Do your ideas belong to you—or are they secretly running the show?

If identities can calcify into cages, how do you melt them back into something alive?

In this episode, we talk with therapist and writer Mike Ross about the weird life of ideas: how they form, how they spread, and how they quietly start making decisions for us. We go from punk rock and tattoos to liminal spaces, Robin Williams, Gen Alpha chaos ("67"), emotional granularity, and Mike's concept of cognitive alchemy—naming and reshaping the stories and feelings that shape us.

If you've ever felt lonely online, stuck in your own head, or hungry for something more real than the feed, this one's for you.

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• The weird life of ideas: when thoughts become "drivers," not visitors

• How identities calcify (and what it takes to loosen them)

• Why the early Internet felt like salvation—and the modern feed feels like a beige matrix

• What we lose when algorithms replace serendipity

• Liminal spaces and why they mess with us (in a good way, sometimes)

• Tattoos, punk rock, and identity as signal

• Robin Williams, grief, and the stories we inherit

• Gen Alpha chaos and the mysterious "67" energy

• Emotional granularity: getting specific about what you're feeling

• "Cognitive alchemy": turning stuck inner material into something usable

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• Mike Ross — (add your preferred link/handle here)

https://www.linkedin.com/in/lordofthestrange/

https://lordofthestrange.substack.com/

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Sponsor us.

We'll make you a weird, wonderful custom video.

Email: madwarfarepodcast@gmail.com

(Or just send snacks. Still counts.)

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MAD Warfare™ is hosted by narrative strategist Jocelyn Brady and cognitive neuroscientist Sean Anthony Guillory.

Edited and produced by Amine el Filali.

Visit madwarfare.com for extra giggles.

Send your wishes, weird ideas, dream guests, and sponsorship inquiries (yes, again) to madwarfarepodcast@gmail.com.

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This show is MAD enough to include homages, short clips, and references that provide vital context and/or moments of joy. We deeply respect every creator's work and use these moments for educational, artistic, and transformative purposes under Fair Use. If we missed an attribution or you'd like to collaborate, reach out—we're happy to chat.

What if your worst enemy wasn't a foreign adversary—but a virtual clone of you?

A digital twin that knows your habits, your cravings, your blind spots.
It knows when you're tired. When you're distracted. When you're easiest to influence.

Sounds like Black Mirror.
It isn't.

In this episode, we sit down with Matt Canham—former FBI supervisory special agent, trainer to NASA and DARPA, and founder of the Cognitive Security Institute—to talk about digital twins, social engineering, and why the human mind is now the primary target.

This is a conversation about prediction , personalization, and what happens when systems know you better than you know yourself.

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Key Topics

What "cognitive security" actually means—and why it's not psychology cosplay

Digital twins as behavioral models, not avatars

Why prediction beats persuasion every time

How social engineering exploits routine, not stupidity

Personalization as a structural vulnerability

Why awareness doesn't equal protection

The difference between influence, manipulation, and coercion

Why humans are easier to model than systems

What institutions are quietly preparing for

Where responsibility ends: individual brains vs. system design

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Resources + Links

Cognitive Security Institute
https://www.cognitivesecurityinstitute.org/

Matt Canham — speaking, training, and research on cognitive security
https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthew-cognitivesecurity/

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WANT TO SUPPORT MAD?

Sponsor us.
We'll make you a weird, wonderful custom video.

Email: madwarfarepodcast@gmail.com
(Or just send snacks. Still counts.)

⸻

MAD Warfare™ is hosted by narrative strategist Jocelyn Brady and cognitive neuroscientist Sean Anthony Guillory.
Edited and produced by Amine el Filali.

Visit madwarfare.com for extra giggles.
Send your wishes, weird ideas, dream guests, and sponsorship inquiries (yes, again) to madwarfarepodcast@gmail.com.

⸻

FAIR USE

This show is MAD enough to include homages, short clips, and references that provide vital context and/or moments of joy. We deeply respect every creator's work and use these moments for educational, artistic, and transformative purposes under Fair Use. If we missed an attribution or you'd like to collaborate, reach out—we're happy to chat.

Who wins when nobody knows what to trust?

If the biggest national security threat isn't hackers or spies—but bad communication—what happens next?

In this episode, we sit down with Dr. Andrea Hickerson, Dean of Journalism at the University of Mississippi and founding director of the new Center for Information Advantage & Effectiveness, to distill how information actually moves, mutates, and manipulates us.

