On a First Name Basis
A show dedicated to telling the human side of the stories surrounding the research at Boise State University.
On a First Name Basis
Jared Talley: Does a Fish Know Water?
Picture this: a sixth-generation Idahoan with roots deeply planted in the rugged soils of Idaho’s high deserts finds his voice in the world of environmental philosophy. Dr. Jared Talley from Boise State joins us, sharing a tapestry of personal anecdotes that weave through the challenges and curiosities of life amidst Idaho's distinct landscapes. From tales of cattle ranching and blacksmithing to the academic pursuits that led him from Idaho to Michigan, Jared's stories paint a vivid picture of Idahoan life and the environmental philosophies that have shaped his path.
Our conversation takes a reflective turn as we explore pivotal life transitions, such as moving from high school to higher education during the 2008 recession. We recount the economic hurdles of the time, the cultural quirks unique to Idaho, and the unexpected educational paths that followed. With an emphasis on the importance of mentors and the joys of learning, we discuss how these experiences have guided us both in our respective educational and professional journeys. Jared's insight into environmental ethics and stakeholder engagement offers a fresh perspective on natural resource management, challenging common misconceptions and highlighting the critical role of community voices in policy-making.
As we wrap up, the importance of embracing discomfort as a catalyst for growth comes into focus. By examining ecological systems and personal development, we underscore the necessity of challenges in fostering innovation and adaptability. Whether through philosophical discussions on rangeland management or personal anecdotes about returning home, the episode concludes with a call to reflect on shared values and the transformative power of giving back to one's community. Join us for a thoughtful exploration of identity, resilience, and the enduring connection to the lands that shape us.
Welcome to On a First Name Basis, a podcast where we dive into the stories behind Boise State scholars. I'm Dr Chris Saunders, but please just call me Chris. I'm a faculty member here at Boise State and I'm excited to share with you some of the amazing stories of my colleagues, their journeys, the challenges they've overcome and the connections they're building right here in our communities. Supported by the Boise State Division of Research and Economic Development, this podcast is all about getting to know the people and their work. Join me as we explore the human side of the innovative blue turf thinking happening at Boise State. Let's get to know each other more on a first-name basis.
Chris:On this episode of the podcast, our guest is Dr Jared Talley from Environmental Studies in the School of Public Service at Boise State. I know that was a mouthful, but welcome to the show, Jared.
Jared:Yeah, thank you, Chris, it's good to be here.
Chris:So if you go to JaredTalley. com which does exist, you are gonna see some words, some descriptor words like environmental philosopher. You'll see phrases like the philosophy environmental governments, and you might think that you might have an idea what that means. I know that I did when I went there, but I'm going to encourage you to stick around, because I think that you'll learn that maybe those words don't mean exactly what you think they mean when it comes to Jared. And in that context and in the context of getting to know Jared better, one of the first things you should know about Jared is that Jared is a sixth generation Idahoan and will proudly tell you that he has never been a resident of anywhere else in his entire life. So tell us about growing up in Idaho, your experience in rural Idaho.
Jared:Yeah, there's a lot to say there. One. You'll also, on that website, see some really outdated photos. Be warned.
Chris:You're saying you don't look the same.
Jared:It's like I just am really bad at updating those. And then, two, I did live in Michigan for a little bit when I was doing my PhD, but I was never a resident.
Chris:Right, it's the official no resident. You slept there you went to school there, but you always came home.
Jared:Exactly, it was always coming home, it wasn't leaving home.
Jared:That was exactly right. Yeah, thank you. I'm sorry I forgot the question now.
Chris:So what was it like growing up?
Chris:Your experience, sixth generation. Those are deep family ties to the land.
Jared:Yeah, you know, in fact, Michigan actually is really relevant here. I actually don't remember a lot of my experience growing up because, like, does a fish know water? Right, they're just always in it and maybe you don't reflect a lot on it because you just don't have anything to compare it to. And when I went and did my PhD and all of a sudden I'm sitting here in a totally different place thinking about environmental issues that I'd been thinking about here, but they're so different because and something we'll get to I'm sure at some point is that Michigan doesn't have much, if any where I grew up was not the same as everywhere else, right, and the issues that we were thinking of and the experiences I had growing up were not actually the same. And it wasn't until I left and got some comparison that I really realized the value and the privilege and opportunity that I had to grow up in Idaho right, my mom's family is you know, multi-generation back to around Murphy, Idaho, which is down here in the valley on the southwest side.
Jared:My dad's family is from Bowmont, which is not that far away and they're both multi generation, so you know the joke is about that Christmas tree being, or the family tree being, a Christmas wreath sort of thing, but the so my, my, my experiences growing up are desert and high desert. Okay, spending a lot of time out on the desert the Snake River Canyon, the Sagebrush, the rivers going up into the Boise Mountains here, the Owyhee Mountains, that sort of stuff. I really don't care for water. I love water but like I like it dry.
Jared:I like desert.
Jared:I like it hot. I like it dry, cold. I lotion is so horrible I cannot even touch it Right, but that's my experience.
Chris:Well, and like you said, right, so that's, that's your water. Right, you're not a fish, but your water is the lack.
Chris:It's the lack of water.
Chris:You're the opposite of a fish. Did your family farm ranch like? What is their connection to the land?
Jared:Yeah, my mom's family had beef cattle and so, you know, spent a lot of time out there growing up, you know. And that was, you know, lost due to lack of succession planning and all that when my grandpa passed my dad's family actually the William Hardesty was the gentleman that came out, my great, great, great great, whatever grandfather back in the 1800s, and he was a blacksmith and also a broom maker.
Chris:Yeah.
Jared:Like he brought out sorghum broom corn, Okay, and would make hardesty brooms and I've seen him in museums every now and then the hardesty brooms that's my family's brooms. But he was also a blacksmith and blacksmiths became mechanics and they became engineers and so there's that side of my family is all mechanics of some sort.
Chris:Everyone just tinkers, which is really going to tie into, I think, where our conversations will, will, will go. We'll go later. So this is this is rooted in your, your, your family, family tradition.
Jared:Yeah, and then the other side is, you know, beef cattle.
Chris:So and so I for those of you that don't know, if I haven't mentioned on the show before, I grew up in rural Idaho as well. Not not as many, not as many generations. I grew up in the panhandle, so different right Different, not dry. Not a lot of sagebrush Right, a bunch of pine trees, but also the freedom that I didn't realize, that not everyone got to grow up and just run around out in the woods, that were adjacent to our place.
Chris:Right Again, that concept of public land seems so obvious that there was just a bunch of land that you could go do all these fun things on and no one was going to yell at you for that that other places would be more restrictive. I grew up in a house that had been in the family for a couple of generations. That was adjacent to my, my grandparents' farm and he, my, my grandfather, raised first dairy cattle. So I've I have some early memories of hanging out in the calf barn and feeding feeding the calves my first. I had a cow named Strawberry. For the longest time I couldn't figure out why did I name it strawberry, and then it took me later I'm like I was probably doing strawberry milk that there was a joke there right like, but it really took me a long time.
Chris:Why did I name this cow strawberry? Um I he changed over to beef cattle because of government subsidies, right? He's basically bought out of. We've got too much milk. We need you to stop making milk and it was very lucrative for him to change to beef cattle. But I remember missing the milk barn, the milk barn for me as a kid was a kind of special place. And beef cattle are right, they're not around as long for obvious reasons.
