If Books Could Kill

It turns out that the key to wealth is buying the right kind of watch, marrying the right kind of wife and being the right kind of white. Where to find us:  Our Patreon Our merch! Peter's newsletter Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Sources: Uneasy Street A Century of Wealth In America Family, Education, and Sources of Wealth among the Richest Americans, 1982–2012 Wealth Elite Moralities The insane growth of America’s millionaire class The Extraordinary Rise In The Wealth Of Older American Households Planning & Progress Study 2025 Striking Out on Their Own: The Self-Employed in Bankruptcy How Many Households Meet The Net Worth Guidelines Of The Millionaire Next Door? Paying Tribute to Thomas Stanley and His ‘Millionaire Next Door’ Pity the Billionaires What Rich Women Want The deserving or undeserving rich? The Evolution of Top Incomes Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

The boys catalog the definitive worst takes of the year, from the pundits who misunderstood our political moment to a guy who wants to have sex with a computer. To hear the rest of the episode, support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/IfBooksPod

The boys continue their discussion of Walter Isaacson's "Elon Musk." This is the part where Elon loses his mind.  Where to find us:  Our Patreon Our merch! Peter's newsletter Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Sources: From self-proclaimed ‘socialist’ to Team Trump and DeSantis: Elon Musk’s curious politics revealed   The Quiet Political Rise of David Sacks, Silicon Valley’s Prophet of Urban Doom Elon Musk biographer admits suggestion SpaceX head blocked Ukraine drone attack was wrong  Elon Musk's Daughter on Dad's Biography: 'Sad Excuse for a Puff Piece' Character Limit Twitter fulfilling more government censorship requests under Musk  Elon Musk booed for nearly 5 minutes straight at Dave Chappelle show in San Francisco  New CNN Chief Trying to Please GOP Elite  Research finds more than 14 million preventable deaths by 2030 if USAID defunding continues, including more than 4 million children under five What the data says about Social Security  Trump Administration, DOGE Activities Risk SSA Operations and Security of Personal Data Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

How do you tell the entire history of humanity in a single book? Whatever you do, do not open a browser window.  Thanks to Dorsa Amir, Duncan Stibbard Hawkes and David Perry for help researching and fact-checking this episode! Where to find us:  Our Patreon Our merch! Peter's newsletter Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Sources: A Response to Yuval Harari Yuval Noah Harari’s History of Everyone, Ever How Humankind Conquered the World The revolution that wasn't Advances In The Study Of The Origin Of Humanness 21 Lessons for the 21st Century is a banal and risible self-help book Are Human Rights Western?  Bonaparte in Egypt Ship of Fools The Dangerous Populist Science of Yuval Noah Harari A Reductionist History of Humankind Harari, Sapiens and historical accuracy The Broad Spectrum Revolution at 40 The Neolithic Revolution in the Middle East Was the Agricultural Revolution a Terrible Mistake? The Darker Side of the "Original Affluent Society" Harari's world history Compassion with Justice: Harari’s Assault on Human Rights Reconsidering the link between past material culture and cognition  Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

Live like Dale Carnegie, neg like Calvin Coolidge. Where to find us:  Our Patreon Our merch! Peter's newsletter Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Sources: Self-help Messiah: Dale Carnegie and Success in Modern America The Positive Thinkers Age of industrial violence 1910-1915 : the activities and findings of the United States commission on industrial relations Representation and Rebellion: The Rockefeller Plan at the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, 1914–1942  Dale Carnegie and the Problem of Sincerity New York Times review from 1937 Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

Peter and Michael discuss a book that's light on facts and long on sentences. Where to find us:  Our Patreon Our merch! Peter's newsletter Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Sources: Book Review: ‘Summer of Our Discontent,’ by Thomas Chatterton Williams Police shootings database 2015-2024 From the archive, 22 March 1991: President Bush sickened by Rodney King case Barack Obama Public Approval Letter To Christopher L. Eisgruber, President Princeton University Police give additional details in beating of machete-wielding man amid Dallas protest In City After City, Police Mishandled Black Lives Matter Protests RIOTS IN LOS ANGELES: Challenger; Nation Needs Healing, Clinton Says Median household income by race and ethnicity U.S. 1967-2023 Majority of college students support Israel/Gaza campus protests, 1 in 10 actually participate in them Thomas Chatterton Williams on Race, Identity, and “Cancel Culture” Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

