 Okay, well good night for all the viewers of the Yaron Brooks channel Would like to introduce ourselves. My name is Matheus Pacini I'm here with Ricardo Birch as well. We are from Good Night For all the viewers of the Yaron Brooks channel Sorry, we had an echo there. Go ahead So Again, my name is Matheus Pacini and I'm here with Ricardo Birch We are from Objetivismo, Brazil and we are today interviewing Yaron Brooke with some questions we got from our readers And so If you like, Ricardo, you can start All right, so hi, Iran. It's nice to see you again Last time and perhaps the first time and only time we spoke was in Latin America So in Argentina and in Brazil It's good that you'll come back in a few months. So we can chat again in person But we want to produce this episode which later on will translate to Portuguese so then the broad Brazilian population can Understand it in case it won't speak English. So then our first question is we just want to get your Your story of how you got to know Ren's ideas and what motivated you to continue studying Objectivism for like over three decades Sure, so so I grew up in Israel and As I think most most kids and most teenagers in Israel in the 1970s I was a Dedicated socialist. I think everybody was in those days in Israel and they and a real collectivist and A friend of mine I was talking to a friend and he was spouting these capitalist ideas and I said You know, were you getting this nonsense from with you know, where's this coming from? This isn't I've never heard anything like this. It's ridiculous And he said you got to read this book and he handed me a copy of Alasdair And so I read it was a good friend and I respected him and I read the book And it took me a long time because Iron Man was basically challenging everything I believed in She was questioning all the assumptions I had taken for granted I like to say I argued with Iron Man. I yelled at Iron Man. I threw her book on the on the on the On the wall And by the end of reading Alashrug that I was convinced that she was right and everything I'd been taught was wrong And and more than anything I think The thing that really stuck with me in Alashrug was the idea That was really revolutionary to me That you one should live for oneself That one should live the purpose of one's life is happiness And in one's own well-being and to live the best life that you can for you I'd always be taught sacrifice I would always be taught that the purpose of life is to sacrifice for others for the state for the for the collective for the Jewish people for whatever And and I bought into it and I I didn't know there was an alternative and suddenly Iron Man's I think ethics opened up the world to me it opened up opportunities and possibilities that I couldn't imagine and Because it was so revolutionary because I could see That it had this amazing impact on How I was going to live and and how I should live I started reading Iron Man I I basically started picking up all her books and you know fountain had and The nonfiction and in those days it was very difficult to get the books. I mean, this is pre-internet So and Israel was kind of still in backwater So, you know anytime my my father would go to America I would send him to bookstores to bring the Iron Man books And which he didn't like because he didn't like the books and he didn't like the fact that the Booksellers would always look at him funny because he was buying Iron Man books And but but he got me the books. I picked up books in secondhand bookstores And and basically started studying her ideas and the more I studied the more Committed I got the more it was clear that this was a philosophy for living a philosophy that would That I could really build a life around and and there would be that was the philosophy that would benefit my life And and over the years I became more and more You know more and more serious about studying it and and ultimately became obviously a professional intellectual In in her ideas Yeah, so, uh, how do you think her ideas influenced you into later on moving to the us? Well, I mean they influenced every aspect of my life. I mean they influenced certainly they influenced My move to the u.s. So when I finished out of the shrug, it was clear to me that There was no reason to stay in Israel that Israel was an accident of birth and that Given given that you only had one life and given that you you needed to pursue happiness That the real challenge was to figure out where the best place on planet earth to live was And to go there that is to live the best life that you could in the best place possible Where you had the most opportunities to live the best life And it was and you know looking at the world and looking at what what countries Were out there and and which countries were free and which were not and It it was pretty clear that the u.s. Was the place I wanted to go to so, you know, it took me a while to get here It it took about 10 years from when I first read out the shrug Until I actually moved to the u.s. But it was clear to me when I moved that I wasn't going back and that this was This is where I wanted to live my life and that at heart and in spirit. I was an American In many ways more so than many Americans are So but but it influenced every aspect of my life it influenced the way I approached my career the way I approached, uh, you know romantic life The way I approached my studies the way I approached Just life in general friendship everything because it was It was you know, it shapes everything you do if you understand who ideas if you don't take Adler shrug just as a political book But it's a book about life a book about morality a book about philosophy Then you realize that it's it's a revolutionary book that that is That has the potential to guide every aspect of your life. Um Moving forward so it very very powerful and and and You know shape everything about my life since then So later on in life in the 90s and the early 2000s as you became a an intellectual public intellectual One of the main jobs you've had is to motivate people into you know Going about and then picking your path to shrug and other books by and when you're reading them So what do you think are some of the challenges you face in trying to motivate the audience? to especially the newcomers right like The conference to pick up the books and how does do you think there are differences between? Let's say the region. So if you're talking to people in the u.s. Or in latin america or europe, yeah