Kind: captions
Language: en
when things go bad when if we sink to
bad times on that merry-go-round in the
21st century with all the power we have
and all the many different kinds of
existential risks we have nukes is just
one of them now it could be the worst
ever
there's something going on in culture
right now that is driving us into what
you call the Primitive mind which is not
necessarily an ideal place to be
thinking from
what is the Primitive mind and why in
this unique moment do people find
themselves there
I use the example of like Skittles or
brownies or you know these things are
hard to resist even though a huge part
of your brain is saying like no no no no
no no this is just like trashed sugar
it's gonna make you feel bad and you're
gonna gain weight like it's bad across
the board except it tastes good for one
second the the primate doesn't
understand that and it's thinking we
just found dense
you know high calorie
food this is precious eat as much as you
can because you don't know where we're
going to get it next right so it's this
we're crazy people we're crazy and we
have this we live in this Advanced
civilization where so many of our
natural programming uh you know
Tendencies uh actually hurt us and
misfire so we're constantly in this kind
of tug of war
um and so that's the kind of General
situation that applies to I think most
problems in humanity and most personal
struggles we have you can kind of boil
it down too there's this tug of war
going on because we've been kidnapped
out of our home Forest somewhere and
we've dropped into an advanced
civilization and we're trying to do our
best so I like to think about um how
this applies to when I look at like
political tribalism or something like
that which is very prevalent today and
something in the environment has the
environment's been changing super
quickly
um you know dude social media just
started and it's like completely changed
the world and the internet is pretty new
um and mobile phones and and there's
just just the that's all these giant
seismic Environmental changes which
throw off the balance in these tug of
war we've got both individually and
Society we have kind of a grand tug of
war going on
um
and so I start you know that that's what
I'm doing a lot of thinking about is
okay I see a lot of kind of things that
are the political version of eating
Skittles and brownies which is you know
hating half the country and feeling like
you're perfect and righteous and the US
group is great and the damn group is
awful like that's just junk food of a
different kind right it's just that's
base Primal behavior that doesn't
naturally make sense and it's not good
for us it's not good for others uh and
it's on the rise clearly right you see
it around you and you also see it in
plenty of surveys and polls and
um and so uh that's what I've been
thinking a lot about why right you know
what what's what are the environmental
changes and and why are they stoking
this kind of decline in the National the
us at least in the National tug of war
and and uh and a lot of in a lot of us
as people if we look at the Primitive
mind as us 50 000 years ago and we think
about the baser instincts why do those
base instincts feel good why is the
righteous indignation such a
it it feels so awesome why would that be
from an evolutionary standpoint the
program is very simple
and this developed over not just fifty
thousand years but this is this is you
know billions of years going back right
this goes through our whole Evolution
the program is very simple in terms of
its goal
the genes that you carry
uh they're still around right now
because they happen to be unbelievable
at survival right they've survived
through fish through reptiles and
rodents and other primates and great
apes and now they're in you you know
most of the genes didn't make it this
far so everyone today their genes are
amazing at survival and so the goal of
your programming is to that you're the
animal that is surrounding these genes
you're just kind of you're developed in
the way you are you are physically and
mentally Who You Are
because
every little part of you is is good at
serving this the core purpose which is
keeping those genes Immortal passing
them on passing them on right you're
gonna die but your genes Can Stay
immortal if you haven't dare you to
Urban you know what maybe maybe it also
with the the crazy future we have maybe
we can upload our concerts
but the point is that it just is so
simple in in so many ways something that
helps you pass your genes along
is going to because of so much Evolution
make the animal feel good it's going to
reward the animal with dopamine and
other kinds of happy chemicals because
that's what the programming does it it
basically like you if you want your dog
to do something or you give it a treat
but that's just what you're really doing
is the dog doesn't care about the treat
that when they eat the treat they get
the dopamine hit the dog cares about the
dopamine hit and it's addicted right
like like all of us and so you give the
dog a treat it hits the dopamine head so
that's like really the dog's brain is
the one giving it the real treat right
and you're triggering something that
gives the the secondary treat
um and so it's a similar idea with us is
that
um the things your brain naturally
rewards you for are going to be things
that helped you
to pass on your genes so what does that
mean to pass on your genes you have to
uh survive right you can't die
especially at a young age you have to
survive
um which means you need calories
you need to stay safe and then of course
you need to reproduce which is why
humans are all maniacally obsessed with
sex and then now the genes are in your
kids so suddenly you'll throw yourself
off a cliff before you'll throw your kid
off a cliff which makes no sense except
it does if you're thinking about the
fact that
um uh the genes are in the younger
healthier container now so the genes are
telling you protect that thing over
yourself right so again crazy right and
this is all very obvious it's just that
if you think about you know why do
Skittles Taste good because back then
something that tasted dense and sweet
like that was probably a really high
calorie food which was critical to eat
because you didn't know when you're
going to get food now your question why
does you know political tribalism feel
good in the same kind of primitive
Blissful kind of way
um and it's because the tribes that you
know to survive for your genes to pass
on the best thing you you really needed
you couldn't survive alone humans alone
would just would be in big trouble you
needed to have a village and a tribe
around you
and so uh we are desperate to be to seek
out connection and community and to be
in the good graces of the people closest
to us and if there's a group of cool
kids and they're ostracizing the uncool
kids you really want to be in the cool
kid group that's just our DNA we want to
be included we the in our nightmares to
be ostracized to be the one that
everyone's talking [ __ ] about behind
your back we hate that and again that
doesn't make sense who cares right it's
just we're all gonna who cares what
they're saying because our dumb
primitive brains are horrified because
they think we are now going to get cut
out of this the the life raft which is
this support group this this community
and we're kind of out of that we're
gonna die and if if you get rejected by
uh a girl when you go up to her it's
it's horrifying because
all the other girls now in the tribe are
gonna you know laugh at you and you're
never gonna mate you're never gonna pass
on unions of course and today that
doesn't make sense you can get rejected
and it doesn't matter but our brains
continually are misinterpreting the
world around us the way you describe
that a it seems really really true but
also begs the question then how on Earth
did we get to the point where the
enlightenment is real that we have the
scientific method and we've created all
this amazing stuff we at some point
somehow some way began to elevate above
that uh and I don't know how kids today
will take the following statement but as
a child of the 80s it feels like we were
doing really well for a while at least
in the U.S freedom of speech was like a
core tenant individuality being able to
think for yourself being celebrated for
that now feels like we're going in the
wrong direction
um
how did we how did we get escape
velocity at first even before we we talk
about how we're getting pulled back down
if you think about how much
self-help books and people who give
advice on the internet and and people
who give medical and nutrition or
Fitness advice or productivity advice
right and and people build these systems
um what's happening is that basically
all of this is this struggle to okay
let's make systems
and habits and routines that
can protect us from our own worst
desires so a simple one is don't buy
unhealthy food for your house if you
want to eat more healthy right you know
uh commit to the commit to a gym routine
and and form a habit
um and so people are constantly in their
own lives forming these systems which
are like these structures that you can
build these artificial structures that
you can build that can kind of support
you and keep you afloat so you don't
drift down into kind of your worst your
worst instincts and your your most your
most nonsensical Instinct it's not evil
they're just they don't make sense for
your life they're gonna push your life
in the wrong direction so we build all
these systems
um you have diets right a diet is just a
system and you're gonna maybe do it with
a with a group of people
um these are all ways to kind of
outsmart our primitive instincts and and
and uh and and try to uh to kind of kind
of build the structure so the
enlightenment
is just that on a massive scale uh well
the enlightenment itself is kind of uh
you know is is a ton of philosophy about
the best systems that groups can use
that countries can use to use to what
end so the the if you if a human is just
following their base instincts they're
just you know scarfing down junk food
right
if a if a group of people is following
their base instincts you've got Warlords
and dictators and slaves and super
oppression and no upward mobility and no
justice right that's the state of nature
we've done this so many times you know
look at history there's so it's just
like it's like you can have this moment
when you know things seem better and
then they and then and then there's
civilization collapses and you end up
with again you have these these Warlords
and you've got
um uh you know dictatorships and this is
so so humans have suffered so much by
um kind of falling into think about you
know that the hierarchy
um is something that is kind of a
natural thing for us to fall into this
thing which is why we all want to kind
of please the scary authorities
um and so uh the enlightenment is trying
to say what how is what is a better way
here what is the true human nature that
produces that is it is it that we you
need a brutal dictator in order to
control humans because otherwise they
will just get out of hand and start
murdering each other or and this is more
than what the Enlightenment thinkers
thought is actually human nature isn't
necessarily that bad it just needs uh
some basic laws and structures that can
uh prevent people from uh prevent the
worst actors among them from taking over
and from overpowering each other and
from harming each other and at that
point
um actually humans function can function
very well together so it's kind of this
nuanced thing between you know you have
tyranny uh and Anarchy right which often
Anarchy often then melts away into
tyranny and and doesn't it always yeah
and so this is saying what if we do
something in the Middle where instead of
saying there's these rigid iron-clad
laws and every single person is under
the control of the king you say actually
there's going to be freedom and the
government's going to have a very
limited ability to do anything but
there's going to be this big wide fence
with Ironclad walls on the wide fence
which is that you can't harm someone
else
um you know physically you can't steal
their property you know things like that
uh equal Equal justice under the uh
under the law you're gonna have you know
equal rights you're going to have
um uh very you know when you basically
you're going to be totally free but if
you start harassing people and punching
people and stealing their things very
quickly you're ending you're going to
end up in jail so there is an iron fist
there but it's very light touch it only
applies to very specific things so they
basically the the if an anarchy
everyone's 100 free which turns into a
bunch of bullies and Warlords and now no
one's free the enlightenment was like
okay if we if we have everyone be 80
free but that last 20 no one can do
um
then then we think that not only will
people be able to now live freely and
safely but also it'll Foster all this
productivity all this natural
competition with rules the competition
will flourish and this to me is no
different than a human's human creating
a little group to do a diet with right
this is a mass scale structure that is
basically that that the rational parts
of our brain can create that uh can say
if we if we just live within this
structure our worst instincts can't take
over
okay this is uh this is really complex
and very nuanced but I think incredibly
important and the reason that I wanted
to talk to you and that I found your
book so compelling is all of this stuff
really matters so I came to uh studying
history very late but the more I study
history the more I realize that the way
that the society functions matters a lot
and if you meaning life and death
quality of life uh being just tormented
endlessly or having something that is a
pretty amazing place to be so uh there
are three books that I would encourage
people to read if they really want to
get a sense what humans are capable of
in in the wrong direction and that would
be Mao the unknown story
uh the rise and fall of the Third Reich
and the gulag archipelago those are very
terrifying books about what happens when
the baser instincts uh go awry and so
when I think about okay how does this
end up happening
let me know what you think about this
thesis uh hypothesis may be more
accurate so you have humans have just a
a need for certainty and when I'm
teaching entrepreneurs one of the things
I teach them is you have to be able to
intoxicate your team with certainty and
if you say hey this is the way forward
of course you're never going to know for
sure but like you have to put out this
is what I think we have to do to
accomplish this goal you've got to tell
them this is it we're going to go do
this thing now privately you can have
all the doubt in the world but you need
to have certainty to get them marching
in a direction which is why going back
to your idea of why this feels so good
is that for humans have an innate desire
for progress I think that's just in
terms of the Primitive Minds just
hardwired into us which is what keeps us
out there forging and hunting and
pushing and if that didn't feel good to
your point about the the dog's brain is
actually what's giving it the treat the
dopamine reward
if doing hard things in the pursuit of
progress didn't feel awesome then we
would never have become the most
dominant apex predator the world has
ever seen so you have this innate push
for progress and you have this crushing
need for certainty and so you have
people that can Rise Up by giving you
that certainty and being nuanced is
incredibly difficult it takes as
somebody who often struggles to hold
very nuanced ideas uh
I think one of the markers of a high
level of intelligence is that ability to
really find a nuanced path through
something now having grown up in America
I'm immersed in this American experiment
so I never really realized that it was
an experiment that they're it's fragile
and that it could be lost and that when
you look at a tyrannical government
where certainty is ruling the day one
person is just telling you you're gonna
go do this and people can get behind it
because they just hey I followed the
rules and that's that even though it can
be horrendous tyranny
and that when I think of things like the
woke mind virus
which seems to be really capturing
people today part of it is
it sounds great even though it may not
be working part of it is that it gives
people certainty on how to move and then
part of it is that finding the Nuance of
even though it sounds good it's not
working they're using names that you
never want to push back against but the
underlying idea may not be quite aligned
all of that gets very murky and very
hard to navigate through and so people
end up getting pressured to be silent
they don't understand their own View
because they're not able to talk out
loud about it they're not able to
clarify their own View and so they're
never able to Think Through the problem
well to Define that nuanced View and
then to move forward with certainty
and nuance
so it feels like a system that is very
easy to get wrong and very difficult to
get right and so as when you were
writing the book and you called it a
self-help book for societies
talk us through this idea of the latter
so that people can understand how to
think through these nuanced positions in
a way without
falling prey to just whatever is the
popular narrative
well so I I we talk a lot about
horizontal
spectrums we've got political you've got
the left the far left and the left and
the center and the right and the far
right right so it's just one dimensional
horizontal axis we have a lot of those
on any spectrum of opinion you know you
could just lay out the opinion of views
this extreme that extreme and then the
things in the middle and that's all what
you think right which is great but like
I was like what let's like build another
access a vertical one that that can be a
how you think access so we can just to
talk about it it's just it's just it's
an important concept that I people know
but like let's give it an access so I
call it the latter and
when it comes to thinking it's just
defined
pretty simply where at the top you know
you care about truth that's what you're
you're acting the way someone acts when
they care most about truth and at the
very bottom but you care so only care
about is confirming your existing
beliefs
and then of course it's a spectrum so
you can have like you know multiple
rungs on that ladder and it's not that
some people are the low rung people it's
that we all have the Tendencies the
tendency to kind of go up and down on
this ladder depending on the day on our
mood on the stage in our life on the
topic
um but once you're thinking about this
as uh an actual access that you can be
on a ladder then I think it helps you
realize okay wait I'm doing that thing
where I'm I'm trying to confirm my
beliefs and I'm I'm actually not going
for truth deep down and you can be more
self-aware so
um the the
what does someone act like when truth is
their motive truly right I mean if you
think about this if you just take it out
of like the realm of politics or
religion or one of these really you know
sensitive topics and you just
um you know you're trying to figure out
how to fix something uh there's there's
you have a bunch of tools and you're
trying to fix a machine that's not
working and you have people around and
if if you're saying I have a theory here
that actually what we need is we need to
cut the red wire and we need to like you
know whatever you know but put another
metal plate here
uh and someone else says
um no no no no no no you got to leave
the red wire and cut the green wire
right you're you're not going to say
you're an awful person because like
you're the kind of person who thinks we
you know the green wire type people
right you know you're not no why would
you ever that's crazy you just you just
what you'd be doing is
you try to assess well just fully
um without any bias like you're trying
to assess does this person know what
they're talking about right is this
person just someone who just just out of
nowhere says I don't like the green wire
or you know you'd ask their background
and they'd say oh and you hear them talk
and you say oh this person actually
seems like they have a lot more
experience here than I do or they know
they understand this kind of
machine better okay so I'm going to
listen to them and I'm going to update
my beliefs maybe I or I was so certain
about the red wire and you know they're
the fact that they think it's the green
wire makes me reconsider whether I know
this is just normal human thinking
because you all you care about is which
wire should I actually be cutting on
this thing
um so when it comes to a if you're if
you truly uh are if you're on the that
that's kind of top rung thinking if
you're thinking that way with your
political beliefs uh or any other belief
you know you'd have this belief and you
would be so open to dissent into
challenge you'd like you'd seek out
articles that are disagreeing with you
because you're thinking that you know
you can think of your belief as a little
machine and you're trying to see if it's
as strong as a machine as possible you
collected all these little information
puzzle pieces and you've assembled them
together into a hypothesis and
um you know that uh people have blind
spots and people are biased and people
make mistakes and so this machine
probably has some flaws how am I going
to find out what they are uh I'm gonna
go out and test it I'm gonna I'm gonna
find people who disagree with it and say
kick them machine see if you can break
it right which of course is a debate or
an argument are you gonna go read things
that disagree with you you're going to
read people that say
um you know that this is built wrong uh
and if someone makes a good point and
you say oh you know what like you're
actually the machine's not standing up
well to your
descent
um you're not gonna be offended or angry
at that person or cut them out of your
life you're gonna say
great I need to update or I need to
reconsider that right okay so this is
obviously like ideal thinking right and
if we always thought this way when
you're thinking that way you are a hyper
efficient learner right you are you if
your motive is truth and you act that
way you behave that way you're going to
be the best at finding the truth
eventually you're gonna really and
