'TOTAL GRIFTER!' Arthur C. Brooks On Andrew Tate & Whether Money Can Buy Happiness

0:00Piers Morgan:Andrew Tate, with his university or whatever, is just a total grifter. Yeah. What do we do about that? The whole idea that we're so credulous, that we're so eager to actually be convinced by these particular people, has made us into bad consumers. The problem is not the grifters. The problem is the people who are willing to follow the grifters all the way to the end. And we need to be more skeptical. Well, depending on where you stand on these things, those who offer to reveal the meaning of life and secrets to everlasting happiness are usually one of three things, a guru, a grifter or a genius, maybe even a bit of all three.

0:34Piers Morgan:My guest today was certainly hope to be considered in the last category. He's a Harvard professor, social scientist, a number one New York Times bestselling author, specialising in the science of human happiness. His new book is The Meaning of Your Life, Finding Purpose in an Age of Emptiness. I'm delighted to welcome Arthur C. Brooks. Arthur, great to meet you. Nice to meet you. We were just talking off camera. I mean, I've followed you for a long time, you followed me for a long time, we finally get to meet. It's interesting because I know Jordan Peterson very well. He's sadly had a lot of ill health in the last year.

1:09Piers Morgan:Jordan, whenever I've interviewed him, he's always... He often gets very emotional, he gets quite dark. I wouldn't say he's completely glass half empty, but he veers that way. You're almost the opposite. You're just as scholarly in many ways, but you're a glass half full guy instinctively. You look for the positive, you look for happiness, path to joy. Would you accept that categorisation? Sort of. I mean, Jordan and I do have the same toolkit. We're both behavioural scientists with a real background in neuroscience as well to really look at the psychology and biology, what makes us up. I'm not a glass-half-full guy naturally.

1:45Happiness is hard for me, which is why I study happiness. I actually dedicated myself to the science of human happiness because I wanted the secrets. It's sort of me-search more than research. So what is the secret of being happy? Well, it's a complicated business. But the secret to learning anything that's hard and nuanced really has three parts to it. You need to understand it. You need to make a commitment to change your behavior. You need to teach it to others. It's like anything else. If you want to learn to be a good golfer, you should learn about golf. You should practice golf. And then really the most important part is actually explaining it.

2:16So you become responsible for it. Surgeons... Funny enough, you see, take golf.

2:20Piers Morgan:So I play golf. and I find the harder I try and pursue being a better golfer, the less happy I am doing it. Whereas the more natural I play golf, where I get my joy just because it happens organically and around with friends or whatever, that's when I'm happiest playing golf. When I start to take it really seriously and think, I want to get my handicap down, I want to do this, I can feel the happiness eroding from me. Right. No, I can understand that too. And in truth, there's a parallel with happiness itself. If you say, I want to be happy today, I'm going to try to be happy today. The pursuit of happiness can often be quite a miserable process.

2:58Yeah, that's exactly right. And that's one of the reasons that the pursuit of happiness per se is misbegotten. The way to actually become a happier person is to look at the macronutrients of happiness, the component parts of happiness, and to do those things and let happiness find you. That turns out to be a much better way to do it. Don't just try to be more, just don't try to be healthier. figure out what healthy people do and do those things and enjoy those things and live well. And so when it comes to happiness, there's really three parts. There's enjoyment of life, there's satisfaction in your accomplishments, and it's finding the meaning of your existence.

3:31And so what do you pursue? A more enjoyable life, better accomplishments, where you accept struggle to try to do good things and look for the why of your life by living in a particular way. And that's really what I teach my students.

3:41Piers Morgan:Someone said to me recently something that really struck me. They said, look, let's be clear. We've all got a terminal illness called death. We're all going to die. So once you understand that and you accept that, you can chart a path to happiness and fulfilment in life because you know how it ends. There's no secret sauce to avoiding the Grim Reaper. That's right. We're all in the same boat. It's just when it happens, you may as well do things which bring you joy, genuine joy. But I do think I see some people and they just really strive to be happy in a way that doesn't really work. Yeah. Now, and part of that is because they think that the harder they try, the more it's going to come to them.

