The Reading Octagon

Episode #306

Christopher Ryan

· 6 books mentioned

Books mentioned

  1. Sex at Dawn

    Christopher Ryan

    Mentioned by Joe Rogan (host) · at 00:00:52

    Amazon (opens in a new tab; affiliate link) Source: Official episode description (podcast RSS) · Transcript (podscripts.co)

  2. The Bible

    Traditional

    Mentioned by Christopher Ryan · at 00:31:28

    Amazon (opens in a new tab; affiliate link) Source: Transcript (podscripts.co)

  3. Civilized to Death

    Christopher Ryan

    Mentioned by Christopher Ryan · at 00:34:47

    Amazon (opens in a new tab; affiliate link) Source: Transcript (podscripts.co)

  4. The Book of Mormon

    Joseph Smith

    Mentioned by Christopher Ryan · at 01:26:49

    Amazon (opens in a new tab; affiliate link) Source: Transcript (podscripts.co)

  5. Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers

    Robert M. Sapolsky

    Mentioned by Joe Rogan (host) · at 02:02:03

    Amazon (opens in a new tab; affiliate link) Source: Transcript (podscripts.co)

  6. The Game

    Neil Strauss

    Mentioned by Joe Rogan (host) · at 02:24:13

    Amazon (opens in a new tab; affiliate link) Source: Transcript (podscripts.co)

Timestamps are segment start times from the podscripts.co transcript of the audio release (includes ad reads), so they may differ from the video by a few minutes.

Christopher Ryan is a psychologist, speaker, and author of Sex at Dawn who discusses how agriculture, property, and civilization reshaped human sexuality and social inequality. The episode also explores hunter-gatherer life, evolutionary mismatches, psychedelics, consciousness, technology, addiction, happiness, and Ryan’s personal experiences, along with the book’s reception and critiques of pickup culture.

What they talked about

  • Origin of the word Yucatan
  • Psychedelic experiences and heroic doses
  • Human sexuality before civilization
  • Origins of agriculture and hemp cultivation
  • Baboon troop social dynamics after disease
  • Happiness and meaning in subsistence living
  • Critique of modern society and personal freedom
  • Isolation tanks and altered states of consciousness

Data last updated · Report a mistake · How it works: mentions are pulled from public transcripts and episode descriptions, partly with AI-assisted extraction, so details and timestamps can be off.

Episode sources