you're gonna have a natural humility and
you're also going to end up with a lot
of nuance because the truth is so often
nuanced so you're gonna be open to that
and you're gonna end up refining your
belief and now your machine gets a
little bit a little bit sharper and a
little your idea gets a little bit
better and now you
get more information you read more you
test your idea more and the Machine gets
a little bit better and eventually
you're gonna have this very complex and
nuanced point of view
that is he worked really hard for and
it's going to be nuanced and it's going
to be the best chance you have it being
accurate now that would be nice if we
all thought that way but of course
there's this primitive mind that we
talked about which is this part of your
brain that uh is not wired for truth
it's wired for survival in 50 000 BC and
what that often meant was agreeing with
the sacred beliefs of your tribe and
believing them and the people who could
believe what the tribe believed
um with full conviction they did
survived well they were you know they
were on the in-group they they fit in
and that's what was needed
what's up guys it's Tom bilyu and if
you're anything like me you're always
looking for ways to level up your
mindset your business and your life in
general that's exactly why I started
impact Theory a podcast that brings
together the world's most successful and
inspiring people to share their stories
and most importantly strategies for
success and now it's easier than ever to
listen to impact theory on Amazon music
whether you're on the go or chilling at
home you can simply open up the Amazon
music app and search for impact Theory
with Tom bilyu to start listening right
away if you really want to take things
to the next level just ask Alexa hey
Alexa play impact Theory with Tom bilyu
on Amazon music
now playing impact
impact Tom bilyu on Amazon music and
boom you're instantly plugged into the
latest and greatest conversations on
mindset Health finances and
Entrepreneurship get inspired get
motivated and be legendary with impact
theory on Amazon music let's do
so this other part of our brain very
much identifies with certain ideas and
when you identify with an idea
your brain has a tough time telling the
difference between a sacred belief and
your identity and your identity and your
body and so it's actually a lot of
research where in fmri experiments
people's fight or flight parts of their
brain light up when certain beliefs like
political are challenged it actually
lights those things up and and when when
people have those parts so their brain
being lit up by this challenge they are
extremely unlikely to change their mind
because they feel attacked yeah when you
it's it's literally lighting up a
different part of your brain when
political beliefs are challenged then so
this is a specific study I'm thinking of
from 2016 uh and you know there were
like 10 non-political
beliefs that were challenged and then 10
of the of the participants political
beliefs and the non-political beliefs
were much more likely to to light up
kind of the prefrontal cortex like
um you know rational centers of the
brain and the political beliefs were
much more when those were challenged the
limbic system the more primitive
emotional you know Parts the amygdala
the fear centers the fight or flight
parts of our brain lit up and the
default mode Network which is a set of
brain regions that are associated with
internal introspection and
um uh you know reflecting inwardly as
opposed to listening to what someone's
saying on the outside and so when the
political beliefs were challenged
Minds didn't change and when the
non-political beliefs were challenged
there was much more movement and the
person saying I guess I was wrong so
it's that it's that the the natural
um or or the the The Logical kind of way
to think would be as I said obviously
why would you not want truth everyone
should want that why would you want to
be delusional
um and that is what we're like most of
the time but then these certain areas
like politics Will trigger a crazy part
of our brain that treats ideas and
people as one and the same feels as my
identity yeah it feels angry and hurt
and offended when someone disagrees with
them and gets really riled up and and
gets you know you feel that emotion
you're really hyped up and and and you
kind of hate that person maybe and maybe
even you cut them out of your life and I
can only be friends with people who
agree with me on these topics and that
is madness that is a totally weird thing
going on in the brain
um and so that to me is what I would
call low wrong thinking is is when uh
and so when someone's if most someone's
motivated by truth we said what they did
they'll seek out dissent they'll change
their mind right they want more
information they're humble when they're
on the low rungs in that whole you're
thinking a whole different way and
you're you're deep down even if you
don't know it at that moment you're deep
down motivation is to confirm what you
believe to feel to continue to feel
strongly about it and to to talk about
how right I am and how wrong and bad
those other people are who disagree with
me you're gonna behave in a way that
serves that motivation so that's
confirmation bias and cherry picking
evidence that fits in all these
cognitive you know fallacies that come
up um and these biases those are all
ways that your brain can make sure you
continue to believe the things that you
believe in the face of information that
might be compelling uh that says you're
wrong doesn't matter you'll become a
brick wall uh when it comes to those
beliefs and we all can we all do this uh
and it's good to note when I'm you know
if you can't a good litmus test is
if you believe something really strongly
um ask yourself is there anything
someone could present me right now is
there in this argument is there anything
this person could say that would make me
say you know what I think I'm wrong I
need to rethink that and if the answer
is no of course not every time they're
talking I'm just waiting so I can then
you know you're in the you're down in
the low rungs and that's okay we all do
it but it's like it's a reminder calm
down remember that you and your ideas
are not the same
be humble accept that you might be wrong
and like listen and maybe you'll learn
something and remember truth matters
more than being right and if you have to
continually remind yourself of this why
does truth matter
um because
um when we have a more accurate picture
of the world we can do more for the
world when we have a more accurate
picture of reality we live better lives
we had end up with fewer regrets uh when
you're also when you're thinking that
way you tend not to be in a tribal
mindset you you feel love for all humans
you know uh you don't feel this weird
difference in empathy between the US
group and then them group you're you're
your best self when we're you're in that
mode
um when you're you know if you're
seeking truth and you're remembering the
truth is hard it's going to bring this
humility in and you're going to end up
um with a clearer view of the world but
you're also going to learn a lot more
think of what is learning learning is
getting your perception closer to
reality right and so you're going to do
that and you're going to learn and so
you're going to end up um you're gonna
end up knowing a lot more you can make
better decisions you can end with more
wisdom down the road you can be you can
you you're I think morally kind of a
better person you know you're and um
yeah and and the alternative is delusion
delusion that feels good in the moment
just like eating Skittles feels good in
the moment but um actually makes you
um
uh you're you're you're not in touch
with reality and
um I think over the long run uh I don't
think that's good for I mean you know
maybe you could argue that some people
are happy not knowing the truth and
maybe it's better that way but I don't
think most people would say that about
themselves and if someone wants to say
you know what I don't want another truth
then okay you know I would say then but
I think if you know 99 out of 100 people
would say I want the truth and I know
the truth and they think they know the
truth so it's not that they actively are
saying I don't care about the truth you
sure about that so this I've even heard
you talk about this so I guess one let
me acknowledge uh the only part of your
answer that surprised me was the moral
thing so I'll follow up on that in a
minute uh but I you I think you're bang
on especially with the idea of identity
people end up getting tied up in that
but I've heard you say that
um when it comes to
um being right when it comes to people
trying to get to the truth that some
people are saying no no like truth is
just a power game and even even this
idea that there is something right or
something better than another thing is
is just a uh structure in essence of
Oppression
um so when you said that I think
everybody wants the truth
is that true well you're talking about I
was probably referring to a very
specific ideology kind of this
post-modern line of thought which says
there is no such thing as objective
truth and that everyone that that
everyone has their truth
um so that's that's a very specific kind
of very kind of um far left kind of
radical line of thought um which I think
is I think this is sorry finish sex that
sounds very interesting oh I'm saying I
I think it's I think it's perfectly
interesting the concept that
um you know when you have when you live
a life as person a versus person B
um you have total different subjective
experiences yeah
um I I think that's interesting
interesting but I fully believe in an
objective truth it doesn't mean there's
just because there's subjective
experience doesn't mean there's not also
objective truth it doesn't mean that
we're always good at finding it but the
whole birth of the the scientific method
right what is science is it's just a
it's a process that anyone in the world
from any country any language any age
any religion or race can participate in
together it's this giant Global project
um that is just a method it's a way of
thinking and it's a method for getting
closer to the objective truth so
um I'm not a post-modernist so I I know
that some people so I as far as whether
they'd say we don't care about truth I
don't think that's what they think they
think that each person kind of has their
own truth and um but doesn't that mean
by definition that there is no objective
truth and we're getting now to where I
think this starts to derange and again
for anybody listening I just want to
remind you I worry about this going off
the rails totalitarianism uh genocide
like it gets scary fast just I'll
re-point out the three books I mentioned
at the top like humans have a long
history of killing a lot of people in
the name of ideology uh so this really
feels like it's important to get right
uh it does seem like by definition
people that say that the there is no
objective truth and that's just a big
part of the power game that they are
they are actively rejecting that idea
um it's yeah and I think they're wrong I
think that they
um but they're not saying we want to be
delusional they're saying that
you know and in this case when you're
talking about you know kind of the woke
movement what they're saying is that
um privileged people don't have access
to the full truth but oppressed people
do because oppressed people know the
dominant narrative which is the
privileged narrative because everyone
knows that but they also know the
oppressed experience which only they
have access to to me this is that's it
doesn't that's not true I think that if
you course suppress people have access
to information that but everyone is an
individual and everyone has a ton of
access to specific life experiences and
this kind of binary people with that
skin color don't have the full truth but
people that to me is just it's not it's
rigid and childish kind of what do they
mean when they say truth that I I
actually don't understand and you threw
out a definition earlier that I think is
pretty close to mine but before I offer
mine what when people say the truth what
do they when post-modernists say the
truth what do they mean
um well I would say I don't want to
speak for people who I I'm not one of
them so I'll do the best I can but you
know there's this thing called
standpoint Theory right
um which is uh the idea that I was just
kind of referring to which is that
um people are positioned in The Matrix
of Oppression and that there's a kind of
a current going on like we're all in a
river together and that's the dominant
narrative
and that's the that's kind of the forces
of Oppression and people who are who
benefit from that which they would say
in in you know in other Marxist places
they might say they're the ruling class
um and the U.S in today's kind of what
movement they would say the Straight
white men
they are always swimming with the
current
and so everyone knows what the current
is like because we're all stuck in it
but they don't have any idea of what
it's like to go against the current and
so people who are
um not straight white men
they have a totally different experience
of reality they they have they actually
have more information and what they say
counts more because they actually have
access to what they say about what what
they say about uh the uh their world
view it doesn't so you know to me what
this actually is is a way that when
there's a statistic or a set of data or
an argument that comes out that
disagrees with this ideology to me it's
a convenient way to say that's all a
part of the dominant narrative in fact
science itself the scientific method was
invented by white man which by the way
is not true it's like that that's part
of my you know it's like it's such a
there's no does it gives no Credence to
cultures all around the world who
created you know the scientific method
together and uh have have you know they
get all this credit for something like
science to White Western men
um by saying that this is a tool created
by white Western men
um to uh entrench kind of their own
power and again I'm I'm saying what I
I'm trying to steal man what I think
they would say I completely disagree
with this entirely I think that science
is not does not have a color or and I
think science is a way of thinking and
it is the best known method in my view
of finding the truth of getting closer
to it now you can ask what is truth it's
just that there is
um
uh
the fact that there is also subjective
experience which each person kind of has
their own doesn't mean that doesn't mean
there's that's part to me that's part of
objective truth objective truth is just
reality so you know the Earth is ways
this this many kilograms and it the
gravity here is this strong and it's
going around the Sun and it's been doing
that for this long and humans evolved
this way and we are now our brain works
this way because of it these are really
hard questions but to me there is an
answer here it's just that humans takes
a long time for us to get closer to it
some of the things like the diameter of
the earth we got that one for a long
time and they had no idea and there were
different theories now we know it it's a
clear answer we have the answer we know
the mass of the Earth we understand some
of how gravity works but when it comes
to you know Evolution and and why aren't
you know where our memories are in our
brains and we don't know but it doesn't
mean there it doesn't exist uh it it
does exist so so to me I think I'm look
if you go to the you know you talk about
Mao one of the things that in in the
maoist revolutions they were very
hostile the radicals to science to they
would say the the the the you know the
intellectuals and the scientists they
are are a part of our oppression right
to me I I you show me a movement that is
hostile to science and the notion of
objective truth that is also Humane and
productive over the long period of time
and I I will I'll be surprised because
I've never seen one to me when a
movement is hostile to the idea of
objective truth and Science and
um very and almost always goes along
with the good people the good oppressed
people and the bad privileged people
right that's the the or whatever maybe
it's the other way around maybe it's
like Hitler it's the good upper inner
people and the bad Outsider scum
whatever it is anytime someone's doing
this moral dualism and their
anti-science to me that is just human
primitive Minds have ganged up together
into kind of a religious movement that
is you know masked in the certain kind
of righteous politics and that it's
actually almost always going to lead to
uh really really bad things a
destruction and suffering and and it
almost never ends observing the people
the movement supposedly is supposed to
you know the Nazis were supposed to
serve the the Patriotic German and the
maoists were supposed to serve uh the
people right and and make it a a give
people a better life and and what
movement is supposed to serve black
Americans and women and to me in all
these cases I feel like those are some
of the people that are hurt most by
these movements so
yeah
dude so this is uh this is really really
important so I'm gonna Define what I
think truth is and then answer why I
think you if you want to be a good
totalitarian top-down movement you have
to find a way to uh bury science so the
truth is from where I'm sitting
the human mind is a prediction machine
and the truth is the thing that as you
get closer to it allows you to better
predict the outcome of your behaviors so
um take
Newtonian physics so Newtonian physics
got us a lot closer to the truth and we
were able to realize oh wait the Earth
is revolving around the Sun this is
roughly how gravity works we were able
to predict the motion of large bodies
very very helpful and I think we could
land on the moon without einsteinian
physics I'm almost certain that's true
so it's like hey pretty impressive but
then without uh general relativity and
special relativity we would not be able
to do things like GPS we certainly
wouldn't be able to do nuclear physics
and so as we got closer to the truth
there we were able to unleash the power
of the atom and so it's like hey we got
closer to that we're better able to
predict the outcome of our behaviors and
thusly unleash tremendous power
tremendous progress and so
truth in that sense becomes very useful
so even when you think about things like
um the social sciences okay you make a
prediction we're going to put in this
um
this new law whatever and we expect X
outcome now if we get a different
outcome than that then there was
something flawed in our thinking we were
farther from the truth than we thought
we were but if we're willing to look at
the results we can actually get closer
to the truth we can structure something
even better and now next time when we
run a new experiment it's going to be
hopefully getting us closer to the
result that we wanted
so the reason that I think that in a
totalitarian movement which I will say
that there are shades of that anytime
where you don't allow a dissenting voice
you're headed down the path of
totalitarianism and I see that very much
with woke thinking so the reason that
you would have to a shoe science or
anything else is you you need a
narrative to
give people the certainty to move
forward and to take action the problem
with science that pesky pesky thing is
it tells you whether you're close to the
truth or not because you can accurately
predict the outcome of your behaviors so
if you're telling people hey here's the
narrative do these things and life will
be better for everybody and then you do
those things and life isn't better for
people or it isn't better for the people
that you said it was going to be better
for it breaks the ability yeah so now
it's like oh the very thing that I'm
using to intoxicate people people with
certainty falls apart under the scrutiny
of reality but if I can say oh that that
test that you're going to use to see if
this was
effective or not that is so flawed you
can't even do that shame on you for even
bringing it up and that's you know bad
racist whatever now you can keep the
narrative intact now you can maintain
power and that that's that's where this
starts to break down for me I cannot
until I started reading
um
Nietzsche and the idea of the will to
power I could not understand why people
would want a world view that was
obviously broken like what are you
getting out of it you're not making
progress you're not getting anything
better like I like refrigerators and air
conditioning and the internet like these
are amazing things and none of them are
possible when you start saying no no two
plus two isn't really four like what is
happening yeah I I think if it is um
why do people do what they do right
because they have a world view where
they believe that the rewards are here
and the penalties are here and this is
what's good and this is what bad good
people do and bad people do and I want
to be good and and so then Behavior gets
driven right they seek the same human
nature and you and you and you give it a
a do you think that's where it starts
that doesn't feel like the first moment
that feels like how you get the second
person into this but it doesn't but yes
but but that's what I'm saying is if you
can author the story that people believe
you're all powerful you can play God if
you can if I can convince
a ton of people that I am I speak to God
so I know no one else but I know what's
going to get you into heaven which is
the ultimate Primal incentive
and by the way there might you might
have a lot of sex with virgins there
um which is another huge Primal
incentive and everything you could ever
want and eternal life and everything
you're primarily scared of Heaven solves
it I know how to get you there and by
the way I also know what's going to get
you sent to hell
and he and now because if they can
believe that that I I know I have the
answer now I can start saying okay
here's what I here's what gets you into
heaven all the things that I want you to
do and you can drive the populace like a
remote control car
and right and so if you take a any kind
of tyrant
um they're always doing some version of
that would they have a story and if they
can make that the story people believe
look at North Korea right I went to
North Korea for five days and when 2013.
