Martin Seligman, founder of positive psychology, talks with Chris Williamson about his career and his new book on agency. He says psychology 60 years ago had three blind spots (happiness, thinking and determinism), and traces how learned helplessness research, in which only about five of eight subjects became passive, led him to optimism and to a shift toward building strengths.
Resilient subjects were optimists who explained setbacks as temporary and specific. Seligman says pessimism comes naturally while optimism must be learned, through disputing catastrophic thoughts and imagining worst, best and most likely outcomes. He cites a 335-study meta-analysis and training 40,000 US Army drill sergeants. Agency combines efficacy, optimism and imagination; he suggests washing one cup to build efficacy. He argues cultures flourish with agentic beliefs and stagnated after Augustine rejected agency in 383 AD. He credits Claude and ChatGPT as creative partners, and notes shadow sides like victim-blaming. His optimism coding predicted a Trump win.