An Interview with Dr. Joel Anderson - Philosophy and the Wandering Mind

Rhythms of Focus

In this extended episode, professional philosopher Dr. Joel Anderson engages in a deep and stimulating conversation about Wandering Minds, ADHD, and Beyond with our host Dr. Kourosh Dini.

Discussing philosophical and practical issues around agency, procrastination, and the balance between forcing oneself and creating affording conditions, they explore the concept of 'agentic play,' the importance of creating environments that invite rather than coerce, and the role of emotions in the effort to engage with tasks meaningfully.

They question the differences between motivation, effort, and naturally flowing engagement, and consider the implications of removing distractions and setting guiding conditions in a caring manner. The episode ends with reflections on how these philosophical dialogues can shift one's approach to work and life.

00:00 Introduction to the Conversation

02:33 Joel Anderson's Background

03:48 Diving into Philosophical Concepts

05:01 Exploring Agency and Play

05:48 Affordances and Environmental Design

10:08 Self-Binding Strategies and Productivity

17:59 Emotional Work and Hard Labor

21:11 Navigating Procrastination and Effort

30:21 Meeting Tension with Care

30:43 Hierarchical Set of Binds

32:50 Facing the Fog of Tasks

35:40 Building Trust and Self-Efficacy

43:49 Effortless Engagement and Motivation

52:52 Listening to Yourself

55:09 Concluding Thoughts and Reflections

Links

• Dr. Joel Anderson's Inaugural Lecture
• Joel's Home Page
• No Bad Parts - Richard Schwartz PhD

Transcript

Introduction to the Conversation

I've got a treat for you today. Joel Anderson is a good friend of mine. He's a wonderful guy, brilliant philosopher. He's a professional academic philosopher, even. He's got a way of thinking things through in a way I truly admire. Every time we talk, I, I walk away feeling stimulated. I'm ready to write, uh, suddenly I'm seeing something in a new light.

We've been having these conversations in one way or another for over a decade now. Uh, and I thought, you know what, what if we just recorded one and shared it on a podcast? I have no idea whether you'll enjoy it as we do or not, but,

uh, it's, it's, it's cool. We sort of start slow and build up as things go on. Listening to it, I wonder if we've developed a sort of shorthand. This sort of thing happens. It's like any place or person where you've been hanging out or with for a while. Uh, things line up, you know, the organization of either physical or thought space just falls into this functional sort of place.

In any case, I thought it would be entertaining and I'd love to hear your feedback about it. If you're up for it, drop me a line at [email protected]. That's W-A-N-D-E [email protected].  

Joel Anderson's Background

I have a chair in moral psychology and social philosophy in the Ethics Institute, which is part of the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies in the faculty of the humanities at Utrecht University. So that's the whole hierarchical layering of that.

That's the thing. Alright, cool.

Nested communities.

We've been chatting since, I was looking, I was trying to find the first email between us, and the earliest I found was 2014, but it looked like it was in the middle of a conversation.

Yeah, it always feels like that with you, that as whenever we pick it up, it feels like we're just in the middle of a conversation that's been going on for a while, so I

Totally, yeah. So anyway, thank you for being here. You're the first guest and, this is cool.

Well, just so everybody knows, I mean, I'm a huge fan, right? So for me, this is, quite an honor. Following all the things that you've been doing through the years, both in your therapeutic and psychiatric work. I work on, procrastination, research adjacent work that you've been doing, but then also just the tools that you've provided for people and advice on how to get the most out of DEVONthink, or especially OmniFocus.

So you're, you're a very generative and generous human being, and I very much appreciate that.

You are incredibly kind. Thank you.

Diving into Philosophical Concepts

One of the things that I really enjoy in our conversations is how stimulated I feel and that I feel like we really get into stuff . So, for, um, at the risk of, of going all inside baseball, you know, during this, this talk here, I, I'm totally fine with it. Um, because we might just jump in and dive in and talk about concepts and like, do we, how do we define it? How do we present it to the audience that Yeah. You know?

Right.

Know, and really I think, um, what are the times when we feel most alive? I mean, you put it in terms of play, right? I mean, for me, I'd, I think it's a big part of what drew me into philosophy. I. Exploring the possibilities of various words and concepts and ideas is, you know, just like what you're doing if you're noodling on the piano or trying to solve some or other people are trying to solve some problem or a creative endeavor, you've got this canvas and you're trying to figure out how can I represent something with the paint I've got. It's, um, it's this, it's this exhilaration that comes from seeing opportunities and being able to just give yourself over to that creative elaboration of what's going on there.

And I think conversation is, is, is, is a great context in which that happens.

Totally, totally. That discovery, I like that phrase, "give yourself over." Yeah. You know, that, that, that, that, um, um.

Exploring Agency and Play

One of the concepts that , we talk about is agency is one of the main, main things I get into and defining it as, um, uh, uh, being able to decide non reactively, um, or decide and engage non-reactively.

But in that idea of play and discovery and creativity and all that, that "give yourself over," it's like, do you suspend that? Do you like, do you, like, do you let that go? That part of you that has to like, that has to, uh, pause to decide Or then there was this other phrase that you, you'd said, I think the last time we spoke, which was age, "agentic play."