why it's fascinating
am I not afraid I mean I probably should
have been more afraid given that now
they've started arresting some of the
people on this same tour guide no thanks
but it was so interesting because what I
was immersed in for five days was the
North Korean story and it goes like this
the Korean War which we think of as
something that was from 1950 to 1953 and
is over
um in and in South Korea I think they
would say the same thing uh that
happened and now we're the 15th biggest
economy you know one of the big boys in
the world in North Korea the story is
that that war is ongoing still going
that the South the poor our poor cousins
in the South they don't hate South
Koreans our poor cousins down there are
being occupied currently by the evil
imperialist Americans they use that term
a lot of times the imperialist Americans
the they are occupying half our country
and the South wishes they could be free
and the only reason that we're free is
because our great leaders are brave
leaders and our military are so powerful
that the U.S can't get here they want to
take over here too but they can't and
they're scared of us and that's why we
get to be free people and but people
down in the South they're not free that
is a story that is very far from the
truth so what happens what was what were
we told you you know we were told before
we went in I had nothing to Envy which
is a book about you know a North Korean
Defector you cannot bring that into the
country they said and the the they're
saying the worst thing you could ever
bring was like a radio that had South
Korean stations because if people there
knew that Seoul was not an oppressed
place but actually a thriving Metropolis
with people who are well fed and free
and living their best lives
um it would be a disaster right and so
they have this story and
some people believe it in the country a
lot of people do and the people who
don't know to keep quiet
and so if you can control speech you can
control what people believe and if you
control people believe you can keep them
acting the way you want which is
subservient to the dear leaders and
worshiping the leaders and and being
conforming and conforming to all of that
if so you you are incredibly hostile to
truth because you want to impact you
want to overpower people and you want to
basically have people like marionettes
uh and doing what you want and so you
can't if there's the truth would never
work if that were the so so they'd they
every single measure in that country is
of course there's no internet right
there's so so so so much effort put
towards suppressing the truth and that's
always the case because if you can if
you can write the story that people
believe you drive their behavior if you
stop being able to do that you can't now
if that's now what science is the reason
science is great is because what science
says is put away all the stories
we're there's a there isn't a big story
a real story called objective truth and
we don't we don't claim to know it
science never has even science has
theories they max out at Theory because
they say science is skeptical of its own
conclusions and it assumes you know no
scientists said oh my God science is
broken because Newton's Laws weren't the
completely they say great right science
says yes we're let's be less wrong every
year let's be a little less wrong so
science is saying there is a there is a
story that's real and we're just working
together humbly collaboratively on
trying to get closer to it which is so
different so again and when something's
hostile to science they're almost always
hostile to free speech as well and they
almost always are the kind of people
that can't stand up in a real debate
they don't actually have real actual you
know evidence on their side so if you
can't hang in a debate what you do is
you say debate is evil and and these are
dangerous ideas that cannot be
platformed and if you platform them
we're gonna punish you because you're
allowing dangerous harmful ideas to
spread which is harming marginalized
people right it's just the oldest trick
in the book there's a hundred versions
of this and it's always the same thing
it's just authoritarianism
for the sake of controlling people yeah
okay so uh we still have the will to
power sort of hanging out there but for
a second I want to go back to Identity
uh this idea that people end up tying
their identity to a set of ideas and
when that gets attacked the regions of
the brain light up that have to do with
whoa you're attacking me
um it seems to me that the only way out
of this trap and that you can literally
draw a line in the sand in my life
before this realization and after so I
used to Value myself for being smart
that was leading me down very weird
paths because I would say I'm sort of
middle of the road I'm fine I can get by
but I'm not going to be celebrated
necessarily for one of the great
intellects of all time uh and so I
realized that by valuing myself for
being smart anything that attacked that
notion was just I I could not have it
um and so I had to switch what I built
my identity around to being that of the
learner
and once I switch my identity to oh I
don't mind being told that I'm wrong oh
I don't mind realizing that I don't have
the right answer oh I don't mind
whatever just like hey if it's true
meaning it if I act as if that thing is
true I can better predict the outcome of
my behaviors I'm going to adopt that and
so it became about building my ego
around my willingness to stare nakedly
at my inadequacies and so that like just
radically changed my life I don't see
another way out of this I think
everybody like if you want to make your
life better that's the only answer the
only answer like you need an ego you
need self-esteem you need to feel good
about who you are you need a sense of
identity you need to be able to say who
you are and like what value system you
live by
is there another way or is that the one
well
what you're really talking about is
you're taking a backpack that is heavy
with rock
size you know with rocks that are that
are these
these this description of your identity
and these these characteristics you
pride yourself on and the the the things
you feel certain about and that you need
to make sure everyone knows you're so
smart about
um and all these labels you put on
yourself right those are all rocks that
weigh down the backpack it's heavy when
you're talking about is the magical hack
of putting down the backpack and saying
actually I'm just
a learner like you said or some humble
thing I'm just an individual who's
complicated who evolves and I'm just
that awareness inside of the individual
and I'm going to try to get less wrong
throughout my life and I'm going to be
wrong a lot though and I'm going to
evolve and I might be into this kind of
stuff this year and then I'll change my
mind next year
um and
uh I'm not part of any tribe or group
necessarily unless it's in like kind of
a fun way where I'm not taking it very
seriously it's it's liberating right and
your light suddenly and now you're free
to you can start skipping around
learning stuff and exploring stuff and
trying things
um and uh you know people will also like
you more because you just come off more
humble it makes you seem wiser and you
know your your ego is not you know
getting threatened when something so
many different things happen right
you're not a little petty person so yes
that but this is this is very hard and
you talked about meaning and identity
and purpose and connection and all these
things that we need and one of my main
problems with with movements a lot of
certain political movements
is the ones that and then this is no
different than Cults and other things
when they tell you all your answers are
here you come and join our thing and you
have meaning and you have purpose and
you have identity and you have
righteousness and you have connection
and you have a community you know who
you are now because now you're you're a
blinkist you know you're uh whatever it
is
um and when you come here all of those
holes that are so painful and so hard to
fill it's like a get rich quick scheme
come here and you got it and uh you have
all those things just join our army of
course it's it's snake oil it's a trap
because those things are hard and they
actually they've for they emerge from
Deep unique individualism that happens
over long periods of time
um you start to figure out meaning for
yourself you start to figure out you
know
um you know your purpose and and what
you really care about and uh what you
really believe right one of the things
these moves promise you is a full setup
ready to go One Stop Shop for all strong
opinions now you know what every
political issue you have
every moral thing you know it's easy now
you have your answer this is what the
good people think this is what the bad
people think memorize the checklist and
you're good to go read these core op-eds
that are that we all pass around and you
know what you know how to say all the
right arguments
um and so to me what those things are
doing is they're not actually filling
any of those holes they're they're
they're they're they're just a kind of a
sleazy get rich quick scheme that that
lures in vulnerable people these are
almost it's never bad people joining
these things uh or believing these
things it's all often these things prey
on people's empathy or their desire for
connection or these human things
um but it's to me it's very um it's no
it's no different than kind of an
abusive cult in a lot of ways um and uh
I think that what the wise thing to
teach people especially vulnerable
people is is that you know you feel so
bad about yourself for not having
knowing your meaning and not having
strong opinions and not knowing what you
think about all this but actually that's
okay no one really you know most people
don't know and that's okay and because
none of that is who you are you're
really this internal awareness and
you're free to be any of these things
that's what I would want to tell people
as opposed to saying you know you know
in in a certain mentality if you don't
have strong opinions on everything you
sound like an idiot right now I'd say no
no that is not correct right it's that
the people who have unearned conviction
about everything they're blowhards and
they don't actually you know their their
egos are just going Buck Wild so I feel
like it's the exact opposite advice and
I feel like somewhere along the way you
got a much better message or you learned
a much better message because
um and I can say it's better because
it's just uh I think it's more realistic
and it is
um it's it's as I said it's liberating
yeah it's interesting for me it was
getting kicked in the face by uh
some things I did worked and other
things I didn't didn't and I realized
that I was arguing for ideas that made
me feel the way I wanted to feel but I
knew that they weren't going to work in
a business context and I don't know if
without the marketplace saying hey we
actually will buy this we'll pay money
for this thing we're not going to pay
money for that thing if if I didn't have
that just brutal objective Clarity of oh
one course of action I go out of
business the other course of action I
thrive is very sobering and that forced
me to realize okay I If I argue for this
idea because it makes me feel smart or
you're gonna think I'm smart if I can
convince you but the market won't be
swayed I don't know if I ever would have
gotten there and so I see
I mean this goes back to something I
already said but I see really
well-intentioned people get lost in the
sequence of
every answer is going to be nuanced
Nuance is very hard if you can't talk
out loud if there are certain ideas that
are just off the table and you're not
allowed to have them then you're not
going to talk out loud which means that
you're never going to go from wrong to
right and so you're just going to run
down the checklist of I want to please
my tribe and fit in and not be
ostracized which is leveraging the
Primitive mind against me and this is
where we end up and so
I'm really
unnerved I'm I'm worried about the idea
that you put it in your book but you use
different words the classic being
um Hard Times make strong men strong men
make good times good times make weak men
weak men make hard times and so you go
in this Loop and in the book you say can
we not just skip the hard times part
um I worry that we can't
yeah and one that's especially scary
because it's why I I reframed it just
because
it wasn't it's not quite I just don't
think that you know what is a hard man a
weak man or whatever sorry it's a strong
to me it was like what it really is to
me is is it's wise people create good
times why is meaning people who see how
bad things can get they they've usually
because they've experienced it
themselves and they don't take anything
for granted and they work really hard
with humility and collaboration to to
because they know how important it is to
build systems that create Good Times
when people have lived in good times for
a few Generations
they don't find them precious and they
don't think
Their Stars every morning for oh my God
I get to wake up in Good Times They just
think this is how things are in fact I
actually things suck and they start to
you know if you you calibrate this is no
different than a human if human is x
amount of money and they just dream of
having 10x and they get 10x all they
suddenly have all these complaints about
not having 100x right so it's the same
thing you get good times for too long
you stop appreciating it and instead of
all the kids learning Civics and saying
well could we have to all work together
to keep good times they say good times
are just how things are or whatever
these times are this is just how things
are and they stop teaching kids Civics
and people start doing all the things
that actually create bad times and
loosening all of these this really well
thought out structure starts all the
different support beams start to weaken
um so that's why I go from you know
wise people create good times good times
for too long creates foolish people
and foolish people eventually will drive
you right into bad times and you know
bad times is you know whatever
civilizational collapse it's happened
many many many times before or just some
awful un unwise War whatever it is and
then hundreds of millions of people die
so for those people that's the end of
the cycle but in the rubble you know a
couple decades later wise people emerge
and an excruciating process that usually
the people who experience bad times
aren't even around anymore their
grandkids can be back in good times
right so this is this cycle and the
reason that it's so scary right now is
you know
bad times if you read history it's wow
it's a lot of bad times and you I just
they'll say things and I'm like that
sounds awful it's terrifying like
there's a lot of like actual King
Joffrey's out there and like slavery
like rampant slavery all over the place
for thousands of years and it's like
imagine how awful that is and like rape
and just
complete massive Injustice and crushing
poverty right and so you think about how
awful this is but in some ways what's
weird is that the 20th century was you
know the best yet in so many metrics you
have the best GDP per capita life
expectancy it's just skyrockets around
the world you know Medical Technology
um uh extreme poverty is at its lowest
ever
um and so you have this incredible
prosperity and that same century
when things did go badly they went
really badly you had the biggest
genocides ever you had the biggest Wars
ever you had suddenly a new thing which
is complete existential threats
existential risks like nukes right you
didn't have an existential threat in the
1700s there was nothing that might have
killed all of humanity that we made that
we did with our own foolishness right
you didn't have that much power as a
species so suddenly in the 20th century
we're developing these giant magic wands
that we can suddenly shoot at things and
we might just kill ourselves so the 20th
century was the best ever and also in
some ways the most vulnerable and
scariest ever with the biggest tragedies
so now apply that to the next Century
it's just even more we're gonna have
even better Prosperity life expectancy
is continuing to go up you're going to
completely eradicate disease and poverty
and it's going to be amazing genuinely
amazing except if this goes wrong when
things go bad but if we sink to bad
times on that merry-go-round in the 21st
century you know
um with all the power we have and all
that many different kinds of existential
risks we have nukes is just one of them
now
um it could be the worst ever we should
be really scared the stakes get higher
as Tech gets more exponential uh the
good times get better but the bad times
get worse and right now since we're just
living in objectively pretty overall
Good Times
people are not scared enough of bad
times they just take it for granted it's
just human nature I'd do it as soon as I
forget finish this conversation I'll go
back on with my life and stop feeling
scared because we just I grew up this
way and my parents grew up this way and
like we just uh we have a good life and
that life is good and everything ends up
fine and that's right we should not be
thinking that way we should be scared
and we should be working really hard to
teach kids Civics and to say you know
how can we be wise together and and
uphold this kind of liberal democracy so
what are the things that lead to bad
times
can they be described like I would say
uh the second you talk about ending
freedom of speech you're on a one-way
Street to bad times so what make bad
times and then we'll get to what make
good kind Good Times yeah well
um this I you know the enlightenment was
uh can you define them what the
enlightenment was yeah exactly the
enlightenment was uh a period of intense
I mean it's funny because people's one
of the theories is that
um that Coffee coffee shop started
sprouting up and all these smart people
who would normally have been in saloons
singing songs and punching each other
and playing games were suddenly in
coffee shops dead sober caffeinated and
debating and then they were going to
write books about their debates and
there there was you know and so it was
actually like a time when all of this
philosophy blossomed and people would
going back to Greek philosophy and
saying what have we learned and what
what's the you know this has been so
much trial and error with Christianity
and with democracy and all these things
that have gone on so what what did we
learn what what uh you know how should
people live and it's kind of the latest
crack that at least the Western world
came up with
um on the what's right and wrong for how
people should live what's the most
effective and practical but also the
moral way that governments should you
know how governments should work and
um and so the the and then the
application of that was you know the US
was kind of the first one and now of
course hundreds of you know over 100
countries have now put that into
practice which is building actual
countries
based on that philosophy so it was a lot
of talk and suddenly it was being put
into use and the U.S had a unique
opportunity because uh they didn't have
the baggage it was for Blank Slate they
could say um we can start from scratch
it was much harder to do that in Europe
and other places
um and so
um there were things like free speech
right which was one of the major
insights of this which is that uh free
speech is the basically the foundational
right on which every other right is
based now if you think about what's the
alternative to free speech it's always
the same the people with the most power
whether it's cultural or or government
or physical you know violence the people
with the most power
to decide what's what's offensive what's
okay to say what's not and almost always
you know if it's a king
um no good there's a lot of dictators
out there right now who imposing who are
imposing censorship and none of them are
saying I impose censorship they're
saying I'm against hate speech I'm
against
um
uh you know we are against blasphemy
right there everyone frames it nicely
but what do you think then hate speech
and blasphemy are a part of what leads
to Good Times
but I well I think
freeze
free speech is what leads to good times
and you can a hundred people Define hate
speech and blast me 100 different ways I
think
things being said in a free speech
environment which some people will find
to be hateful or blasphemic
um is inevitable inevitable so the
alternative is you say okay actually
hate speech is banned again 100 people
have different 100 different definitions
of hate speech so what's actually banned
it's that the powerful people determine
to be hate speech in the case of a
dictator it almost always happens to be
criticism of the government
non-patriotic speech or if it's a
religious dictatorship you know um you
know a blasphemy against again God or
whatever it is uh it is almost always if
the alternative to free speech sucks in
a lot of ways you're going to have a lot
of shitty people saying shitty things
and it's gonna some of those things are
gonna hurt when they're sad and some of
those things are going to cause harm and
they are but the alternative is
authoritarianism because someone has to
lay down the law of what constitutes
hate speech and it's always the powerful
people deciding what is inconvenient to
their goals is what this becomes not
allowed so it's when you think about it
that way you realize that free speech is
the only thing that you can have or
otherwise you're just back in you're
back in tyranny and so then another huge
one of course was the voting system
right it has been democracy forever but
specific modern version of this very
complex big country you know republic
democracy
um
that is an Insight that is a built on
centuries of trial and error experiments
still um uh um and it's it's incredibly
flawed right and who who thinks the U.S
government system is is great I mean
it's it's awful in so many ways and it's
