Copenhagen Night Out Experience
Now is the best time to try something new.
Now is the best time to try something new.
This week I treated myself and attended an event called Science & Cocktails. As a parent, I seldom get the chance to go out without the kids. When I do, I like to pick educational and entertaining events that help me unwind, learn something new, and have a good time all at once.
Science & Cocktails always invites acclaimed speakers from scientific circles and often present their research and ideas in a way that is accessible and engaging to a broader audience, making it a popular platform for disseminating pop science.
This week’s talk in Copenhagen was about:
“Why do we get the wrong leaders?” by Brian Klaas.
The event was nicely coordinated, and the drinks were delicious. The speech from Brian Klaas was insightful, and he brought up great examples.
I wish I could stay a bit longer for networking but maybe next time.
The night started with Tachy’s Lo-fi music. It was a superb experience. I enjoyed it with my eyes closed, setting the night vibe. If you are interested in this genre or want to know more about Tachy, click on the link below:
About the speaker:
Brian Klaas is a political scientist and expert on democracy, authoritarianism, US politics, Western foreign policy, political violence, and elections. Hearing that he became interested in politics through his mother’s influence was heartwarming. In the past, Brian Klaas has advised governments, US political campaigns, international politicians, the EU, NATO, and more. He has interviewed over 500 top leaders, cult leaders, presidents, war criminals, dictators, psychopaths, and terrorists to understand why we give power to the wrong people. Brian Klaas is also a creator of the podcast called Power Corrupts. His promise was in Copenhagen that he would challenge the audience about their basic assumptions about power. Also, he is a fcking good drummer for the rock band, Contention One. I checked on YouTube, and it is seriously good. Give it a try!
I would love to share my thoughts, and since you are here, you might be interested, too. Here is my experience report.
Children’s know
It’s always lovely to hear about children and their intelligence. Have you known that children can predict who will win an election based on the face of politicians? Children don’t need promises, dreams, and hopes from politicians. Kids look at their faces, and they know who will win. I wonder when the media will replace pollsters with children. Probably not in the near future. Later on, Brian talks about his experience with a cult leader. Scary how good people turn into monsters right after they taste power.
Power attracts the corrupt
Biran gave us two examples of that. First, he talks about the famous or infamous Stanford prison experiment and shows two approaches to attracting people to the police force. I will show you the one that is not just humorous but also gives an authentic picture of the work at the police station. Check out the video here. Make sure you know and advertise precisely what or who you want.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9psILoYmCc
How can you spot power-hungry people? Try to observe. If someone seeks power and obtains it and then does everything to stay in power, then I got bad news for you. These are the signs that you found yourself a power-hungry person.
“Power should be a burden, not a calling”
Well said, Brian. This is why so important to change the system for good. We are waiting for people to self-select themselves to be leaders. That’s a bad idea. Seek out leaders, don’t wait for them. The sad thing is that those who would be good leaders usually don’t want to be leaders. Big corporates and parliaments should run an integrity test on their highly ranked people. We learned that unsuccessful psychopaths go to prison and successful psychopaths go to politics and business.
Make sense now
For those who don’t know me, I can’t get enough of evolutionary psychology. Evolutionary psychologists explain so much about our behaviour, and in the meantime, they raise excellent questions and make people think more. It’s always a pleasure to hear more about evolutionary psychology. I enjoyed that part of the talk the most. Here is the explanation of why we tend to choose men as leaders. First, you have to think as a hunter-gatherer. If there was a dangerous animal nearby or a fight was about to take place, who could protect others? The smartest one, the empathetic one, the richest one from the tribe? No. The big strong man, the macho man if you like. We might locked up all the dangerous animals, and a lot of us don’t have to fight for our lives, but our brain is still wired as we are hunter-gatherers. That’s why we vote for charismatic leaders, influential strong men, simply to protect us.
Thank you for reading me!
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Thank you!