Yeah, I mean, I think the biggest challenge is The same challenge I faced when I first read iron man, and that is that everything you've learned everything around you is as opposed to these ideas and that Society is going to come after you they're going to argue with you. They're going to debate you that they're gonna They're going to be hostile to you Because you hold these ideas. So it requires a real independence of thought A real a certain strength In one's own conviction to hold these ideas and sustain them So you go in front of students and you talk about capitalism And and all students everywhere in the world, you know I've spoken about this even in china in china. It's the same way. They all have the same canesian altruistic kind of point of view when looking at economics and looking at capitalism and looking at socialism It's not that they're socialist. It's that they're not capitalists and The status of one for one another and you you just have to Keep knocking down the same objections that everybody has because every professor in the world teaches the same garbage the same wrong ideas And then when you get into philosophy when you get into the ethics, the challenge, of course is they've grown up You know, particularly in america and latin america. They've grown up with christianity. They've grown up with altruism They've grown up with jesus on a cross dying for their sins And and now i'm telling them they should live their life for themselves in pursuit of their own happiness That that you know and and that is a shock and it's very hard for them to accept And they think that means the initial response They think that means treating other people really really badly And and and be horrible to other people and so it takes a while to explain that that so The real challenge is undoing all the bad stuff that they have and and then of course motivating them to read a big thick book like a la shrug 1100 pages in a world in which Uh young people don't read period. They just don't read never mind a big book. So it's not tiktok You can't condense a la shrugged into tiktok video And and so there's a so those I think are the biggest challenges is Is fighting the existing philosophy the existing Viewpoints and then getting people to read and you're not going to change people's mind about philosophy Without them reading Ayn Rand they get they're gonna have to ultimately read whether it's a la shrugged or whether It's a non-fiction books. I know in you in portuguese you have now the virtue of selfishness and you have some other books non-fiction by ayn Rand in portuguese You know these I must read you're not going to understand the ideas unless you actually study the ideas philosophy is It's deep and again You have to undo all the things that you be taught and it's work and people have to engage in that work In terms of the differences in regions You know there's a sense in which the americans it's easiest because There's there's a certain part of america that connects stein rand. There's a certain sense of life There's a certain uh tradition if you will of the founding fathers of liberty of freedom of a pro capitalist attitude So there's some but then at the same time america is quite religious and and that's very difficult to overcome So I find it hard in america. I I think You get traction, but it's it's not easy given how big the country is My experience in latin america particularly in brazil has been quite positive So the challenges in latin america are two things two challenges. One is catholicism and the other is what I call continental philosophy the fact that There is none of the ideas of individual rights and the ideas of pursuit of happiness that you know, you're very much influenced by german romantic philosophy and really nothing else but there's also massive frustration in latin america young people know Things are wrong things are bad things haven't worked and and For decades you've tried all kinds of things and all kinds of different regimes and all kinds of different status Tinkering and nothing works So at least there seems to be a certain percentage of people who are open kind of to radical new Controversial ideas because what the hell nothing else has worked. So why not try something new? So in that respect, I think I've always found brazil Very positive and very open and and and audiences engaged and interested I think I think it's true to some extent in the rest of latin america But it's it's an uphill battle everywhere and then in europe Europe is difficult because europe is not one place right europe is very very Different places in europe are very very different. You know, eastern europe has the experience of communism again Young people I think are more willing to be radical more willing to think outside the box More willing to reject communism off hand You know, ukraine, which of course now is in the headlines because of the war In ukraine in 2015 a la shrug was the best-selling book in the country And people were very engaged and people were very interested in places like poland and other places like that People I think are interested and engaged because of the memory of communism In in central and southern europe almost no interest life is good and and uh, they're very collectivistic and they're very just cynical and they're very You know Why think radical life is too good? Why why be radical? Why why shake take things up? I mean everything's very comfortable like in scandinavia and and now it's interesting scandinavia There's interest in iron man and in great britain. There's a lot of interest in iron man, but but It is true that young people in those countries are comfortable And uh, you know, I think there's more energy in latin america and in eastern europe than there is in in um in the west Yeah, so out of curiosity. So you said that, you know, there's a difficulty in getting people to read Especially young people like an 1100 page book. Uh, do you ever recommend the audiobook version? Because you know that that's at least my experience. I mean, I've listened to all the audiobooks Yeah, that's an easier way to get people to do something because you can see the number of hours Right, so probably I don't think I have but but but but yes. I mean, um, I don't know How much young people listen to particularly fiction books? I just don't know but yeah It certainly is another way to reach people in another another avenue another possibility Yeah, um, so Switching a little bit to Objectivism and the