I'm like, oh, wow, that isn't that nice blend of, of ideas. And uh, but that just idea of like creating the space, right? So we're, we're trying to invite the muse, give ourself over, like be able to, to invite that, that that flow and um. And, and the job of the practice, the job of the work, the thing we do is, is we create the conditions for it and then, and then we become it.

Yeah.

Affordances and Environmental Design

I mean, there's this wonderful word that I love using for capturing some of this: "affordances," right? So affordances for thoughtful and intentional play, uh, or affordances for, for insight. I mean, it's got this notion of, um, an invitation. So it's, it's a bit of an odd use of the word affordance, but it was developed by very, uh, thoughtful, it's known as an ecological psychologist named Gibson. And, uh, this notion of an affordance is like a chair. You know, there are chairs that afford sitting, they just like invite you to sit in them. Yeah. Or you have a, a well designed. One of my favorite examples is, you know, you have, you have doors where you want to know, should I push or should I pull?

And a well-designed door is flat, has a flat panel on the side that you should push and has a handle on the side that you should pull . It in certain sense, it, it creates a, a almost a, it prepares you for an experience of flow. It signals to you what's to be done and, and invites you to engage in a certain way.

And I think, that contrast, we're all too familiar with, that contrast between a, uh, a, a situation, a, a work setting in which there's various tasks you need to complete that is aversive. And it's like everything feels like a barrier. There's, or there's things that they're pulling you in all kinds of directions.

And then there's those context in which. You, you kind of this alignment, uh, of what you need to do and what you want to do is kind of ready to hand there. It's just inviting you to take those next steps and, you know, and that's, that's what you're doing in all these different, uh, in all the work you do with like, whether it's, you know, setting up a to-do list in such a way that when you get to the to-do list, you're not suddenly confronted with raw panic of where do I even start?

Mm. But that it's a manageable kind of welcoming space in which to exercise your, uh, your agentic freedom. You're, uh, uh, your, yeah, your agency.

I love that phrase, affordance. You'd, um. I remember we played around with those ideas like that, and I think you'd even had at one point, I don't remember this, but you'd,

I think it was a paper you'd written or something

where you had like seven Yeah, it was my, my inaugural, yeah, my inaugural address.

What we make a, we can make a link, make a link available to that. I mean, I don't know if people wanna see some pomp and circumstance, uh, of a, of a Dutch , formal lecture. So I have this, I mean, I, 'cause I just love playing with these different images. I heard you actually using Trellis. We had a long discussion of the use of scaffolding trellis.

Um, and uh, and I think of kind of affordances as another species of that, of that genus, right? Mm-hmm. So these are ways in which our environment is structured so as to be supportive of our agency.

Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, when we look at, for example, you know. The to-do list you bring up, you know, like there's, it, it's so easy to be repulsed by it.

It's so easy to look at it because it's been written by someone else. It's been written by past self, it's been written by, right. Who was that jerk? Right, exactly. And, uh, and, and then, you know, that easily touches off the part of us that's like, I haven't been able to follow through on the things I've asked myself to do.

You know? Yeah. And, and, and, and past self may have, you know, punted to, to our current self, uh, because for whatever reason they didn't feel like it, or they, or they made the, a very clear decision at that time. This is the thing and everything else has to wait. Whatever it is. But then that's where I think it's, it's, um, it started to transform for me.

So I, I, I think you're right that I, I started very much with the trellis. I still have that, that or, and the affordances. And how do we, I. You know, make it so that we can not have to think. So that to, in terms of getting into the flow to, to smooth that process, but then realizing that, uh, we do have to think in terms of, um, uh, we are, we are a unique person right now.

Whoever we were 10 minutes ago, 10 years ago Yeah. Is, is a different person. And, and we can set ourselves up relatively well. Um, and, and we can even stumble into like an inspiring amount of friction based on what they've, they've presented. But things change. Everything changes. And that's just, you know, that's, isn't that the ever.

The ever thing that things change,

but Yeah. But, but,

Self-Binding Strategies and Productivity

and it, but it comes, it, it comes back to your contrast with, um, more force based approaches, uh, as well. I mean, one thing that, one strategy that we can use when we're subject to temptations having trouble focused, getting pulled in all sorts of directions, is, um, uh, we can bind ourselves to the mast, right?

This is the, this is the story from the mythology of Odysseus who is gonna be passing. He needed to guide his ship past the sirens of Kalis and, and, uh, Cheribdus and, and, um. And he knew that if he, uh, he wanted to hear the song, but if he knew, if he were, if he were, were listening, he would order his, uh, his crew to head towards the cliffs and, and like many ships before him would've been, would've been destroyed.

So you have these, these, these efforts at self binding where you have a commitment mechanism, you lock yourself in. He had his crew tie him up so that he could listen to the song, but wouldn't be, wouldn't be tempted. And then, you know, once you're past the period of temptation, you let go. Um, so there are all these, there are all these kinds of kinds of mechanisms.