Chris:Right right, they're, they're their final destination is a lot different than than than those milk cows, but but yeah, so I, I, I, while I don't particularly like the desert, right, but I, I recognize that that that same thing of like this is that was my water, that was and when I went somewhere else, I I first. When I moved away from home, it was to come down here to valley, and I'm like man, this is just desolate. They're Boise's, the city of trees.
Jared:Who made up that?
Chris:And I get it. There are a lot of trees here compared, but not to where I grew up and not the same kinds of trees and when I went to Arkansas for graduate school that was my.
Chris:That was like for you, your Michigan, Arkansas was my Michigan of this is really really different different kind of trees, different kind of beauty, different type of outside use of that land, cause you can't use that land the same way that you can use the land here. What people called mountains there, I'm like those are some nice hills, hills, you got there.
Jared:Like, let me, let me. I went skiing in Michigan and I realized after the fact that it was an old garbage pile that they'd put dirt on top.
Chris:You're kidding Really?
Jared:Yeah, literally.
Chris:Wow, that's a big garbage pile, if you can ski ski right People, people, people complain right, oh, bogus base, and that's not a big ski, I'm like. Compared to other places, bogus basin is pretty, is pretty substantial.
Jared:You know, it's really interesting to me to think about like the dryness or the wetness. Right, you asked about experience and really like fundamental to everything I think about is that word experience, and I didn't actually realize it. Again, I'm talking about Michigan and this kind of comparison thing. One of the experiences I had and it took me a long time to understand what I was feeling was feeling lost in Michigan, like physically lost. I could not get my bearings.
Chris:You couldn't walk outside, look around.
Jared:I mean, here in the Treasure Valley, growing up here I joke, and it's probably not even a joke, probably true. You could blindfold me, pick me up in a helicopter, drop me off anywhere in the valley, turn me around and I'd tell you. Put me on a map and I'd tell you within a quarter mile where I'm at, because of the horizon and there was no horizon in Michigan and I realized that, that it took me a while of going back and forth to being like, wow, I feel like I know where I'm at on the world on the map, you know on the globe and then going back there, I'm like I have no idea what direction is what?
Jared:um was the horizon? And then that made me start thinking like how does our like just experience of our landscapes really change, how we feel and navigate and, you know, act and believe within that landscape?
Jared:So I think what you're talking about here is actually just really central to even what, what my work is
Chris:Well, and, and that for me it was, and I can. The word I use is space. Right, there is an openness here and a large right. Like you say, you talk about the horizon. That horizon isn't close to you, it is in the distance, right, but you can go. I know what those mountains are, right, or I know what I'm looking at here, or even just probably knowing how the weather comes across the valley, you can pretty much you know like, oh, this is coming in this this way, or oh, the inversion settling in. When I was in Arkansas, right, that space wasn't there. Driving down a country highway, you're just surrounded by this deep, thick, like you walk 15 feet off the highway and you're lost in the vegetation, where, here, you just see forever right, it feels like forever.
Chris:So I definitely that was my first thought is when I first set foot in Arkansas, I'm like I don't almost claustrophobic, right. I can't see where I would be going.
Chris:I would be lost. I would be lost in the woods.
Jared:Claustrophobic
Chris:Interesting.
Chris:Now was part of that that you were in an urban area.
Jared:Part of it was, but I spent a lot of time outside of it and I still felt the same. And you know what actually got me over? It was during my. Phd. I started delivering pizzas just to meet people that weren't in the academy. I did not grow up weren't in the academy I was. I did not grow up around people in the academy and I was just. I needed someone to talk through why my pickup wasn't running right.
Chris:Fair enough. Your colleagues and your fellow grad students weren't too much help there.
Jared:You know, in a philosophy department. Surprisingly there weren't many people that did that sort of stuff. So I started delivering pizzas, make some money, have some friends outside of the academy, sort of thing. But what I realized was because I was forced to learn roads and directions. That was the first time I started feeling comfortable, and then I could kind of learn some landmarks and where I was at Start to feel what the place was like.
Jared:Yeah, it was not anything about the place, it was about the map that had been put on the place or the job that I had had. That that actually started making me feel comfortable.
Chris:So kind of, maybe it'd be actually like, for the first time you'd had to, you had to go through this process to figure out, whereas where, right, it'd be like a fish learning to live out of the water, right, that's, that's difficult.
Jared:That's a really good way to put it.
Chris:Difficult to do. Right. You're like I'm out of my natural environment, how do I do this? And again, hold on to that thought of process for new things.
Jared:I think is really, really important, it's central, really important.
Chris:So you grew up in rural Idaho. You didn't know what was out there yet, right, and in our previous conversation you worked in a lumberyard, right.
Jared:I did After high school.
Chris:You got done with high school early
Jared:. Yeah, that's the way to put it.
Chris:Yeah, worked in the lumber yard.
Jared:Yeah, the Franklin Building Supply here.
Chris:Oh okay
Jared:It was started here in Boise, out there on Franklin and Cloverdale, so near Boise State, a couple miles away. They're the largest privately owned lumber yard in Idaho Kind of a weird Idaho treasure that a lot of people don't know. Things like I-beams that now we build all of our houses with all of our floors with I-beams. They were created by Franklin Building Supply.
Chris:I had no idea.
Jared:Yeah, they were looking for better engineered ways to build floors and partnered up with a trust company and they designed these I-beams and now everyone uses them.
Chris:That's really cool
Jared:All over the place, and that's here in Boise right.
Chris:It's fun to learn about the things that are uniquely Idaho. As you go everywhere else in potatoes, they specifically tell you they're Idaho potatoes right In Idaho.
Jared:they're not, they're just potatoes.
Chris:They're just potatoes. Right, it's an advertising, but other things they learn fry sauce is not Finger steaks. Finger steaks, finger steaks. They claim that the torch and my mom, who grew up in Boise, will attest to this when the torch was a little bit different and the torch was a place you went and had family dinner. But the claim to fame is that that was the original recipe for finger steaks and for many of us who grew up in Idaho, we just think that finger steaks have always been the thing.
Jared:Yeah, yeah, but until you leave,
Chris:right until you leave, and they're like what do you mean?
Jared:Finger steaks, you don't spread pieces of steak.
Chris:Yeah, and then dip them in basically ketchup mixed with mayonnaise, like that's what my mom did was right squirt of ketchup, squirt of mayonnaise and that was fry sauce at. So so you're working in the lumberyard and then what? I guess, did you always know that you were gonna then go back to school?
Jared:did something happen that were like yeah all right, I'm done in the lumberyard, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna go to school yeah, um, I honestly thought I was just gonna work at the lumberyard until basically I keeled over right like that's a cheap coffin right there when you get a discount on the lumber.
Jared:But you know, I was pretty naive and I did not realize that there's kind of a historical pattern to housing and prices and recessions. And then 2008 hit and of course 2008 was a very large recession and I had worked my way up to kind of some middle management and I had some employees and we were going down pretty quick Like we had to start trimming employees and all that. And I remember it was the first time in my life I'd had to lay someone off and I did, and I didn't feel right about it and it's just a hard thing to do one way or another and I was really curious, or maybe frustrated, I guess I should say at that point, about why I was having to do this and hurt this person the way I had to hurt this person. And all I'd heard on the news is you know something? You know Federal Reserve and you know Washington DC and banks are screwing over people. I don't know what's happening.