way, you know, given the fact that it's It's very difficult to understand objectivism to the You know, it's an integrated philosophy and there's a lot of stuff to study And oftentimes people don't realize how much stuff there is You know, as we say pre oac, right? I mean, I heard this from you and other people that you don't know What you don't know unless you go through the oac I'm in year three now. So I I totally get that now Um, so what are some of the common ways you see people misapplying objectivism? I mean, I I think some of them are You know, political the associated objectivism with some kind of conservatism or they They they they they cannot since they can only people seem to have a tendency to think only Indualities left and right So if you're not left and objective is clearly not left then you must be right And then when they when you say, but we're not right? We don't agree with the right on x y and z then they don't know what to do with it They're completely confused and they completely they completely out of it So so that's one So certainly in politics you see a lot of people being confused and a lot of people You know aligning themselves with a set of ideas that is not objectivist Um in ethics I think that they take some kind of superficial view of what self-interest is they know it's not exploiting other people They know it's not lying cheating and stealing But then they don't do the work to really integrate their ideas into them So they kind of drift a little bit and they don't fully integrate it and they don't live A fully integrated life. I mean one of the pro challenges is it goes back to challenges Is we live in a world where the dominant philosophies are all Disintegrating they're all emphasizing disintegration not integration um, so There's no It's very hard for people to get that they've got to do the work Right. Ethics is supposed to come natural. It's supposed to be an instinct. It's supposed to be just there You read a book. You read an essay. You're done seven virtues. I'll follow the virtues um, but it requires constant integration and then of course At the core of all of that is an epistemology That is hard and and that that really is the reason why they get confused in politics and in ethics is that To really understand the concepts and to really understand the ideas You have to have a solid understanding of how in a sense concepts are formed and And and how to deal with concept and how the conceptual faculty deals with ideas And what integration means and why integration is so important, which you know having been in the OEC I'm sure you you understand but but Integration I mean who talks about integration in the world out. They accept objectives. I mean things things that aren't related things are not integrated So so people see the world as a disintegrated thing and then they have to latch on to I have to have an opinion about this But I don't know how to integrate it with the rest of my knowledge I'm just going to have an opinion based on some similarity with other opinions and It's a mess and it's a cognitive mess. So what you mainly see among objectivists is I'd say cognitive confusion about morality and about the applications, which is morality and politics um I think the other thing I'd say is Objectivists dismiss aesthetics way too much. They don't pay enough attention to it. Obviously fine man This is crucial and there's a whole branch in philosophy and she for hood. It was very very important for the good life to live a good life So I think those are the main kind of confusions challenges problems How to you know, how to how to really apply these ideas in your day-to-day life and Think about them properly. Think about think about the abstract concept properly There's you know, as Leonard Peacock has talked about There's a tendency among a lot of objectivists to be rationalistic to hold objectivism as kind of floating abstractions not to link it to the the the actual Concrete in reality actual examples and then Then because of that, it's very hard to apply them You know, some people have an opposite tendency, which is empiricism. All they have is reality But they can't they don't know quite how to connect that reality to the abstract concept that they think they know So all of that is a challenge. So the basic the basic challenge is a challenge of thinking of thinking well and and and and that requires Real study and I met of course as a book Which I don't think is in Portuguese the introduction to objectivist epistemology which at the end at the end of the day is kind of the core and the heart of Objectivism because if if everything centers in objectivism around reason and rationality and thinking Well, then you better know how to do it and epistemology is really the the core of how you do that But you do have I think you do you still have opa Objectives of objectives of philosophy of iron man in in portuguese. Is this still in print? a good so No, okay, you can find it we should probably work and getting it in print but Back in print, but it's um, you know, you've got some really valuable chapters day in epistemology That are really crucial to getting and of course, it's a fantastic book in a sense that it gives this complete integrated overview well overview complete integrated presentation of objectivism of the philosophy qual philosophy and I think Anybody who's serious about these ideas should definitely read What we call opa objectivism the philosophy of iron man by lene pika Continue on the on the same kind of a same question, but As you know here in brazil, for example, we have a big community that likes the austrian school of economics and I would like you to comment on on on george raisman He had a really great Book he wrote a great book called capitalism Where he tried to integrate the ideas of objectivism Into the austrian school of economics and as a follow-up question Why is it so difficult to see people applying the the applying objectivism to other areas Aside of philosophy because you see that over the years many people Finished the oc, but they were not you don't you don't hear about them anymore You don't see how them how they apply the knowledge they got Outside the oc to their lives as a whole so I don't agree with that I I think they're out there and they're quite evidence I mean look at alex epstein look at look at the work he's doing on energy and on fossil fuels and on climate change and he's very visible But but look and maybe the most important thing that