4:24Once again, you need to live in a particular way where happiness finds you. That's the real secret to it. Now, you made an interesting point just now, which is you need to be thinking about the end for you to understand and enjoy the path to getting to the end. And that's key. I mean, different people disagree about what actually the end is all about. We all know we're going to die, but we don't all agree that we're not going to exist. And so different people, some people, traditionally religious people, live in such a way that they will extend their existence beyond their physical death. And ironically, those people are the happiest people.

4:55Because you're a Catholic, right? I'm a Catholic. I'm a practicing Catholic.

4:57Piers Morgan:So you believe in the afterlife. I do. So I've had this argument with atheists, whether it's Richard Dawkins or Ricky Gervais, whoever it may be, is like, God, it must be, I mean, that must be so depressing to think that when you died, that's it, right? I said, at least I've got something to look forward to. You might want to ridicule my belief system. But I am quite content that if I die, I think... I mean, to me, it seems preposterous that there wouldn't be something else out there. Otherwise, what are we? How have we got here? What's there before the Big Bang? All these unanswerable questions.

5:30Piers Morgan:There has to be a more powerful entity for me. No, I agree with you. And as a scientist, I think that's especially interesting. If I were a Picasso expert, I'd want to know about the paintings and the painter. And I would find no evidence of the painter in the painting. And so that's one of the reasons that as a scientist, I marvel at the creation, but I wonder at the creator too, is how that comes about. And that gives my life a whole lot of meaning. Look, Pierce, we might be wrong, but so what? Yes. So what? The thought that we're right is incredibly... Consoling. Yes. And it gives us an anchor in what we're trying to do.

6:02And by the way, we live better, and we lift other people up in bonds of happiness and love because we want a better life for them too.

6:08Piers Morgan:Do you think Jordan Peterson believes in God? I do. I do. Because he's never really said he does. It's hard for scholars. It's hard for social scientists because we're born and bred to think that everything is socially. But why is it harder for scientists when all I ever ask a scientist who is sitting on the fence or is an atheist or whatever, I say, well, okay, you think everything started with the Big Bang. Yeah. What was there before the Big Bang? And because the human brain can't comprehend nothingness, obviously, there must be something out there which can explain those kind of things which is superior to us.

6:42There has to be because otherwise you have no answers for me. No, this is the ipsum esse. That's what Aquinas called God. That to be, the thing that's around it that's not... Part of the problem with a lot of scientists is they look at the representation that you and I as Christian people or Muslims or Hindus for that matter, how they represent the Godhead. And that's like a guy with a long beard. And that's so absurd because that's to say that God is another creature. And they justifiably reject that. But the Bible says, I am. Ipsum esse. It's something that's outside of our creation. And therefore, it's what Aquinas would have called the first mover.

7:18And that's your point.

7:19Piers Morgan:In the book, The Meaning of Your Life, the subtitle is Finding Purpose in an Age of Emptiness. It's interesting because I look at young people. I've got four kids. Yeah. How old were they? From 32 down to 14. Yeah, yeah. And they're all very different, and I'm not pinning what I'm about to say on any of them individually. But generationally, I would say that the single biggest factor on how they think about things has been the advent of smartphones. The fear of... The FOMO, the fear of missing out. The ability to see what all your friends are doing at any given moment, which you may not be doing, which when I was their age, it was impossible to know.

8:02Piers Morgan:Totally. You didn't know, right? You might know what one or two mates were doing, otherwise they were all doing their own thing. This constant, they're much more looks obsessed because the stuff they're putting on Instagram or whatever always has to be perfect. I don't care, right? But they do. That generation really cares about aesthetics, which in a way are quite empty things, I think. So we've got a bizarre situation where statistically it remains the case that this is the best time to ever be alive. There are fewer wars in recorded history, cleaner water, less child poverty, we're living longer, we're living healthier, we're finding cures for more diseases, and so on and so on and so on.

