—when Trump does his rallies—he is very much intentionally and obviously taking on a character. When he’s doing his rallies, you’re seeing essentially live entertainment in which he inhabits a character who’s sort of an exaggerated version of the President, in which he’ll say a little more outrageous things, he’ll be funnier, he’ll be a loose cannon, he’ll not care about political correctness. When he plays that character, he’s insanely popular with his base.
I watched just the clips of where he was making fun of Christine Ford and, if you can separate yourself from the idea that she is just a victim—it’s actually quite horrible if you think that, I would agree—but the President thinks she’s not credible, and much of the base thinks she’s not credible. If you just look at his performance, like did he deliver the entertainment? He really did. No matter what you think of his politics or him personally, I think historians are going to agree that by a fairly large margin, he’s the best that any president’s ever been at that—which is holding a crowd, electrifying a crowd, getting a big crowd making them excited, and keeping them in the base. I don't think even historians who don’t like this President will disagree that he's the best there’s ever been at having those rallies and holding the audience.
My take on it was very well done technique-wise, and how you feel about it depends on how you feel about her credibility in the first place. People are going to be all over the board on that.
## [The FBI Investigation and the Third Way to Win](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWN6Ni8zYy4&t=1713s)
Apparently, the FBI report is submitted. Do you all remember what I said when this FBI investigation was first approved? I told you that in any big organization, you can't do anything in a week. I mean, nothing of any importance. The fact that they constrained it to a week just guaranteed that nothing terribly important or extra will be done. A few extra interviews, a few extra allegations, but it’s going to look a whole lot like it looked before they did it. There are just not enough people to talk to; there’s no physical evidence.
I heard Greg Gutfeld say this—and I concur—we've been thinking in terms of: the President is either going to get this Supreme Court nominee and that would be good, but it might cost him in the midterms; or he could not get the nominee and that would be really energizing for the base, so he might do better in the midterms than anybody expects. He has two ways to win. But it’s easy to forget that there’s a third way to win, which is that he gets the nominee AND it also energizes the base because they watched the process.
## [Changing the Rules: The Ultimate Conservative Energy Trigger](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWN6Ni8zYy4&t=1836s)
Let me put this to you in a frame that I think will make all this make sense. When you're trying to understand who's energized by stuff, there’s probably nothing more energizing for conservatives, for Trump supporters, for Republicans—they’re not perfectly overlapping, but let's call them that group—I don't think there's anything more energizing than somebody trying to change the rules without going through the right process. Am I right? There’s nothing more energizing than somebody trying to rewrite the rules to their advantage without going through a process.
If we go through a process and laws are changed, you can often get people to go along with it even if they don't like it. But if there is, for example, activist judges freely interpreting the Constitution and they're doing things that maybe are not strictly in the Constitution, well, that is like the third rail for Republicans. It’s like, "Okay, the only thing we have holding civilization together is an agreement about the rules. It’s all we have." As soon as we lose our agreement on the rules, the whole fricking thing falls apart. So we’ve got to agree on the rules.
It’s very energizing, and I think that this whole nomination and "advise and consent" process—although it’s still technically within the rules, nobody’s quite violating the Constitution, there’s not really any kind of evidence threshold for this sort of thing—still, I think everybody would agree that the Left is changing the rules and they didn't get permission. Nothing’s more energizing to the Right than the Left changing the rules without getting some buy-in from the other side. It seems that that's what they're doing: changing the rules about how we see evidence, changing the rules about reasonable doubt, changing the rules about innocent until proven guilty.
## [Conservatives: Action vs. Talk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWN6Ni8zYy4&t=2023s)
The other thing that consistently amuses me—and I’ve said this before—is that although my social instincts lean far left, left of Bernie, that’s where my moral compass points. But I prefer the company of people on the Right. I don’t know if it’s because I grew up with Republicans; I’m sure that had something to do with it. But there’s something about the consistency, the dependability, and the way that Republicans and conservatives regard fair play that I just prefer. One of those is: don't change the rules unless you've talked to everybody.