we have is The the higher ground education, which is the school We or network of schools the largest Montessori network network in in the united states or in the world Maybe and it's all run by oc graduates, right? And and it's like I don't know the 10 of them working there or something like that And then there are others who are in other educational ventures or in other different parts of the educational So people are doing really good and important work Applying objectivism particularly in education probably the most important field in which we need to apply it So I think it's happening But you have to have scale And you you know to get to to get to the kind of cultural visibility that we all would like We have to have thousands of graduates in order to get a few dozen who are going to be big celebrities But I think I think given the number of graduates we've had which is more in the hundreds Than in the tens of thousands. I think we're doing quite well in a sense of The visibility and the number and and remember a lot of the oc graduates Internally focused that is a lot of the focus is on using them to teach new oc students At least for now because we're still growing and again, it's a numbers game But but you've got uh, you've got a number of people out there applying these ideas to various fields. We haven't had anybody applying it Consistently to economics and that's a real shame. We've got Rob Taw Who uh, but who who doesn't publish a lot and it's not very active. I wish he was more active But he's probably the most knowledgeable in terms of bridging Austrian economics with objectivism look George reason Is brilliant and and and and you know, he's he's a he knows economics the book is is It's a massive book. It's it's an encyclopedia I don't think it's very well written, but it's it's it's got it's it's got immense amount of knowledge in it It's it's definitely an attempt to try to integrate objectivism into Austrian economics, unfortunately, I think he makes some errors when it comes to that integration this goes back to Some of the issues about about understanding objectivism. His main error is the accepts kind of von Mises's methodology Uh, which is uh, very rationalistic. He accepts a kind of methodology that is A little detached from reality So he's rationalistic in the way he presents it and I think a lot of the uh, you know is what so But I think overall, you know, he's the only he's the only person we have who is an economist and is a An austrian economist and an objectivist who's written significantly on it So I think as a consequence of accepting the bad methodology There are significant errors in the book, but that shouldn't dismiss Um, we shouldn't dismiss the book because of that because I think there's a lot of value in it and also I'd say that there is A a lot of work to be done, right? I think austrian economics is basically the right economic theory um, and I think that we need people who I think unfortunately many of the modern austrian economists have been seduced by mario art bar and by moral subjectivism and by Anarchism and and by by a lot of bad ideas But behind it all is a solid foundation in economics And I think what we need to do Is we need to work on a proper philosophical foundation for austrian economics and into into show How austrian economics integrates well with objectivism again, rub tall has done some work on that showing that Uh, the the subjective value that people like mesas and menger and But primarily mesas talked about Is consistent with rand's view of objective value that the two are very A very similar concepts that they don't contradict with one another But there's got to be a lot more of that going on It's good that people are interested in in austrian economics in the sense that it's it's good economics. It's right economics it's uh It's unfortunate That with the austrian economics that they pick up they pick up a bad philosophy And that is the philosophy that is behind anarchy The philosophy that is that tends to be a subjectivist philosophy or They try to hold on to whatever philosophy they've always had religion Or a contient philosophy or whatever the philosophy happens to be They hold on to philosophy and they just embrace the economics I think at the end of the day that is a losing strategy Uh, I think at the end of the day You know, you're not going to change the world based on that and You're not going to you know, you don't benefit in your own life on it You become just a fighter for economics, but but the whole point is to change your own life uh, so I think Philosophy is much more important than economics Much more foundational Much more impactful in the individual's life And I wish the austrians would take iron man seriously and they need to they they are losing because of it We are all losing because of it and I often say imagine if Mises and Hayek And I don't know who else I you know and freedmen and and and some other great economists for 50 years ago had taken iron man seriously And uh and promoted who as the philosopher of liberty I mean the world would be a completely different place today Completely different. So one of the great tragedies of the 20th century one of the great great great tragedies of the 20th century is that uh significant important intellectuals of the time did not take iron man seriously and that needs to change and uh Hopefully some of these austrian economists will will change that So as we're talking about, you know, all these difficulties in applying objectivism in one's own life or In another area like economics or psychology and so on. Um, I think one of the Let's say difficulties in in spreading objectivism is that it's so difficult to teach it And I think especially, you know, a lot of people might think that they have a good grasp of objectivism But as soon as someone asks them a question Uh, especially a tough question like a right intellectuals tend to ask Uh, then you very quickly realize like you have a notion of what the answer is But it's not you don't really you don't really hold it as strong as one might think So given that what do you think are some of the I know you're no longer the CEO of ari You know, you work for a while Given that so what do you think are some of the guidelines? to Trust someone to teach objectivism I mean, that's difficult and and we always struggle with that and we always debate it internally and it's not easy to figure that out And and one of the reasons why we've put so much emphasis on the OEC