Ever heard of cognitive dissonance? That thing a psychology lecturer might have explained to you once upon a time, likely using the same UFO cult example everyone else uses. Well, a new paper by Thomas Kelly suggests that the UFO cult example might have been ever so slightly oversold.

Kelly's archival work suggests that the researchers didn't just observe the cult as reported. Instead, they infiltrated it, faked supernatural experiences, assumed quasi-leadership roles, and then wrote up the results as if the group had spontaneously doubled down on their failed prophecy, which they had not. Because the leader recanted, and the group fell apart shortly after the failed prophecy. Minor details.

Matt and Chris discuss this paper, a 2024 multilab replication, and some other papers by Kelly, considering the ever-reliable tendency of researchers to find exactly what they are looking for.

It's cognitive dissonance all the way down, folks.

The full episode is available to Patreon subscribers (1 hour, 10 minutes).

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Decoding Academia 34: When Prophecy Fails Debunked?

00:00 Introduction

02:04 Cognitive Dissonance Theory

06:41 Classic lab evidence: effort justification & the ‘severe initiation’ study

08:33 When Prophecy Fails: The Original Account

10:54 The debunking: archival evidence, misconduct claims, and ethical red flags

20:22 Replication reality check: multi-lab results and ‘strong vs weak’ dissonance

31:40 Beyond one case: survivorship bias, failed prophecies, and early Christianity parallels

35:51 Christianity as Historical Anomaly or Cognitive Dissonance Exemplar?

41:48 Thomas Kelly: Interesting biosafety takes and a possible Christian lens

45:43 The importance of seeking for disconfirming evidence

50:23 Conspiracy-theory dynamics & narrative elaboration

56:30 Classical Psychological Theories and Personal Motivations

01:03:07 Steps that can be taken to reduce biases

01:05:01 Stay tentative, check evidence, and don’t pick sides too fast

01:06:30 A lesson from Scott Alexander!

1. Festinger, L. (1957). A theory of cognitive dissonance. Stanford University Press.
2. Festinger, L., Riecken, H. W., & Schachter, S. (1956). When prophecy fails. University of Minnesota Press.
3. Festinger, L., & Carlsmith, J. M. (1959). Cognitive consequences of forced compliance. The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 58(2), 203–210. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0041593 (The original induced-compliance/$1/$20 study)
4. Kelly, T. (2026). Debunking "When Prophecy Fails." Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences, 62(1), e70043. https://doi.org/10.1002/jhbs.70043
5. Kelly, T. (2025). Failed prophecies are fatal. International Journal for the Study of New Religions, 14(1), 48–71. https://doi.org/10.1558/ijsnr.33085
6. Aronson, E., & Mills, J. (1959). The effect of severity of initiation on...

Cult Season rumbles on as Chris and Matt expand their minds in an attempt to absorb the cosmic insights of spiritual influencer and alleged cult leader Teal Swan (born Mary Teal Bosworth, 1984). Our intrepid hosts explore her recent appearance on the Just Tap In podcast with Emilio “starchild” Ortiz — a beanie-wearing vessel of pure credulity, lobbing softball metaphysical questions gently into the astral winds.

The topic covered is ostensibly “Major 2026 Predictions” but this is really just an entry point for discussion of the ancient origins of AI, multiversal astral contract negotiations, and, of course, the urgent need to discuss masculinity before we spiritually implode.

You will learn insights, such as: how AI will eliminate ageing, guide us to SOURCE, amplify our shadow, and corrupt and deceive us ... all at once. Aliens and other cosmic beings are deeply concerned with and also not really all that bothered with humanity. Also, pop stars are apparently set to receive divine instructions to stabilise the collective psyche in 2026. And how we are all trapped in a planetary pressure cooker that will run at least until 2030. Teal is trying not to scare us, but it doesn’t look great (though it might also be great and lead to utopia).

Expect astral board meetings, sensemaking redefinitions of “power” and “love”, warnings about the painful sacrifices required to join Teal’s “conscious community”, and some distinctly uncomfortable talk about opening gates and reframing mother–son dynamics. As ever, Matt and Chris attempt to decode the elevated vagueness, semantic gliding, and cosmic scaling of very earthly anxieties.

All hail SOURCE!