8:42Piers Morgan:It ought to be the absolute golden age of humanity. And yet young people collectively have never been more anxious, never been more depressed, very sadly many taking their own lives. There's a total disconnect between reality and what they are feeling about this. Where does the age of emptiness fit into this? So you're exactly right that the technology that mediates the relationships and the perception of reality of young people has broken their brains. And actually we know this. Have you ever had Ian McGilchrist on your show? The great neuroscientist from Oxford? No. Oh, he's wonderful and he has this idea.

9:21He's a terrific, he's really the greatest neuroscientist who is also a psychiatrist and philosopher working today. And he talks about the two halves of the brain working differently. The left half of your brain is the analytical side, the information and stuff, how to and what side. The right side is what you really care about. That's the why side, the mystery and the meaning side. You think about your car and how it works on the left side. You think about your marriage and how it works or doesn't on the right side. I can solve my car. I can't solve my marriage, Pierce. I've been married 35 years.

9:51I will never solve my marriage.

9:52Piers Morgan:Let me help you. Your wife's always right. Exactly. There you are. Well played, sir. I was like, did she pay you? But this is really important because when we're using technology, we're forcing ourselves into the left sides of our brain. That's the analytical side. And what happens is when we have right side needs, love, mystery, meaning, hope, faith, and we satisfy those needs with a simulation from the left-hand side mediated through a through an algorithm of social media, we're empty. We know. There's one thing you can't simulate, which is the meaning of your life. This is how we've broken our brains.

10:26Our brains are literally not working right.

10:27Piers Morgan:And it's led to a physical disconnect. Absolutely. Where people are just not even... I mean, they're talking about a sex depression, right? Where young people just aren't having as much sex as previous generations. They're not having the same kind of relationships. What's going on there? What's going on there is that we're mediating our relationships through a small screen so that men are contenting themselves temporarily with pornography, which leads them to greater amounts of depression and anxiety and loneliness. It's very, very clear in the data that the more pornography that men consume, the lonelier and more depressed that they get.

11:01And then they'll date on apps. Men and women will meet on apps. Now, the problem with that is that that's fake dating. That's fake courting to a very large extent. You need more human friction, right hemispheric friction in the mating risk of mystery.

11:13Piers Morgan:Okay, but let me figure up on that. What is the difference, if you think about it, between when I was young, 16, 17, going to a pub and chatting up a girl or whatever at the bar, right? And you get lucky or you don't get lucky. And doing exactly the same thing on the dating app where you just know a little bit more about that person. Oh, but it's different. It's completely different. So what's the difference? To begin with, all you're looking at is with very limited information on the basis of a photograph and a few words where you're curating your image. When you met your wife, did you meet your wife in a pub?

11:42Piers Morgan:No. Where did you meet your wife? I was speaking at an event where I was dying a terrible death and everyone was mocking me. And she was the only one laughing. It turned out she was laughing at how they were mocking me. But she was the lone voice of support in a sea of derision. And you saw her and you heard her words and you smelled her. I met a girl in 1988 in Dijon that didn't speak a single word of English. And I didn't speak a single word of her language. which turned out to be Catalan and Spanish. And she smelled to me like a cantaloupe on an August afternoon. And that is the woman with whom I have four grandchildren today.

12:24Really? Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. It took a couple of years to improve our communication. But the whole point is that your brain is highly complex. You know who your mate is. Interestingly, we know the repertoire of the genetic tendency to be able to protect against diseases by the way that our mate smells. That's actually called the major histocompatibility complex. Your brain knows that from how she smells. You don't get that over a dating app. All you get is a few lies about who the person is and the best picture that was ever taken. And you know perfectly that you don't know anything. And that's meaningless.

12:57That's the reason that people have more dates and less attraction, less sex, less likelihood of marrying.