In the past it was O.G.C. Objectives Graduate Center and Uh, it has been to try to train people ourselves And then get to know them really well and then, you know, have them Um have them as uh as what as teaching assistants for a while Before you actually put them into the classroom and have them teach objectivism. So I so they you know, it has to be somebody who has a a deep understanding of the ideas of the philosophy It has to be somebody who is good at communicating and that's not always the same Communication is a whole other skill set and verbal communication. You could be a great writer but a terrible teacher um So you have to find the right people and and this is why again We're constantly trying to encourage people to join the OEC and to become part of it Particularly if if you're in a spying intellectual, particularly if you want one day to teach Particularly if you want to one day to teach objectivism, uh, you should join the OEC You should you should get engaged with the intellectuals at the institute. You should become part of of Of what we're doing and what's going on and and allow us to get to know you and to get to know your skill set And and uh, you know, the jobs are there. That is we're always looking for teachers. We need more teachers uh, but but How to how to find the right person? It's a matter of what they know And how well they are communicating it and that takes that takes a long time to prove to us that you actually can live up to that So, uh, just to try to get a little bit more specifics. What do you when you say get to know them? Uh, what do you mean? You we you want to look at their dental records already, you know Sure. I mean if dental records could tell me, um, something, um, I want to see them teach I want to see them write I want to see them think or not see them think but see them answering questions I want to I want to I want them to be in situations where Um, I can see how their mind works and how good they are communicating the ideas And I want to see them. I see the breadth and width of what they can do So a variety of different topics right gives them questions And a variety of them classes for them to teach. So I I think it's a combination of all that And of course the best way to do that is to teach them And of course, then they are then uh, they're in the position you are in the OEC right You get asked questions and you have to write and writing is really really really really hard And things you think you know until you write them out. You don't know that you don't know them And suddenly you discover what you know and what you don't know. So I want them writing I want to see what they wrote. I want to see where they're confused I want to see if they can learn they can get better if I give them the same writing assignment two months later Are they any better at it? Are they clearer thinkers? So all of that it really is a process and it's very concrete, right? I want to get to know them in an intellectual sense Right in the sense of I want to get to know how them their mind works. That means seeing how they write Seeing how they teach and seeing how they ask questions Some people are very good at they can figure out how to teach a class But then as soon as you ask them a question they fall apart So I want to I want to see how they think on their feet, which is what what What we what we refer to in terms of answering questions and we train them to do that and we we help them to do that So I'm for example, I'm I I'm doing a bunch of seminars for the institute right now on public speaking Right, so people on zoom they they come they they show up they have a they have a talk they're going to give The lecture for they give a talk for half an hour and then I tell them what I think Both of the style and of the content And then, you know, hopefully two months later they do it again Right and uh, and uh, that's it You know, so so that's how you do it and that that's the objective criteria the objective criteria is Can they can they present material in a convincing way? As judged by people who know the material So so the objectivity of it is the fact that the people evaluating them are experts Right. Yeah, that makes sense Um, so as we're talking about, you know, we got a little bit into the OAC and how it's a little bit of a numbers game that you know Mikey are like a hundred people who graduate But maybe, you know, plenty of them will go out and do like great great things. I mean, if you wanted them 20 would be great 20 out of 800 would be fantastic Right. Yeah, that would be an amazing number 20 success rate That's better than venture capitalist in silicon valley. And this is more this is more speculative than venture capital in my view 20% would be amazing Yeah, that that's fair. That's I was uh, I was pumping the numbers up a little bit for the uh Yeah, I mean think about think about how many how many people get phd's In the world out there How many of those people do anything important in their lives in terms of influencing the world? They don't just regurgitate the same stuff that everybody else regurgitate. How many of them are original? Doing something new and something significant a tiny fraction of 1% right? So 20% is huge if we can get 20% of every OAC class going on to do something important To spread the ideas we win now. How do you get to a thousand? That's the question So you can do the math how many classes of a hundred you have to graduate Where 20 each go out to do something? So you have to have 50 classes before you get to a thousand and I think a thousand is the game changer. So That's 50 years Yes, that's my time horizon. I've always said it takes about 50 years to change the culture That's also my question. I think you answered before I asked it So what would you like the objectivist movement to look like in terms of like numbers Numbers of intellectuals and an influence and books published and so on Well, I think to to to change the world. We need about a thousand people Who are teaching speaking writing? um And who are professional intellectuals and who are basically objectivists Applying it in a variety of different ways and and to a variety of different topics They they they need to be at newspapers. They need to be well The equivalent of newspapers today. They need to have sub stacks. They need to have youtube shows They need to have they need to be in academia. They need to be at schools at high schools at universities At whatever whatever the the the mechanism is