Dr. David DeSteno

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1,091 appearances 1 recordings 1 series first heard Aug 2025 last heard Aug 2025

Dr. David DeSteno’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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So people who really believe in an afterlife, they have the least anxiety about death because they feel like I'm going someplace good.

People who firmly reject any form of afterlife.

They're a little more anxious than the believers, but they're less anxious than one other group, right?

Because they're like, oh, I'm going to end up in the ground, okay, don't like it, fine.

The group that is the most anxious about death are the people who don't know.

Because they're like, holy, is there an afterlife?

And if there is, did I do what I need to get into that afterlife?

And so those folks are the ones because they're struggling with the belief.

Like certainty, right?

We know the brain likes certainty one way or the other.

And certainty that things are going to be good is better than certainty that there's just an end and there's no suffering.

It's just an end.

There's no hell you're going to.

But the people who don't know, they're the ones who are the most anxious.

And so I think for – I think the reason a lot of religions talk about this – well, there are multiple reasons.

One is because it's just inherently strange to think that you're a conscious being and one day that consciousness is going to end.

So that's scary.

But it often gets tied into a way to shape people's behavior, right?

Religions use that fear as a way to guide people, right?

You better –

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