Dr. Todd Rose

Like, this is why I can't believe he got funded.

He gets people, he shows them a couple hundred faces, and he asks them to rate them on their attractiveness from one to five.

One, no thank you.

Five being yes, please, right?

Which, by the way, you do that kind of stuff on the street, you're a creep.

You do it in a scanner, you're a scientist.

But here's what's wild.

So you're in that scanner, and you see a face, and you say, well, I think that's a five, pretty attractive.

What happens next is instantly you are shown another number, which is supposed to represent the average score of everyone who's done this task before you.

Yes, exactly, right?

And then we're going to watch what happens in your brain.

And here's the thing.

That group number was completely made up.

There was no other group.

It's just you.

And it was engineered so that half the time, you're told that you and your group are lockstep.

You said five, the group said five.

And on some of the trials, it makes it wildly different.

You said five, the group said one.

Oh.