um So, uh, you know, and they need to be people who know the philosophy inside out and can apply it inside I you know, not everything right? So so you can't expect everybody to be Uh to know everything about metaphysics or everything about a philosophy or epistemology But they need to know enough to be able to apply it effectively in their field of study in the area So you need about a thousand people like that. Some of them will be alex epstein Some of them will be greg selamiri's Or terra smith some of them will be me somebody. Some of them will be Don Watkins, you know, you've got it for all of us are different and all of us do different things and Engage in the world in different ways But you need numbers because only a few of those thousands will be really really really prominent And remember, you know, you said a hundred Of which 20 right we haven't we've never had a class of a hundred So you can't start counting 20 years ago or when the OEC started because they have been classes of 100 Only now are we getting to real big numbers and real big classes So it's still it's still true that it's about 50 years from now Maybe it's 50 years from five years ago 50 years from someone but it's about 50 years from now Hopefully it will get to the point where we have classes that are bigger than a hundred and we can accelerate this and make it faster But but you need oh and one of the things you need is You know, I've talked about this in other circumstances You need artists you have to have artists And they have to be artists who know the philosophy have integrated it But then don't create objectivist art because there is no such thing They create art they they create good art. So they're really really good at the art They've gone and studied in Italy or whatever and they really know what they're doing when it comes to producing art But they have the sense of life and they have the values that are That are going to change that are going to produce good art both thematically and Anesthetically uh, and then you need you need um scientists Let it pick up talks about this in um his dim hypothesis book You need scientists educators and artists On top of the intellectuals the philosophers and everybody else So you need scientists And and which means you need people who are actually doing things as science who credit who credit um Their success in science To iron man. I mean, I think Harry Vinswong has said imagine if somebody gets an overpriced of physics And he's accepting the award and he attributes a success to iron man's epistemology That would in many ways change the world, right? So that's she needs scientists Um in uh scientists educators educators. I think we're getting scientists educators Artists and intellectuals those the four Areas in which we need people and of course You know, they're going to be tens of thousands of people who've been inspired by iron man Who might have studied it quite as deep But uh, but but who are then communicating these ideas at whatever level they can Whatever level they know to the rest of the public and that slowly Changes the the world changes the the terms in which people think And it what I call soften. This is the culture to these these these ideas So the more people they are out there talking about these ideas expressing these ideas engaged in these ideas The faster this happens So I mean you brought up the dem hypothesis. Um And you brought up this this 50 year Uh number right estimate. Uh, and if I remember correctly that was around Leonard P. Koff's prediction like that in about 50 years Well, it was a prediction that he says in the book was inspired by me He wanted to say he wanted to say there's no hope Oh, I see I see and I convinced him that there was hope and and you know, 50 years was You know a good reasonable A good number Okay, and neither of us will be alive to see if it turned out right or not right Yeah, um, so I mean you're talking about some let's say these challenges in in Having objectivism be more influential in in society and culture Uh, and you know, there's a need for more fundamentally more Human resources more intellectuals more individuals thinking and applying these ideas But what do you think is um, I mean if you had If you had a magic wand And I have a sense that Harry beans anger would be upsetting me asking I put the question like this because it's like fantasizing But if you had a magic wand and you could just, you know, change whatever you want to change in the world or Let me put it in financial terms Uh, if you had like infinite money, right, you have like a billion dollars Let's say What do you think needs to happen to get to let's say this this point of a thousand uh intellectuals Well, I think if you had unlimited resources, um The first thing that has to change is educational system. So I would if I had a billion dollars, I would invest heavily in um in changing the educational system in in Trying to privatize it so so working politically to try to privatize education and at the same time supporting schools with good curriculums and supporting any objectivist entrepreneur who's willing to go out there and start a school and And and and build curriculum and and build maybe online educational tools They just improve the ability of young people to think Because if they can think then we should be able to capture them, right? If they can't think then it's hopeless So that would be the first thing and then the second thing is I would just Take whatever the online institute is doing today and and and you know Make it bigger, right? So um, uh Take all the financial constraints away. Basically, uh, say, uh, you know, whether it's it's uh Marketing at at the shrug to young people trying to get teachers to teach it Trying to get free copies in the hands of people making that global not just in the u.s But in brazil in asia and you know in in in uh in europe even in africa We just got a we're just about to send a bunch of books to africa um The people all over the world. So so try to just scale that up as as much as you can You know liberate a lot of the intellectuals out there. So whatever intellectuals we have who um might be struggling financially, uh in terms of uh In terms of uh making a living so they have to do They can't just dedicate themselves to just objectivism and just spending the world buying them out in a sense Just saying, okay, here's the money Go just do just teach just speak just just do youtube just whatever it is that you do Go out then and