 The radical, fundamental principles of freedom, rational self-interest, and individual watchers. This is the Iran Book Show. You ready? Welcome to Iran Book Show on this Sunday afternoon. Thanks for joining me and we today are going to do pretty much an open Q&A. So, you know, those of you online watching live. You can use the super chat feature. Jennifer is here with me, so she'll be asking some live questions and we'll see who else pops in. Anybody, anybody who's supposed to show it $100 or more has gotten an invitation. So we'll see, we'll see as they come in. I think last time a number of people joined us that were late. A couple of things I wanted to catch up with on before we get to the question period. Hopefully you guys didn't miss yesterday's interview with Matt Ridley. I've interviewed Matt before. Matt just came out with this book viral on the search for the origins of COVID-19. I'm a little surprised about the book is not doing better. That show is not being watched more, I guess people are not really interested anymore. COVID is like passe, it's like over or whatever. Or people have just decided what they think about COVID and they're not interested in new ideas and new views. I highly recommend the book, it's well written, it's, and it presents some pretty alarming evidence anyway you want to look at it no matter what you think the origins of COVID are, you know, I think, I think that the, there's a lot to be really really worried about. I also want to make clear that the conclusion, the conclusion of the book is not that the lab leak theory is what actually happened. You know that's I think where the way Matt thinks the preponderance of evidence lays right now that's what it suggests right now but everything's still open. There's a lot yet of evidence to go through the Chinese and the Chinese researchers and everybody else have been super close mouthed about this. So, we've gotten very little evidence and very little cooperation from the Chinese, I guess not too surprising, given given the kind of regime that they have over there these days. But also, a lot of misinformation or what looks like misinformation from authorities in the United States, particularly from this from from the people in, in the US who obviously were cooperating with the Chinese lab, legitimately out in the open nothing conspiratorial here, but while cooperating with them and have not been forthcoming with information about this. The more you follow this online the more you can see the different points of view and and that's the disarray in terms of information that is available about this issue it's pretty pathetic two years into this or almost two years into this. Well two years into it if you count the first infections probably happened in November of last year that we know so little about where this came from and we have so little cooperation from both US authorities and Chinese authorities so it's it's very very disappointing and very very worrisome that the hiding no matter what the answer is I mean there's reason to believe that the Chinese want to hide it. If it was an animal from animal market and there's reason to believe that Chinese want to hide it if it was a lab leak either way, the Chinese I think would rather just leave it shrouded and mystery and leave it open. But I do believe that there are people in the US who know the answer to that who are not cooperating. You know I saw a piece of it that there was an article today that was published I think it's science magazine from a well known scientist. The headline that the media reported on it was that he is presenting now proof that it was a not proof but strong evidence that it was that the the whole thing started in the marketplace if you actually read the article it's not exactly what he says. But it is counter evidence to the idea that it started the lab. But you know it all is now there's a bunch of evidence and you have to filter through it and you have to figure it out. And that's what people like Matt Ridley and Alina Chan and many others on the internet are trying to do. So it's tricky. It's what's particularly surprising is that the American intelligence agencies don't have a view about all this you would think that they would have had a much clearer, much clearer view of what's going on. So anyway, I encourage you to listen to to watch the interview. The interview is, you know, is both on my channel also on the ingenuism channel. Generally, I am hopeful that many of you will subscribe to the ingenuism newsletter I think it's got some cool stuff published on a regular basis the videos the interviews are really really good. You should go over there there's a podcast that I think that I joined frequently and and is good so. You know, go go over and and and hopefully hopefully watch watch those videos watch those interviews and sign up for the ingenuism newsletter that's at ingenuism.com. I before I get to Jennifer, one more issue I want to quickly cover because just the way the news cycle has been and I have not been around. And I'll tell you where I've been in a little bit. Michael says, so this is right Kyle. Michael says just because Kyle shouldn't have been there. That doesn't mean he loses the right to defend himself. Absolutely. I never said it did. I'm not surprised he was acquitted. It's unlike the prosecution was pretty pathetic even by their own count. But also, it sounded like there was reason for self defense. I think anybody more mature, anybody more experienced anybody who is, you know, a little bit older and trained would not have would not have been in a position where they would have killed those those people but And that's why I said Kyle should have never been there. I've never had an AR 15 and calcium not have driven from his state to another state so called defend property. But of course, a lot of things should have happened differently and the primary thing that should have happened differently, besides them not being riots is the police should have done something about the riots. That's the primary the primary is, this is what happens on the anarchy under anarchy, a bad stuff happens bad stuff happens. People shoot people. When there is no police when there is no agency of self defense mayhem happens and it's very, very difficult afterwards to recreate exactly who's responsible for what, and who did what to whom and why, you know, who should be blamed for what. And this is why it's so important to have an agency, a police force, a well trained police force and an active police force that actually engages with criminals and stops them. And clearly these rioters were criminals and they needed to be stopped so that the big fault here lies with the lack of policing with both at the local level at the state level if this was beyond what the local police could handle and they should have intervened, they should have sent in the National Guard they should have done what was necessary to not allow these Kennesaw was a Kennesaw Kennesaw, Wisconsin to go up and blazes the way they did. But of course you're seeing that all of a place you see you saw that last night I think in Portland Oregon again Portland is a blaze again. And you're seeing the inability of the police to handle these rioters primarily because they're not willing to use the kind of force necessary. You know, when, you know, these police are not cannot use the kind of force necessary to defend themselves against the kind of rioters that exist out there they knew they the only way to deal with riots is by use of more force and more substantial force and not equivocal force and and make the rioters pay. And if they're rioting. I mean it's one thing to demonstrate and I think the riot, I've problems with demonstrators, but certainly once it turns into a riot. The police should be should be emboldened to use whatever forces necessary to break it up and to stop property damage to stop the burning of things to stop mayhem and destruction to stop the anarchy. All right, perfect timing Deborah Wow. You did that perfectly Debbie. All right, so I am going to go to Jennifer. And we're going to take a question for Jennifer question from Debbie and then the super chat is open. $20 questions get priority. I've