How one comedian's offhand advice launched a decent TV episode, a mediocre book and a terrible movie. Where to find us:  Our Patreon Our merch! Peter's newsletter Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Sources: Susan Faludi's "Backlash" For Women Who Count on Men to Be Jerks Bridget Jones’s Legacy Single Women in Popular Culture A Decade of Advice for Women and Men in the Best-Selling Self-Help Literature The gendered nature of self-help Single Women in Popular Culture  Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

This is most of the episode but if you want to hear the last 20 minutes, support us on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/IfBooksPod

By popular demand we are releasing last month's Patreon bonus episode on the main feed! We chart the transformation of the lab leak from an unfounded theory promoted by right-wing cranks to an unfounded theory promoted by liberal journalists. Where to find us:  Peter's newsletter Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

Peter and Michael discuss The Let Them Theory, a self-help guide to seeking bliss through unmitigated complacency. Where to find us:  Peter's newsletter Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Sources: How to stop screwing yourself over Mel Robbins and Plagiarism Let her? Army wife claims Mel Robbins stole her idea for blockbuster self-help book  Mel Robbins’s “Let Them” theory: really that simple? Breathing Practices for Stress and Anxiety Reduction: Conceptual Framework of Implementation Guidelines Based on a Systematic Review of the Published Literature  Polarization in America The 5 Resets  Impact of health warning labels on selection and consumption of food and alcohol products: systematic review with meta-analysis Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

To hear the rest of the episode, support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/IfBooksPod

Are you a single lady struggling to find love with a man? Don't fret! A twice-divorced game show host who thinks conversation is for women is here to help. Where to find us:  Peter's newsletter Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

Who's to blame for the crisis of American masculinity? On the right, politicians tell men that they being oppressed by feminists and must reassert their manhood by supporting an authoritarian regime. And on the left, users of social media are often very irritating to people who write airport books.   Where to find us:  Peter's newsletter Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Sources: Conscientiousness as a Predictor of the Gender Gap in Academic Achievement Gender Differences in Scholastic Achievement: A Meta-Analysis Early Childhood Behavior Problems and the Gender Gap in Educational Attainment in the United States Where The Boys Aren’t The gender achievement gap in grades and standardised tests The State of Gender Equality for U.S. Adolescents Highlights of women’s earnings in 2023 The gender gap in educational outcomes in Norway Social Influences And The Gender Gap In Disruptive Behavior Family Disadvantage and the Gender Gap What might interrupt men's suicide? As Women Take Over a Male-Dominated Field, the Pay Drops The Cost of Caring Is Your Child Ready for Kindergarten? Age of Entry to Kindergarten and Children’s Academic Achievement The Effect of Age at School Entry on Reading Achievement Scores  Beyond the Pros and Cons of Redshirting Self- Control and the Developing Brain Importance of Sex Differences in Impulse Control and Addictions It is a myth that boys lag behind in brain development Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

Peter and Michael dissect Jen Sincero's "You are a Badass," a book that answers the question: What if "The Secret" was written in the painful, try-hard style of "The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck"? Featuring a surprise digression about Sincero's other, even worse books. Where to find us:  Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Sources: Savy Writes Books Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

In 2004, historian Thomas Frank proposed a theory about the rightward drift of the white working class. Was he a prescient king whose work presaged the rise of Trump — or a bumbling fool with a broken thesis?  Unfortunately it turns out he is a secret third thing that takes one hour and six minutes to explain. Special thanks to Julia Valdés for her help with this episode! Where to find us:  Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Sources: The Thesis That Drove American Politics Crazy: The Emerging Democratic Majority What’s the Matter with What’s the Matter with Kansas? Class is Dismissed The White Working Class and the Democratic Party It’s time to bust the myth: Most Trump voters were not working class. How the diploma divide came to dominate American politics The 'Diploma Divide': Does It Exist for Racial and Ethnic Minorities? Blind Retrospection: Why Shark Attacks Are Bad For Democracy Nationally poor, locally rich: Income and local context in the 2016 presidential election Democracy for Realists: Why Elections Do Not Produce Responsive Government Identity Crisis: The 2016 Presidential Campaign and the Battle for the Meaning of America Political Landscapes of Donald Trump The White Working Class and the 2016 Election Partisanship by family income, home ownership, union membership and veteran status The Elites Had It Coming What Explains Educational Realignment Among White Americans? Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