often doesn't represent the will of the
people and it's open to corruption and
it's like everything else but what's the
alternative right I mean it's it's it's
it's you just have to always think like
this is the the kind of the theme with
Enlightenment governments is it's the
less it's the it's the least bad outcome
so what's a threat to this what creates
bad times if I consider the liberalism
like a house that we live in Liberty
lower uh lowercase L liberalism right
like Enlightenment style like classic
liberalism I consider it a house that we
all in the US are living inside of
whether you're left right or Center
politically we are all
you know in the liberal house living
under its rules and benefiting from its
benefits
um and uh and it has just it values the
individual and it says that you know
everyone is you know life liberty and
property or Pursuit of Happiness
um and that equality of opportunity is
at least the goal you know of course we
can argue about how well it's being
achieved but it's kind of a it's a set
of ideas that most Americans left right
and Center say yeah well that's good we
just need to achieve it better right so
to me that house is one of the main
things that creates good times it has
that has created modern good times it is
we can always we can oh we owe our good
times to that house that house has kept
people most of the time most people
reasonably free has engendered
prosperity
and has again fostered at least the best
crack at fairness that probably we've
seen uh you know of course there's been
lots of unfair things Jim Crow I mean we
failed at the liberal house a few times
but the liberal house itself is is is
mostly made good times now what is what
creates bad times is the house the
support beam starting to Decay and
Kraken right and and and so an example
of that this is why we talk a lot about
you know wokeness but
the Maga movement I mean when I see with
Trump you know there's a lot of things
you could criticize Trump for but like
the election stuff uh is to me if you're
thinking about it this liberal house
when he said before both people forget
before the 2016 and 2020 election before
them he declared I will accept the
results if I win
then this person wins and then doesn't
win and when the person doesn't win
literally tries to say the election is
rigged that is a mind virus of its own
you talk about the book members that is
a mind virus it's a mind virus which
says whenever my candidate doesn't win
it must be ripped and that is a support
beam that's that is right there in front
of you the decay of a support beam
because what is this what would you call
that support the support beam is
um so it's not just the system of
um kind of democratically elected
leaders because Russia claims to have
that
it's the widespread trust that we
actually have Democratic leaders it's
trust in the system so that we all can
agree my candidate lost but it was still
correct it was still the right thing
that is Magic and in the peaceful
transition of power where the losing
candidate Reagan when he when he went
out as the the winner but Hillary when
she lost they're making almost the word
for word the same speech they would say
which is what you know you should want
kids in America to learn that this is
what separates America from so many
countries of the past and so many others
today is this moment the peaceful
transition of power and when Hillary
lost she said I lost and I'm stepping
down as as a proud American stepping
down
that's is the it's kind of an ethos it's
a religion in a lot of ways it's an
ethos that when your candidate loses
gets fewer votes you accept it and that
is your president that is a support beam
and so what Trump is doing is sending
out a mind virus into a huge swath of
America which says actually the elect
there were the numbers say this but
don't believe it
and you know
corruption happened so the question I
think the fair question is is he is
partially right right is there something
but he made so many claims and there's a
there's a you know I've gone into every
you know all the major claims and I
linked to a page in in the book that I
think is really useful which is just
going through all the claims and showing
wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong
wrong wrong so this was not based in
some actual corruption that was
happening this was a mind virus for
selfish reasons
um that is there's a lot of Mind viruses
for selfish reasons this is one if you
care about the liberal house you have to
be like this is the public that's like
the big support beam in the middle of
the house is the Trust In free elections
that is what separates I mean look how
many countries struggle with just having
a fair election when you can't trust
that now you don't believe that's your
leader now you you know now there's
suddenly you know your Insurrection now
you shouldn't we shouldn't even follow
the laws of this government we shouldn't
trust their CDC we shouldn't trust their
whatever
um and so it's that that's that's I'm
that is watching something Decay and
then I think wokeness is another one
that is to me them that that Maga
concept and what specifically not social
justice because liberal social justice
of Martin Luther King style is very much
inside the house very proud of the house
and saying we need to make this house
do what it promised and support all
Americans and actually be fair and just
that's a proud liberal saying that
inside the house
um wokeness is very specifically saying
that liberalism itself is bad and
exploitative and that free speech is bad
right that it's dangerous to platform
ideas that we don't like
Etc
um and so that's a wrecking ball outside
the house and the Maga movement is a
wrecking ball outside the house
and if you're in the house and you're
squabbling with each other about
specific debates left right and Center I
think you have to pause and say we'll
get back to these the wrecking balls we
all need to not allow the wrecking balls
and if you're on the left you especially
have to worry about you're in charge of
the the woke Wrecking Ball and making it
stop being so powerful standing up to it
and if you're on the right you ha you're
in charge because someone on the right
yelling about wokeness only only makes
woken to seem justified and someone on
the left yelling about Maga just makes
them seem you know so it's it's the
first question is are you Pro house or
Andy house and I am very much Pro house
because I believe that the house is what
gives us good times and the decay of the
house is what will lead us to the bad
times that so many people in history
have gone through and if we had to put a
super quick definition of the house
would be liberal values
liberal values liberal laws and liberal
yeah liberal it's it's two things it's
liberal
laws and rules
so the Electoral College and the First
Amendment and
the justice system right the Supreme
Court all these that's that's that's one
part half of the puzzle and the other
half is liberal Norms is the the fervent
kind of almost religious defense of
liberal the liberal spirit so if the
government says um anyone can start a
business right free market but you're
part of a cultural group that says
anyone who starts a business is an evil
bad person and and you all your friends
are gonna start stop talking to you and
you're going to probably be fired from
your job for trying to start a business
um and you're probably going to be it's
going to be hard for you to ever make
money because everyone's going to think
you're an awful person no one's going to
start a business so you can have that
law that says free market but if the
culture is if the cultural norm is is
saying business is evil you might as
well not have free markets so with free
speech First Amendment isn't critical
right you need it but if if then if if
Free Speech will get you destroyed
socially and professionally you don't
have free speech you might as well not
have the First Amendment so liberal
rules and liberal norms and
um the kind of the thing that glues it
all together is the the trust in these
core liberal institutions like the
justice system
like the you know the the financial
system and like the political system and
and uh and that that trust that things
are fair and and when when and that's
why actual corruption when the media
actually becomes kind of corrupt when uh
you know when you know a president is
actually correct when you know that is
does so bad because it really Burns that
trust and then people start violating
the Norms because well they're violating
it whatever and so we kind of lose that
shared kind of commitment and without
the Norms then the house is going to
eventually crumble
okay so now we have a much better
understanding of how the house ends up
falling apart how do we stop it
before it's
stopped by a rebound born of just
unimaginable amounts of suffering
so I'm telling a story here which is the
pro House story the pro-liberalism story
and if you look at any polls or just
have conversations most Americans agree
with me on that most again left right
and Center most Americans are like
liberalism is good and the house is good
and that free speech is good and
whatever most Americans think this
and so
um
picture that's like a story and it is a
story about it's a story that says
liberalism is a good thing and that we
should defend it
and that story is this big powerful
story and there is a there's competing
stories like the woke story which says
liberalism is exploitative and bad and
oppressive and just a cheap disguise for
the same exact kind of Oppression that
is always occurred and that we need to
be liberated from it which is a term
that specifically means like it's
revolutionary we need to rev we need to
have eventually a revolution that
dissembles the Master's house and you
can't use the Master's tools to
dissemble the Master's house no free
speech you have to actually use
repression to
um right so so that's another story how
do people say that with a straight face
and by the way that's okay that's what's
cool about liberalism they say sure
bring it in you want to have a Marxist
uh write a Marxist book in our country
bring it well let's debate it right you
want to be your far right person bring
it into the conversation right let's
have all the ideas here liberalism is
Supple and big and open and it says
bring it all in and let the best ideas
win even criticism of itself the West is
critical of itself right which is very
it's unusual it's self-critical and
that's that's one of the things that
makes it amazing it also kind of puts it
in danger in a lot of ways but so
liberalism says sure this is the big
pro-liberal book The the story I'm
picturing like a big book and here's
these other competing books bring it in
let's all debate it out
now the liberalism book most people
agree with and I think it stands on much
Sounder ground I think history backs it
up I think I think looking at history
says this book has been better this
story has been correct uh has led to a
better world better good times than than
the kind of Us Versus Them Marxist ideas
right so I think it stands up to
scrutiny and most people in the U.S
believe it so it should have no problem
standing up and then with the stories
that is the most powerful that's what's
taught to kids that becomes that that
maintains the ethos right
what's happened in the last decade last
five years especially is because of
maybe it's because of social media maybe
it's because of some other complex
factors
so many of the people that believe the
big liberalism story
have become scared to say it out loud
because the the woke story or in a lot
of cases the Maga story if you're on the
right
and they try to be a republican
politician right now and say the most
basic Reagan phrase which is that the
election was fair and Biden is the
rightful president that's career suicide
and a lot of the parts of the right so
right now you've got these wrecking ball
movements that are there's always
wrecking ball which is always movements
that hate liberalism and think it's but
something's going on now that makes that
much more scary to defy them they
actually can punish
dissent a lot more than they normally
can again maybe it's because everyone's
scared of Twitter mobs who knows but
that's a little change that has made all
the people who believe this story go
silent what happens when everyone goes
silent and made so they still believe it
but it's in their heads that story loses
all of its power and now this other
story which should not be able to start
writing policy and entering companies
and changing the way companies worked it
to serve it and changing government
policies and changing curriculum and
educating and teaching little kids that
this story as opposed to saying it's one
of the stories which is totally fine
saying this is the correct thing and any
kid any kid or your parents they
disagree with that they're bad people
they're bigots right that's been a lot
they've been allowed to do that and
that's so dangerous so to me this is a
kind of a promising thing because it's
that if I thought that we needed a
revolution that we needed you know to be
liberated from this evil system I would
think well that's hard it's a tall order
I don't think that I think we have a
good house and most people like the
house and the house can stand up strong
if everyone just defends it
and they're just scared and the fear is
not that they're going to get murdered
no one is hanging lynching uh people who
say the wrong thing right now what
they're doing is they're trying to get
you fired they're they're criticizing
you they're shaming you that's a soft
cudgel it's not a hard cudgel so that's
kind of a house of cards a soft touch
everyone just stops being scared and
people start showing courage and then
everyone starts copying each other's
courage this whole thing these are
marginalized back to the sidelines where
they belong and they're marginalized to
the fringes until they can convince more
people because that's how you actually
make progress in Liberal democracies you
have to persuade these aren't good at
persuasion so they go back to the
fringes where they belong until they
come up with better arguments and
liberalism is fine
if we have a crisis of Courage right now
um and and that's the and again I think
that's a nice problem to have because it
means that we're so close it's all the
ideas are there that people know and
they just need to start saying what they
think and that can start to happen like
dominoes and people start doing it so
that's what I'm hoping for
I hope you're right uh I do worry that
Vladimir Lenin is correct give me one
generation of children and I will change
the world that's paraphrased was pretty
close
uh first thing Hitler did was get a hold
of the kids you can get oh god there was
one kid that like ratted out his dad and
his dad ended up being killed and they
had like statues on my shoes oh god
um that's terrifying to me and I do one
thing that I've been thinking more and
more is that every generation they get
to have the world they want
and if you
if you didn't grow up with the liberal
values if you weren't taught Civics
which is something I want to get back to
you like what exactly you want us to
teach kids when we're teaching them
Civics but if you weren't taught that
how much damage will one generation do
because they're gonna get the world that
they asked for good bad or indifferent
and at least for like you said the last
10 years there's really been an erosion
of two of the two pillars that we've
talked about so far anyway the uh trust
in the liberal democracy and then Free
Speech just to sort of round it
um so I do worry about that quite a bit
um what do we need to teach people that
would get them back on the not straight
and narrow but get them back to the
things that lead to the good life which
I will uh round to
being able to say what you think is true
being able to explore ideas so that you
can hold a nuanced opinion and then
having faith in in this system I think
the as I said
the liberal house
is our best ticket to Good Times
and our liberal house Stands Strong if
people believe in it and defend it and
understand how it works understand what
the alternative outside is and they
realize how important this is so
teaching how the government is
structured and so what I would want kids
to learn is so then and if the support
beams are based on common understanding
of the values and defending them I'd
want them to learn the value of those
support beams so free speech I'd want
kids to be taught that words the the old
phrase sticks and stones will hurt my
bones but words will never hurt me
because you know uh
have a thick skin towards words and uh
and and that if you disagree with
someone you can either walk away that's
a totally good option you can have a
debate but you don't
try to hurt them how are you going to
switch that because the what was it
um Jonathan height and what he wrote
about I think it was 2014 is the year
that he pegs just everything changed and
people went from believing in that to
wanting to be protected they want safe
space they're in a defense mode how do
we begin to unwind that well so that's a
specific ideology that has been and
teachers have been trained on that and
the ma programs they are ideological
factories and they they have been for a
while so these a lot of these teachers
going to schools they've been
indoctrinated they indoctrinate kids
into a specific again it's I don't mind
is it liberal I'm saying bring if you if
your teacher wants to teach Marxism to
kids bring it just say this is one point
of view and a lot of people disagree
with it then it's fine and by the way
here's what other people think and
here's what these people think and bring
this but then I have no problem but how
do we get back to that if people are
clamoring for safety okay well and they
believe that words are violence because
they believe that words are violence
because they're being taught that right
so they have to be
you think that's it oh of course you
don't think this has anything to do with
social media no I think the reason I
think that sticks and stones will break
my bones but words won't hurt me because
I was taught that that's a specific
thing it's not necessarily intuitive and
now I think that that woke ideology
doesn't believe that it believes words
are violence specifically it says that
words are violence and so and and it
even goes further silences violence
right so you actually have to you have
to not just not just not disagree with
our ideology because that's violent but
you have to actually be an outspoken
proponent of it because otherwise you're
being violent it's a huge manipulation
and it's the exact opposite of what you
would teach in a liberal democracy if
you wanted to uphold that democracy
um you brought up Hitler right and
um you brought up uh Lenin right the
Bolsheviks and you could say Mao as well
one of the in indoctrinating kids one of
the things that all of they had that
that the current movement that woke
movement does not have is the ability to
murder your parents if the parents are
saying the wrong thing or if the kid
speaks out in class they're going to get
sent to they right now they have
actually you know there's a soft cudgel
and a lot of kids I don't think believe
necessarily what they're being taught
they're being taught something different
at home I don't think it's as easy as
you you can't really do have it with
Purity indoctrinated generation today
it's much harder there's the internet
there's chat rooms right there's so I I
don't think I I I'm very concerned about
what kids are being taught I think it's
also just it's bad for the kids it's
really like sad I'm sad for kids that
are learning that if someone disagrees
with you they're being violent and that
the right way to handle this agreement
is to punish the person that is what
they're being taught that you go tell
the teacher you know you punish the
person eventually you go and tell social
media and you get them fired right that
translates right to that
um I think it's bad for bad for the kids
and of course there's all these you know
Rising anxiety and depression and all of
this so you can you know this
correlation causation there but I don't
think that any of this is good for kids
but I also think it's awful for this
Society but I don't think they have the
hard cudgel and I feel like they're
again I feel some optimism here because
a lot of people see the optimism in the
data well what I see is for example I'm
talking about this right now if I were
in uh Nazi Germany I'm going straight to
the gulag when I walk out of here
because I'm sitting there and
criticizing the the capital P party
right and so now you're going to really
indoctrinate kids because No One's Gonna
there are so many people saying what I'm
saying on the internet right now there
is a very strong movement to against
this right now parents are are learning
about this and
um and it's it's not easy to actually
indoctrinate it's it's not into
indoctrinated liberal democracy it's
hard that's why liberal democracy is
cool because it is
um there's some robustness there it's
it's it's hard to really you can get
it's vulnerable to mobs and things like
that as we just saw because you don't
have a dictatorship that can say we
don't we have free speech it is
vulnerable but it it bends but it
doesn't break very easily bends easily
but it doesn't break right which is the
Red Scare it bent right all of our
values are going out the window we
weren't acting like Americans all these
liberal values the house was but the
house stood so it's not that I again I'm
the person who just said we shouldn't
get cocky the house can fall down but I
don't feel hopeless I feel like what
needs to happen is people saying what
they think so when it comes to like kids
and curriculum
um yeah I think there are a lot of
there's a lot more awareness right now
about this issue in K-12 schools that
wasn't there three years ago even right
this is new social media you could say
is a big problem that's everyone knows
that now everyone talks about how social
media is making us tribal and bad and