From deepfakes and dashboards to sports rumors, betting markets, and why "media literacy" might be the wrong fix entirely—this is a conversation about how narrative, tone, and trust quietly decide outcomes long before facts ever get a vote.

Welcome to the info war.

Why bad communication—not bad actors—is the real national security risk

Why dashboards create a false sense of knowing

Deepfakes: when quality doesn't matter, context does

How sports, fandom, and entertainment become information Trojan horses

Why famous people are harder to deepfake than regular humans

How misinformation sneaks in through tone, not facts

Why media literacy puts too much work on audiences

Media ethics vs. "just think harder" solutions

Who actually benefits when confusion spreads

Why trust collapses faster than truth

Center for Information Advantage & Effectiveness — University of Mississippi

Andrea Hickerson — andreahhickerson@olemiss.edu

Book: Fake Checking: A Journalist's Guide to Deep Fakes

Sponsor us.

We'll make you a weird, wonderful custom video.

Email: madwarfarepodcast@gmail.com

(Or just send snacks. Still counts.)

—

MAD Warfare™ is hosted by narrative strategist Jocelyn Brady and cognitive neuroscientist Sean Anthony Guillory.

Edited and produced by Amine el Filali.

Visit madwarfare.com for extra giggles.

Send your wishes, weird ideas, dream guests, and sponsorship inquiries (yes, again) to madwarfarepodcast@gmail.com.

—

FAIR USE

This show is MAD enough to include homages, short clips, and references that provide vital context and/or moments of joy. We deeply respect every creator's work and use these moments for educational, artistic, and transformative purposes under Fair Use. If we missed an attribution or you'd like to collaborate, reach out—we're happy to chat.

What happens when the information environment becomes too loud for the human brain to handle?
And why does it feel like everyone — kids, adults, institutions, governments — is getting overwhelmed at the same time?

We sit down with John Bicknell, former Marine and host of The Cognitive Crucible, to talk about the cognitive overload shaping modern life: from teenagers buckling under algorithmic pressure… to countries struggling to manage complexity… to why some global actors might actually weaponize chaos itself.

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Key Topics
• Why different groups (teen girls, teen boys, adults) are being overwhelmed at different tempos
• Gaming, porn, incels, self-image, comparison loops — and what's really driving these shifts
• Empathy: the healthy version, the unhealthy version, and the "weaponized" version
• Why algorithms trap us in bubbles and why escaping them takes effort
• The Law of Requisite Variety and what it teaches us about surviving complexity
• Cognitive noise: how stress, life chaos, and global events change what messages "get through"
• Why simple messages perform better in noisy environments
• How militaries (and adversaries) can exploit overloaded populations
• Space, sovereignty, China, the Kessler Effect… and why the next frontier of conflict might be orbital
• Cognitive security as our generational challenge

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Resources + Links

The Cognitive Crucible — https://information-professionals.org/podcasts/cognitive-crucible/
Information Professionals Association (IPA) — https://information-professionals.org
More Cowbell Unlimited — https://morecowbellunlimited.com/
"More Cowbell" SNL Sketch (homework assigned by John)

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WANT TO SUPPORT MAD?

Sponsor us. We'll make you a weird, wonderful custom video.
Email madwarfarepodcast@gmail.com

—
MAD Warfare™ is hosted by narrative strategist Jocelyn Brady and cognitive neuroscientist Sean Anthony Guillory.
Edited + produced by Amine el Filali.
More at madwarfare.com.

—
FAIR USE
This show is MAD enough to include homages, short clips, and references for context, critique, and joy. All such moments are used under Fair Use for educational and transformative purposes. If we missed an attribution or you'd like to collaborate, email us — we're always happy to talk with humans.

Ep 019: May the Best Story Win w Rand Walzman

Before "fake news" or ChatGPT, one computer scientist asked a dangerous question: could a machine invent believable lies?
That was 1985.
Dr. Rand Waltzman went on to shape DARPA's research into social media and information influence. This work helped define what we now call "cognitive security."
We talk about how those early experiments connect to today's manipulation economy, why emotion is the real battlefield, and why the biggest threat isn't the tech … it's US. 😬

Key Topics
• The origin of cognitive security—and why it started with a thought experiment about AI and deception

• Why emotion, not information, is the real target in modern influence operations

• "Foreign vs. domestic" is a myth: why today's propaganda is homegrown as often as imported

• From DARPA to disinformation: what Rand learned about how ideas spread (and why they stick)

• The rise of affective computing—machines that read and react to human emotion

• Humor as protest: how "wicked fun" became a tactic for civil resistance in Macau