Jared:So I started trying to read about it. I tried to understand what was happening on a grand federal, national level that made it so I had to do this thing and I really couldn't understand it very well because I didn't really know enough to know what I was reading. So it turns out. I remember laying in bed for a couple weeks after that thinking I'm just flipping dumb, right, and I didn't like that feeling. And so College of Western Idaho had actually just opened up. We didn't have a community college in the valley, there was Treasure Valley Community College, but over in Ontario Right, that's a bit of a drive, yeah and so it had just opened up community college.
Jared:But over in ontario right, that's, that's a bit of a drive, yeah. And so it had just opened up. I think that was 2008 as well. Um, I was maybe in the. They'd been open two semesters when I enrolled um and I didn't know what the hell I was gonna do.
Chris:But but you're there, you're taking classes.
Jared:I went there and happened taking classes and, you know, fast forward however many years, and now I'm sitting here right, wouldn't have ever predicted that.
Chris:Did you happen to have a biology class from Steve Lysne when you when you were at College of Western? How does that name ring a bell?
Jared:It does not ring a bell, but there's a lot of names that don't ring. I know.
Chris:I just have to get a plug. So my actually first teaching position out when I finished my PhD was at the college of Western Idaho
Jared:oh was it.
Chris:So I moved back with. I didn't do the professional thing that you're supposed to do. I came back with because my partner and I we wanted to be back here and we're like.
Chris:I'm finished, let's come back. No job prospects, we'll find something. And so I was an adjunct at College of Western Idaho. Steve Lysne gave me my first job,
Jared:wow
Chris:And so I'm just wondering you know we should pull on that. I bet you our paths have crossed or that there's some intersection of some of those things.
Jared:We should pull on that at some point. It's not accident that we're both from Idaho. We both left and both of us came back without a job prospect. And for me and I don't know if this is similar to you I'm going to live here and if I can work at Boise State, I would love to, but if I can't, then I will deliver pizzas. I ain't got no pride over it.
Chris:Definitely let's pull on this. I'm going to jot this down so that we don't forget it.
Jared:Yeah, yeah, yeah, but that's later.
Chris:Absolutely so. You're like I want to know more things, right? So general interest in that was just general interest.
Jared:I just felt dumb and I wanted to not be.
Chris:It's a great motivator right, and so you then ended up at Boise State. So the experiment and going back to school, learning some new things you're like I want to know more things.
Jared:Yeah, I really enjoyed it. I really enjoyed it.
Jared:And I stayed working at Franklin Building Supply through most of my associates, but then when I came to Boise State I had to quit.
Chris:You know class schedules and all that stuff and that was.
Jared:You know, I owned a house and I was trying to pay mortgage and all that. That was a really fun time. But I came over here and got my bachelor's. And the really interesting thing is and I don't know what to think about this I'm not making any general claims here but for me, I never came into school thinking I'm going to be an engineer, so I'm going to take engineering classes, or I'm going to be a nurse or a teacher or a scientist. I had no idea what I was going to be, so I just started taking classes that were fun, Fast forward, and I had a bachelor's in philosophy, right.
Jared:Because that was what was just fun to me.
Chris:Now, the experience you described, I would say for most students that is not the norm and I really wish as a teacher, I really wish it was. I wish that we got more blank slates right. Of students coming to school that just want to learn things that they and find out what they're passionate about, because I think that then those drive us in ways that just you know, taking classes because you have to.
Chris:And I have lots of students that take my class because they have to, rather than they get to or they want to, right, my guess is that you are more of thinking I get to learn about these really cool things, and so was there a class then that kind of then started to what nudged you into now your field, right?
Jared:Philosophy 497 with Dr Stephen Crowley, my first semester I came came to Boise State.
Jared:liked science, I liked philosophy, and it was a class called philosophy of science. I thought well, hell, that's just the perfect damn class, right?
Chris:And Stephen has a personality we'll call it a personality larger than life.
Chris:Steven is wonderful
Jared:I was thrown in the deep end. I was not prepared for a upper division philosophy course. I absolutely wasn't, and I struggled through it but I was unafraid. I think that's part of my professional identity. I'd been a professional before. I was unafraid of reaching out to people. He was a professor. I respected him. He was also just a human and I could reach out to humans and so I struggled and I reached out to him and we've developed, you know at this point, you know over a decade friendship and he's a close mentor. He was throughout my undergrad and we talked and he helped me out through the course. And then I was work-study eligible. So I got on work-study and he hired me to help him out. Kind of setting up experimental philosophy, which is kind of this weird subfield which gave me some research experience, which parlayed into all these things.
Chris:You caught the bug right.
Jared:I caught the bug.
Chris:, right, yeah, right. And once you find that thing right, it doesn't matter how challenging it is right You're going to just keep hunting it down.
Jared:Yeah, and I never shied away from a challenge right, as long as it kept me interested. And it did keep me interested.
Chris:So that's awesome. I remember we talked previously, though, too, that there was something in the curriculum, though that kind of that started to nag at you right, oh, yeah, right that there were certain things about your experience that didn't quite match up to the the curriculum. An example that you, you, you gave me were about cows, so so explain this example. I think you know what I'm talking.
Jared:Yeah, I absolutely do
Jared:absolutely do the um. You know, I I had just started kind of questioning um, like where cows just bad? After I'd been going to school for a long time, and that was really difficult because I that did not fit with my experience, that cows are just bad. I mean like I'm talking ethically bad, this is just this is just no good.
Chris:They produce methane, they're destroying the environment. They eat all the things, right yeah.
Jared:And I was like I mean certainly they can right.
Jared:Humans can too right Like they can be bad, but I just it did not seem like they were, but I had been. I was being just told through all my classes, or any class that talked about it, that they were just bad, bad, bad, bad and that didn't really jive with my experience, which you know already. Having the curiosity and the motivation now not not jiving with my experience, I wanted to learn more. You know again, fast forward. It's like you know, cows aren't bad, bad cattle management is bad.
Chris:It's bad right.
Jared:The cows themselves are just cows, they're just there.
Chris:They're going to do, they're going to eat, they're going to make more cows, they're going to walk around and yeah.
Jared:Yeah, and there's a lot of really interesting kind of ethical concerns around that and worldview concerns about what the role of nature and pure nature and wild nature and cows and domesticity, domestic animals, all plays and all that's great and it's wonderful and we should think about all that, but none of that means cows are bad,
Chris:right and is that so is that, then, the kind of the thread that you started to pull on, that started to realize, right like it's not just about how we think about them, but also the management side, right the right now you're starting to pull into government and policy and words like stakeholders, right people that care about the cows and care about the land, and it gets complicated in a hurry
Jared:Right yeah yeah, and I know that we talked a little before this, but I don't think we actually ceded the word stakeholder, but I'm glad you used it because that was the next step for me. You know, philosophy is wonderful and I love it. I am a philosopher and I'll never give it up. But I really don't like the 30,000-foot view all the time, like I do think it is helpful on the ground and I want to help on the ground. And after my undergrad I didn't know how to do that. So I went into our Master's of public administration with the natural resource and environmental policy management focus to think about what actually was happening right on the ground. How could I help there? And I was funded on a GA. Studying stakeholders and stakeholder engagement which is funny that you use that term Like that literally was my next step.
Jared:Researching that and published my first paper on a framework for stakeholder engagement and thinking through how to include community in decision-making, which, of course, is now something central to what I do
Chris:Right and I mean, and at the core right is who are the people that have a stake in this, that care about this and that people care about the land and how to manage it in different ways and they come from different levels, both hyper-local right.
Chris:The farmer on his land like somewhat local other people in the community, but then regional and state, and then you keep getting farther and farther out and the level of caring is different.