unhappy and depressed ten years ago
everyone thought social media was great
that's when you're really vulnerable to
it so I just see a lot of progress I see
the country's wisdom starting to come
along and it looks to me a little if I
could zoom out if I could predict I
would say that we look back on this time
as like we look back on the Wild West
and that it was kind of the social media
sprung up there was like mob rule it was
kind of chaotic you know this the you
know radical ideology kind of like you
know started changing curriculum in
schools and getting people fired and
this this you know reactionary movement
you know was denying the election it was
kind of nuts and that because we didn't
we didn't have the
we didn't we got you know the the
Primitive mind won round one
um because I didn't in the chaos and
then wisdom started to Prevail we
created better systems we created new
kinds of social etiquette and um and
wisdom started to come to Prevail and
people started to speak out just like
after the Red Scare at some point it
would have been terrifying to say I
think Communists should get to live here
and be free and have the same rights we
do and they should be able to speak
about why communism is great and that's
what a good American I can say that now
I would have been terrified to say that
in 1951 or whatever so we come out of
these periods too
um and so I I don't know I feel very
frustrated but I also feel like there's
a good route towards a better way
all right talk to me about power games
versus liberal games because this feels
like I love your optimism that
ultimately liberal games will work but
uh like I was saying earlier none of
this made sense to me and so I tell I
started reading uh Nietzsche and the
whole idea of Will To Power
um will to power being this sort of
innate thing where you want to have
control of your own life but also being
this strong drive to want to just be in
control and when you look at the some of
the current battling it feels like that
it feels like Will To Power sort of
taking over on both sides
um
how what what is the power game versus
liberal game then we'll talk about how
to break the trend well I mean the
easiest way to understand what the power
games is just look at the animal world
watch what David Attenborough
documentary and they get eaten I just
literally today watched uh Komodo dragon
which gets [ __ ] big can't believe
they're real like it's crazy oh my God
uh and it ate something the size of a
deer I don't know if it's a deer gazelle
whatever it just ate it whole yeah it
just ran up it's a diamond wrapped it
yeah literally and swallowed that thing
hole it was the creepiest thing I've
ever seen in my life so yeah so let's
talk about that so the Komodo dragon ate
the gazelle yep was that fair
well I don't know and and who determined
because the gazelle had one eye plan I
want to keep my body for myself and and
keep living and the Komodo dragon had a
different plan which said I want to use
your body for energy I want to eat it
right and and they both and it's fair
they both are allowed to want that so
was there a judge that said the Komodo
dragon gets eaten no the if the the
gazelle is fast enough then the gazelle
has the power the Komodo dragon
doesn't have the power to so we can't
in this case the gazelle wasn't fast
enough the Komodo dragon was fast enough
so it had the power to do what it wanted
in other words the rule in the animal
world is everyone can do whatever they
want if they have the power to do so
there is no other rule there's no right
or wrong there's no one to make sure
it's all okay if someone has the power
to do with this they do it and otherwise
you can't
and now think about a bunch of people on
an island just drop them there right and
before you know they might create some
little egalitarian thing and then
someone starts being really scary and
beating someone to death who doesn't do
what they want and started saying
everyone has to pay me taxes and they're
acting like a Mafia Boss and before you
know it they're a big bully and then
five people gang up together and they
together can take down that big bullying
out there and charge and before you know
it the biggest bully is the dictator of
the island and that is the power games
that is
that that you know was Saddam running
things the way he was running because it
was fair because it was right he was
doing because he had the power to do so
because people were scared of him and so
he created this story of his own
ruthlessness and people were scared of
it and so people would like to topple
him but they didn't have the power to do
so so he got to make the rules and do
what he wanted regardless of what's fair
regardless of who's suffering and who's
not and whether there's equality or
whatever that is so much of human
history too if you just it boils down to
the gazelle and the Komodo dragon it is
uh the the raw power games are going on
and the real rule here in this
dictatorship or Kingdom or salt in it or
the warlord territory is
everyone can do what they want if they
got the power to do so and the dictator
and their little Consortium has the
power to do what they want so they do
and other people don't say they can't
you can reboot your life your health
even your career anything you want all
you need is discipline I can teach you
the tactics that I learned while growing
a billion dollar business that will
allow you to see your goals through
whether you want better health stronger
relationships a more successful career
any of that is possible with the mindset
and business programs in Impact Theory
University join the thousands of
students who have already accomplished
amazing things tap now for a free trial
and get started today
we are animals just like we we are just
like the animals in David Attenborough
doc the only difference is in some rare
cases in modern times and maybe in
little examples throughout other times
there are times there are little moments
in history we're like wow they really
kind of had a egalitarian or like a fair
thing and then it gets toppled by the
Mongols or by the you know whoever and
there it goes because um or or some coup
and the King's son takes over and all
those rules go out the window so you
have these little moments maybe of
things seem kind of fair maybe there's
some logic to this it's not just the
power games and then they then they get
conquered by them stomped on by the
power games and so the power games
continues to Prevail and it's the it
really is the rule and everything else
is an exception until you've got these
liberal democracies which starts which
are basically designed to say
we can we need to come up with a way not
just that's fair and that's that's
better than the power gains but
something that's resistant to the power
games inevitably people inside and
outside the country are going to try to
take over and impose the power games and
there has to be this this resistance to
that and so that's what again I talked
about the liberal house that to me is a
house where the power games are on the
outside what's the key to that that uh
is it the ability to create a stalemate
is it uh just we force ideas to battle
what what is it that gives it that
resilience
hey so first of all it's a very well set
well thought out set of rules I mean
these are geniuses who are not just
coming up with them talking about the
founding fathers founding fathers not
only are they really very unpopular
these days well I think that people
should try living in a place that's run
like the power games and maybe they'll
come back here and say they they didn't
do something so bad but anyway
um and of course they were flawed but
what they did was they did two things
they
they were historians they knew history
really well right they they knew
everything they they knew everything you
know from Greek philosophy to how the
Romans functioned to how great
dictatorships functioned and then they
of course understood the you know the
English Monarchy and Parliament system
really well so they had all of this and
they had all this Enlightenment
philosophy that they were all Scholars
on uh they also were all they all went
to law school they really understood
like you know legal Theory and
everything like that and then they
collaborated together and they did
something amazing which is they built a
really really complex and well thought
out set of
rules
um it's I don't even understand them I
mean I don't think most Americans it's
really complicated try to understand
like tort law I mean it's really hard
but they but it was it was so brilliant
about it is
um it was it was not just the set of
rules but it was rules it was it had a
humility which is that some of these are
going to be wrong or times are going to
change so they actually they could you
could do you could do amendments uh the
Court justice system would actually
develop and evolve through precedent
over time
and
um and and the president could come in
and impose a new bill and and and and
and sign something new into law and you
know you they didn't anticipate the need
for you know trust busting and you know
you know uh but you know breaking up of
monopolies you know because then that
became an issue later and so they you
know whatever and so there continues to
be you know new changes and then uh the
system is able to
um argue and fight about it and end up
coming to uh you know new rules that
continue so it's just rules of built
upon rules and it's far from perfect
right it's it's it has all kinds of
problems there have been a lot of flaws
and you know
but it um it's this kind of
it's almost like this living system of
rules now that's again that's half of it
the other half is that America has like
a real American religion we believe you
know what all men are created equal and
equality of opportunity and you know
life liberty and the pursuit of
happiness and free speech and that you
know you'll have
um
you know you know Americans really have
this religion of freedom from the
government and and you know and
um and and Justice and fairness and
whatever again a lot of Americans
haven't always followed that but there
is this really ethos and together it is
the really really well thought set of
living laws and that enduring ethos that
is without that ethos who's gonna uphold
the law I mean if you if no one believes
in it it all goes to hell so it's this
belief in it this this reverence for
those set of laws that together is
robust and it can stand up to a lot I
mean there's a great quote from I forget
who some Republican strategist in the
early 50s and he was basically saying
um he he was saying that you know
Americans are acting who are so scared
of Communism they're acting like the
very people that they're so scared of
they're they're they're not you know we
are not acting like Americans you know
that means something again Reagan and
Hillary Clinton uh completely opposed
ideologically say the same thing about
the peaceful transition and power so
there's this American religion which is
very powerful uh and so that to me is
the liberal games the liberal games is
composed of these laws and this ethos
and and this belief in those laws that
together has at least for a couple
hundred years
pretty much fended off the power games
like there's you know I always think you
know we we give terrorists a fair trial
someone can come to the US from outside
the U.S and kill a hundred people and
they will get a defense attorney
and they will get into a jail cell and
they will get a defense attorney and
they'll get a fair trial that is so
civilized I mean sometimes I'm just like
damn that is so you know like
um
it's it's not the power games here and
you know again it's the power games are
always lurking under the surface right
and so you could say oh there's you know
crony capitalism and there's there's you
know there's institutional racism and
there's there there's these you know
these things that are actually the power
games in Disguise and that's true but it
had power games can't fully take over
the liberal games is really powerful and
really strong and I think people who
live here they don't realize how much
suffering they're not experiencing that
so many of the people in the past
experience an uncertainty and fear of
invasion and fear of you know
dictatorship and fear of a coup that you
just don't have to wake up and be scared
of that you can go live your life and
that is and you also go to the grocery
store and it's full of because it's
liberal games also has been incredible
for you know for prosperity and for
resources so
um I'm a big liberal games fan and and
someone might say well you think
liberalism is perfect and I say no I bet
in 300 years if I went into a time
machine I bet they come up with
something even better it's just at this
moment it's the best thing that we've
done as far as I've seen you know I'd
like someone to tell me that actually
this system which was very anti-liberal
has been better and for just as many
centuries and show it to me like someone
pointed out I'll listen
um that's interesting the time Horizon
being one of the key elements of it
because and maybe I'm painting the
liberal picture inaccurately but it
feels to me like there isn't ever going
to be anything better than what I call
the physics of progress which is
essentially the scientific method
recontextualized for other elements of
life
um this is me trying to teach
entrepreneurs how to build a company
knowing that if you want to be a
successful entrepreneur the thing you
have to get right is you have to be able
to solve novel problems so not only
problems that you haven't seen before
but problems nobody's ever seen before
and so it takes a method of approach so
I write this whole thing down how do I
do this how have I run my companies and
uh I end up writing out like these five
or six points and I pitch it to my team
here and I'm like here's what it is one
of the guys goes oh that's the
scientific method and I was like is it
really like I unfortunately did not pay
attention in high school uh and so I
went and yes it in fact it is I mean
it's a slight different set of words
words but exactly the same idea and it
is basically going back to my definition
of truth that you're a prediction engine
uh if you're in science or otherwise
what you're doing is saying uh I have
this hypothesis which is just a guess I
have a guess that if I do this thing it
will yield this outcome and in business
you're doing it in a motivated way so
it's like hey I'm trying to get to this
outcome and there's an obstacle between
where I'm at and where I want to get and
I have a hypothesis about what I need to
do to overcome that obstacle to get
where I want to go then you're going to
do it and now this is where going back
to this idea of your ego if your egos
around learning this will work well if
it's around being right you're going to
be in real trouble but you run that
experiment with a metric in mind that
this metric is Success so if you're the
Democratic party or the Republican party
it's like hey we're going to run this
campaign and successes we get elected
um ethically maybe the right word and so
you try it and if you get elected it was
the right thing and if you don't it
wasn't and if it wasn't then you need to
look with humility that okay what did I
do wrong what could I do better the next
time and then you go reformulate your
thing that works in business Works in
science Works anywhere only thing that's
different in science is you don't want
motivated thinking you shouldn't be
trying to get to a specific place other
than I guess you could say understanding
we want to understand better what is
true
um and so that becomes I think a really
important thing that if people can begin
to function from that perspective of
okay I'm trying to predict the outcome
of my behaviors I need to look nakedly
at the reality of whether this worked or
not and if it doesn't I'm going to
adjust my behaviors and keep going
um
that becomes a very tricky thing if
people have motivated reasoning which
you talk about in the book I forget you
used a really clever phrase
you're using well motivated yes the
reasoning equivalent of drunk driving
yes very well said yeah very well said
so yeah I don't see a way around that
that feels like you said there might be
something better than liberalism if that
is liberalism
um I'll be very surprised if there is
something better the sort of fine-tuning
of the mechanics of how government works
sure I'm sure that can be I mean the
other the underlying Concepts that
individuals should have dignity and like
live you know with equal under the law I
mean it's gonna I it's hard for me to
imagine a better City so the underlying
philosophy there you know just general
human rights equality of opportunity I
mean it's hard to see that improving
upon that now the actual methods to get
there and all the different systems and
laws and you know the way we try to
think how complicated a quality of
opportunity is we don't just say okay
everyone can apply for a job well some
people's parents were oppressed by other
people's you know it's like it's
complicated so you have to have you know
this and then and then what if someone's
born dirt poor and they don't have it's
not actually equal opportunity okay so
let's do these social systems not too
much because now you're infringing upon
freedom and you're you're so it's it's
very very you know nuanced and complex
attempt to to this is really interesting
so now you get into
um something that really does sound
better like if you just came to me out
of the blue and said hey right now we're
doing equal opportunity but we want to
do equal outcome I'd be like oh word
like that sounds a lot better so that
would be something where I would say I
get why people get behind that from
where I'm sitting that seems destined to
fail though once you stop and think
about it based on human nature
um do you agree with that or do you
think that no there really is
we really ought that's probably the
right word to use we really ought to
strive for equal outcome well it's a
hard one because
um
you you know if it depends how deep you
go you can say if two people are able to
you know freely no matter who they were
born as try to become a billionaire
um then there's equal opportunity
someone else could say well if someone's
born with a lot more uh that you know a
lot more money in their family in
connection someone else is Born Into
poverty and you know single doesn't
track well what yeah that doesn't track
well right being being born rich is does
not true whatever it is if they're born
you know
um uh
that's not true right if yeah it is true
you're saying people that are born into
abject poverty do just as well as people
that are born and definitely not but
being being born rich doesn't Okay it
like doesn't track at all so the reason
I interrupted you yeah is because I
think that there is a there's only
is it the only thing there's almost only
one thing that there's two things that
matter there we go that breaks my
hesitation there are two things that
matter
one is IQ it matters so much and then
the other is basically the ZIP code
you're born into which I God this is
going to be controversial but I really
believe this having seen it up close
it's mindset and IQ those are the only
two things that matter okay but
people who are born you know into a
two-parent family
[Music]
um are so much less likely to end up in
jail in you know in poverty I think
that's mindset I'm very open beat me to
death show me how I'm wrong no I mean
you might be right I actually I don't I
don't know that much about this I would
say that there are so okay so here's the
thing you could say
um you know different zip codes
different whatever you know there is
something to wealth in terms of just the
aggregate of a bunch of people born to
people who are upper middle class versus
people who are in the bottom 10 I mean
you're just going to see a lot less
crime a lot more whatever you might say
that's mindset in IQ maybe I don't know
but the point is not IQ unfortunately
mindset yes but so if you really want
equal opportunity
[Music]
um then like you could argue that true
equal opportunity would say well then if
someone is born with two to a different
IQ right or different temperament or
whatever then they're not actually on
equal footing and that's 100 therefore
any single this you know disparate
outcome well you can trace it to
something you can trace it to their
internal motivation maybe someone's just
more ambitious and cares more about
success and other people you know okay
well they were that's not equal then
they were born with this magical you
know tool called ambition whatever so
you could do this all the way to the
Bottom now I don't think that's very
wise because interesting why not well
first of all I think that it's an
inherent for infringement on freedom to
say well person a is less ambitious than
person B so we should make sure they
have equal I think person B wants to be
ambitious and work hard to get rich and
person a wants to hang around and hang
out with their family and and be
satisfied to be lower middle class I
don't see why it's a better situation to
force them to have the same
um I like the idea of freedom and I
think that people should there's you
know we really you know there's these
studies with little kids and one kid
does three times the work of the other
kid and then they're both given the same
reward and they actually the kids think
that's unfair it goes deep into our like
wiring to think that you should get you
know proportional rewards to your effort
and to your contribution or whatever so
I think people should be free to pursue
you know what what they what they want
and the point so
you on one extreme you say if if there
isn't some actual thing where jobs
aren't accepting people from this
background or whatever because that's
actually not equal then therefore it's
equal opportunity enough and what will
happen will happen and then the other
extreme is saying
inherently anything that's different you
could trace to some thing that was
different about them maybe it's
