The (bad) way people and dogs eat (PODCAST, E56)

[liamhodgson]

Adam has been touched by the unstoppable rise of urban planning content

[AimaCox-Zucker]

I was employed doing social work with kids for years, and I was always shocked by the things that people would suggest I contact CPS for. I would see parents who would let their kid walk alone to a neighborhood store, or allow their kid to hang out with other children unattended (to play), and suddenly teachers or police would act like that was abuse. Kids do better with some unsupervised time, it builds resilience and decision making skills 🤷🤷‍♂🤷

[heidiperry]

When I was maybe 12, I decided to follow my mom’s boyfriend’s dogs around the canyon they lived in. We were gone for hours! They led me all over the place and even came back to find me when they had lost me. A life like that, man…every dog and human should experience that.

[DanThePropMan]

I love that Adam's dog is named after a pastry, but when he calls her names, he just names other pastries.

[timstevens]

I think Kellogg's suing a fairly popular YouTuber over the naming of their family's adorable pet pup would be a public relations NIGHTMARE. I think you can sleep soundly knowing they have no plans on coming after you Adam :)

[mjafar]

You sounded a lot like “Not Just Bikes” channel when criticizing the absolute madness of suburbia and I loved that!

[JoshNpublicgplus]

I do think you have overestimated the extent to which music (or any other skill) is "easy" to "talented" people. I think some people try to cultivate that image, and it might be somewhat easier to some, but I think a big part of that is that they were, for whatever reason, able to make that skill their entire life, with very few distractions.

These people are often wealthier, and therefore able to spend less time stressing about work or whatever else when they could be immersing themselves in, say, music 24/7. They are often solely devoted to that skill and mostly have been for their entire lives. They often have connections with experienced peers who can help them find more efficient ways to practice. All of those things help, but effort is still very much required.

More importantly, though, I think that attitude towards thinking about "doing music" or whatever it is is harmful. Those skills are inherently valuable and fulfilling whether you're "naturally gifted" at them or not. I want to see more people who aren't traditionally good at music making music, because I think that helps to advance what we think of as "good music" more generally. The making of it is a good in itself, but the art could also benefit from a partial rejection of the distinction between good and bad music, and of the competitiveness and elitism that comes with.

That being said, yes, some people can pick up a violin and adequately sight-read a Bach partita. In those cases, I think we'd also benefit from acknowledging that their abities to do so did not come out of thin air.

[laserwolf]

My mom grew up in the burbs, and my dad grew up in Queens, NY. Both report that everyone in the neighborhood knew each other and kept tabs on each others' kids. They said this was a large part of the "do whatever just be home for dinner" attitude; parents knew they're kids were being watched over by someone. I was born in '88, and that was not my experience at all. I didn't know anything about any of my neighbors, and we certainly didn't keep tabs on anyone else's kids.

Now, we actually did have woods in our back yard--not a few trees but actual miles of woods. My brothers spent a lot of time there, but I pretty much always stayed inside (how was I ever gonna find my way back? I'd think). So I know my siblings actually did meet neighborhood kids up there. That's probably why they grew up to be sociable, and I have so much social anxiety as an adult.

[LynnDot]

Also, I do think there’s just a huge difference between rural vs urban dog ownership re: safety. I grew up rural and dogs weren’t as strictly controlled other than keeping them away from livestock (good way to get shot). But now living in a dense city I have a 50mph road less than 2 blocks from me, and crazy drivers that run stop signs, lights etc. Much riskier for a pup.

[SuqMadiq]

Just sharing an anecdote: I was born in '96 and I had much of the same "feral" childhood experience in North central MD.

Less backroads, as I lived in the suburbs right outside a city, but I roamed all day nonetheless.

It even carried into my teenage years since I picked up skateboarding. Lots of fun spots to find around the city. I did have a cellphone by that point, though.

[vespasiancloscan]

On comparing pets and "free dogs": wouldn't it depend on the individual's personality anyway? Two humans put in the same situation could be happy or miserable; who's to say it can't apply to less intelligent animals?
Dogs were genetically modified by humans massively too. Thousands of years of selective breeding made them genetically disposed to take certain likings. A terrier will have the time of its life hunting rats, while a retriever could have it just by playing fetch. Most breeds aren't even hunters & scavengers anymore, they're completely conditioned to rely on feeding time by the human. I don't think a Lab would be happier in a "more natural" environment. It's not a "natural" dog. They sure are happier if allowed to roam freely, but they still require an owner to make up for all the things that have been bred out of them.