Jared:Yeah, Just like your grandpa. It's even national or even global markets that are impacting whether or not he's making milk. Yeah, exactly One farm.
Chris:And that now I have this memory Right. And I think about that of like that, that, that, that pressure, and as a kid I just like why doesn't grandpa have the black and white cows anymore?
Chris:Like where did the?
Chris:Holsteins go Right Like why are they? You know, as a kid exactly exactly. No, I mean as a kid, I'm not, I'm not understanding that you know and trying to and now you know, reflecting back like, oh, there's a whole lot more yeah, a whole lot more more going on there.
Chris:So you go and get your PhD in Michigan, right? So you're lost for a while. But I would imagine was the work then grounding for you. Like, were you so my experience at graduate school? I knew through the process of graduate school that I wanted to teach, that I wanted a teaching emphasis, that that is what drove me. I like being in the lab, I like doing it, but being in the classroom really, really, really drove me and I wanted to come back.
Chris:Right, we're getting closer to pulling on this thread of coming back. Did you find that same thing of like I have to be in Michigan to do this thing so that I can get back and make a difference?
Jared:Yeah, it was a very intentional decision.
Jared:In fact, I'm really thankful to my mentors, Dr Steve Crowley and Jen Schneider. Dr Jen Schneider in the College of Innovation and Design, she was my master's advisor and close mentor of mine. They both told me if you want to come back in academia, you got to leave. It's really difficult to continue on and I would have never known that. How would have I known that no one had ever done this before? Right For me and my family. I'm like, oh, thank you. So I did. I was like, okay, well, I'll leave, that way maybe I can come back, right. And that was the entire goal. The entire time was to go do something, learn something. perspective, and it's an authentic perspective to them. That didn't match mine. But it's like, well, how can we work together? Right? And so all of this stuff started really coalescing in Michigan. To you know what I ended up actually doing in Michigan and coming back.
Chris:And and so you, you, you come back right. And now you, let's say, you have officially your environmental philosopher right. So, so PhDs? For those don't know, all PhDs are doctorates in philosophies right, so we're all philosopher I am a philosopher right, um, but I think that most people think of philosophers as something that right Like it's Socrates.
Chris:It's people, people sitting around thinking about things but not actually doing things. So so I said that we would get to unpack this. So so what is an environmental philosopher? What are you as an environmental philosopher? You don't just sit around thinking about things, but that's, that's part of it.
Jared:I'm going to answer this in two parts.
Jared:One what I think most people including environmental philosophers, I think think they are is people that sit around and really think deeply about our and I mean humans' relationship and our moral obligations to the environment. And what is the environment? That sort of thing Sit around, think. Maybe, if I think really critically, I can come up with a way to say here's, morally, what I ought to do regarding the environment. And I don't disagree with that, I do plenty of that myself. But the difference. So when I say environmental philosopher one, I define environment different. There's nothing green around. There's a lot of blue and orange around you and me right now, Chris, but there's nothing green, no nature. But I still think we're environment, we're in an environment, and that is really critical to what I do and how I see what I do versus kind of more traditional environmental philosophy.
Jared:Environmental philosophy is because I don't see a sharp distinction between what's pure and green and nature and wilderness and what's. You know, a city, park and built and constructed, an artifact. I think they are different and I think that we relate to them different, but I treat them both equally. And so when I say environmental philosopher, I mean a philosopher of us in our environments, and that's why this, when we first started talking about, like the horizons, experience is so critical. That, to me, is the kind of the.
Jared:What makes us human is that experience of our environments and our ability to reflect on that and the way that that experience actually kind of moves us around and changes our views and beliefs and all of that stuff. So when I say an environmental philosopher, it's that. And the last piece that kind of makes me a little different is yeah, sometimes I do it in a chair, but it's often moving around because that's the reality. And I think that having different experiences and going out and working with communities and being on a ranch or being on horseback or being on a boat or whatever I'm doing, which I do, all that stuff in my normal work life is helping me to think through these environmental issues from a different perspective, because I'm experiencing them.
Jared:You're in the environment that you're actually doing the thing right and it's like I think it's really good to uh to think deeply about sitting in a chair when you're sitting in a chair, about sitting in a chair, that's wonderful.
Chris:So it's the fish finally thinking about its water yeah what is this? What is this stuff that I, that I swim through?
Chris:that's exactly what is the city block that I'm walking through right now? Um, I'll have to admit I probably don't think about those things as much as you do. I can remember I took a class in undergraduate that was about the art history, architecture of London, so a specific city, and it was a class where the first half was books right classroom, and then we went to London, oh wow, and so that that to me resonates of it is much different to learn about something in a book than it is to stand in that place and to hear it and smell it and get the sense of, oh, this is what this was built for then and now, what is it used for now?
Chris:Right, you talk about that constructed, right, a constructed park. So who built it in this way and how did they want people to?
Chris:experience that and how do you step foot off the concrete into this landscape? So I remember thinking about more of my place when I was in that class in that city because that was kind of the design. The only other I guess analogy that I would have or that I can think of in my own experience is camping. Camping me is a lot different when I'm outside camping. So many things are better in my mind, Like I think about stress and anxiety and right, we always like we want to disconnect to me. It's not that I'm disconnected, it's I'm connected to something different. Yeah, Right, my son, when he goes camping or is just outside in general, things change, right.
Chris:Yeah, yeah, like what environment.
Chris:You are in, but you're taking it right. That's part of your process, but you don't stop there, right? And so when we talk about philosophy of environmental governance, now you're doing something with the thoughts, and I think that's a really important part, because I think that too often there are lots of academics that are purely academic, right.
Chris:That's purely theoretical, and that has its place right. We have to gain knowledge, of course. But if all we do is gain knowledge and put it in books, and put it in papers, and put it in libraries which are, again, wonderful places, we need these places but if no one ever plucks that information out, it does anything with it.
Jared:Then it's just words on pieces of paper, or not even words, it's just pieces of ink on pieces that might get,
Chris:that might get lost with with with time.
Chris:And so I think, in talking with your, your you don't want to just think about things right, you want to take that to the next, the next level. So so, with your research now, with your scholarship, now describe some of those projects Like so, give people a taste of right. Here's this thought, here's this what we know, but here's how you and your students and your, the stakeholders that you work with what, what are some of those things that you're doing? What are the problems that you're actually tackling?
Jared:Yeah, I mean there's actually quite a few, so I'll pick out a few and maybe go fast and I'll just put a plug in. Anyone listening to this that wants to learn more about any of this, please reach out. I would love to hear from you and talk to you. You know there's one, a project I've been working on for a while, about rangeland monitoring and NEPA analyses and I mean these are all policy terms.
Chris:What's NEPA?
Jared:Nepa is the National Environmental Policy Act. It's a process act on how we make decisions on federal lands. It doesn't say what decision to be made, it just says here's how you have to make it. And really what it comes down to is you know, cattle have been very bad for public lands for a very, very long time historically. We didn't know what we didn't know. We overgrazed, we overstocked and we destroyed some things. That's fair. But then we built a policy structure around that pattern that is locking public land ranchers into sometimes bad grazing management, but it's legal, like if they don't do that they're breaking the law If they do something different.
Chris:And just because it's legal doesn't mean it's good management.
Jared:Exactly Right. And so oftentimes people say, well, you know, cattle are destroying the land. It's like, well, actually look at the law that they're following, that they don't want to break the law because then they get kicked out and their communities get destroyed and their families get ripped apart. You know that sort of stuff. They don't want to break the law, but they're being forced to do that. So what do we do? Well, we have to change those permits. We have to change the law, make them better, make them more aligned with the ecological reality that they're within, so that their cows are helping, or at least neutral, but oftentimes and research is showing that they actually can help regenerate the land if managed well. But we have to change that.