got a question from last time here but other than that I don't have much. Also, we have goals to reach. We certainly didn't reach them yesterday with the interview but then I didn't expect we would. In terms of it wasn't really, you know, it seemed like you guys didn't have too many questions from Matt, although you should have had a lot of questions for him. But hopefully you have questions for me today so feel free to use the super chat. Thanks, Ryan. We'll get to that question feel free to use the super chat and feel free to help support the show by using the super chat, the super chat feature. All right, Jennifer. They just announced in Austria they're going to mandate the vaccine by February. Do you think that that could possibly happen here. I think it would be very difficult here I mean what happened in Austria is the first step was to they wanted to lock up in a sense they wanted to lock down the unvaccinated. So, which is unbelievable so they wanted to basically say unvaccinated people cannot leave their homes and vaccinate people have to be under lockdown. You can only leave your home, you know the police would be able to stop you in the street and ask you to show vaccine card for you to even be outside. Now that is of course nuts. And I think there was such a backlash to that and the ridiculous nature and the nature of that is they went, they need to solve that and the solution for that is, you know, we're going to force everybody to get a vaccine and then we don't have to stop in the street because everybody will have to have a vaccine. I guess they'll tattoo it into their foreheads. You walk around with a tattoo that says yes, I'm vaccinated. I'm okay. It's just it truly is unbelievable. What the Austrians are doing. It's, it's super surprising. You know, it's going to be interesting how people interpret it. The Germans might do the same as talking Germany about mandating vaccines. What other countries in Europe, what they're done here in Puerto Rico is instead of mandating you get vaccinated they made it very difficult for you if you're unvaccinated. So for example, you know, in France, you have to have a vaccine passport to go into restaurants to go into stores to go into public areas. And basically vaccination rates went way up because once you force people to once you required it at the government level, people incentivize to get the vaccine whether they whether they wanted to or not. So in the world's gone nuts. It's gone put any and if you look at the stats. I think I think Matt was saying this I mean, if you are vaccinated, your probability of dying from this is is the flu, less than flu, even for old people. This is not, you know, if you're vaccinated you're fairly protected the vaccine diminishes over time the effectiveness of vaccine diminishes over time to get a booster, you probably have to get a booster every year. You know, it's another it's another flu for those who are vaccinated for though and there's also reason to believe that over time, COVID will become less deadly for if you're unvaccinated, maybe you get sicker. You know, okay, so that's your problem. Why is it any of our problem. Right. So, unfortunately, turns out the vaccinated people get COVID. Unfortunately, turns out that vaccinated people can infect other people with COVID at a lower rates than unvaccinated but they still can. So, the whole thing is a is a mess it's a mess because of communication. It's a mess because people don't understand data. It's a mess which I've been saying from day one it's a mess because the state wants to impose zero risk on all of us. We have a mandate that we get the booster every single year. There's no end to it and and what they but what they learned from last year from the lockdowns last year is that they can get away with anything, and that we would roll over. Now they are major demonstrations in Europe right now I was I just read a headline from the Netherlands from from Holland, yesterday. I haven't read the stories I don't know what the what the details are but that there were demonstrations in the police were shooting people. So I don't know if they were using live bullets or rubber bullets. But at least in it you know it sounds like the Netherlands they know how to break up a a riot. But this was a demonstration about not not accepting lockdowns as finally people are starting to wake up to the need to resist lockdowns and and it's becoming violence and I think if if Germany mandates this there's a huge segment of the German population that is going to demonstrate and riot. It's also of course very politicized the right in Germany, the anti vax right is is is pretty, you know is is filled with all kinds of characters on the right over there so you get this mixture. You have to be careful when you're when your anti vax mandates, because then you might be associated with some crazies on the right. It's all, you know, it's so politicized and so messy and so anti non scientific and so authoritarian and so status that the whole thing is a mess and a disaster. There's going to be more and more. They're going to be more and more demonstrations they're going to be more and more conflicts and and standoffs in Europe, and it'll be very interesting I mean to see how this all pans out one of the interesting things about Austria is if I'm not mistaken. And maybe I am but I don't think I am is that the government in Austria is a right wing government. This is not, you know, and I wonder how people are going to explain this as a left wing conspiracy that the whole covert thing was a left wing conspiracy. So many people in in the right in the US believe that somehow lockdowns mandates vaccines and everything were left wing conspiracy then how come the rights in Austria of all places is is about to inflict is to mandate so it's just it's just bizarre. Yeah, but your own don't underestimate how people can twist things around to support their conspiracy theory for example one thing popped into my head, the rights clearly been infiltrated by the left in Austria. That's what's going on there. It's all just the left now. So that just proves how effective this conspiracy really is the fact that now a right wing government is doing things associated with a left wing conspiracy. But you see this is yes and but you know the contradictions are beautiful though because you know one of the most admired figures among the right today, and particularly the conspiracy theory right is Orban the president of hungry and the Hungarian right because he shut down the media shut down the left he shut down everything he closed the border to these, you know to Muslim immigration. He's the hero of Tucker Carlson, and many on the right. And hungry said lockdowns, vaccine mandates, you know, all these things so I wonder how they but you're right, they always find a way around it. You know, Orban is confused on this issue. This he's got some leftist advisor, or he's trying to manipulate the left he's out lefting the left. You know, who knows, we could we could really control our brains to find ways in which conspiracy theories can justify what they've come up with. And one of the things I want to say this about the interview yesterday was really and I didn't. So I, I did. I think early on reject the lab leak process certainly rejected the idea last year of the virus being manufactured. And this being a bio weapon, based on what I read from scientists about it. It turns out I was wrong. It turns out those scientists were wrong on both counts, both on the count of the lab leak the lab leak is is. I don't know how likely I wouldn't put a probability on it, but it's certainly not a nutty proposal it's it's given the number of lab leaks we have in the US of actual SARS viruses. It's, it's I think a high likelihood that this was a lab leak or at least over 50% or somewhere in that region. But even the manufactured part is not at this point completely crazy once you actually read the extent to which scientists that being involved in gain a function research which means manipulating viruses to be more infectious we understand them so then we can try to figure out how to combat them. And once you understand this as mad describe the structure of