Decoding Content

1. Just Tap In Podcast #260: "Teal Swan – Why 2026 Is a Psychological & Relational Tipping Point for Humanity"

Links

1. The Gateway (Gizmodo Podcast, 2018) - Six-part investigative series by Jennings Brown
2. The Deep End (Freeform/Hulu, 2022) - Four-part docuseries by Jon Kasbe
3. Mormon Stories #1607: Growing Up with Teal Swan - Diana Hansen Ribera - Interview with Teal's childhood best friend
4. Mormon Stories #1328-1331: Leaving Mormonism to Join Teal Swan's Cult - Jared Dobson
5. BBC- Teal Swan: The woman encouraging her followers to visualise death
6. Scam Goddess: The Culty Con of Teal Swan w/ Sarah Marshall

In this Decoding Academia episode, we take a look at a 2025 paper by Daria Ovsyannikova, Victoria Olden, and Mickey Inzlicht, asking a question that might make some people uncomfortable/angry, specifically, are AI-generated responses perceived as more empathetic than those written by actual humans?

We walk through the design in detail (including why this is a genuinely severe test), hand out deserved open-science brownie points, and discuss why AI seems to excel particularly when responding to negative or distress-laden prompts. Along the way, Chris reflects on his unsettlingly intense relationship with Google’s semi-sentient customer-service agent “Bubbles,” and we ask whether infinite patience, maximal effort, and zero social awkwardness might be doing most of the work here.

This is not a paper about replacing therapists, outsourcing friendship, or mass-producing compassion at scale. It is a careful demonstration that fluent, effortful, emotionally calibrated text is often enough to convince people they are being understood, which might explain some of the appeal of the Gurus.

Source

Ovsyannikova, D., de Mello, V. O., & Inzlicht, M. (2025). Third-party evaluators perceive AI as more compassionate than expert humans. Communications Psychology, 3(1), 4.

Decoding Academia 34: Empathetic AIs?

01:40 Introducing the Paper

10:29 Study Methodology

14:21 Chris's meaningful relationship with YouTube AI agent Bubbles

16:23 Open Science Brownie Points

17:50 Empathetic Prompt Engineering: Humans and AIs

21:17 Study 1 and 2

31:35 Study 3 and 4

37:00 Study Conclusions

42:27 Severe Hypothesis Testing

45:11 Seeking out Disconfirming Evidence

47:06 Why do AIs do better on negative prompts?

54:48 Final Thoughts

In this interview episode, we are joined by physicists Sam Gregson (Bad Boy of Science YouTube channel) and Tim Henke to examine the rise of science populism: a style of science communication that borrows the tactics of political populism, including grievance narratives, institutional distrust, and conspiratorial framing, while presenting its advocates as lone truth-tellers battling a corrupt academic elite.

We discuss how DTG favourites like Sabine Hossenfelder and Eric Weinstein, as well as fresh new faces Brian Keating and Avi Loeb, deploy selective truths about physics to fuel self-aggrandising, anti-expert narratives.

Along the way, we also cover stuff like why “physics hasn’t progressed in 50 years”, cranks are useful props for populist arguments, and the strange obsession with Nobel Prizes.

If you are interested in guru dynamics, science communication, and physics crankery, this might be an episode for you.

Links

1. Bad Boy of Science (Sam Gregson)
2. Tim's Profile Website
3. Bad Boy of Science – The Rise of Physics Populisers
4. Theories of Everything (Kurt Jaimungal)
5. Losing the Nobel Prize – Brian Keating
6. Into the Impossible (Brian Keating)
7. Sabine Hossenfelder’s YouTube Channel
8. The Portal (Eric Weinstein)
9. The Galileo Project (Avi Loeb)
10. Sean Carroll – Mindscape / Preposterous Universe
11. Not Even Wrong (Peter Woit)

We descend once more into the Gurusphere, encountering secret peasant archmages, decline narratives, Epstein emails, and endless moral panics.

The full episode is available to Patreon subscribers (1 hour, 37 minutes).

Join us at: https://www.patreon.com/DecodingTheGurus

00:00 SM 44 PF

00:23 Introduction

01:30 Konstantin Kisin: Not Left Or Right, Just Right

05:20 Boghossian is shocked by pessimistic French people

08:50 Konstantin and Warren Smith as relics of the anti-SJW era

12:45 A PSA! Hyper Capitalism Tier Update!

18:36 Matt's AV Setup

20:01 Recommendation: Successville (British version)

21:40 My peasant farmer dad is secretly an Archmage!