13:02Piers Morgan:There is a narrative that money doesn't bring you happiness. I've interviewed thousands of people. I would say it can bring you happiness. I know rich people who are really happy, and I know very poor people who are really happy. It often has little to do with actual money. But the ones who have money who are happy say, it just bought me security not to have to worry about things that having no money made me worry about. I get that. But I don't think it's the money itself that makes them happy. It's the other things. It might be the relationship they're in or the job they have or whatever. They're getting fulfillment, which is making them happy, that I don't think is paid to the cash.

13:40Yeah, that's correct. Now, money does eliminate sources of unhappiness. Unhappiness and happiness are actually functioning in different parts of the brain. They're not the opposites of each other. You have happiness and you have unhappiness. You have positive emotions. You have negative emotions for different reasons. And if negative emotionality is getting in your way because you don't meet your caloric needs, you can't pay your rent, your kids can't go to the doctor, when you eliminate that, you eliminate those sources of unhappiness and your life is better. And you conclude, I got happier. I mean, at one point, I was so poor, I was a musician, from when I was 19, 20, until I was 25, I couldn't go to the dentist.

14:15I didn't go to the dentist one time. We didn't have socialized dentistry in the United States. And then I had enough money at 25 to go to the dentist, and I filled 12 cavities, and I concluded that money bought happiness. Now, I will confess that not one day during that period did I go without a cigarette. So priorities, I suppose. But the point is that I made the wrong conclusion. I was eliminating unhappiness, and I thought it brought me happiness. That's wrong. Now, when you do have money, there are ways that you can buy happiness. And your rich friends who are happier doing these following things.

14:44You don't get happiness by buying stuff. You get happiness by buying experiences and having those experiences with the people that you love. Yeah, but have you ever bought an Aston Martin Rapide?

14:54Piers Morgan:Because I have, and that brought me a lot of happiness. How long? I'd always wanted Aston Martin. James Bond always drove Aston Martin. And when I could finally afford one, it brought me happiness when I bought it. Yeah. I still have it. Every time I drive it, it brings me happiness. Genuine happiness. But it's the experience of driving the car. It's not the car per se. Well, actually looking at it makes me happy. Yeah, yeah. But that's an experience too. Knowing I have one makes me happy. Perhaps you're the exception, but the truth is that as an empirical matter, buying experiences and spending those experiences either in really an edifying way or with people that you love, that brings real joy.

15:31Or buying time and using that time in a way that's really productive, not scrolling Instagram for pizza. Giving the money away to causes that you care about brings happiness. Saving for the future brings happiness because that's future success, whereas borrowing money ruins your happiness. Uncovered windows can make your home feel up to 20 degrees hotter. Stay cool and save up to 50 % off custom window treatments during the 4th of July mega sale at blinds.com. From outdoor shades to room darkening blinds, finding the perfect fit is easy. Get free samples, expert design help, and professional measure and install services or DIY with confidence and support every step of the way.

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16:19Piers Morgan:It's fine. Right. Right to the point when you have, as I have recently in the last year or two, lost a couple of great friends suddenly. Yeah, yeah. And you're like, well, what if you don't have a future? What are you saving it for? And also, I don't want to just, leave what I have to my kids, necessarily, because then they wouldn't have what I had when I was their age, which was just the hunger to have these things. To earn their success. Yeah, and there's nothing... And you talk about happiness. I remember my first pay packet as a young journalist on the Wimbledon News. I was 18, 19. I remember it was hardly any money, really.

16:53Piers Morgan:But the joy that it was my money to spend how I wanted to spend it, I can remember how happy that made me. You know, I believe you. and I completely believe that too. And the truth of the matter is that some people save too little and some people save too much. Are some people just generally by nature... I mean, my mother always remembers me being a happy child. Yeah. We went through quite a lot of trauma as a family. But she always remembers me just being a real glass-half-full person. And I still think I am. Right. I'm able to deal with, like, a lot of crap, just quite phlegmatically, count to ten, have a drink.

17:28You're not phlegmatic, you're sanguine. I mean, you've got a kind of a... Well, I wouldn't even say sanguine. You also have a good sense of humor.