this particular virus and I forget the name of this thing that there is being attached data allows it to be in contagious it is. I don't think it's likely that it was manufactured not not all virus but that section of the virus that was played with. But I think there is a positive probability I don't think it's nuts. I think that it was done away with but the nice thing about what matters done is compared to what people last, you know, who came out and made these arguments last year is, it's a whole book, you know, filled with both sides, not taking a definitive stand and he's tilting in a particular direction, tons of evidence, trying to make the best case for all different scenarios. It strikes me and maybe I'm wrong but it strikes me as a very objective analysis of the material, not what I usually see from the conspiracy theory people very not political. And you saw he saw the interview yesterday. Matt stayed away from politics he wouldn't comment on Fauci and Rand Paul because of that and I respect him for that. But it's, you know, if you're going to make, you know, what is it if you're going to make extreme claims if you're going to make big claims, you better have big evidence right you better have substantial evidence and I think what Matt and Alina have done here is they've done that they've assembled evidence for this and, and that is, you know, on that that is pretty amazing. Scott says you have to take a stand. No, I don't. I mean that's silly. It's, it's, it's a, most of these kind of issues are probabilistic. It's not you don't have certainty. It's absurd. Matt who's done all this research Alina, who is an expert in this field have done all the research both of them in the sciences don't have a definitive answer. It is absurd to think that on complex issues you should have 100% certainty about these things that is truly, truly absurd. I mean, too many people take too many stands on too many complex issues that they don't really have enough information to take a stand on. And I think a lot of that's because of this attitude that this is something important going on, I have to have a position on it. But if you don't have the knowledge, you know, I mean you've got to do your best to come down somewhere or another but don't present it as this is what it is, if you don't know. I mean, my all my allies believe X so I probably should believe X too. Right, right. And I'll fight for X to the death not because I have any firm said knowledge of it because all my friends believe X. It's truly, truly scary. Yeah. All right, Debbie. I'll just one more note on the vaccine mandate. It kind of is happening here in a way my company has had to. And not because we chose as a company but because we're considered a government contractor because things to the government. And so we've had to we could we did have the option of no longer selling anything to the government and extricating ourselves from the government. Completely, which would be great. Yeah, but I don't know to what extent like the economy could continue to function given how many places the government as its tendrils in that you know could companies even function if they truly disconnected all economy would boom. Well, in the long run. Yeah, but in the short run, all the children would be. No, I agree. I mean, the OSHA mandate is under review by the courts. It's right now being frozen by by I think the appellate court. And ultimately, I think we'll reach the Supreme Court, the whole OSHA, where the OSHA can do this. But you're right, the government does have the authority and it does it on lots of things. It does it on diversity. It does it on minimum wages. It does it a bunch of different things to mandate through executive order not through Congress executive order that its contractors behave in a certain way. This is how we got affirmative action originally. It was a it was a executive order that mandated government contractors have these diversity requirements and that's how it spread to basically the entire world. There's been such a such a phenomenon in the world out there. And of course universities in a sense of government contractors because they get money from the government. And because we have such a big government and has tentacles everywhere and in everything. You know, you can't escape the government mandates from so yes there's a sense in which we do have a mandate so what what for example what is the company doing is it asking you to submit a vaccine proof of that you got a vaccine. Yeah, everyone has to submit it by a certain date, and anyone who hasn't either submitted that or a gotten an exemption approved is going to lose their job, be separated from the company. And so that's really a stressful thing for us, because we could lose some percentage of our workforce at a time when there's a labor shortage. And, and, you know, we provide, you know, it's a medical it's a biotech company. So we have provide things that are associated with testing and vaccination. So then now what's going on is this policy to control, or to supposedly help with this pandemic is going to undercut businesses that are producing things that are actually doing, you know, having an impact on the pandemic, and making it harder for us to dig ourselves out of it, because it'll be harder, you know, by inducing these labor shortages into the companies, there is some percentage of the workforce that's going to absolutely refuse to get vaccinated. Even though they're going to lose their jobs. So, you know, it's, it's really crazy. And we just like we absolutely can't afford to we're trying to hire more people and that's a struggle, and retain the people that we already have. And, and so it's, it's a really horrible thing to do to companies. It's, it's, it's insane. And again, I said this before, but if you look at these statistics about COVID, and if you're young, if you're under 25 under 30, it's not clear that you should be vaccinated. It's not obvious. It's, you know, it's very reasonable for you, particularly, you know, there was some evidence, it was just a paper yesterday I was looking at, with some evidence of heart inflammation. In, in particularly in young people who, who gets, who gets the Moderna vaccine, for example. It's just, there's just reason not to get it. And, and, and there's very little reason to get it, given that if you're young, the consequence of getting COVID a very, very, very minor and Yeah, I meant Ford, they're doing that too. They're going to fire people soon if they don't get it. Yeah, most companies are going to be in that position. Considered a government contractor. No, no, they're just doing it for, no, I don't think so. Just a company choice. Huh. Well, I don't know though, because most companies could probably be considered a government contractor if they sell something that ends up in the hands of the government, but I don't. It's pretty broad net that they're casting. No, I mean, it's truly, it truly is horrific. And it's truly authoritarian and it's, and it's not surprising at the same time. This is the, this is the direction whether we like it or not. And, and it's hard to tell what the speed of this is actually happening, but we're moving towards authoritarianism, one way or the other, you know, and to becoming a less fee society one way or the other. And it doesn't really again matter who's in charge. This is where we're heading. But in spite of that, it's so important to continue focusing on positive value or perhaps because of that. And I found that this is what my comment was going to be about that you made a really interesting comment in. I can't remember which episode might have been the one on a recent podcast about what the psychology of people who turn Trump is people who were kind of surprisingly wouldn't have expected it like a prominent objectivist in some cases and you made a comment that they were you think overcome by hatred of the left and that they were just so overcome by that that it like it kind of overrode their positive values and that they, they just wanted to jump on any kind of bandwagon that that was about attacking the left. I thought that was really useful and insightful. It makes sense I can see this mechanism there's