28:14 Scott Galloway talks with Gwyneth Paltrow

40:18 American Capitalist Culture and the Gurus

48:54 Bryan Johnson vs AG1

51:45 Bryan Johnson & Epstein Schmoozing

58:09 Bari Weiss's Peter Attia Woes

59:14 Epstein and QAnon Conspiracies

01:03:23 Overinterpreting Epstein emails

01:09:04 Shermer promotes Dave Rubin to hawk his book on Truth

01:10:37 Conspiracy Theory prevalence on left and riht

01:17:44 Jonathan Haidt and his anti-social media crusade

01:23:15 Plato on the Corruption of the Youth

01:24:30 The Eternal Appeal of Decline Narratives

01:26:22 They won't let you enjoy things anymore...

01:30:24 Matt's laissez-faire parenting tips

01:31:45 Life lessons from Lord of the Rings

01:34:17 The Witch King of Angmar defeated by a Woke White Women

Sources

1. Konstantin Kisin on not being left or right
2. Boghossian and Kisin bemoan civilisational decline narratives
3. The Guardian on Bari Weiss’s new CBS “Podcastistan” hires
4. Niall Ferguson on how Trump “won Davos”
5. The Guardian: Elon Musk had more extensive ties to Epstein than previously known
6. My Farmer Dad Is Secretly an Archmage – viral short-form fantasy drama
7. Behind the Scenes of My Farmer Dad Is Secretly an Archmage
8. Original Chinese version of

In a rare departure from our usual diet of online weirdos, this episode features an academic who is very much not a guru. We’re joined by Julia Rohrer, a psychologist at Leipzig University whose work straddles the disciplinary boundaries of open science, research transparency, and causal inference. Julia is also an editor at Psychological Science and has spent much of the last decade politely pointing out that psychologists often don’t quite know what they’re estimating, why, or under which assumptions.

We talk about the state of psychology after the replication crisis, whether open science reforms have genuinely improved research practice (or just added new boxes to tick), and why causal thinking is unavoidable even when researchers insist they are “only describing associations.” Julia explains why the standard dance of imply causality → deny causality → add boilerplate disclaimer is unhelpful, and argues instead for being explicit about the causal questions researchers actually care about and the assumptions required to answer them.

Along the way we discuss images of scientists in the public and amongst the gurus, how post-treatment bias sneaks into even well-intentioned experimental designs, why specifying the estimand matters more than running ever-fancier models, and how psychology’s current norms can potentially punish honesty about uncertainty. We also touch on her work on birth-order effects and offer some possible reasons for optimism.

With all the guru talk, people sometimes ask us to recommend things that we like, and Julia's work is one such example!

Links

• Julia Rohrer’s website
• The 100% CI blog
• Rohrer, J. M. (2024). Causal inference for psychologists who think that causal inference is not for them. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 18(3), e12948.
• Rohrer, J. M., Tierney, W., Uhlmann, E. L., DeBruine, L. M., Heyman, T., Jones, B., ... & Yarkoni, T. (2021). Putting the self in self-correction: Findings from the loss-of-confidence project. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 16(6), 1255-1269.
• Rohrer, J. M., Egloff, B., & Schmukle, S. C. (2015). Examining the effects of birth order on personality. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 112(46), 14224-14229.
• BEMC MAY 2024 - Julia Rohrer - "Causal confusions correlate with casual conclusions"
• Dr. Tobias Dienlin - Less casual causal inference for experiments and longitudinal data: Research talk by Julia Rohrer

We crawl around the dark crevices of the internet so you don't have to. And what wonders we have to show you...

The full episode is available to Patreon subscribers (1 hour, 34 minutes).

Join us at: https://www.patreon.com/DecodingTheGurus

Supplementary Material 43

00:00 Introduction and Banter Allotment

01:23 The Hypocrisy of the Defenders of Western Civilisation

10:07 An Optimistic Take?

17:02 Scott Adams' Controversial Legacy

18:43 Scott Alexander's Rationalist Eulogy for Scott Adams

32:31 A Final Tribute to Scott Adams

33:43 Andrew Gold's Interview with a Racist

39:02 Fair Play for being a Racist

41:17 Comparing Follower Counts and Audience Makeup

44:40 Racism and Xenophobia Discussion

49:07 Securing the Future of Our People...