Jared:And so I spent a lot of time working around this and redoing NEPA documents. And you know, because as philosophers we're just good writers, that's one of the things that I was trained to do, and so I was, you know, donating and volunteering my time to just help write documents for community members, to help try to push these processes along. So there's that. And then, on the other side, I'm researching this, like what is the role of monitoring in these new documents and how is a good cattle grazing plan set up and all of this stuff good cattle grazing plans set up and all of this stuff and then I would take that back in and into the collaboration and I would talk to people and it would help us move things around. And then I'd come back and research some more in this iterative process.
Jared:There's a paper coming out here very soon about this and it's a philosophy paper about this process. So on one side of the paper is actually just talking about the kind of philosophical dimensions of this work. On the other side of the paper is talking about how to do engaged philosophy, how to do philosophy in the world and helping the world rather than just kind of in an armchair.
Chris:Right, yeah, like this. This all sounds good in theory. I'll leave it to somebody else to talk to the people that actually would do the monitoring or whose cows it is that you are monitoring, because they have that, their experience again, experience as a scientist, I think I can write science does not have all the answers and that science can be wrong, and that science that sounds good in theory isn't always good in practice, and I don't think any scientists would disagree with me on that. And you know that cattle ranchers land is a really complicated laboratory and it is not it is not a contrite right.
Chris:It's really hard to set up controls and something like that. And so that collaborative right you talk about this iterative process. I'd imagine that was really challenging right Of you. Know. You're going back and forth to these different levels of experience and I would imagine at some point people, local people, are saying no, I don't care what this says, this isn't going to work because of X, y, z, like in theory. Yeah, that would be great if I could do it, but that isn't what's going to happen.
Jared:Yeah, X, y, Z, like in theory, yeah, that would be great if I can do it, but that isn't what's going to happen. Yeah, and in fact to that point, there was a situation a couple of years ago where the Forest Service had said you need to put all your cows on this allotment at this time of year and I mean that was the legal thing to do. Right, you need to do this to follow the law. And their answer was said no, if I do that at that time of year, the hot season of use, those cows are going to destroy those riparian areas and I don't want that.
Jared:So the rancher voluntarily took half of his cows, pulled them down to his home place, his ranch, so they could graze on that. Took some of his land out of hay production, which inevitably hurts his winter profits because he has to buy more hay over the winter, but did that voluntarily. You know, some of his land out of hay production, which inevitably hurts his winter profits because he has to buy more hay over the winter, but did that voluntarily, you know, particularly to not destroy the riparian heirs. He knew what was going to happen.
Chris:It sounds a lot like your work is marrying right the expertise of the theory right and this bird's eye view with the experiential expertise in a way that Both can benefit from each other. Have you experienced right? I would imagine sometimes there's some distrust there right, yeah, Right.
Chris:Maybe I'm understating right.
Chris:There are challenges in that level of communication. I didn't, you know, growing up. Probably a lot of the local farmers wouldn't have, we'll say, taken kindly to some academic coming onto their farm and tell them how to raise, how to move their cattle around, right. But let's think about it. Most of us don't particularly respond well when somebody else outside of our field comes and tells us what we're doing wrong yeah but doesn't necessarily know how to fix it well,
Jared:and especially if they really don't know even how it works to begin with.
Jared:Like, well, I may know a lot about grass, so I'm going to come tell you how to ranch. How does knowing about grass mean knowing how to run a ranch? Right, and I'm not saying that there's no, nothing that can be done there, but like that's really difficult position, right, you know some of the things. I mean this is somewhat accidental and this comes back to that that we at the very beginning saying you know, coming back to place Right. Somewhat accidental, and this comes back to that, that we at the very beginning saying you know, coming back to place right.
Jared:One of the reasons that I think I'm well, two of the reasons I think that I'm fortunate to do this work, is one I'm necessarily interdisciplinary, right, because I love philosophy, but I love working on the ground, and so I've had to learn all new disciplines and language to put it on the ground. I have a master's in policy and resource management. I've been spending years around ecologists and hydrologists and trying to understand, like I'm not a researcher in those fields, but I actually have developed a language there, but also I'm from this area right, look at me Like I look like I'm from this area, right, and that's fine.
Jared:But what it allows me to do is, on campus I can talk academics, I can write a philosophy paper, right, I can absolutely do that Out there in the field.
Jared:I can talk to those community members because, guess what, they're not an external other community member, they're my community members Like we have the same experiences, just maybe 80 miles apart. Community members Like we. We have the same experiences, just maybe in, you know, 80 miles apart. And then when I go down to, like, the governor's office species conservation, where I spend a year in there helping with some policy on that side with salmon recovery I can talk policy, right, so I can actually talk across these and it's one of the things that has been really that I'm very fortunate to have in order to do this work. But I think that's also to go back why it's important to be thinking about place and bringing people you know going learning your fish and water get out of the water, come back so that you can help your place. But you have an ability, you have a language, you have an articulation that you can actually use to talk across these silos.
Chris:It's a different type of translation right, it is I think that most people in the academy, most academics, that there's a level of that when you're talking to others, and I think it's really important that academics are good at speaking to people who are not academics. Yeah, absolutely that for me as an educator. I feel like that's what I do, right.
Chris:That is my job for my students is to translate the world of chemistry in a way that makes sense to them, is relevant to their experience, right To their place. When I teach them, you know how their Instant Pot works or how the de-icer that we put on the road works right, which then consequently finds its way into waterways right, of course, exactly right.
Chris:Chemistry is very much involved in those kinds of things. But yeah, that translation aspect at the intersection of all those things and, like you said, because of where you grew up you get that extra hat to wear, that extra level of translation. That only comes from experience, right? It can't be. You cannot teach someone what it's like to grow up in Southwestern Idaho in a book. Right, you can't, you can, you can read about it, but it will not be the same as actually having that lived experience.
Jared:I want to say a few things here. One, yeah, you can't teach someone experience, but you can help someone learn how to respect these sorts of translations. So, like I don't think you have to grow up in Southwest Idaho in order to do the sort of work that I do, I don't think you do. I think it takes a different comportment to learning to learn, like the kind of the ethical boundaries and the comportments and how to actually do this work that we don't often teach very well. And the second thing I want to say there is that science communication.
Jared:I've talked to many, many, many science communicators over my career. Because of the work I do. They don't always get it wrong, but there's one thing that oftentimes I hear that I'm like see, that's where we're getting it wrong is that we focus so much on how we can communicate better with and if you think about all of the communication episodes, times you've talked and communicated with other people in your life, it's never one-sided, it's not like, oh, if I just got better at communicating, then we will communicate better. It's like, no, communicating is not just speaking. It's like no, communicating is not just speaking, it's also listening. And we are really bad sometimes at listening and not listening, just like. Okay, you're done talking, now let me talk, right now it's my turn.
Jared:Actually listening and saying I hear what you're saying and that changes how I think about this. That's what communicating is. Science communication is going to just hit its head against the wall forever until it realizes that once you have to really communicate, you have to actually listen to the other two Interesting and that changes the communication.
Chris:And I think your point is a completely valid, that valid point. It probably is a lack. I bet you that there are a lot of scientists and science communicators that probably agree with you, that are just, in this right, ironic, that are just bad at communicating that right when they talk about science communication, or at least maybe that's the hopeful, hopeful side.