One of my favorite ones is people who have shopping addictions. Um, I mean, it used to be the case that if you didn't have the actual physical credit card, you couldn't go shopping. And so if you froze a credit card in a block of ice, I. Would, it would take like an hour or two to let it melt again. To be able to use it without, without having to, uh, you know, without risking damaging it.

Or there are people who will take the router of their internet, uh, their wifi at home and they'll mail it to themselves. So they have to wait for the delivery of that to come back. So there are all these ways that are, that are, there are forced strategies, right. They're, they're, you're being coercive toward yourself.

Yeah.

And I, I mean, I think one of the things that really resonates with a lot of what you say is we should be really careful about reaching too quickly for those kinds of strategies. 'cause they're, you're really doing, you're, you're relating to yourself in a mode of, of coercion force.

Hmm.

You're kind of doing, you know, you're.

You're not respectful of your own need for freedom and choice and autonomy. And sometimes frankly, we, you know, we're in a really bad way and we need that, you know? Mm-hmm. Maybe if that's gonna be the thing that, that, that, that, that turns things around for you, then that's a, that's a strategy. But I think it's, um, it's a strategy.

We should be, we should be keen to avoid if we relying on, if we can, right? If, 'cause we, we rely on that too quickly, then we get into these relations of, you know, as you, as you, you've talked about in a number of these podcast episodes already, we're then trapped in that mode of using force to get things done instead of creating these affordances, these spaces, these invitations to the exercise of agency.

All right. . Now here's my, here, let me, let me throw out a, uh, devil's advocate type of thing. I don't know. Good. The, the, the. So I, I'm trying to think through the idea of force, right? So that we have, you know, uh, you know, I have to start, um, yeah. Or, um, uh, waiting for a deadline or shaming ourselves.

I often , put it in the context of emotion, like the sort of negative emotion, right? All right. So freezing the credit card. What a neat idea. I never thought of that. So you, or, or the mailing, the router. So either one of those, is that binding to the mast I, I, I, I, I hear what you're saying, but could that be, how is that different than, let's say, turning off notifications to focus?

Right. Um, I want to, I wanna read a book. I wanna read a physical book. The internet is right there. So I'm gonna take that router and mail it to myself and that'll force me to, or at least it won't force me to read the book, but it'll, it'll remove an option deliberately. Um, and I'll be more inclined to read the book.

I might, I might also be more inclined to do many other things too, but, but yeah. Uh, it'll, it'll be one of the guides that'll start. So I guess the question I'm asking is, that's great. What's, what's distinguishing that as a force or as a, uh, as, as creating an affordance of sorts, a limitation that would help me engage in something I'm intending to do?

No, that's really, that's really good Kourosh. 'cause I think, I mean, you're right that from one perspective, you could look at all of these things as just a matter of reducing the number of temptations we're exposed to, right? So why isn't that just, you know, all of a piece with kind of setting up your environment?

And so I think at some level you're right, but my, my sense is that we do want to draw a distinction between those ways in which we are as it were indirectly steering ourselves, those ways of doing that, that are kind of coercive and manipulative. Yeah. And those, those ways of doing that, that are just, you know, it's kind of like the care of the future self and, you know, uh, curating an environment that's supportive of yourself.

Right. And so it's like, when is, when is something, when is something a helpful kick in the kick in the rump mm-hmm. Um, to nudge you along? And when is it abusive? When is something like a, a kind of patronizing form of paternalistic intervention? And when is it just giving good advice? So I think this is, you know, I'm, I'm not, I'm not trying to just split hairs here, but I think this is, in one way, this is describing the challenge of finding the appropriate ways of, of dealing with our, our shortcomings, our tension, our our, our temp, our giving into temptation, uh, and so on.

And I don't think, I don't think there's like, I don't think like if you're using the computer somehow it's in a different category. 'cause all of these tools can be used in more manipulative or more supportive ways. But I just, I just wanna underscore this idea, which I think aligns with what you're saying about the contrast between, um, play and visit on the one hand and like force and shame on on the other, on the other side.

It, it aligns with that to say there are ways of relating to ourselves that might increase our productivity. But at the cost of treating ourselves, manipulatively and with and without self-respect.

Um, okay. A couple of thoughts. First, splitting hairs is fun, so let's go ahead. I hope the listeners, I hope the listeners can, uh, can split along with us.

Yeah. Uh, uh, second note to your point of, um, I, there there is very much that thread I think that has been out there, that's been, that has been subtly called and sometimes quite overtly called about like a meaningless productivity, you know, a productivity that's, you know, just, um, kind of empty. Kind of empty, yeah.

Yeah. Um, or, or the productivity for productivity's sake. Um, where, where, or, or, I think the, the best way I I'd heard it was when, um, someone I'd, I'd been talking to described it as, I'm, I'm, I get nauseous when I hear. X or y person, you know, like that, that, that their way of approaching it and there's something revolting, there's something that happens that, um, that I think it touches on that, that feeling of you just need to force yourself more, uh, you need to work harder, you need to it.

And these words are not well defined in...