literally their brain itself but that's
not fair because they didn't choose to
be born as a as this person and so then
you should have basically true equal
opportunity it means equal outcomes
um and I would say I'm two-thirds three
quarters of the way to the first extreme
which is that I think that you should
mostly have equal opportunity and it's
not and that is inherently going to be
unfair sometimes and it's going to yield
inequality and it's going to sometimes
yield unfair Advantage
um and but you should do some stuff to
mitigate that you know you should have
some forms of social safety net and you
should have scholarships and programs
that try to give ambitious smart people
of you know disadvantaged backgrounds a
better you know springboard to I think
that you should have some of that but
just enough that you know you're doing
something but not so much that you're
starting to infringe upon Freedom so I
think there's a fairness there's two
factors here there's what is the right
thing to do what is fair
and to me I think that almost equal
opportunity with some
you know some adjustments
is still unfair but these are all unfair
and to me that is the best balance that
makes the the most Fair situation even
though again it's just not always it's
not one situation that's at you you
force equal outcome that's just not fair
to the person who works harder than the
other
but then there's also what's practical
and so equal up equal outcomes we've
tried it it turns into abject poverty
and brutal to equal outcomes right it
turns into uh the the the rulers making
the rules have billions and everyone
else is in poverty and there's you know
everyone's hungry why do you think that
is I I think it's is it I mean again I'm
not a scholar on why communism doesn't
work but it seems partially because
human nature I think
okay if you have 10 factories and uh in
there and they're in a free market
they're all incentivized to try to
out-compete the other factories and work
really hard
um and and uh and and if one of the
factories is producing half of the total
yield of the ten factories
um they would get a lot more and if you
change that system you say does it
matter how much you're all producing
you're all going to end up with one
tenth of the total yield it's obviously
an uh disincentive for the productive
Factor how did the production factory
get productive in the free market it it
it it it thought really hard about
strategy it worked extra hard worked
those extra hours it innovated all those
extra things super hard work Innovative
you know just the human Spirit of like
how can we you know be creative here
it's going to melt away not some people
will still have it but most people are
going to I mean I'm I I don't think I'd
be nearly as ambitious if I knew I was
going to have the same outcomes not just
in money but in anything just if I knew
that it might what I did didn't have any
outcome on on my life
I'm not that I I'm kind of a lazy dude I
don't think I would do very much I think
anybody would right and so it's obvious
and this is this is kind of like human
101 that like this is not a good
situation for for prosperity and
inherently the other thing is that it
requires totalitarian government to keep
everyone equal you have to shove humans
are so inherently unequal in so many
ways that to make them all equal you
have to really apply a pretty oppressive
force and so what you end up with is the
power game so you have you know a brutal
dictator uh who and you have rebellions
that want to happen and they have to put
down the rebellions and you end up with
the bill the leaders have everything and
you have the most inequality it's just
now there's a vast underclass so now I
think lots of Communists would say
the what they do say is that that's not
real communism that's a dictatorship
That was supposed to be communism just
like you would say wokeness isn't real
social justice that's not real communism
okay sure
but there's been a hundred experiments
or so and they've really they've all
pretty much turned into abject poverty
so
it's just this is not like I'm just
basically basing this on
history
going full to the end of forcing equal
outcome even if in some arguments you
might say that is the fairest way okay
that's one philosophical position I
don't necessarily think that's true
but regardless of the fairness argument
there it just is deeply impractical so
you can't not think about practicality
and so to me the U.S is it trying to I
think that and again just right here you
have the Republicans Democrats disagree
on where they should be on that Spectrum
so I don't know where I should where I
want to be exactly I don't know but I
would say I'm three quarters of the way
to the pure equal opportunity free
markets and one quarter of the way to
the forced equal outcome and that to me
is somewhere in there seems to me and I
admit that I might be wrong about any of
that seems like the best balance of
fairness and and productivity
so interesting so yeah the whole
communist thing I don't understand this
feels like one that people can eliminate
at the thought experiment place to what
you already said which is no one is
going to work hard and be ambitious if
they're going to be rewarded in exactly
the same way across the Spectrum did you
read the book uh the red famine no oh if
you want to terrify yourself read the
red famine it's so I like to read books
as I'm falling asleep I couldn't do that
one while falling asleep because in the
book there is a point at which so this
is what happened to the Ukraine in like
the 1920s
um and about the time the woman ate her
seven-year-old I was like I'm out I have
to read this while I'm awake I can't I
can't do as I'm drifting off sleeps
[ __ ] nightmarish and uh that's what
happens when you go okay everybody
um to each according their need based on
your ability fact I can't remember the
exact phrase hopefully people know it
um the whole Mantra of Communism and so
they went and they were like oh the
kulaks are outperforming other people
they must be evil
they're stealing they're taking
advantage of people so they killed them
and in doing so they then left nobody
knew how to farm so you have the worst
Farmers trying to feed the country
everybody's basically starving to death
the government's taking everything from
them and so the hard reality and plea I
hate this I hate that this is true but
we have different abilities we have
different levels of intellect and and I
do not think this breaks along racial
socio-economic it's just humans in the
same family have different intellects
and abilities and all that and so just
look at athleticism facts why would this
be different right it's just right so so
that one is just you you are going to
put yourself in a really dark position
when you do that uh so I I
I will often speak on people always say
just don't talk about things some that
you don't know and you'll be fine
forever I like to talk about things as a
way of saying this is how I would think
through a problem that is a novel going
back to my whole thing about
entrepreneurs you have to be able to
think through a novel problem so I
obviously do not know what the answer to
any of this is it is all insanely
complicated and I come to this truly
with humility I come to this assuming
I'm wrong at all times I just want
someone to show me how I'm wrong but I
do need a hypothesis which is just a
guess but I need a hypothesis in order
to effectuate action so here is my
hypothesis
you're never going to get equal outcome
without ju the the most Sinister Hammer
to beat down the people that rise up
because getting the people that are
underperforming to rise is brutally
difficult it's just way way too hard
it's so people are always going to
default to beating the people that are
succeeding down
but if you want to get close to equal
opportunity it is
when you take practicality into it it's
education is the only question and
you've got to
just have the world's most
unbelievably Effective Education System
which will take iteration and trial and
error and all that stuff but if you
don't do that if you don't say hey as a
nation we're just going to educate the
life out of our populace you're always
going to be in bad shape
yeah I mean you educate what you're
doing is you're taking the Raw
um talents
and you're actually like Bridging the
Gap between raw talent and productivity
right because there is a big gap there
if someone's born in the woods
if Einstein is raised in the Woods by a
pack of wolves he won't even be able to
invent the bow and arrow because it
doesn't matter how smart he is
um there's this giant knowledge tower
that Humanity has contributed to over
you know thousands of years and built
that he was born on top of just like
we're all born on top of it and with all
of that he then figured out general
relativity
and so
um think about how much more Einstein
could do for the world because he was
educated and so of course it's just
that's the extreme example but like
every kid has some talent and some
ability and when you're educating them
all you're just you're just maximizing
the potential there
um
and you're getting closer to something
that is more fair that is more you know
you are that is a way to level the
playing field a little bit
um but there is an ethos in the U.S
right now that is not that different
than this that if there is inequality it
is instead of saying instead of the
nuanced position which is that there is
some unfairness that created the
inequality and that maintains it and
there's also some fairness actually that
would lead to you know inequality you
have a you have a million people that
are all different different abilities
different ambition levels different
energy different values
uh and you're gonna have inequality if
if everything is as Fair as possible
you're still going to have inequality so
um instead of the Nuance thing which is
saying we have to look at inequality
um whether it's not you know in unequal
representation or whether it's in in
wealth inequality and we have to try to
suss out what
ingredients that went into this are
Injustice are and which ingredients in
here are not Injustice because there's
both
instead the ethos is Injustice
inequality equals Injustice period
and
um that to me is not an it's it's an
ethos that it does not yield
productivity or or fairness in in the
end and I think it's a very
disempowering
[Music]
um
it's a very disempowering thing to teach
kids that this country because there's
inequality is inherently oppressive and
I think it just just demotivating so how
do you deal with
uh the country having an imperfect past
being founded by people that owned
slaves at least some of them
um how do you do that is it a separate
the message from the messenger is it
contextualizing them
yeah well first of all you have to
contextualize everyone I mean 96 of
Americans in 1958 vote has said that
interracial marriage was immoral
today someone who says interracial
marriages immoral is probably a pretty
bigoted person
so is everyone back then and someone
that you wouldn't really want to be
friends with or that you wouldn't admire
if I went back to 1958 would I would is
everyone just that kind of person no
it's that these are not people the worst
and the no worse than we are they just
live in a different time right so it's
not excusing it just like it's not
excusing the fact that people own slaves
especially given that some of them
didn't like John Adams and was saying
this is bad and this is evil and this a
lot of the founders who own slaves
grappled with I mean they knew this was
bad but the point is yes I think of
course it should be in context but but
your your other point is that like the
point is that for example
black Americans are one generation away
from Jim Crow
uh they're five generations Away From
Slavery you know maybe they're two from
Jim Crow and five From Slavery and one
from a bunch of like you know housing
policies and genuine illiberal you know
examples of the house not being what
it's supposed to be
um and so obviously uh that is going to
um have a long-term effect given how
much you know these things compound over
time and so uh as I said I'm three
quarters of the way to the Equal
Opportunity thing I think oh let's take
that into account uh and let's do
something about it but not go so
overboard that you end up hurting
everybody which is I think a lot of the
policy suggestions are go so overboard
with that that they actually hurt
everyone
um and it becomes unfair and it's not
good for I don't think it's good for any
parties at that point
any answer to me that doesn't include
just an absolute
um Perfection of the education system is
destined to fail that's a tough one
though because
um
what do you educate kids on you know you
know Seth Goddard alphabetical order or
order of importance well uh
the point is that a lot of people
disagree on what I mean it's like you
and I probably don't agree on everything
and 100 no but you and I I guarantee
after this conversation we would both
say okay here's my stance you say here's
your stance and then we'd go but we're
gonna predict an outcome yeah and that
we want a very desired outcome and if
what we're doing isn't getting that
outcome then we know we need to change
and we'll go into what I call the
physics of progress and we'll keep
refining refining and refining no we're
never going to get it right on the first
swag but I'm just saying there there is
a system that you can set up this goes
back to the idea of liberal values and
and I do not know liberal values in that
way well enough like I am so coming at
all of this as like an entrepreneur
who's just seeing everything from the
outside now and coming in so I could be
using these words wrong but like when I
think about
liberal values I think about the
scientific method I think about
Enlightenment values I think about oh I
think doing this will yield this result
but if it doesn't then I'm going to go I
was wrong and I need to update my model
of the world and my thinking and I need
to tweak and change until I can
accurately predict the outcome of my
behaviors so I really want to believe
and strike me down if I'm incorrect that
if you and I were building the education
system we'd be like okay we're going to
take our best guess it's going to be a
little wacky in the beginning and then
we're just going to refine refine or
find and we're going to try to put
things in place much like the founding
of the US where it's like hey wildly
imperfect system wildly imperfect people
that have put this in place so we want a
system that will self-correct self-heal
et cetera Etc so that over time it just
gets better and better and better
true yes I think you talk about with
entrepreneurship you have a metric which
helps you have something to measure you
know here you can do test scores but
then you have teachers teaching to the
test right you could you could say it's
in in wealth but maybe you have mass
depression you know so it is also you
have to figure out it's it's a tough one
because sometimes you're not going to
see the results for 20 years so it's
also not a quick experiment of
unfortunately far longer than 20 years
I'm sure right and so you're not going
to see the results for a while and it's
also you have to also argue about what
the metrics even are that you're going
for
um are you trying to you know you know
it's it's and then there's also the
weird there's a lot of facts that you
know there's
uh a lot of education does not happen in
schools as evidenced by the fact that so
much so many experiments when they pour
money into schools it doesn't change
anything about the test scores or the
outcomes and what changes that is how
many books the parents have in the house
that's a metric that tends to track with
success and with crime and stuff better
than
how much money was poured into their
public school so it's also really
complicated where education even happens
but yeah but that's exactly why what
you're saying are you saying the problem
is unsolvable no that's what I'm saying
that's why I agree with you actually is
that you can't have just ideological
approach to this you have to say okay
yeah there's a lot of places education
happens there's a lot of potential
things that we would want to educate
kids on and there's a lot of ways we can
measure success and disagree on that
so I think that's the one thing we'd
have to realize yes because if you if
you can agree on what we're trying to do
now there's some obvious ones obviously
you want not fewer people in jail right
that's a big one
um you know uh so crime is just at the
at the you know that's that's that we
can all agree on that and then I think
you could say uh you know crime and
poverty right so you want the most the
highest percentage of kids emerging from
or you know not falling into poverty
later in life
I'm gonna give you the highest level
thing what I think the highest level
thing is going to be human flourishing
we won't agree on what that means but at
least if we can steer towards okay human
flourishing is our AIM now maybe this
scores versus like you know are you
measuring people's happiness and if you
get crazy here and I'm gonna say we're
gonna take blood levels
because I'm gonna get real weird on
everybody so I don't want uh subjective
measurement of happiness I want an
objective measurement of like stress
markers so looking at stress markers
looking at
um longevity I guess you do want some
subjective measurements of like
happiness tell me you know are you
living the life that you want
um so that you can get some adjustments
you want to look at what are markers of
um
access to nutrition uh access to jobs
you you certainly can't say that
somebody is going to do well in that job
or not because of all the things we
talked about earlier but are you able to
access the information
um so that I know you at least have a
shot I don't know if it's a test or
whatever but that you have a shot to
learn the thing that allows you to pass
the test that allows you to gain access
to
um the knowledge that you would then
need to apply for a job in your given
thing look it this I don't know the
answers I want to be very clear this is
just me trying to see where the edges of
how I think through the problem I think
it would be maybe is also it's like you
might want to measure you help kids
understand all the options out there and
get to know themselves well enough to
figure out what they want in life so
that's half and then how
what percentage of kids are getting what
they want in life after they figure it
out so it's it's are they are they
learning about all the options and
learning about themselves so that they
actually develop
goals wisely in a way that actually is
like useful and then are how all the
achieving so it's like two of things
maybe I don't know I don't know it's
hard to say complex I am I am Way Beyond
I'm very happy that's not my problem to
do this because it just said it's the
most daunting issue because you know and
it's also like yeah maybe you had uh you
know billions of dollars and and a
thousand test kids okay now we could
really but that's not what you have you
have these underfunded school districts
and you have
kids coming with behavioral problems and
it's just like it's it's just also such
a hard problem because it's like trying
to run a business but you're underfunded
and you're half of your buildings on
Fires you're trying to so it's really
difficult yeah and I think in the
beginning so I'll take us off this topic
in a second because I I clearly do not
have deep wisdom here that I'm sharing
but uh I do think that you also have to
look at things like GDP how are we
performing at Large
okay maybe that goes against maybe maybe
a bunch of people that are trained on an
ideology where success and wealth is the
most important thing maybe that's going
to yield a good GDP but you're those
stress markers and the blood are going
to go the exact wrong direction so you
also yeah this is why you want people to
be able to choose and I think that's
going to be one of the fundamental
drivers so you have people like me that
want to just work and work and work and
work and work because I love what I do
and I derive meaning and purpose through
that and I just love it I I have been
ambitious since I was a little kid I
sure to some extent I was born with it
something about the family I don't know
but I was an outlier in my family
everybody thought I was crazy I've been
saying I'm going to get rich from the
time that I was like 11 or 12. my entire
family used to make fun of me but there
is not uh it's not a coincidence that
the one person in the family that was
just obsessed and was like I'm gonna get
rich I'm Gonna Get Rich ended up getting
this is why equal outcome is not fair I
mean forget all the controversial things
about you can say about natural ability
or about you know nepotism and um and
and starting Place forget those just
right there
you're more ambitious than your siblings
with the same upbringing probably pretty
similar natural you know innate
abilities and as a kid anyone would have
told you that my sister was smarter than
me sure and maybe she is and the fact is
um I don't think your sister would say
it's so unfair that he has more money
than that she would say well yeah he's
nuts
right yeah exactly and so it's it's it's
uh it's just an equal outcome you
probably would have given less to the
world
and yeah so anyway we're going to get
back onto that but it's just a perfect
example very interesting okay so while
we're on the topic of equal outcome
equal opportunity uh and I know that you
look into the future in fact I think
you're writing a book about the future
it involves the future
uh uh would you how do you feel about
people manipulating the IQ of their
offspring
um I with caution and I think just like
anything you know think about new
technology that is developed well what
do we do we we start to understand it we
argue about it we have political fights
about it we um we get wiser new kids are
born with with fresher eyes on it and we
see a bunch of bad mistakes that are
made and we learn from them and over
time we develop wise policies so with