I’m feeling like one of the other characteristics of Republicans—and see if you agree—wouldn't you say that you could describe them as more action than talk? Don't you think that’s a good generalization? They’re the sort of people who might not tell you they’re going to vote, but they're very likely to vote. As opposed to the resistance—it feels like the resistance talks a lot. They do act a lot too; there’s a lot of organization. But it seems like with the Left, the amount they talk and the amount they act are pretty correlated. If they talk more, they’re acting more.
But over on the Right, it’s a little less obvious. On the Right, there are people who don't need to talk. They don't see the value of talking. Maybe they're not complainers. They say, "Well, my contribution is voting, so I don't need to chat about it. I don't need to have a protest. I don't need to wear a hat. I don't need to make a sign. I don't need to talk to my neighbors. I don’t have to tell my co-workers who I’m voting for. I don’t have to answer a poll. I don’t have to do any fricking thing you want me to do. It’s a free country and I don’t have to participate in any way I don’t want to. But one of the ways I like participating is voting."
It seems to me that we have a situation that would be similar in some ways to what we call "shy Trump supporters," but I don’t think it’s shyness exactly. I’m talking about how it would be harder to measure the likelihood of Republicans voting because Republicans are action, they’re not talk. If they haven’t talked to you and told you they’re going to vote, you might make the mistake of thinking they're not that incentivized to do it.
I think you're going to see—because the trigger for voting on the Right is huge right now—a basic question about how the world works and how we're going to hold society together. The question of whether one side can rewrite the rules unilaterally should produce one of the highest turnouts of all time. That would be my guess. It’s not a question of shyness; it’s a question of preferring action over talk and just taking care of business. I think there’ll be some surprises. Your dad always said no bumper stickers because cars don't vote? That's so Republican. "Undercover rage," "messing with pollsters"—I wonder if Republicans are just generally less likely to give their opinion to a stranger. It might be true.
## [Persuasion Test: Encouraging Voter Registration](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWN6Ni8zYy4&t=2271s)
Has anybody tried my method of encouraging somebody to vote? I'll recap it. Tell me in the comments if anybody’s tried it yet, because you're running out of time. You need to do it in the next couple of weeks. You can just regard it as a persuasion test to see if the technique works.
Let's say you've identified somebody who is likely to vote the same way you are and you want to encourage them to vote. You don't want them to think about the whole process, because that’s too big a decision, too big a commitment. People don’t like that. You want to boil it down to the smallest increment that will get them to do something—anything. That "something" might be: "Open your email, there's a link there." The link tells them where they can sign up.
Importantly, you keep your email very short. Just the facts: "Here’s the link to sign up. It takes about 60 seconds." That’s important. Tell them that they’re only putting in a one-minute investment and that they can request to vote-by-mail. That’s very important. You want them to request the vote-by-mail because then they don’t even have to leave the house. You say, "Maybe we can fill this out together if you have any questions," or you could say, "Just vote for the stuff you know. You don't even have to vote for anything on the ballot that you don't understand. Just get your feet wet; just vote for the stuff you know."
You also have to ask people more than once. Somebody prompted me: the more times you touch them, the more likely they’ll act. That's true, but you’ll probably get a sense pretty early on whether somebody can be moved. If you get a real clear sense that it’s not going to happen, just cut that one loose and maybe try somebody else. But I’d be interested in your feedback. Somebody said "five four seven"? I hope that means it worked five out of seven times.
If you push too hard, they will resist. Your pushing should be in a different context. Once maybe you talk to them, twice maybe you send them an email. The third time, once you’ve given them some time, you say, "Did you see my email?" That’s not really bugging them; that’s just following up.
How many states vote by mail? That's a good question, I don't know. But if you don't have that option, then maybe you can offer to drive your friend to the polls. Is that raining? I think there’s a huge rainstorm happening right now. I’m going to go out on my porch and enjoy the rain. Anyway, let me know if it works for anybody. Bye for now.