A note before we get started.
This episode includes a racial epithet and discussions about pornography.
If you have small kids with you, please save this for later.
This is hidden brain.
I'm Shankar Vedantam.
We start today's show with a personal question.
Have you ever googled something that you would never dream of saying out loud to another human being?
When we have a question about something embarrassing or deeply personal, many of us today don't turn to a parent or to a friend, but to our computers.
Because there's just some things you just can't ask a real person in real life.
And you need to ask Google because it's completely anonymous and there are no judgments attached.
Google knows everything.
I agree to that.
Every time we type into a search box, we reveal something about ourselves.
As millions of us look for answers to questions or things to buy or places to meet friends, our searches produce a map of our collective hopes, fears, and desires.
You do learn a lot about people that's very, very different from what they say and kind of the weirdness at the heart of the human psyche that doesn't really reveal itself in everyday life or at lunch tables, but does reveal itself at 02:00 a.m.
on Pornhub.
Today on hidden brain, what big data knows about our deepest thoughts and secrets.
My guest today is Seth Stevens Davidowitz.
He used to be a data scientist at Google, and he's the author of the book everybody lies, big data, new data, and what the Internet can tell us about who we really are.
Seth, welcome to hidden brain.