And to me at least, it's pretty obvious that dogs love their owners more than fellow dogs. The comfort and security is incomparable. Pets sleep belly-up. "Free dogs" can't afford that level of security.

[RaskylC]

hahah i just laughed so hard when i heard him call poptart : "HEY DOG, POPTART, Ding Dong, you donut" LOL like just throw everything until poptart responds XD

[edwardwong]

Adam is absolutely brilliant. He is just egging Kelloggs to come after Poptart and get free publicity, which he deserves as I love his podcast. Then he will just rename him to Puptart and send a thank you letter to Kelloggs. I bet he has already bought some Kelloggs share so that he can chime in at the next shareholders meeting and suggest the suit. Then sell the shares afterwards. Poptart is very cute too and the name is fitting. By coincidence I am wearing a red Kellogg's shirt today.

[KKFWB]

eat dog was the first thing in my mind while reading the title

[GyroCannon]

This pod has the most salient opinion differences between Adam and me so far.
- I agree that death isn't the worst thing, but persistent comfort (e.g. being a house dog) sounds way better than extreme excitement and then extreme fear (e.g. being a wild dog foraging and finding food, then having to run for dear life from a predator). I might argue that persisted comfort is the goal for me.
- I'm not a humanist. I definitely prefer animals more than people, because humans have the potential to do so many incredible things... and yet there are so many steps taken backwards for every step taken forwards. Animals don't have that potential and therefore I don't judge them by such standards, and so I think they meet the bar that I set for them, while humans constantly fail to reach them.

[fakjbf]

The biggest problem with the closed carbon cycle argument is that it assumes the carbon cycle would be the same without the cows, but that’s not true. Prior to humans the total biomass of all animals on earth was ~20 million metric tons. Today, the total biomass of just cows is over 100 million metric tons. Just looking at cows we have five times the bioactivity than there used to be, and the carbon to sustain all that biomass has to come from somewhere. And a large part of that somewhere is the soil, intensive agriculture to sustain domestic animal populations depletes soils which is bringing sequestered carbon back into the cycle. When you add in the biomass of humans and all the other domestic animals like chickens and pigs, that disparity just gets even bigger. The idea that there is a closed carbon cycle of which we are just a part of is a complete misunderstanding of the topic, it’s only a closed cycle if you are treating carbon in the ground as equivalent to carbon in living organisms or in the air, but the distinction between those is the entire point.

[kgsvvglai]

Death is indeed far from the worst thing than can happen to you. However, getting your foot cut by a sharp piece of rock while chasing a deer and suffering a slow and agonizing death as a consequence of the resulting infection is not that far from the worst thing that can happen to you. It's a double-edged sword.

[izzybitney]

I hide my pup's food in little frozen blocks around my pool area. She loves to find them. Also she has a job: frisbee. She lives to play frisbee. I'm working on an outdoor enclosure rn too. I think every dog needs a job. I'm too scared to let her free roam, everyone is so touchy about dogs roaming the neighborhood around here. Someone poisoned my cat because he got out one too many times.

[abyssaljam]

The feral kids part amused me, being a kid growing up in the semi-poor Swansea (UK) I was aloud to roam, but vary rarely did, but one day I went for a 'very' long walk with a friend. We were folowing his dad and brother, who were on a quad, along a canal I had walked along many times with my mum and dog. Eventually his dad came back and picked us up for a ride to the house (like 4 miles).

When we got home my mum was there and my friends mum, who shouted at us for going to a dangerous location. When we got home, i was quite upset as my mum never shouted, she explained that she was actually cross with my friends dad who let us on a quad with no safety equipment and two other people. but had to shout at me to not have and argument with my friend parents.

[godminnette]

Hey Adam! A lot of other YouTubers who do this kind of format usually make a Reddit thread for questions around a week in advance of the livestream. That way, they can do a scan of the most upvoted or most interesting comments before or during the stream. I don't know how well that'd serve you here, as you seem to also want questions relevant to a topic you're bringing, and perhaps you don't want to gate questions behind another platform... but I think it's far preferable to gating it behind money.