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Why would it not make you smarter? Having a hard time following this logic. Perhaps not significantly, but if they say something you don’t know, then by definition you just got a little smarter, if only by one fact about one topic.

Also, I think a lot of ideas are presented black and white but podcasts like these show the intricacies of the gray area

> Listening to smart people talk doesn't make you smarter.

I don’t listen to standups thinking it will make me smarter, I don’t watch football thinking it’ll make me more athletic. Why would you assume people listen to smart people to become smarter and not just for the entertainment and informational reasons that are straight forwards reasons?

Likely they will say something that happens to make contact with some other thought you picked up somewhere else, and you'll make a new mental connection between concepts and that expands your mental map of the world.

It's always good to understand the world a bit better.