• Why censorship fails and "displacement storytelling" might actually work

• The danger of apathy and what real pushback against manipulation could look like

Resources + Links
• Dr. Rand Waltzman — LinkedIn (best place to find him): https://www.linkedin.com/in/randwaltzman
• Books mentioned

◦ Propaganda — Edward Bernays

◦ Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes — Jacques Ellul

◦ Affective Computing — Rosalind Picard (MIT Media Lab)

MAD Warfare™️ is hosted by narrative strategist Jocelyn Brady and cognitive neuroscientist Sean Anthony Guillory. Edited and produced by Amine el Filali. Visit our website at madwarfare.com for extra giggles. And send your wishes, weird ideas, dream guests, and (yes it bears repeating) sponsorship inquiries to madwarfarepodcast@gmail.com.
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FAIR USE: This show is MAD enough to include homages, short clips, and references that provide vital context and/or moments of joy. We DEEPLY respect every creator's work and use these moments purely for educational, artistic, and transformative purposes under Fair Use. If we are missing attributions or you would like to collaborate, please reach out—we're always happy to chat!

What if the story running your life isn't yours at all?

Author and publisher Nate Ragolia (Brink Literacy Project) joins us to talk about how the stories we inherit—about who we are, what we deserve, and what we're capable of—shape everything. From teaching creative writing in prisons to publishing comics by people society wrote off, Nate's work shows what happens when people stop living inside someone else's narrative and start writing their own.

Why the stories we believe decide what we see—and who we become

How Brink uses story to rebuild identity and hope

Why "you are not a static thing" might be the most freeing idea ever

The problem with protagonist syndrome (and why it's not all about you, actually)

How empathy starts when we drop the hero/villain binary

What media literacy really means—beyond yelling at the algorithm

Reclaiming authorship: changing your internal story before someone else does

The American story: can we still write one we believe in?

Brink Literacy Project — brinklit.org

Friction Literary Journal — frictionlit.org

The Brink Store — brinkstore.org

Instagram: @brinkorg, @frictionseries

Nate's Podcast: Debut Buddies — wherever you listen

Books by Nate Ragolia: There, You Feel Free | The Retro Activist | One Person Can't Make a Difference

Sponsor us. We'll make you a weird, wonderful custom video.

Email madwarfarepodcast@gmail.com

(Or just send snacks. That works too.)

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MAD Warfare™️ is hosted by narrative strategist Jocelyn Brady and cognitive neuroscientist Sean Anthony Guillory.

Edited and produced by Amine el Filali.

Visit madwarfare.com for more absurdity and insight.

Got wishes, dream guests, or brilliant sponsorship ideas? Email madwarfarepodcast@gmail.com.

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FAIR USE: We include short clips and cultural references for context, education, and joy under Fair Use. If we've missed attribution or you'd like to collaborate, reach out—we're all ears.

What's the worst possible headline someone could write about you, using nothing but public records?

That's opposition research. Sonia Van Meter, managing partner of Stanford Campaigns, shows us how to use it–to your prosperity … or to your peril.

What opposition research really is (and isn't)

Why oppo is about narrative, not "silver bullets"

"Self-research": knowing your own vulnerabilities before anyone else does

Tone as strategy: how to hit hard without looking cruel

Strategic patience—when not to respond and let others do the work

Deepfakes, likeness, and why local races are most at risk

Why momentum and the perception of winning matters more than one perfect hit

Breaking in: why being nice and useful is the real oppo superpower

Stanford Campaigns — oppresearch.com

Sonia on Instagram: @therealbourbonface

Sonia on Threads: @therealbourbonface

WANT TO SUPPORT MAD?

Sponsor us. We'll make you a weird, wonderful custom video.

Email madwarfarepodcast@gmail.com

(Or just send snacks. That works too.)

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MAD Warfare™️ is hosted by narrative strategist Jocelyn Brady and cognitive neuroscientist Sean Anthony Guillory. Edited and produced by Amine el Filali. Visit our website at madwarfare.com for extra giggles. And send your wishes, weird ideas, dream guests, and (yes it bears repeating) sponsorship inquiries to madwarfarepodcast@gmail.com.

—

FAIR USE: This show is MAD enough to include homages, short clips, and references that provide vital context and/or moments of joy. We DEEPLY respect every creator's work and use these moments purely for educational, artistic, and transformative purposes under Fair Use. If we are missing attributions or you would like to collaborate, please reach out—we're always happy to chat!