all of the usual you know friction
I'm all for it because
uh first I wasn't expecting that answer
oh yeah because first of all
um like you said IQ it matters I mean
it's a predictor of of you know crime
and
success and mental health and happiness
and all these other things it I'm not
sure about happiness but it is predictor
of all these things that are important
in life so more of it I would say is
probably on the aggregate good I think
we can be better at solving problems I
think people can be better at getting
what they want from life and and Living
Rich lives if they have a higher IQ and
I think that they I think on the
aggregate I think we can solve more
problems and be wiser
um
together
um and
um and and and
um
the other bigger Point here is that
it's not like we're living this these
like perfect life without manipulating
anything in harmony with nature right
now and we're suddenly going to be doing
this unnatural thing playing God with
our kids brains
every piece of fruit you eat has been
invented by us your dog was invented by
people inside inside doesn't exist we
invented the concept of being inside we
invented these homes clothes none of
this is natural the the nutrition the
supplements you take
um the people get Pacemakers in their
heart you go get surgery you get an
organ transplant right we are already
completely weird transhumanist I can
talk to you from across the world with
this rectangle in my hand like that's a
cyborg ability that we have just because
it happens to be in my hand and not in
my brain who cares so so we are already
on this train and his overwhelmingly on
the aggregate made things better over
time I mean some people might argue that
the hunter-gatherers were actually way
happier maybe but I don't want to go be
a hunter either so as someone who much
prefers to be here
um with a long life span and general
kind of freedom and safety and nutrition
and options and
um I uh and I owe those things to all
the weird things you know beavers build
dams would you say beavers are playing
God with the river no it's like that's
what they do we happen to be Mega
beavers and we build all kinds of weird
they manipulate a river we manipulate
everything right and so of course you
can go too far you climate change right
you can obviously like uh you can you
this ability can get us into trouble
that's why you want to be wise and sure
I'm sure the IQ manipulation of kids
genetic engineering obviously that can
go in really unwise awful directions and
there will be some horrible tragedies
but just like cars come around
million people maybe two million die
every year in car accidents right I
don't think many of us want to go back
to horses so there will be tragedies it
will come along with real downsides but
the I think it'll be a giant net
positive
um over the long run or even you don't
have to say that that's strong I'm not
sure it'll be in that positive but
either way it's what we do that's we do
we build all kinds of dams and this is
going to be the latest and so we're not
going to stop it we're not going to stop
human Humanity from innovating so the
best we can do is say okay what have you
learned from the giant technological
Paradigm shifts of the past let's try to
be as wise as possible about this crazy
thing that's going to happen and the
best thing we can do for this and all
future crazy debates that we're gonna
have to have
about these new things that are
happening and how to handle them is
scientific method stuff can we
experiment can we argue can we have
nuanced debates can we come up with
wiser Solutions if if the genetic
engineering theme comes abortion and you
have the pro this side and the pro this
side
uh forget it now the whole thing's just
a religious war and no one's thinking
and it's just that if you if and if
someone on this side disagrees with
their side they're going to be
ostracized and so he could get there and
that's what part of what concerns me
about our current political environment
is that we have so many hard problems
ahead the big discussions we have to
have as a species and you know our
society has to be able to have its wits
about us we have to have our wits about
us going into this future where we're
getting more Godlike power and be wise
about it because the stakes are going up
and when I hear about a debate like that
I just kind of have this this nightmare
scenario in my head of today's culture
you know handling that and I think very
quickly you have this crew and this crew
and this conspiracy theories and this
and just you know we won't be wise
that's a great way for us to be our
worst selves and make bad decisions and
really screw things up
I wrote a comic book about this called
neon future not not about this but about
this uh culture making a very important
decision about Ai and Robotics and in
the comic my hypothesis is that the
world will bifurcate and there will be
people that are like Over My Dead Body
revert technology go back to somewhere
in the mid 90s and then other people
will embrace it wholeheartedly and that
you'll get this schism
as you think about the realities of this
culture is going to make decisions about
AI it's happening right now
um what do you think is this all gonna
go awry because we're having to contend
this minute
I mean
it's any prediction I would make
uh is totally
out of my ass because we haven't done
this it's like AI is the way to think
about it is there's a super intelligent
alien species
on its way here and we don't know if
it's we see the spaceship we're not sure
how fast this but we know it's four
years away or 40 years away but it's
coming and someone's like well I'm an
optimist someone's like well it's like
who the hell knows are they altruistic
are they are they coming here to conquer
us are they do they not care and they're
just gonna Stomp all over us by accident
while doing their thing because they
just don't care either way we don't know
we don't know what they want we know and
we are in this case we're building it
just
I think you know if Humanity were a
single person I would say you're an
idiot for building this
but humanity is not and it's a
collective and it has a life of its own
you know the the collective Humanity I
call it the human Colossus
it builds
and there's not really anything you can
do to stop it uh and even if the
individuals all say this is bad it's
it's someone will be building and then
it's an armed race and then you have to
it just it builds and it so progress is
happening the aliens are coming we are
summoning them regardless of whether
each individual is saying we shouldn't
do this
um and so I have no idea what it's going
to be like I think we should now the one
difference is here we are actually
creating I think it is inevitable that
the aliens come
because we're going to build this
what's not inevitable is we actually can
possibly control the personalities of
these aliens and their goals maybe not
you know some people will say we're you
know eleazarudowski was here 50 years
away of of AI alignment research from
being able to have any ability to
control what they're going to be like
and where we should stop and do when we
can't so it's doom and then other people
argue that uh we should be able to
actually uh uh Jan lacun says you know
we should we should be able to
raise it like children into being who we
want it to be I don't know we've never
built this before so how would I now I'm
not the AI researchers the ones actually
building it they don't know how it works
or what's going to happen so I certainly
not know and I think a lot of times
people's optimism or pessimism in this
situation like this is just about who
they are some people are just optimistic
and that's what their default is unless
it's officially bad you know they know
then they're gonna always just default
to optimism and I'm like that so in my
head deep down if you set me in a time
machine instead I'm pressing 2060 and
you get out of the time machine my gun
to my head I expect I get out and I'm
like this is awesome everything's
amazing that's what I think partially
because that's what's happened in the
past someone from 50 years ago or 100
years ago that's what they would think
about today's world um they would think
it's incredible mostly and so I think
I'll and I think some other people they
they assume 26 you get out and it's just
it's just either a humans are gone or
it's just it's back to the Stone Age or
there's an all you know AI dictatorship
or human dictatorship using Ai and we're
awful dystopia who knows
are you on board with pressing pause on
the development or do you want to see it
go yeah I mean there was like that
letter there was like something very
basic it was like these large language
models are moving very quickly let's
press pause on those
uh yeah that just seems wise you're
you're like we're in a car you know
barreling up a mountain of progress and
there's kind of thin ridges and you know
listen we don't go off there let's just
pause for a second let's talk about I
mean that's how any smart human would do
something important with such high
stakes they would say but in this case
there you can also some people would
argue well China is not stopping so you
can't get the whole thing to stop and
talk about it so you know it's
complicated
but
yeah I mean I think that going full
speed ahead with the only mechanism of
uh uh uh that's driving the whole thing
is just like ambition to build without
any kind of like conscience or like
discussion or like or like a bigger
picture
thinking uh is obviously not the best
plan
um I just don't know if I don't know if
it's realistic I don't know I don't know
if that does anything but yes I'm all
for our pods so given that that seems to
have gone unheated although there is now
some talk about regulation
um do you have a like if you were gonna
put your ideas in the ring for what the
what we should do with that pause is it
all around alignment is it uh just
creating a regulatory environment
yeah I mean
um
you know regular regulatory stuff is
hard here because you again you can't
you can't halt things you can't you know
you can't fully control it and make sure
okay now we we stopped it and now we can
let it go as we please safely you can't
do that you know you can maybe do some
kind of Regulation with giant Computing
centers which is needed for this that's
one thing that we have going for us just
not let them get too big yeah I mean
maybe maybe that we treat them like
nuclear reactors in Iran and we're just
like we don't want them to you know
um and and that that's you know that's
one possibility that's the thing one
thing you have going for us is that you
can't at this moment at least create
super intelligence AI in your basement
your mom's basement you know someone
genius programmer because you just need
so much
raw computational power that right now
you know big Tech almost has a monopoly
on like the ability at least for certain
things like large language models
um to actually train those from scratch
I think just requires a huge at least
you know assault I don't know if it's
just big Tech but you can't just uh do
it from your compute laptop so yes I I
think
um there should at least be lots of
vigorous conversations about regulation
and what would you regulate
and
what is regulatable here and
um what are the risks and what are the
pros and cons I mean just to be having
those vigorous that should be like we
should be that should be one of their
main political discussions we're having
right now and one of the main
intellectual discussions we're having
um and then uh yeah I mean
it's like when one of these new large
language models hit it's just like all
these new companies are springing up and
it's like this paradigm shift is coming
at us very quickly and yeah just just I
think pausing to catch our breath and
like see what this thing can really do
you have discussions about could this
lead to Super intelligence or is this a
dead end for that which you know that's
a debate right now
um could this thing turn into general
intelligence you know or or is it not is
it just kind of like a very brute forced
but dumb big autocorrect some extremely
fancy autocorrect is that all it really
is uh and it can't understand English it
can't actually understand the words or
is it actually learning to understand
Concepts
I don't know and and you know there's
there's some people to talk about having
you know GPT for describe what G how
gpt3 Works let's experiment with that
can the AI tell us about the AI I mean
so I don't know right now I'm just
shooting from the hip because
um
uh a I just like I haven't I haven't dug
as deep with this as I will have by the
time I'm finished with this book but
also I just think it's um when we're
going into totally unprecedented Waters
um it's again if we're discussing the
aliens are coming should we all have our
guns or should we create a peace treaty
or should we uh you know ignore them or
should we
you know it's like it's like you can
take guesses but um
I don't know I know one of the ways I
gauge as a writer who reads I'll read a
lot of different people's opinion and
I'll look at what the different lines of
thought are when I'm researching
something
I I can tell there's a certain type of
topic where the experts are wildly
disagreeing with each other completely
opposing each other
and that's what tells me that the
species has no idea what it's talking
about yet you know once once we start to
figure it out then most of the experts
start to con you know and that doesn't
mean they're necessarily right but
they're more likely to it means a
species might be starting to figure this
one out right now I'm like the species
that does not know
how dangerous AI is how to make it safer
how great it could be I also think that
we forget that this thing could solve
all of our problems if we're still here
to have problems
um and it also could allow you know the
AI itself could of course become super
intelligent which is super scary but
also
um even if it doesn't
you're giving
you know magic wands to all kinds of
people
um you know you're going to be able to
um have a zoom
convo with someone who maybe you met
online who's been you know you started
liking their tweets you DM with them you
became friends you had a phone call with
them and now you're having a zoom and
we're talking
and you don't know if they're a real
person or not that's crazy right and so
that's when you can combine the video
synthesis and the voice synthesis and
then the language
you put those three together you have a
zoom call with someone and you do not
know if that's just some code
putting on a pixels on a screen that
looks like a person or if that's a human
and and so we're not that far from that
and then when you have that what does
that mean you have
so there's one debate about well will AI
become sentient and if it becomes
sentient that's really scary okay but
you don't even need that you can have
people believe that sentient
and so now you people think that's a
real person and that person can
manipulate millions of people
um into voting a certain way into
undermining the support beams
undermining trust convincing people that
the election is stolen to spreading it's
pretty scary because if you think about
what there's not some like you know it's
not like we're on some the liberal house
is made of steel bars we're physical
ones right and we can it's made of you
know these these Concepts these abstract
things like trust and shared
understanding and so those who want to
erode that we'll have an easier time
liberal democracies have been extremely
robust through crazy waves of change
can they stand up to this I don't know I
hope they can I hope this is yet another
thing that liberal democracies man it
even survived this or maybe not maybe
this is the end we could be you have to
accept this
scary but we could be at the end of of
America as we know it and in 10 years
we're looking back in 20 years we're
saying we did not know how good we had
it oh my God imagine if you just go back
and you could you know and and that's
real
um one of the things I think people
should do or you know this isn't even
again I feel deep down probably
optimistic but I still think there's
countries you want to go to if there's
things you want to do just enjoying
yourself out there if you want to go and
pick up a new hobby do it because I
don't know I don't know you shouldn't
count on 20 years down the road and you
don't know what's going to be going on
you know you might be Sheltering
somewhere trying to find your next meal
and being scared of that you're gonna
get shot by the warlord down the street
and thinking about when you could have
just picked up and gone on a camping
trip I mean do the things you want to do
now because I don't know who you don't
know how long it's going to last God I
hope that does not because you clip that
people snap out and it's like they're
watching it in the radioactive Rubble I
know it's sad and scary and it's just I
think we should feel a little sad
thinking about it and
um that that will help us to be more
wiser the worst thing we can be is cocky
and think America always survives my
parents my grandparents they all had
risks and they survived theirs and we'll
survive ours and this is just how things
are and my grandkids are going to be
living in the similar life than I just
that that attitude will absolutely give
us the worst shot at a good future what
scares you more the collapse of liberal
values or AI
well I mean I think they go together and
so some people criticize me for saying
you know why is he so focused on like
you know the culture War when there's
things like Ai and nukes and all this
but to me what I'm really focused on is
the house the liberal house the culture
War to me is a uh kind of uh a mechanism
that is destructive to the house and
when it's heating up that puts the house
under more strain and to me the liberal
house is is not just what has given us a
good pass but it gives us the best shot
to solve big problems it allows us to be
wise as a people because when we have
free speech we can form a giant brain by
putting our brains together like neurons
and a larger brain and make better
decisions that's how we built this
incredible civilization magical that no
human can do because we actually can
have super intelligence together
in a place like the liberal house better
than in other places so to me it's like
this house is is not just what allows us
to have good times now but it gives us
the best shot of staying in good times
and and and and
solving big problems and
uh
and rising to challenges and when the
liberal the liberal house starts to go
away and suddenly it's just kind of a
war of scary ideologies and everyone's
scared and everyone and and people start
quarantining their thoughts to their
little conversations or to their own
head that's when we become really stupid
as a species and that's when I just
think now the threats all are much worse
now we're much more likely to have
nuclear war now we are much more likely
to build misaligned AI I think um and so
yeah so I think they go together I think
in some ways the liberal house is like
the it's almost the first thing because
it's like like it's like put your own
mask on before like starting to do stuff
like let's just make sure that we have
like a functioning you know societal
structure that we are functioning in and
now we can try to solve problems if the
structure Fails Like forget the problem
so
but obviously if if I had to say okay
you know what what's more likely to have
a safe future if I can press a button
and say AI just goes away or the liberal
democracy uh the culture works you know
heats up and starts to really erode our
electoral trust and stuff I think if you
zoom way out probably the safest thing
would be to get rid of AI and just
accept yeah we might just be another
civilization that ends up in you know
Civil War and then there are really some
bad times but we're still around well AI
could legit extinct everyone
um
you know so I mean it's it's I think
that maybe it's like AI is a bigger risk
but
the the thing we can do to control it is
like that's why the the the liberal
house is uh strength gives us the best
shot to do well with this thing which is
happening either way so I guess that's
how I see it that's the thing we can
control more is how we're functioning
together and how we're having these
conversations and how we're solving
problems yeah once you stop
thinking about the individual and you
just start thinking about the society I
agree with you I am certainly in the
short term far more worried about people
certainly people in groups and how that
can click over and become Madness very
fast in all one wave and gets really
scary than I am AI but for sure if
you're like wow look it's only 50 60
years of like absolutely agonizing
turmoil trauma and loss but like we come
back and I totally agree with you most
important to me selfishly right now is
just like let's have our society
functioning well and like being not
collapsing if I'm an alien watching
Earth and I'm rooting for them to go
extinct
I'm thinking I'm not worried about the
culture world I'm like that's not going
to extinct them yeah I might right you
know AI oh yes they're making AI this is
this is when they're really gonna
they're building the great filter great
filter I had a crazy thought the other
day that like one of the things for the
Fermi Paradox which is the Paradox of
why we don't see evidence of alien life
given that we should see so much of it
um and one of the theories is that we
might be early really early like maybe
there were gamma-ray bursts and other
hectic kind of conditions in the early
universe that made it very hard for
intelligent life to develop because
plans just got sizzled at some point
along the way before enough time had
passed
or or intelligent life did develop and
it got sizzled so now we're actually
starting to be one of the first there's
a one of the many you know there's
theories that say no we're uh we might
be very rare maybe actually it's very
unlikely that we got here but we did and
most of the others don't because they