some point for anyone where if you're so convinced that things are so bad and something so horrible has been done to you that you don't even want to pursue values anymore you just want to wipe out whoever did this horrible thing for you, you know, like I can imagine a scenario where that would be my mindset, like if somebody murdered my whole family and did something terrible to me, you know, like that can happen. So if you continue to focus exclusively on this negative and that just becomes your whole world. Then it's going to turn you like you're going to become the thing that you're focusing on you're going to actually turn into someone who becomes a medicine itself, and leads to the makes me think of that quote from out of shrug that I really love don't think of being in danger or enemies any longer than it is necessary in order to fight them. And this is why I think this mechanism is why and that, you know, we're as objectivists I think anyone who has a fundamental set of values that's fundamentally at odds with the major cultural forces and trends is at risk, at least of falling into that trap. And, you know, there are a lot of objectively bad things happening in the world like what we were just talking about, but, but this just reinforces to me how critically important it is to still focus on living and pursuing positive values. I mean, you really like if you don't focus on that on living and being happy, you're not going to live and be happy if you focus on death and destruction that's what you're going to get for yourself. I agree completely. And I, and I think, you know, again, I'm not going to attribute motivations to everybody. Yeah, who voted for Trump or everybody who is on but certain people. There's no question that the entire motivation the entire state of mind is negative and for some of these people used to be obsessed with the thread of Islam, I know a number of them, the world is going to end and Muslims are going to take over there was going to be massive terrorist attacks, we are, everything was weak and and while I acknowledge the threat I didn't think it was going to end the United States I never thought Muslims were going to be taking over the United States and that was going to be and and I'm not even convinced that's what's going to happen in Europe, but that's what obsessed them and that led them then to be massively anti anti immigration, and then, you know, anti anti the left on immigration but beyond that anti anti, you know, then then that fear, as it didn't materialize right so if you really look at the last 10 years, it seems like the Muslim threat has declined not intensified, at least it seems that way now we'll see what happens the next 10 years, but at least the last 10 years, the Muslim threat has declined that obsession transferred from Islam to the left. And again I'm not, I'm not saying that everybody you support a Trump is this way I'm saying some block, and then they became all consumed by every little detail of the threat that the left pose to freedom and liberty they associated with everybody on the left, the attributes of the worst people on the left, that is of the of the far left of the complete, you know, the complete nuts. They associated these attributes with them. And, and, and, you know, as a consequence, because Trump, the thing they loved about more than anything else was the fact that he stood up against the left that he talked that he talked down to the left that he challenged the left that he that he ridiculed the left that he wanted to shut down leftist newspapers that that he was willing to say it say what they were feeling he was willing to project what they believed and, and I think that a lot of people that motivation through hatred that motivation through fear is what really and look Trump ran a brilliant campaign in 2016. I think the reason he lost in 2020 is to the large extent, because he didn't pursue the same kind of campaign he didn't be partially because he'd been president for four years it was hard to tell the people the world was falling apart and it was not his fault it was everybody else's but in 2016 he pursued a brilliant campaign to really encourage fear and encourage hate and encourage resentment of the other, and, and tell people that the world was over and the world was falling apart and he was the only thing that could save them. And that's, that's, I think people bought into that and they bought into hook line and sinker. And then of course a degree to which the left hated Trump was reason to love him because anything the left hates, you would support because you hate the left so much and many people. Many, many people. Again, I think, I think had a particular view of Trump because of of how how the left hated him, and then it soon became. If you were critical of Trump you automatic part of that left. So I, I'm still being accused of being a commie leftist, all kinds of stuff, not for any particular thing I've ever said except my disdain for Trump. Immediately with with the left. I mean, and it's hard it's hard to. You know I struggle with this because it's hard to. It's like the the the vital thing right. It's hard to be objective. It's hard to look at all the different viewpoints it's hard to really assess. Who is the bigger threat long term not short run. I mean, I was against Trump, but I knew that Biden was awful it wasn't like I was providing and I knew that we would take a huge hit to freedom and liberty and business and and all of that if by into taxes potentially if Biden was elected but to sometimes to be able to lose in the short run in order to have a little bit of hope for the long run is a difficult thing to do and not everybody's going to see it and I get it that not everybody sees it. So I, I don't resent people who disagree with me, but they certainly wasn't me. It's, it's, it truly is, it truly is stunning. That that is the way in which some people became completely obsessed with the with the Trump phenomena and obsessed with the evil of the left left is evil. No question. But are they the bigger long term threat to liberty in the US. That is, that is at least in in the current form. That is the big question. And I, as you know, I have a view on that. Well, I mean, there's also a difference. I think there's a big difference between people who think that they assess the situation differently and they think the lack is a bigger long term threat than the right but that's not what I'm talking about. What we're talking about is the people who became like militant Trump, like they became full time residents of what Sam Harris calls Trump a stand, which I really enjoy. I like the way that captures the spirit of that community very well. Yeah, it became a religion. It became a religion and still is a religion for many of them. And, and that's, yeah, that's exactly. That's exactly what happens. All right, let's see. Ryan has a question. All right guys. $20 questions. If you want to ask about anything I'll answer about anything but you got to put $20 in front of it to get on the board we we we we we behind any kind of goal. Shay, thanks. We'll get to that later. But we will start with with Ryan. Hi, I listened to your talk with Ashton Cohen. That's right. I did a talk with Ashton Cohen. He is concerned that big tech and sway elections due to their massive user base. Is this a real concern? Today we accept the risk because more government power is worth is that right? But they can sway elections. But breaking them up is going to stop their ability to sway elections so it's going to transfer the ability to sway elections to who to the mainstream media or should we break them up? Should we break a fox because they have a potential to sway the elections? I've given this example a million times, right? But I'll do it again. In 1989, 1980, when Ronald Reagan ran for president, there were three networks, ABC, NBC, CBS, and maybe PBS, all of them affiliated with the left. There were maybe five major newspapers in the United States, four at least affiliated with the left. There was no internet. There was no talk radio. There was no rush limbo. There was nothing. Every single major media player in the United States was dominated by the left. And