spread the ideas or whatever you can so basically using the resources to let it to to enhance to Increase the ability of the intellectuals to get as many people as possible and then to market the ideas as broadly and as widely as possible um You know the institute has to be very focused right now and both financially because of time and resources take away the financial constraints and and You know, I think amazing things can happen well, um we talked about the The challenges to to make the ideas more knowable and we have about the ooc so uh What do you think are the main things? Those in the 20s can do to contribute to the future to the diffusion of Iran's ideas. I mean, it's a new generation Many things change from our generation from your generation. So what are the challenges I had What they can do to to help spread the ideas Well, I think the best thing could do is is is promote the ideas get people to read the books Encourage people to read the books Um, you know, do what we call it was done study at the oac become whether you become an intellectual or not You'll just have a better grasp of the ideas. You'll become a better communicator um You know organize study groups reading groups Uh organize events and bring out objective speakers to those events Encourage people to follow us on social media Share I mean one of the amazing things today is that there was so much content Right. I mean, you've got all of lend its pickups courses. You've got of all of iron rands lectures All available free online Why aren't Young people just sharing sharing sharing. I mean, they should be on on twitter every day. I should see Somebody sharing something by lend a pick off every single day and I don't see it You know people are reluctant to share This amazing content and and and that's I think unfortunate So you don't have to become an intellectual which you can do is leverage the best intellectuals in the world For the cause you believe in by using their content and and because of social media Uh and because of the internet we can now at a marginal cost of zero Just get these ideas out there into the world. So I really would like to see objectivists all over the world Sharing iron rands talk sharing iron rands article sharing lend a pickups lectures You know, and then when you finish doing all that then you can start doing tera smith and gix elamiri and you know there's a million other people right but but You probably got a long time before you get through just just the core material of lend a pickoff And and iron rand. I there's so much good material. I mean when I was When I first discovered objectivism 40 years ago um there was almost no content It was a la shrugged and and the things that iron rand wrote and that's it there was no lectures by lend a pick off yet and if you if you got them in the 80s you had to go to special clubs and pay a lot of money to listen to tapes and It was impossible to learn anything. There was no resources particularly if you live overseas today, it's there's a million resources and What sends me is that people are not taking advantage of it um, you know people are not uh engaging with that material and and uh It's a shame because it all exists out there and it's all accessible and it all needs to go out there and Exactly how to market it each one of you can decide But if everybody who is an objectivist calls himself an objectivist started sharing one piece of objectivist literature a day That would have a massive impact out there uh Just uh on uh on on a note on this on the iron rand campus courses uh from brazil we are uh from with objectives of brazil we are uh sharing One new course each 15 days and we have at least 2,200 people signing in Each 15 days and more more than 3,000 that were already impacted. That's great We are trying to to get things uh Out as much as we can in a coordinated way because people cannot watch it It all but we have more than a hundred hours subtitled So if you have the chance and you don't know and you don't know english pretty well and you are brazilian you are watching this Uh, you can uh, you can contact us. You can access the platform. It's all there so um We we are doing our best to to get the idea out And uh, let's hope we have a bigger impact. We have daily articles We have more than a thousand articles more than a thousand videos daily on our youtube channel as well So it's really an ongoing effort and it's really nice to see people Getting to know the ideas and and having an impact. Absolutely. I I agree completely and brazil is uh is is being particularly open to this and um and and really Done a good job Promote you guys have done a good job Promoting these ideas, you know, iron man goes back in brazil to the organized around iron man go back in brazil to the early 80s and in pota alegre and And uh, you know, there's been a kind of an objectivist movement if you will or influence of objectivism in brazil for for now 40 years And uh, and it's great. It's great to see it growing. It's great to see it It's uh, great to see it sustained. So great job. Uh, you guys are doing and You know, there's a lot of content now available in in portugese. There's a lot of content in spanish Uh, there's a probably the two languages outside of english where there's the most content And uh, you know, there's a lot of upside. I think it's a consequence to play in in in latin america So, uh, jaron, as you were uh talking about the volume the amount of content that there is available nowadays I mean, I've kind of done the math on What's available just counting the books and the the courses? I mean that easily reaches about a thousand hours of studying time Very very easily. Oh, easily. Yeah Just going through it once Is a thousand hours. Yeah. Uh, so when you add up, let's say the thinking with other people, let's say Reading groups and discussion groups and so on that can very easily go into a few thousands of hours of studying and that doesn't equate to mastery that equates to A decent grasp of the ideas So so my question is, um You know on motivation What do you think is the Let's say the connection between discipline, which is broadly called self-discipline Uh, and and motivation because a lot of people you probably hear there's a lot They say oh, I love and ran. I really like her ideas But then the bottom line is well Can you just sit down for a few hundreds of hours across a few months or a few years and just read the stuff? You know I mean I I think it's all about motivation at the