Jared:But but and I should say I've met a lot of really great science communicators,
Chris:so I'm not, and my guess is they're the ones that listen, or that, that, that, that listen to what people have to say, that, that, that listen to what people have to say.
Chris:And I think that the the important part, too, that I want to emphasize is that the openness to changing your mind and again, as a, as a scientist and as the scientific method is something that you know, a lot of people learn but don't really understand, is that we get it wrong, and the beauty of science is that it has mechanisms to, to, to check itself and to go no, we, we.
Chris:We got to change it, and that's hard but we got to change, and I think right in all fields or all experiences, being open to that change is really important, and that is hard, though right now we're getting to the psychology realm because we as humans are hardwired to not right the psychology realm.
Chris:Because we, as humans, are hardwired to not right, we want to we want to feel that we are right and we're justified
Jared:and we want to feel safe. Yeah, and sometimes we construct a situation which we feel safe and we're like don't change anything here.
Chris:Yeah, change, change is scary man, yeah now, and maybe you'll agree or disagree with me now. I think the challenge is right. We we learn all these cool things, then our problem is then that we don't do the thing right. In theory, we have the tools needed to solve the problem, and then we continue to not solve the problems.
Jared:Right. I'm working with friends and colleagues at the governor's office Species Conservation, which is Idaho State's agency to work on issues of Endangered Species Act SAMNR. Conversations with them, conversations with Bureau of Reclamation, ended up being some grant funding and we're working on listening to Idaho residents about how they think about salmon recovery, with respect to some of the policy options that are on the board, to better understand what we can do moving forward. To better understand what we can do moving forward. The one thing that I want to say I want to be a philosopher for a second, okay One thing that I've learned through a lot of this work and as a biologist or as a chemist and I'm sorry, biology and ecology know this really well as well is that disturbance can actually mean growth and in fact, most systems need a little disturbance to grow. Forest fires.
Chris:Yeah.
Jared:I mean our bodies. If we just sit around and don't do anything, we fall apart. Getting up, moving, lifting weights like that's what gets us to grow or to be healthy Wildfires it's a really great example. We forget that there's kind of maybe a metaphor here, or maybe it's even just actually an analog that humans are very similar. When we get comfortable and we don't change, it's really dangerous for us because the world is changing and if we don't change to adapt and evolve to it, we get left behind. So having some disturbance, you know, some forced change, some things that are uncomfortable, can actually really help us in the long run to grow and get stronger. And I just want to say that because I think that's something that you know. When we're talking about this kind of like psychological need for safety and all that that we lean so much in, that we forget that there is also a physical and probably even psychological need for discomfort. And in fact I'll plug again.
Jared:I've got a paper that I'm about to publish on the role of discomfort and how we learn. That is pulling on these threads and trying to understand, because I've seen it all over in my collaborative work. Is that? Well, let me back up. You would think that if you have a rancher that is doing really good grazing management, making money, people love them, right? They're just like we don't want to put you out of business. If you were their neighbor you'd think, well, I'm going to do what that guy does.
Chris:Right, yeah, right. You're going to imitate what they do, right? They clearly have it figured out.
Jared:Yeah, almost never happens.
Jared:Well, why is that? Well, if you're comfortable, you're safe. Why? Why make a change? Probably feels risky too right.
Jared:Oftentimes those ones that are they're doing really interesting work, it's because something happened, a challenge that was going to take them out, and maybe not that bad, but some big challenge that they were forced to be like. If I want to keep doing this, I've got to do something different. Discomfort right Like disturbance, and I think we need to actually think about structuring disturbance and discomfort into our lives more often than we do into our lives more often than we do.
Chris:Well, and I think with that to pull on that thread, the encountering of novel problems, or maybe problems that aren't new, but we just have decided to not face them right of that willful, like we know how to save the salmon.
Chris:We're not going to because that's hard right. Or an example I use in class is we should just use the metric system. It would be hard, but boy would it be so much better once we get on the other side of that right. But like, a good change is hard right. You can't get us to change our units of measurement. How are we going to change?
Jared:I mean if the ruler factory blew up and there was only metric rulers guess what.
Chris:It'd be hard, and then we, then we'd be fine, right, people would change out their tools, we'd, we'd be good. But but the tools thing I think they're, I think some people believe this, and I would say, believe it at your own peril, because I don't think it's true is that older generations or generations that have lived in the land for a long time are not adaptable. I think that people just don't understand what it is that they do. I have and the philosopher aspect ties into this if you're thinking about problems that are either new problems or problems that existed. But the key part is what are the new ways to solve the problems, the new tools, the maybe the uncomfortable things, because my grandfather, he, would run into problems all the time. Things would break right.
Chris:Things on a farm just break Big pieces of machinery that are really expensive right, you're not going to go get, just get in all the time, all the time, and I remember he would just shuffle off to the shop and he would build what he needed to fix the problem. It was very rare that he would get to the point where he didn't like having to have someone come out and fix it. And in our conversations I've started to now think of my grandfather as this kind of this philosopher mechanic of well, I don't really have the tool to fix this, but I think I know how to put something together. Is that kind of like where we're at right of that? Yeah, you can't order solutions off of Amazon right.
Chris:We can't keep pulling from the same set of tricks because they don't work.
Jared:I love that. First, I am a tinker, I'm a mechanic, I work on pickups and motorcycles all the time, and you should see how many times I'm in the same situation. Like well, what if I did that? I did that because I don't want to have to run to AutoZone to pick up a bolt. But I want to back up real quick and say something about problems. I mean, we're using that word a lot. This is surprising, but problems don't exist in the world outside of humans. We make problems If humans were all gone. There's not a single problem in the world we make problems with if humans were all gone there's not a single problem in the world.
Jared:That is just not interesting. Um, and problems are are this really? I'm putting a philosopher hat on real quick Um, this, really this, this combination of a situation? Just the fact of the matter. Right, the fact of the matter there are dams. Fact right.
Jared:No one's going to argue that that's a situation.
Jared:That's not a problem. That's just a situation.
Chris:It's reality.
Chris:It is the way it is.
Jared:Yeah, you put your values on top of that. Values plus situations equal a problem. So when we talk about problems, oh, the problem is I've assumed a whole set of values, I've assumed we both know what the situation is that we're talking about and I assume we both have the same values And've assumed we both know what the situation is that we're talking about and I assume we both have the same values. And only when those are aligned can we start to think about a solution. But we never get to that point and not never, but very rarely in these environmental discourses get to the point of actually having a conversation about well, what is the value, what are the values, what is the situation? We don't know what the problem is. Let's figure that out together. You have your values. You think you know the situation one way, I do as well. Let's talk together, let's co-define a problem. Turns out, when we co-define the problem, solutions are real easy.
Chris:That's really interesting to think about when and how and who defines the problem, right Cause if, if you're defining the problem differently, yet you're just going to be at odds, right, you're like it's us versus them. But if you, if you share in the problem, if the problem is the same for both of you now how you solve the problem, then it can become a combination right.
Chris:Or share shared values. Sometimes it gets a buzzword back oh, a shared value statement. But really when you share in those values, that gives you a roadmap to solving the problems. That now you've defined and, in many ways, created yourself. You get to solve the problems that you created.