Ronald Reagan still won. Yeah, they maybe weren't as bad as they are today, but go back and read Ayn Rand's commentary about the New York Times in the 1960s and 70s. It was a bastion of the left and it was completely biased for the left back then. It's only gotten worse since then. The differences that today, there are like a million different news sources anywhere from the nuttiest conspiracy theory website to explicitly pro-Trump right wing media to less explicitly right wing media to people who present themselves as the middle. Although I don't think there is anybody really in the middle to moderately left all the way to the far left. Everything is there. Everything. But you have an alternative. There is Fox. There's not only Fox's or kinds of media to the right of Fox. The blog post is substacked is the internet. So the idea that any one company could sway the election, I think is absurd, particularly as compared to history. I think it's much less their ability to sway the elections are far significantly reduced. You know, my view of the Russians trying to sway the elections was, okay, you know, what are they going to do? They're going to distribute propaganda. But at the end of the day, isn't it the job of you as a voter to figure out what's true or not and to figure out what you want to vote for or not. It's not an easy job. That's why I'm not a big proponent of democracy, unlimited democracy. But you can't just assume that people do what they're told in the media that the media is all powerful. I don't think the media has ever been all powerful. And I don't think the media is all powerful today. I think today, it might be less powerful, particularly the mainstream media than it's ever been before, because today, most people have multiple sources and look for multiple sources. And there's even a term mainstream media, which everybody, even people on the left know that it's mainstream media. It's tilted to the left. They might not believe it, but they know it's not Fox. It's not, I don't know, the right wing media. The real sad situation today is that there is no objective media or almost no objective media. And you have to dig for it and things like substacks and elsewhere. And even there, it's not really objective. It's again, media that seems to be biased in subtle ways, but at least you have. I mean, I've never, ever had more sources of information than I have right now. Ever. Now, I need to do more work than ever before to figure out what's true, what's not. But the sources are there. And, you know, I think it's laziness to assume that people are just going to do what the media tells them. And if they do, then that's the culture we have. And that's the culture we deserve. What's alternative? I don't get what the alternative is. We can have state media, right? That's the alternative usually that's proposed. That's what Orban has done in Hungary, in a sense, is have state media. And we know state media is always objective. We see that at NPR and PBS, which are funded a little bit by the state. And let's have state media that reports on it on, you know, the BBC in England, which is funded by, but they have this guise of independence. Let's just have straight Soviet style state media and then we'll know exactly what's true and what's not. I mean, that's what the implication is of the government deciding which media company should be broken up. Who has too much influence. What opinions they like and what opinions they don't like. Right. Remember that Donald Trump wanted to go after the Washington Post in the young times. And Cruz wants to go after, I don't know, Twitter and Facebook. One of the amazing things that came out of that book, viral by Matt Ridley, and from the interview yesterday, was amazing work these independent researchers have done using Twitter. And the extent to which Twitter is a powerful tool for people to communicate, discover things, search the internet, find facts, share them with other people and work together to discover and reveal information. And that's evil Twitter is allowing that. I mean, it's horrible. So who's gonna, who's gonna police all this stuff. Well, I know who I know exactly who it's the government and that's exactly what the right wants the right wants state run media but it wants right wing state run media. And to do that the only way to secure right wing state run media in in this country is to always have a right wing government. And guess how you secure always having a right wing government. I'll leave that to you imaginations. All right. Just to add to that your own it's, we're looking for people are looking for a concrete right now solution to a problem that's really deeper than that. What we need is for people individuals to be able to think critically, we need to overhaul the educational system and people can think rationally and critically examine what's being put in front of them. Don't just get pulled into these rabbit holes by means of those social media algorithms I think people are focusing on the wrong thing. Yeah, they're no easy solutions they're no simple solutions we are declining into authoritarianism and complaining this concrete or that concrete or this particular person or that particular person or the media or Facebook or or whatever you want to blame but it has everything to do with the fact that we have an inability in this culture to think for people to think for themselves and a morality that leads them towards the worst kind of solutions when when they apply their mind even a little bit. It's so the battle is an educational battle the battle is a philosophical battle. It's a moral battle. It's not a battle about the media, the media is a site show and it's a distraction. And it is meant to distract you from the real action and the real action is the fact that people can't think and therefore that the educational system is completely corrupt and gone and but it's working. They're, you know, they're successful in in diverting our attention away from the essentials. Right, Jennifer. Do why do people always want socialism in particular with medicine. But then they'll say well we don't want everything that way. I mean I know medicine is important but something like food is even more important in the sense that you eat every day but you don't go to the doctor every day so why is that one thing they're always. Well, the best argument they can make for it is that medicine is complicated. It's hard. It's it's super complex and therefore the real problems of what they call asymmetrical information, right, that you don't know much, you're ignorant. You can be rationally ignorant but you're ignorant of the impact of various drugs or various treatments of who's a good doctor and who's a bad doctor. And therefore you're easily susceptible to manipulation and and drug companies have a huge incentive to bribe doctors and to con you and to present marketing stuff with bikini clad babes so that you take their latest drug or whatever right in a totally free market and and you can overcome those those asymmetrical problems and as compared to let's say other issues where there's also these asymmetric information problems. This is a life of death one so we need an objective agent and this is this is this is again you know this assumption that the government can be an objective agent we need an objective agent. We need somebody who's not motivated by self interest. We need somebody who's not motivated by profit. We need somebody who is actually cares about you Jennifer and you Debbie and and me and and that is the government bureaucrat who is a public servant who's there for the common good and the public interest and they they have no incentive to lie to us cheat from us and steal from us so and and that's it I mean I literally I was at get if I said this last week but I was at a conference last week at the at the Montpelerin Society Conference so I don't know how many of you know what Montpelerin is but well in society and unfortunately I spent two days basically my room because I had this awful cold so I was at the opening night and I was there at kind of the last day of the conference but other than that I just had to skip it because I was I felt so bad with the cold and