end of the day. I think if you're if you're properly motivated And you understand the value of what you're going to get Then I think the discipline will come suddenly we live in a culture of short attention spans of people not used to studying that you know, they think they can listen to a And a Video on youtube for 20 minutes and they know everything there was to know about a particular topic They the masters of the universe But you know, but that's changing look at lex feedman lex feedman does these Four hour interviews and people listen to them. So I think if people are motivated and see the value that they will receive From spending a thousand hours studying. I think they will do it, but It's hard to convince them and and and then it's hard for them to grasp The value of philosophy in their lives. It's a real challenge for people to to kind of realize how important this is in their own life and and Yeah, very few people land up doing it because of that Right, so on this note of studying And I just to ask a question online rand I've seen many of the interviews of people who knew her especially like in the 50s and 60s and she would help out people when they were taking their PhDs and clarifying what a particular philosopher said and so on Um, so do you happen to know what her studying routine was like? Especially in terms of like studying other philosophers Yeah, I really don't I mean you'd have to ask somebody who who has studied her life more, but I don't know Um, do you know who it is so I can reach out to them? Well, certainly harry menswanger would be a good source He might know you'll know, you know more than I do. I mean harry was there in some respect at least for some years I wasn't so uh, I mean he might know uh, you might want to ask jeff britting at the ironman archives who Has studied her life and has the archival evidence of her life. He might know but uh, yeah, I I have no idea Right, so, um, right I guess we got to a question that yaram brook doesn't know the answer to that's right. That's very unusual That's very we we get extra points for that Well, let me end on my last question is uh Uh, perhaps more on a positive note um So, I mean you were the CEO of ari for about 17 years or so Yeah, uh, so could you tell us uh, what do you think were you know in in trying to like create this Objectivist world. Let's say you're having this impact Have objectivism have a bigger impact in the culture. What do you think were some of the main highlights or your main accomplishments? Uh as ari CEO I mean, I'd say getting ironman's books, uh read more in in dramatically more so book sales increased dramatically uh While I was CEO, I mean they they went up and down over time, but generally the trend was dramatically higher um, particularly, uh books to I initiated the books to high school students If what we call the free books the teachers program Which which saw hundreds of thousands of books distributed to high school teachers Um, and they taught them uh to high school is the fact that the essay contest Um during those years was the largest in the world over 20 000 essays So that's on one uh sense just book sales and and and getting the books into the hands of kids Uh was was was hugely significant and then the other was The the formalization and the growth of the oac Making it into a formal program making it into an ambitious program um It's gone through a lot of different phases and a lot of different types, but we've always pushed that and then third I'd say is This idea of having objectivist intellectuals out there in the world and that the institute could play a role both in training them But also in supporting them and hiring them and Helping promote their work and getting them out there. I mean Alex Epstein again, I referred to him worked at the institute for seven Five or seven years before he went out on his own and did what he did and You know the idea that the institute could be um a source of Those intellectuals that they could could help train them and then support them and then encourage them I think all of those are some of the achievements that we achieved during those 17 years And and look the institute grew dramatically the amount of money coming into it should grew dramatically And the amount of people engaged in our programs drew dramatically during those 17 years people forget how small The institute was in 2000 when I took over right And and of course the fourth thing would be international The institute was very much us focused until I don't know 2007 eight somewhere around there where we started becoming more international and and looking and you know as a consequence, we become much more active all over the world Yeah, I mean on this International aspect, I think you'd be glad to know that now the The anoint center latin america is doing essay contests. Yes for hoping spanish and portuguese. So You know, it's terrific and again spanish and portuguese are probably the two biggest languages For objectives and to expand into you know, we're not going to make much progress in french Or in german But but spanish and portuguese this there's a lot of upside Yeah, so do you have any last comments in the last remarks you want to add? I just say i'm looking forward to Visiting you guys in september I'll be in brazil and in other parts of latin america in september for So i'm hoping we do a bunch of different events and I get to meet a lot of the people who listen to your show And participate in the seminars you guys organize I don't know if i'll make it out to put our leg but i'll certainly be in sub paulo And and maybe other places and generally as I think i've expressed in the past I love brazil. I I find the people engaging and and And uh really positive. I've always had positive experiences then i'm looking forward to visiting again and visiting visiting often and Helping have a real impact on brazilian culture Well, thanks, adam for being with us today So for all brazilian speakers Starting tomorrow, we're going to be working on the simultaneous interpreting of this interview So you're going to be able to listen to it in portuguese And uh also you can check our playlist where we are we are interviewing Intellectuals objectivist intellectuals from all over the world. We we had mark moses. We had don watkins robert garmon Now yaron and much more to come So thanks. Thanks again yaron and thanks for everybody who had the chance to watch us. Thank you and thanks everybody Bye. Bye. See you in brazil See you