Jared:Yeah, yeah, actually, the idea is to co-create the problem. Create the problem because then you'll figure out a solution. The Tinker thing I think is is really interesting. Um, and I'm not the first to say this, there's a book called the zen of motorcycle maintenance. It's about the philosophy of motorcycle maintenance. Um, and generally in philosophy, there's this kind of field or school of thought called pragmatism, and tinkering, and pragmatism is very similar and, uh, it's basically saying you know, truth is this weird thing and I'm not going to go deep philosophical here um, truth is this weird thing where we, you know, we have to know what truth is, to have a definition of truth, to know what truth is, kind of makes it it's like well, what is?
Chris:it just keeps defining itself.
Jared:Yeah, it's like this thing yeah, um, and so pragmatists get made fun of for saying, well, truth is whatever works, and that's maybe more accurate than we like to assume as pragmatists. But it's also not, and it's kind of this tinker thing. It's like there is no actual, like the right solution to a thing. You know, my car breaks down. For instance, I was in the middle of the desert a couple of years ago, a long ways away from anything, including service. I got a flat, put my spare on, got another flat on my spare and now I'm stuck right. I mean, I had a problem and I was able to like kind of just jury rig some things to make it work and it was horrible.
Chris:I mean like absolutely horrible. You didn't just go get a new tire right, like that's the solution to the problem. That would have been a solution to that problem, yeah.
Jared:No, it ended up using a lot of JB Weld because I did have a stick of JB Weld putty in my toolbox.
Jared:But that wasn't like the. You know the. There is no right solution. But for the problem I had was I'm out of service. I'm over 80 miles away. I have no real way to get out of here other than just walk in. The solution that I'm looking for is something entirely different than what I would be looking for if I was two blocks away from a Les Schwab. Problems and solutions are just so contextual and if we think, if we stop thinking about that context and the context of you know people living on the land, people, you know the livelihoods that we've talked about, not just the economic, you know, can this make me money? But this is my life.
Chris:Like, yeah, most farmers don't. Don't say, oh well, I've never heard a farmer say, or a rancher say well, that's my career, yeah, I've never heard. Maybe there's some. But they say I am a farmer,
Jared:it's their identity
Chris:. Right, I am a rancher, it's meant I say I'm a teacher.
Jared:Yeah.
Chris:That is what I am it's not what I do, it's what I am.
Jared:Yeah.
Chris:But yeah, my grandfather I don't think ever was a farmer to make money.
Chris:It made him money.
Jared:That's exactly right,
Chris:but it was just what he did
Jared:Yeah, so livelihood is so different here and when we forget about these contextual variables, it turns out that we just beat our heads against a wall, right? Well, I have the solution. Well, I have the solution because it's a solution to the problem that I have, that I never thought to check if anyone else has this problem.
Chris:Right or the problem is unique to me, or my problem is different, or you don't know how to solve my problem, and so we can't work together.
Jared:So instead I could listen to you and go hey
Chris:That's the same problem I have. Hey we have the same values. When it comes to this, maybe we don't share Right. I think's another thing. We don't have to share all the same values, but we might share values on a specific thing. Why can't we work together on that specific?
Chris:thing, we can have different values on other things, but for this thing let's solve that problem.
Jared:And you know, last thing I'll say on this, just because we could sit and talk about this for hours right is that values are actually really themselves, are really bad predictors of behavior.
Jared:Anyways. Like it just turns out when people say, oh, my values are X, y and Z and then you look at what they actually do, it's not often that they perfectly line up. Really, a better way to think about values and you know you'll have to reach out to me, anyone listening to this, to talk more about this, because we're not going to go into it but is to think about experiences, not values.
Chris:Interesting
Jared:Think about the whole of our experience in our life sets up the value. If you had the experiences I had, you'd have my value. This isn't something that I can just change, it's my experience. So when we talk about the situation, your experience that gives the problem. It's maybe just unhelpful to talk about values. They just don't really do much.
Chris:Now. Your research takes place at a public research institution right. Which means we get students, you get students.
Chris:And you share with them this scholarship. Right Now, you're a mentor, and those students come in with experience right, and some of them will have similar experience to you. Some of them will have different, but, as we alluded to earlier, what's important, though, is so they come here, they take their experiences, they learn some new things, and then, kind of, what's your hope for those students? What's your if, if education right, if, if students are the client right, what's the product for you and your philosophy Like? What is the product that you produce? What are those students then going to go do?
Jared:Yeah, you know I can't not be a philosopher, and one thing that I've been thinking about so much over the last couple weeks is are students the product or the consumer of the university? Because they're kind of both. They're both the product, but they're also the consumer, and I think that just puts us in a really weird place. So, anyways, I love that you just said that and I've been thinking through that, but for me, I mean, there's multiple levels here. One ultimately, I want the students that I get to have the fortune of being in their lives for the couple years they're here, to end up in a place that's happy, safe, healthy. I don't care what that is. I am absolutely fine with a student getting a wonderful degree and running a pizza parlor. If that's what they want to do and they're happy, healthy and safe and all that, I'm fine with that. I don't see a like oh, you're an engineer, you have to be an engineer. Now, if you want to be an engineer, that's the second layer. I want to help you get to that point. That's the second layer. But the third layer and this is like I want all of this package is my ideal is I want you to get to that point in a community that you want to help and oftentimes that means the community you grew up in, right? Not always, because sometimes people need to leave their communities in order for that happiness, safety and security, that sort of thing. But if you want to go back, if you want to help your community, I want to make sure that happens.
Jared:And that's the thread that I think we've been pulling on, for a lot of this is to how can we get students a world class education, like get them an education that gets them thinking critically about their world, understanding this kind of weirdness about problems and solutions and how to work together and respect and listen and communicate. All of that stuff, notice, nothing in there is about getting a job right. That's just about how to just be a really good community member. How do we get them to that point? How do we help them there? Get them the skills to get the job that they want being an engineer, biologist, chemist and then get them back to their community to be a leader that that community direly needs as the world changes we need. You know, maybe that itself is the disturbance having a community member that left come back and say look what I can do now, let's evolve, let's adapt.
Chris:And I was thinking the exact same thing of how you talked about that, those, those disturbances, right, the opportunity for growth, for for me, going from rural Idaho to to college was a disturbance.
Chris:It was different and I grew and it was not comfortable. It was not. I realized really quickly what I didn't know, and then it was a lot more than I thought and that is just a constant thread. I constantly am reminded of all the things that I don't know and all the things that I that far outweigh the things that I do know which keeps things interesting, but no, but then also right, so the students can grow.
Chris:So now they're the consumer, right, so as a consumer, they grow right, they develop, they get something out of this investment of time and money and energy. And now, like you said, and money and energy, and now, like you said, now if they go back to that same community or whatever community, they could be the disruption, they could be the change, right, because they've grown, they've taken their experience and they haven't, they haven't lost the experience, right, it's not an overriding.
Chris:It's not right and I think that's important.
Chris:It's not a replacement. Nothing has ever replaced my experience of growing up in north north idaho and there's a lot of good and bad things about growing up in north idaho, right but those, they're just those they're not problems, they're things they're experiences or situations. That's just what my childhood was like as a consequence I don't like big cities like boise is about as big as I can handle anything other and like I visit, but I don't want to live there.
Jared:Yeah.
Chris:But then they can come back and they can kind of sow the seeds of productive disruption, of like, hey, this is how we grow as a community, and then the community has that shared experience. So we're it's like we're building this big Venn diagram of we're trying to get those overlaps that are productive.