don't ever form complex cells you know
that sort of freak thing that happened
or there's a there's theories of saying
no there's a lot of things that get to
our level and then there's something
there's some great filter that they all
hit and we're about to hit it ourselves
at some point that's really depressing
or that no there's none of this and
there's tons of species out there and
there's just lots of other reasons we
wouldn't have seen them but the most
interesting one to me in some ways is
that maybe we're early and we're one of
the very first to get to this level so
there will be a lot but we have
someone's got to be early right and
they're going to assume that they must
not be but they are so maybe that's us
and if that's us
because you know one of the things you
say is well why would we see it's it
maybe AI kills off things like us when
they build it but then a we'd see
evidence of AI going and doing things
amongst the Stars
so maybe this is the first or one of the
very first times that a species has
gotten to a level where they can create
Advanced AI super intelligent Ai and
that something crazy is happening for
the whole universe right now where the
AI we're creating here is going to end
up being a super Predator that all other
species forever have to deal with
and it's unlikely this is dark no so
it's unlikely it's unlikely because of
course you know that why what are the
chances but it's just a weird thought
that like maybe we're we're doing like
the most important event in Cosmic
history is currently happening here on
Earth like the fact the Fermi Paradox I
think we haven't seen any aliens at
least gives that a a chance like it's
one plausible explanation so anyway side
topic but it's just been something I've
been thinking about no I found that
really interesting so here is my I have
not looked deeply into this but my gut
instinct around the Fermi Paradox goes
something like this
the least interesting thing a super
intelligence could do would be to
physically explore the stars and that
what you end up doing without needing to
harness the power of a star or anything
that dramatic is you just turn inward
and so if we can really create
simulations that meld they don't even
have to be like crazy
um
uh they don't have to be crazy High
Fidelity if if you're able to Jack into
your own nervous system they just have
to feel real and so you would probably
two things would happen phase number one
is you would
um begin manipulating your own
neurochemistry your own physiology and
you would have you call them dreamlike
experiences where you can explore not
only infinite universes but you can
explore infinite universes that are not
beholden to any sort of laws of physics
or even logic so you can just have these
incredible dream-like States or imagine
effectively being able to lucid dream
your entire life like that would be
pretty intriguing
um and then the other would be that if
you could and I don't know if I've not
thought through this well enough to know
if you could truly become a
self-sufficient energy generating
species that lived in a virtual world
that's the one thing I I would you
always need a correlate in the real
world harnessing energy it's a great
question
but if you could again going completely
digital you now don't need to be
bouncing around the universe especially
a universe at least from our corner of
it that's just so empty like there's so
distances are so huge it's so expensive
to go I have a feeling long before you
figure out how to bend space can you
just upload to some magical virtual
world
um you go you know right and and uh and
why would you deal with the also like
biology yep rgo biology and why would
you deal with physics in the universe
when you could just go into yeah you
could just upload what's interesting is
maybe if one of the characteristics of
this thing that advanced civilizations
do when they upload themselves is that
they don't like to they they if they
know it's fake then it doesn't do as
much for them so they create the
situation where they don't know that
it's not real which means you might be
in one right now right and either I'm in
it too because we share it you go in and
there's lots of other consciousnesses or
you're in your own little brain bat and
we're all figments of your imagine we're
all just creative for the simulation and
you're the only Consciousness here or
there is no consciousness and it's all a
simulation
well you know there's Consciousness
because you haven't
I guess I don't know you have it but I
know I haste I should say right there's
no meat based
so are you when you say brain Vats do
you mean literal brain no no the concept
of uploading the more fancy version of
that which is so we are a simulation but
we're all conscious maybe one of us it's
just there's a chance there's always a
chance that this is currently what's
happening and and of course there's also
the theories that we're all one similar
you know we are in a simulation of a
some other species that does these
things and we're one of them and there's
way more simulations in existence than
real ones because you can create a
trillion simulations one species so it's
much more likely we're in one than not
that's the Nick Bostrom line of argument
um but that's another solution to the
Fermi Paradox because you'd say okay
well you know if you're it's like a
Minecraft world it's just like a
rendered universe and they don't spend
that much time on it so why would they
program other species into it they're
trying to study
us so they build a universe around us
and see how long it takes us to figure
out what's going on or whatever and
that's that's the experiment or not I
don't know but maybe there's lots of
other things in this simulation but
I think that when I look back at people
who thought the Earth was flat or
thought that the stars were the
underside of the Dome of Heaven you know
they feel so in the dark they feel so
like wow you just didn't know about
reality look at this conversation we're
having like so yeah we know more than
they did about this particular situation
we don't know what the universe is we
don't know if it's one of those things
where you go really far in One Direction
you come back from the other side
eventually like it's this
four-dimensional kind of self-contained
space
where it's you know
um like a 4D version of when you walk
straight in line on the earth eventually
you'll come back from the other
direction maybe it's we don't know we
don't know if it's a hologram uh that's
a theory we don't know if it's part of a
frothing Multiverse we all know for in a
simulation we don't know if there's a
Creator because if it's a simulation
there is a Creator like religious style
we there's a Creator um and and we don't
know if that Creator would have our
Consciousness recycled somewhere else so
there could be an afterlife like even if
you're not religious
can we go deeper on that that doesn't
make sense to me so just say you know if
you're if you just think we're in a cold
dark physical universe and you're an
atheist which is how I grew up
it's pretty Grim because you don't have
any hope for an afterlife you think you
die and it's just lights out that's it
and I was always jealous of people who
believed in an afterlife because man
they could have even if they weren't
sure they just had some hope
but now
I have two lines of Hope as an atheist
that I've developed one is just concept
of cryonics right now or whatever that
future Tech Will Allow humans to live a
lot longer or to upload their
Consciousness or whatever
and so
again I wouldn't put my money on it
necessarily that I lived to 500 but I
would it's an it's definitely a non-zero
chance and I didn't grow up thinking
that I thought everyone dies by 110 or
whatever so
um there is that possibility genuine and
that's again as an optimist a little
hope goes a long way from my psyche to
be like ah so it's probably gonna happen
you know and then the whole other line
of thought is that if we are created we
are in a simulation it means that what
am I I'm just like a render a program in
the simulation and when I die as far as
I know one of the things that that
Creator does is they take your die and
you end up somewhere else where now
you're going to be interviewed by the
simulator and you're gonna go live in
some happy world that they put you who
knows it could be anything but there's
no reason to think that it's lights out
that they could take that code and they
say no no that code that person's
learned so much now we send them to the
next thing we're given what they've
learned we want to do another you know
another set of world a world that they
live in I just don't know the point is
there's a non-zero chance that the
simulator again it's very religious at
sounding it's like there's a Creator who
can do what they want with my soul my
code after
and
um those two things give me this little
like the sky the gray sky like a little
bit of blue skies there I'm like hey who
knows and that's all I want is just the
the who knows that's if you're if you're
starting places there's nothing there's
just Blackness after death and for
non-existence for eternity that's pretty
that's a pretty Grim starting point you
can only go up from there so a little
hope I'll take it
now I've heard you say that nobody wants
to live forever that is true
help me reconcile well some people parts
that some people think they want to live
forever for sure I definitely do I
definitely thought I did and then I
wrote a post on this thing called
Graham's number so but why then do you
consider the possibility of an afterlife
to be a party in the clouds
I once did a post asking readers uh how
long would you if you had a calculator
this is Graham's number no you could
type in any number and that's how many
years you're going to live what would
you type in
right and again some people I said
there's an Infinity button some people
hit that I think that I'll explain why
that is very we're gonna have to because
I am convinced but I would say 5 000
years I said 50 centuries is a nice
chunk of time 50 centuries I could do a
lot and you know I probably you know you
know granted I'm sure on Century 49 I'd
suddenly be like I wouldn't be like I'm
ready I'd be like no I have so much more
of course but at least give me 50 give
me 10 centuries one century is nothing
think about how recent the year 2000 was
remember Y2K that was almost a quarter
century ago we get like we get Max a
century so that's a quarter of a human
life since Y2K this is we are this is
not enough time so I'm partying the
clouds because I want my other 49
centuries maybe I would like 400
centuries I'd like my ability to choose
I want to choose and I think once we are
in a world where people decide when it's
time to bow out and there's a whole
ritual and there's a ceremony and it's
beautiful and everyone says goodbye to
them and they do there's all this
closure and they've chosen and everyone
respects that and it's a whole new you
know culture that's built around this
concept they'll look back on today when
everyone got taken by their dying mammal
that they live in in the Hundred Year
first hundred years and some people got
taken really early and they lose loved
ones and people still want to live it is
so sad and so tragic and like it is
heartbreaking the reality we all live in
now
that said I would much prefer to die at
80 or today than to have hit the
infinity button really yes what
Graham's number so before if I if before
I wrote about Graham's number Graham's
number for reference is just uh it's
it's there's you know these endless
giant numbers you could conceive of but
this one is famous because it's one of
the biggest numbers ever used in an
actual mathematical proof so it's a real
number that mathematicians have used and
before I knew about this I would have
said something like the biggest number
okay well you know what a googolplex is
a Google is one with a hundred zeros so
that's a you could remember I could
write a Google in two minutes one minute
one minute of little zeros that are done
okay
you would have to have the universe
packed with tiny grains of sand packed
all directions all the observable
universe
and that is one 10 billionth of a Google
grains of sand so you'd have to now go
on D so the what a Google Plex is is
it's one with a Google zeros
so now picture your each of those tiny
grains of sand has 10 billion
microscopic zeros written on it and
every direction for billions of light
years in every direction it's just sand
sand tiny grains of sand each one has 10
billion zeros that is that is the number
googolplex so that so that's a Google
zeros now the number of Googleplex of
course is this is just writing it out
that's just writing the number so I
would have said before something like
the biggest number I can conceive of is
like a Googleplex to the Googleplex
power
and then I started and I'm not gonna get
into it fully here because it's it's a
it's very nerdy but basically if you
start just doing this you can have these
iterations of science so
addition is iterated counting so I can
go one two three four five or I can just
go one plus four and shoot all the way
to five I can go five ten fifteen twenty
twenty five I can go five times five and
skip it just just it's like it's like
you're you're doing a shortcut an
addition shortcut is multiplication
a multiplication shortcut is
exponentation so I can say three times
three times three I could say three to
the third right three to the hundredth
since that's just two numbers as opposed
to writing three times three hundred
times and so the point is That's So you
go addition multiplication exponentation
you can keep going and you can go to the
next and next and next and next and you
keep going crazy things start to happen
we're like a Googleplex to the
Googleplex power is like Child's Play
you realize it's like nothing so anyway
if someone's actually nerdy enough to
like that they can go and search
vaporwai Graham's number and read it but
the point is that some of these numbers
get so big that it literally like gives
me nightmares thinking about how big the
number is
okay so three to the third to the third
to the third just that little fourth
hour is like this is like a size of a
Googleplex now what if that Tower went
all the way to the Sun
and now if the the you multiply that
tower out and that's the height of the
next Tower and you just keep going for
you can the point is you very quickly
get to a place where it's like no one
would want to be conscious for anywhere
near that long and then you could just
keep going so I promise you you don't
want to be conscious forever it'll be
toward the worst torture is living
forever that someone could possibly
imagine it's just too much time the
amount of time is scary that you'd have
to be around it's scary to think about
it's interesting I'm not persuaded by
that at all so here is
um what I have found is when two
intelligent well-meaning people disagree
they have different base assumptions
and if for what you're saying to make
sense one of your base assumptions is
that there is some stacking level of
fatigue and that as that fatigue grows
you just can't imagine being alive
what I would say is let's play a game
that I play with myself all the time
whenever I'm getting overwhelmed by uh
the past and that is to say what if I
literally just came into existence right
now this second and all of my memories
are just context so that I as a meat AI
uh can keep moving forward that I I have
enough contextual information that I can
have a decision-making rubric and so I
can move forward I could ask the exact
same question in the opposite direction
what if I have existed forever but you
just have this either looping memory
setup or you forget everything beyond
the last 25 years the last thousand
years if you're comfortable with a
thousand years
once you remove that I'm gonna take sort
of psychic scars and and have this ever
increasing psychic fatigue
why would you ever want to unplug but if
you're if you're looping memory isn't
that just living the living a bunch of
different lives that's like
reincarnation you're not really you
so you might as well be someone else you
could say that when you die a new kid is
born and that might as well be you with
your memory now looped yeah and so I I'm
trying to soothe you not me so I don't
believe that it Stacks with like these
psychic scars or that I will at any
point
um want to reset but I am also very
cognizant that you those in in a meat
suit for sure assuming we are me too
it's whatever this is yeah if I'm the
only conscious being and everybody else
is not uh I have to be very careful not
to let those things stack and this is
why people ask me all the time so hey
you're wealthy you've already succeeded
why are you working so hard and the
reality is because I understand the way
the human mind works which is you can
never eat a meal so satisfying that
you'll never be hungry again so I've
just completely given myself over to the
nature of the human animal that I will
always want to strive I will always want
progress I will always want to grow and
be more
um and so in giving myself over to that
never thinking that there is a Finish
Line the only thing that bums me out the
gray clouds are
I will run out of the ability to
generate ATP long before I run out of
things that I'm passionate about and so
that is the thing that scares me is
living a life that lacks meaning or
something that just energizes you to the
extreme that would be scary but I I have
not
I don't want to [ __ ] you I would say
I've not known a day where I didn't have
that sort of driving
so so you're saying that here you know
here's my life so far what I see is a is
an atom okay this is this is what I've
lived so far and on this atom it's
always been good and I've never wanted
to not be around never even begun to
fatigue and now
you're saying so therefore if we pack
the observable universe with atoms so
they're touching each other all
everywhere and then each of those
universes gets shrunk down to the size
of an atom and we pack the universe with
universes of atoms right I mean just
keep doing that yes you're confident
that on all of those atoms
it's going to be a life worth living
you're not going to be
begging to be unconscious and saying
this is that is a lot of confidence from
having experienced one atom and again
you can keep doing this you can now do
this a a universe of atoms number of
times your base assumption that in all
of that amount of time something is
statistically likely to go so wrong that
I will want out of this
it's that the amount of time is so vast
it is I'm saying I wrote this post and
you have to actually like read the post
step by step to for a second yeah you
got me there like I understand but but
it's like you you don't even because I
don't even right now it's like it's like
it's like it's like it's even what I
just said about the universe full of
atoms and then smaller that is like in
the in the post that's like a joke what
I just said it's like the the scale of
Graham's number is and and then you
could say like Graham's number
um a gram number time whatever it is is
so crazy that it's just like there's
there's no way you don't go completely
mad and it's like does all of your
anxiety go away if I say you can kill
yourself at any time of course okay so
this is just a situation is that who is
that is that Death Becomes voluntary and
people can bow out when they're ready I
would I would love to press the infinity
button on like someone else forcing me
to die I would admittedly press the
infinity button I won't lie but I would
be much more comfortable
yeah that thought experiment is that you
have to you there's nothing you can do
to kill yourself you will be conscious
for that amount of time and
um
and the infinity button
are you worried about being alone are
you worried about suffering what's the
it's um did you see the Black Mirror
episode where there's a black mirror
episode where a guy is a simulated guy
whatever he's a real Consciousness and
is in this house and the people who are
running his simulation it's like every
minute that goes by for them is a
thousand years for him
oh I don't think so
what I don't think I've seen it okay I
get it but the point is every minute
that goes by for them is a thousand
years of experience for this guy just in
the house
and this is a sick show it likes to do
really sick Concepts so they say you
know they say should we um uh okay
should we should we like shut them off
now no let's like let's like leave him
leave him for the next few days and so I
did the calculation I was like he's in
there for suddenly for two million years
and he just can't he whatever and again
that is like so so that's the moment
when you're like oh my God so even if
you were living like a rich life like
two million years they just and again
this is nothing compared to the the
vastness of time
is a very scary concept to me if you had
to be there for it it's like we can't
even conceive of a million years I'm a
thousand Millennia is very hard for us
but that is like okay you know you can
kind of picture a millennium and you can
picture a thousand but but then yeah so
I I I
I I challenge you to read the grams
number post and then tell me
that you want to press the infinity
button because I don't I don't I don't
think you do all right I'll check it out
for sure dude this has been amazing
where can people find you my blog wait
but why and my email address is how
people my email
list which is you can just find it on
any blog post to mine at the bottom
is how people know when I post something
new because I don't do it regularly I do
it sporadically and so people should
sign up for the email that's and then
Twitter wait but why I love it all right
guys if you haven't already be sure to
subscribe and until next time my friends
be legendary take care peace if you
agree that the culture war is way too
important to ignore be sure to check out
this episode with Constantine kissing
victimhood sells well people in our
current Society believe that being a
victim gives you advantages because it
does