I didn't want to infect everybody at the conference with my cold. So I stayed in my room but I was there for a little bit and so this is a conference of the leading free market thinkers in the world. Right, so it was founded Montpelerin Society was founded in 1947 by Frederick Hayek, and it was, you know, it was like a dozen of the free market thinkers in the world at the time. I didn't invite Iron Man, which is telling in and of itself and I don't think they ever invited Iron Man throughout the history of the Montpelerin. Again one of the great tragedies of of of the 20th century that the free market thinkers didn't take us seriously. But she anyway, so it became an annual conference or once every two years and different places in the world where all the leading thinkers in free markets would come together and debate and the original members of Hayek and Mises von Mises and and Milton Friedman and all kind of the legends of the free market economists, primarily economists, most economists but not exclusively. And, you know, Mises used to get really upset at them and they used to argue about because Mises was was the one who was really consistent and and and you know the one that he was the consistent and used to argue with them about about central banks and about and one of the amazing things anyway it's a it's a it's supposedly people who are committed 100% of free markets and then so in the opening banquet. I was at the opening banquet and I met this guy who is on the organizing committee. I guess he heads the organizing committee for next year's big conference which is in Oslo, Norway, it'll be in October in Oslo, Norway. And I don't know we were chatting and he talked about suddenly it somehow got to healthcare, and he was like, yeah, you know, our great system in Norway and your pathetic system in the United States and you know how can you tolerate not having socialized in a sense not having socialized medicine in the United States. It was like, whoa, you're an organizing committee. This is a free market conference what what the hell. The left is there we would say has infiltrated even Montpelerin right. It was it was it was pretty shocking. But but I know that there are people there who are who are. I don't know compromises particularly the Europeans on economic issues but then there's some Europeans who are great, who are really really tough and then there's some. There's plenty of nationalists there there was certainly one conservative nationalist at the conference, the anarchists there there's several there's at least one on the board of directors actually two on the board of directors. It's a it's a quite a diverse mixed group, but it's you know free markets is not necessarily what unites them, not really, not really free markets so. But healthcare is the one thing that people fall on because of its importance because of its complexity because of its life or death consequences and again, even among free marketers. And that is this perspective of, we need a kind of free market referee innocence. Even Switzerland doesn't have a true free market healthcare system. It's better than any other country in Europe, but it's not a true free market system. It's, it's I think, so no country in the world unfortunately Singapore has a pretty good system but it's not really free market. No country has a purely free market system in the world, and certainly not the United States. I wish we did I wish there was one. It would be cool, but we don't have it. You are and have you ever given a talk in Switzerland. Yes, many times I've given, I've given three, four, five, six talks in Switzerland. Yeah, so I've spoken. God, this is ridiculous. The big friend Geneva. It came to me, Geneva, I've spoken at a university up in the mountains I forget the name of the university, but I spoke at the university up in the mountains. Yeah, I've spoken in many, I've spoken to many times. Yes, I, there are very few countries that haven't spoken at. There are a few in the world, particularly if you go to Asia and Africa, but when you look at Europe. I've spoken in most European countries. I'm tempted to say an overwhelming majority of European countries because I think that is true. There might be five, six, seven, eight, you know, countries in Europe that haven't spoken at. There are a lot of countries in Europe if you have to go look. All right, Debbie. About the rules for life book. I like that idea. And particularly, it sounds like a self help book kind of thing. And I think I've often thought there's so much opportunity for objectivism in that space. And like, for example, thinking in principle, how that can solve all these pain points associated with modern life, like this, the crippling stress and anxiety that people really do seem to be experiencing nowadays, even though existentially our circumstances are as good as they've ever been and that we're not struggling just to day to day survival but I really believe that the inner experience of a lot of people is on that level of suffering. You know, and the evidence of that with the all the opioid addiction and the obesity and just people doing anything they can to alleviate those bad feelings. So I just, and whenever I hear about these social problems or the social media and people getting sucked into these conspiracy theories because they don't know how to think about it. Because they don't have that critical thinking ability failure to succeed at work in a lot of cases because their their thinking skills are are crippled by the education system and by bad epistemology. There's so many problems that can be solved with objectivism. And so I like that angle on it like that's the idea of coming out with the rules for life book and maybe it could address like here's how you can have a better half your life with these rules, you know, and like not just that it makes it better but also that it solves problems like kind of alleviates that negative aspect of of a lot of things consequences of the current culture. And I'm glad you like the idea. I'm seriously contemplating it I will need to raise some money to do it because I have to pay Don Watkins to work with me on it. I just don't know how big of an audience it will have. I really need to think that through. And, but you know if I can raise them I need to pay Don even if it doesn't sell that well it probably is worth doing. It would be a fun project I think to work on. But it's, it's, it's, it's hard to tell what, you know, how do we get a market for it right. I mean Jordan Peterson could do it because he had a million followers on every platform he touches and he's on TV all the time and he does all these things and I'm just not. I'm not convinced my platform is big enough to launch a book but we'll see. We'll see it will certainly be fun writing so I think if I do it it'll probably be sometime late next year and I'll be raising money for it. I think we need something like $30, $36,000 for it, a kind of a one time thing and then and then we'd actually get it done. It's true that's the challenge is getting people to look at it in the first place because getting them to find it. Because I think once they did it could just the power that the philosophy has to solve so many problems just in day to day life and make people happier so that they can live better lives is it's just such an incredibly powerful philosophy for that. And it's but it's a matter of do people discovering that and finding that out and finding like that it's not just about politics which is the thing what what a lot of people tend to think and they think oh I ran she's that like free market person. And it's it's just such a injustice to her because it was there's so much more to the philosophy than politics. And the challenge is going to be to write it in a way that does both justice to her ideas and concretizes it and simplifies it and and and brings it to the level. Yeah, what you were describing right so it's that that would be right because I think a lot of people don't know what epistemology is. And you wouldn't want it to be at the level where you have to talk about the long words like epistemology because otherwise you do the who it's targeted at. Yeah, yeah, exactly. All