Jared:Yeah, absolutely,
Chris:And so you and I right, so we can wrap this up with the thread that we said really earlier on that we should keep pulling on this is there's really the narrative of you and I I mean, we come from very different places, right, and I'm sure our families look very different and whatnot, but but there is a thread there of I I, you know, grew up North Idaho, grew up rural town, and I remember thinking I'm going to get out of here and I'm going to go, I'm going to go go to college, and I wasn't sure why I was going to go to college and initially I was like I got to go far away and it was for that of I need something different. I don't, I knew that there was like there's some, there's some experiences here that I haven't had and I should probably. I should probably have those.
Jared:Yeah, I want them
Chris:Aand, and I didn't go as far, I mean, I just went to the Southern part of the state, I went to the college of Idaho and and, and, and you know, and for me it was still small and it was safe, so I disrupted myself a little bit my baby steps.
Chris:But then I got much of the same advice of you need to go and do something else and I did that. During one summer of undergraduate we did research at Arkansas. That's how I ended up there and that was really challenging, really disruptive and really transformational for me. I can do this. I can take my experiences from Idaho. I can take them other places. I can do this. I can take my experiences from Idaho, I can take them other places. And the whole drive. Then when I got to Arkansas I always joke with my friends the great right, the exile right I felt so disconnected from family, from friends Like I made friends.
Chris:I made wonderful friends, but it wasn't the same it wasn't the same and the drive was always to come back, and the drive was always it wasn't the same. They're not your friends, it wasn't the same, yeah, and the drive was always to come back and the drive was always. It wasn't because I felt obligated Obligated is the wrong word because it feels like you're like that something is
Jared:Like I don't want to do this, but I guess I will.
Chris:Yeah, exactly.
Chris:And so I've always struggled with what's that word of I was. I wanted to come back and give back at least a part of what I had gotten. I had gotten a really great education at the College of Idaho it was Albertson College of Idaho for that short window.
Chris:Oh yeah, a lot of grocery store jokes. I had some really wonderful mentors that helped me grow because they put me in uncomfortable positions of no, I expect more from you and you can do more, and it's going to be challenging. And I remember thinking I want to do that for other students like me that came from a different place, and so I came back and it sounds like I had no job prospects at all. I'm done with my advanced degree that now allows me to teach at a level that I want to. I'm coming back and I will create the opportunity that that based on what's a bit right. So College of Western Idaho it was the only place that had a percent of course.
Chris:I'm gonna go for it, right that's that wasn't my end goal, but I'm like that's and it was wonderful and it was challenging and I learned a lot. Um, and then I got a job at college of Idaho. Like I came back to the alma mater, much like you're back at your alma mater, and that that was for that. That was the dream job, that was the coming back and I write the cycle of life I'm the salmon I've come back to right,
Jared:Like I went out to die here.
Chris:Yeah, exactly yeah.
Chris:Yeah, I, I guess I had a kid now.
Chris:I'm clock's, clock's ticking right.
Chris:I'm exhausted, which I can attest to, but no, but that coming back. And it's not the same community that I grew up in, but it is still a community of my friends and my family. And sure, there are lots of places in the world that I think would be probably wonderful to live, but this is a place that is still home and it was always home, and teaching at Boise State has still been a way to satisfy that right, that closing that circle and even this podcast of connecting with the community at large and trying to translate the stuff that we do that isn't always well talked about, so that people are like, oh there's stuff in there for me right.
Chris:that impacted the community, so is that similar to?
Jared:yours, it totally is. It really resonated with me when you said obligation isn't the right word and it's not. There was never even a question. It was not a question of will I, I go back? Oh, you know, maybe if I can get a job or, you know, maybe if things work out. It was like no, like I'm doing a thing and at the time that I can go back, I'm just going, I'll figure it out.
Jared:One of my good friends, Mark Pratt, runs cattle down in East Idaho and I just love what he says here. He said you know, you always hear the thing oh, I'll believe it when I see it right. And he says, no, that's the wrong way to think of the world. He said flip it around and see what you think. I'll see it when I believe it right. And when you flip it around and you start just recognizing that beliefs are these deep things, deep-seated things, like I'm just going to go back, I'll see what my life looks like when I get there. If I go the other direction, then I'm always waiting, I'm always on edge. There's an anxiety about that. No, just do it. Have a little bit of that trust and faith. That that's where you need to be, and you just get there and life will take care of it.
Chris:Well, and this kind of goes back to you right being present when you're walking down a city, right in your environment, it mind being mindful, right, mindfulness, right, like that of where you're at in your life. Because if all you're doing is right, if I'm listening correctly, right, if you're just chasing the next thing, you're just going to be constantly chasing it. Right, like the dog doesn't worry about it, like it likes chasing but it likes catching it too, right?
Chris:It's, it's, it's it's pretty right, it's just happy to be outside like having a good time, yeah, um, and. But I think that's that's important, because that right, we, we chased, we chase whatever's next instead of going oh, what am I doing right now?
Chris:I mean, I'm certainly guilty of that, we all are guilty of that,
Jared:and talking to you, knowing myself talking to, I mean at this point almost hundreds of students, oftentimes from rural places in the West here at Boise State that I mentor. We all have this kind of deep-seated, non-obligated like no, we're just going to do that right. And like anyone listening to this that feels that sees themselves in that think about that, like just go do it right, you'll be fine, but those places that we came from need us bad.
Chris:Yeah, and this is what I would say too to maybe a student or a future student or someone, someone that struggles. It's not a failure to go back to where you grew up. Right, like and I think that sometimes, even in popular culture or whatnot, that might feel like right of like you're supposed to go out and do wonderful things. Right, you could go out. I agree, though. Right, we both go out, do that, get, get out of your comfort zone. Go
Jared:boomerang
Chris:Exactly like if it terrifies you the idea of going and living in another state or another country or in a city. Right, go, do that, but you don't have to do that forever. Come back, yeah, with the new set of experiences. Right, and you will that that, that place in a way that you never would have before.
Chris:But, or don't come you don't have to,
Jared:you don't have to right, it's not a pipeline, but it's the way there is.
Chris:There is no right answer to where you end up in life right, there's there is no problem as to where you ended up. There's simply where you ended up.
Jared:Yep, that's exactly right.
Chris:So well, thank you so much, jared. Like it? I could talk. I could talk about this stuff for for way longer than people would be willing to listen to it, but I do, although I do think a lot of people do think about this stuff, whether they're in academia or not. Right this and and?
Jared:In my experience, everyone I know thinks about this stuff. I just am fortunate that I get paid to think about this.
Chris:Right, you don't have a problem, you just have you get the opportunity to do this and I hope that your students understand and they and they don't always do it now, but I'm always. I'm always hopeful that in 10 years they'll look back and like, oh, oh, that's what those old guys in front of the classroom were talking about right.
Chris:That they get it because experience, ultimately, is that greatest teacher. But again, thank you for your time, thank you for lots of things to think about, thanks for kind of the opportunity to connect back to my kind of journey as well, but I really, really appreciate it. For those listening again that want more information, you know, search for Jared's name under Boise State. You'll find him, you'll find his website and I'm sure that he would be more than happy to chat with you about whatever's on your mind.
Jared:More than happy. I'd love that.
Jared:Thank you for the invite.
Jared:This has been wonderful, thanks, Chris.
Chris:Thank you very much.
Chris:If you'd like to learn more about any of the topics discussed on today's show, please visit boisestate. edu/ research. I want to give a special thanks to Albertson's Library on the campus of Boise State for the recording space. The theme music for this show was composed and engineered by Boise State graduates Alan Skirvin and Taylor Ross. Thanks again for listening.