Peter and Michael discuss the book that launched the phenomenon of New Atheism and asked the question: What if we hated Muslims, but in a secular way? Where to find us:  Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Sources: Views of Violence Carnival Booth: An Algorithm for Defeating the Computer-Assisted Passenger Screening System The same motive for anti-US 'terrorism' is cited over and over Does intuitive mindset influence belief in God?  Terrorism science: 5 insights into jihad in Europe Analytic cognitive style predicts religious and paranormal belief What Is "Islamophobia"? Essays In Defense of Profiling To Profile or Not to Profile Chapter 2 The Making of Jihadist Social Actors in Europe in Who are the new jihadis? Disbelief - Prometheus Books  God and the Ivory Tower Religion’s evolutionary landscape: Counterintuition, commitment, compassion, communion The Evolution of Religion: How Cognitive By-Products, Adaptive Learning Heuristics, Ritual Displays, and Group Competition Generate Talking to the Enemy  Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

What should workers do when they get laid off? In 1998 a bleak, asinine bestseller told them to find another whey.  Where to find us:  Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Sources: Bright-Sided: How Positive Thinking Is Undermining America Downsizing in America Temp:  How American Work, American Business, and the American Dream Became Temporary The Disposable American Spencer Johnson, ‘Who Moved My Cheese?’ Author, Dies at 78 What was the New Economy? Boss, Employees Share Large Cheese Platter Tarpon's big cheese has aides reading Why doesn’t downsizing deliver? On the Battlefields of Business, Millions of Casualties Shareholder Value and Workforce Downsizing, 1981-2006 Long-Term Earnings Losses Due to Job Separation During the 1982 Recession Does Employee Downsizing Really Work? Layoffs, Top Executive Pay, and Firm Performance Emerging Conceptions of Work, Management and the Labor Market A Conceptual Framework for Analyzing Why Organizations Downsize Organizational Downsizing: Constraining, Cloning, Learning The Decline and Fall of the Conglomerate Firm in the 1980s  Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!

New York’s favorite criminal is in the news, so here is our episode about his ridiculous life. To hear all of our bonus episodes, support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/IfBooksPod

Is fact-checking a legitimate enterprise? Is America's most famous fact-checker nothing more than a dweeb? Michael and Peter discuss. To hear the rest of the episode, support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/IfBooksPod

A memoir about parenting very badly and then getting weirdly defensive when anyone asks you about it. Where to find us:  Peter's other podcast, 5-4 Mike's other podcast, Maintenance Phase Sources: Effects of Authoritative Parental Control on Child Behavior, Child Development Types of Parenting Styles and Effects On Children Does “Tiger Parenting” Exist? Parenting Profiles of Chinese Americans and Adolescent Developmental Outcomes Associations of parenting dimensions and styles with externalizing problems of children and adolescents: An updated meta-analysis Do the associations of parenting styles with behavior problems and academic achievement vary by culture? Results from a meta-analysis Parenting Styles: A Closer Look at a Well-Known Concept Impact of Behavioral Inhibition and Parenting Style on Internalizing and Externalizing Problems from Early Childhood through Adolescence The One Weird Trait That Predicts Whether You’re a Trump Supporter Investigating Correlates of Self-Regulation in Early Childhood with a Representative Sample of English-Speaking American Families Amy Chua thinks identity politics on both sides are to blame. How the 'Tiger Mom' Convinced the Author of Hillbilly Elegy to Write His Story  Thanks to Mindseye for our theme song!