right, since then no, you guys have gone completely silent over there in the super chat since they're not $20 questions I'm going to do a question from yesterday there was 20, there was $25. We'll go back to Jennifer and Debbie, and you can still ask $20 questions if you catch me in time I'll answer them now. And then we'll get to these other lower grade questions later. This is a question Jeff asked for Valdrin, I guess, almost everyone is convinced that cutting government spending in half means lowering the standard of living for everyone, like cutting your paycheck in half. How do you convey that isn't the case. Well, it's pretty simple. Where does government get the money to spend right. It either has to tax you take your money now, or it has to raise debt. How does it raise debt it sells bonds where who buys those bonds what money has to flow in from the private economy in order to pay for those bonds. So if you cut government spending and have what happens is, all of us have more money in our pockets not all of us because they might not cut taxes and they probably shouldn't cut taxes as the first thing they do. But they'll borrow less. And by borrowing less they'll be sucking less money out of the private economy. Some people the people who typically buy bonds will have more money. Now some people say but yeah but it's the Federal Reserve really buying the bonds the printing money. Okay, then the Federal Reserve will stop printing that money. And in that sense they will stop manipulating the markets, stop intervening in the markets and stop distorting the markets. And while maybe net that money will be there the markets will be more efficient they'll be less inflation there'll be more. There'll be more proper allocation of capital, there'll be less distortion and perversion and the economy will actually do much better. Indeed, the less government spending the better the economy will do. You know during the 19th century in the US economy grew at the fastest rates in human history. Government didn't spend more than 3% of GDP. Today government is spending over 20% of GDP that's just federal. If you add state and local we're in the mid 40s over 40% of GDP 40% of the economy is government spending. If you return all that to the private sector, which is where it belongs. Then economy would grow, not shrink. Enric asked how do you plan and organize all activities you do. How do you strategize. Huh, that's exactly what you're asking Henry. How do I plan. I mean I have a long time schedule in terms of talks and events that I'm supposed to do over time I, you know people approach me to ask me to come and speak or to do internet talk or to be on a panel to do a debate. I spend time, you know, generally, I, if, if I can justify it financially, I will do pretty much any talk, any way, any debate, any panel, almost anyone that I can so I, you know, I'll negotiate the time and they and all of that with them and those are typically done well in advance so those are months in advance and they get on the calendar. Beyond that I plan on certain trips. Just where kind of I initiate do you want me to give you a talk so particularly in Europe Latin America and other places. I work with the Ironman Institute to try to figure out good tours for me to do where I speak in a number of different locations in a week. And into a number of different groups and that gets that gets planned. I have a calendar in terms of day plan week plan quarterly planning at a calendar that is that's there. I have a long term plan in terms of how many talks I want to do or in terms of how many dollars I want to bring in through speaking. I have a short term, a shorter term plan in terms of these shows, because these shows are more dependent on a lot of other things that have to do with my scheduling that sometimes outside of my control, my wife's plans. My, my hedge fund meetings, plans, events, things I have to do there that either come up last minute, those always get priority. So I schedule the shows around all of that but I, and then I periodic when there's a when there's quiet moments here and there, not often. I take some time and to think about long term what I want to be doing and what I want to do. I mean thinking about a lot about what we want to do with this show. How do we want to, where do we want to take it from here it's growing slowly. But it's growth is too slow so is there a way to change the format or do something about it that will, there will increase growth, but I don't have a definitive answer to that yet I'm still thinking about it. I'm thinking people tell me different things it's hard to get a straight answer and figure out exactly what the rate approach should be. But it's something I think about a lot in terms of long term strategy for the show. What else in terms of. So for example should be interviewing more. One of the challenges of interviews is you have to commit to a time, a place with a person and my, my schedule is often too much in flux for me to do that too much but I'm, I'm going to try to do more interviews because she has to be arranged dealt with, and while I have a full time assistant she is swamped. So, with everything else that I do and everything else that she has to do so. Anyway, it's, I try to think long term about where I want to take. I mean I'd love for this show to grow much much bigger. I'd love to do bigger events. That's why I did the Richard. What's his name, the socialist event this. I've already forgotten his name. And it's why I'm doing this thing with. It's a wolf, and it's why I'm doing the event with your own Chasoni at UT, which I hope will be a big event we'll see on conservatism versus versus individualism. I look at bigger events to do, I'm trying to find people who will agree to debate me on the big issues, trying to get more visibility trying to get more, more, you know, more access to a larger audience but I've also come to accept. Some people would argue too soon but I think I've also come to accept the fact that I don't know that there is a big audience. For what I have to sell, you know, and it's, I could, you know, there is an audience within the objectives movement for things different than what I do. Because I don't attract many in the objectives movement I try to send percentage of those people in the in the movement I many people in the movement don't listen or watch the show. I could make this more like a podcast. A lot of people listening to this as a podcast complain about the fact that it's, I do too much super chat I do too much interaction with the tech chat I do too much babbling like I am right now. It's not focused and organized like like a podcast typically is. I could do that but I'm less interested in that let's motivate in that and I'm not convinced that that would increase somebody else would be better doing that so a lot of things to think about a lot of things to consider I'd be doing this in one form or another. Since January 2015 I think it is. So it's been a long time. If I was going to grow and be huge it would have happened already, I think. So I suspect that it's probably, it's probably going to grow but we'll keep trying, we'll keep trying and to figure out, you know, how to do these better and how to attract more people. I have not given up yet. And even if I have given up in that sense, I've not given up on the need for the show and the value of the show and, and, and the value to keep doing it although if if the super chat keeps going at the rate it is right now for many more shows and I might change my mind about that. All right, let's see. Yes, Valdrin says we've raised about $110, $120 in an hour that's pretty pathetic so we're pretty short of the $600 goal so if anybody out there is in the mood to give us a little boost here on the super chat that would be very cool. All right, let's see one other $20 question. The real clear average of polls somehow has Biden's unfavorables even higher than Trump's. If this were the public's perception is at is at can Biden avoid a Jimmy Carter like devastating failure for the Democrats. Not to say I told you so but I mean one of the benefits of electing somebody like Biden is that he would lose big in the future now the real question