01:00:01 LawTubers and Grifting

01:00:48 Legal Mindset

01:06:02 Antifa Woke Women are Hunting Legal Mindset

01:07:41 A man of Christ

01:09:16 A Red-Blooded American

01:12:35 Woke White Women and Antifa Paranoia

01:13:55 Electro Gym Work and Pygmy Hippo Love

01:18:47 Antifa Paranoia

01:26:36 The True Masculine Renegade YouTuber

01:32:32 Concluding Thoughts and Farewell

Links

• Peter Boghossian complaining about public attention to the Greenland situation
• Mike Cernovich’s tribute: “Scott is loved because he’s devoted his life to service to humanity”
• In full: Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s speech at the World Economic Forum (Davos)
• Scott Alexander’s eulogy to Scott Adams
• Coleman Hughes on Scott Adams at The Free Press
• Andrew Gold – Heretics: “I Confront Britain’s Biggest Racist”
• Liam Tufts: “Would You Let Your Kid Date a Black Person?” | Steve Laws sparks a heated debate
• Legal Mindset: “Free Kaya, Punish Hasan” (Fast Facts)
• Rob’s Media: Idiot Influencers – Legal Mindset (Go East channel background)

We return for Part 2 of our Scott Galloway deep dive, where the vibes remain strong, the confidence unwavering, and the relationship with empirical evidence increasingly… decorative.

Returning to our Modern Wisdom safari, we continue navigating the forbidden terrain of men, masculinity, and male suffering: a topic so dangerous that it requires constant ritual disclaimers, whispered caveats, and the occasional nervous glance around the bar to make sure we can take out the other men if necessary.

We cover Scott's outline of his masculine Third Way: rejecting both the Right’s “Bring Back the Fifties” masculinity and the Left’s “Men Are the Problem” framework, in favour of a solution that might be described as Stern Dad Who’s Also Nice About It. Prepare to thrill at proposals of mandatory national service, kindness as a masculine superpower, and the radical idea that young people might benefit from not being economically crushed.

Things get spicier when we’re told what women really want and learn about the adaptive skill check of the female orgasm. Chris Williamson unveils a prepared essay on What Men Want which proves to be a moving piece of therapeutic slam poetry that somehow manages to combine manosphere grievance mongering with woke therapy talk. We learn how what men really just want to be told is “you are enough" and should be kind for kindness sake, but also should optimise their friend group such that they can properly signal their high mate quality and train hard enough to take out all other males in the bar.

Finally, we hit peak Decoding Mode as Scott’s statistics begin to escalate: boys are ten times more likely to kill themselves, father absence turns sons into inmates, daughters into promiscuous approval-seekers, and nearly every claim is delivered with total confidence and minimal concern for effect sizes, confounds, or whether the study actually exists. Decorative scholarship is in full bloom.

We do our best as two hyper-masculine men to separate reasonable concerns about boys, mentorship, and social policy from hyperbolic factoids, pop-psych inflation, and the familiar habit of smuggling moral arguments in under the banner of “what the science says.”

Bring your hunting knife and stoic daily diary. Take your testosterone injection. And get ready for some man talk!

Links

• Modern Wisdom: The War On Men Isn’t Helping Anyone - Scott Galloway
• The Diary of a CEO: Scott Galloway: We’re Raising The Most Unhappy Generation In History! Hard Work Doesn't Build Wealth

• Culpin, I., Heuvelman, H., Rai, D., Pearson, R. M., Joinson, C., Heron, J., … Kwong, A. S. F. (2022). Father absence and trajectories of offspring mental health across adolescence and young adulthood: Findings from a UK-birth cohort. Journal of Affective Disorders, 314, 150–159.
• Dekker, M. C., Ferdinand, R. F., van Lang, N. D. J., Bongers, I. L., van der Ende, J., & Verhulst, F. C. (2007). Developmental trajectories of depressive symptoms from early childhood to late adolescence: Gender differences and adult outcome. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 48(7), 657–666.
• Angelakis, I., Austin, J. L., & Gooding, P. (2020). Association of childhood maltreatment with suicide behaviors among young people: a systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA network open, 3(8), e2012563-e2012563.
• Zhang, L., Wang, P., Liu, L., Wu, X., & Wang, W. (2026). Different roles of child abuse and neglect on emerging adult's nonsuicidal self-injury and suicidal ideation: sex difference through emotion regulation. Current...