here is, who does he lose to that's what I don't have control over I you know when when I told you that I wouldn't vote for Trump. I was hoping for a Republican Senate, which I think should have happened if not for Trump being a completed other narcissistic idiot. I mean absolutely would have happened there's no way they lose both seats in Georgia if not for Trump's idiocy. And I was hoping that whoever became the Democratic candidate. Oh, and I was hoping for the fact that Trump lost with discredit the Trump brand, and that a better Republican would rise up and beat the Democrat four years later, which I think is very likely to happen for one piece of that. The only piece that's not likely to happen is a good Republican to rise up. It's possible, but I don't see the likelihood it's much more likely that a Trump like character, like what's his name in Florida will run and become president. And then we're back to you know we're back to having problems so I am still in. I'm still hoping that a bit of a Republican will arise. I'm still hoping that Biden will get defeated thoroughly by somebody who's decent and and and basically, you know, relatively good, but my hopes don't actually have any impact on the world talking enough. My, my premise, my consciousness does not change reality. As much as I try, I pray every morning for these things to happen and I really make an effort. It turns out that hopes and wishes don't have the impact that kind of impact in the world. All right, Jennifer. I'm done for today. Thank you. All right, Debbie. Yeah. I'm not really praying you. Oh, yeah. To whom. Really just upbringing. To whom, whom would I pray to. All right, right. I used to, I used to, because I became an atheist very young, but I used to go to synagogue quite often as a kid. And so, you know, I used to mouth all the prayers I used to know them by heart. I used to pray every Friday night over dinner. And I used to know the all by heart and I could say them and I could, I could have fun reading them, but it never was beyond that it was never had any more meaning to me then this is what you do. Even as a kid, you know, this which is what the family expects is what you do. You don't really piss them off. So you, and it became kind of a, like a habit that was kind of fun. But when you, once you stop, you don't want to go back. Right. Yeah, well, that, that's good that you had that kind of experience. I mean, for me, it was more like a mental habit that I had to really eradicate and train myself not to do that if I got into some kind of a tight spot, my impulse would be to pray about it. I'm embarrassed to even say that now. But like, and I had to remind myself that that doesn't make any sense. Like it was even past the point where I was an atheist, I had had that momentum and that habit of just like going into that mode of thinking when I'm under stress. And, and I had to keep each time that happened. I had to recognize it and say, Oh, yeah, that's just that old thing from before. And it, you know, it doesn't apply to reality anymore. You know, there's all these sort of habits of thinking that you have to eradicate from your mind when you're raised with a bad epistemology and a bad philosophy. Absolutely. One thing religion gives people, which is often cited is a sense of community, which I do think is a valid human need, you know, just being able to go to someplace with people who at least nominally share your, in this sense of national values. But to have that connection with other people who, you know, have some kind of thing in common with you, I think, I think I can see why that is regarded as beneficial even though the religion part is not is incredibly destructive. Ultimately, the community becomes destructive in the context of a religion. Yeah, but, but that's one thing that I love about like get your, the format of your show where there are abilities to connect with other objectivists either through the super chatter through these contributor Hangouts. And, and I like that about the format of it. I don't know if that's just me or if it's generally meeting that similar need for other people, but I think you're the only one I think it does. I think there is, there is a sense in which we do want whether we need but we certainly want community is to rend us value in community and engaging with other human beings. Yeah, yeah, great value for it to be in person but online is not a bad substitute it's better than nothing. You think regularly regular events, regular places we start to see oh that's Jose and that's Scott and that's Frank and, and you know this is that there's a certain, even if you never even interact with them just knowing that there's a certain regular group of people that are together in a virtual sense at a place is is is a real value. So I think I think it does serve within objectives community within objective community. I think my show does serve a communal purpose for some people I mean it is interesting which objectives show up to show in which don't. And how many of the people in the chat are actually here to be obnoxious and to be rude to me. You know, and and how many of them, but that's part of community I mean part of the people there who are who are just jokes right and that's their purpose in life. And I don't know what they're trying to achieve exactly and who they're trying to convince and whether trying to convince me or they're trying to convince you, but but they're just there but it is there is a certain dynamic dynamic that draws people to this whereas I have all time objectivists. Listen, don't listen to the show live listen to it later but even they might enjoy the fact that there's some back and forth and then more their people involved. I like it I don't like being like okay now I'm going to talk to a microphone. Yeah, I like the fact that Jennifer and you are here on video and I can, I can see you guys and I can see you respond. And the fact that I see even obnoxious people online responding and and and saying stuff. I, you know, I'm the kind of person who needs that social interaction versus me just I've done things like this where I just lecture to the microphone, and I assume that people out there and I can do that. It's just not fun. It's just, you know, with radio you get call ins. And I think, I think even though again was the calls in obnoxious. It's fun to do because you're getting some feedback and you interact with another human being and I think people like listening to that. Yeah, well most villages have their idiots right so I mean I guess even the I don't know why it's that funny. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, they're not although I do get a kick out of that one guy that comes like right away to give you a thumbs down each time. One of my favorite quotes ever from from one of them from what I can't remember who posted it but somebody posted it once on on one of these live I think things and he says, maybe it was on Twitter, but he wrote, quote, I am a racist, and I can tell you, you're on is no racist. That's just a gem. I don't belong to that club. Yeah, and then didn't someone call you a Jewish Nazi one time. Oh yeah, that one was pretty funny. Yesterday I was a communist. Somebody came on the live chat he, he took some time out of his day right to spend a while while I was interviewing Matt would lead to try to distract me and kept posting you're on as a communist you're on as a communist. I mean, who does that what kind of psyche. But anyway, the sense of community and that that's another thing that I'm trying to achieve with what I mentioned last time which is I'm getting these opar want to get these opar reading reading and discussion groups on clubhouse so I figured out that I want to do it on on the weekends I'm thinking Saturday late in the afternoon. And I'm not a big social media person in general so I don't have a lot of connections on clubhouse so people are interested please follow me on clubhouse and like let me know that you have interest. I tried scheduling what's your handle and clubhouse just so I can. Listen to this. No, Debbie Sloan and then Debbie Sloan DBB I ESL OAN on. Yeah, they can look me up that way or then it's like at DB Sloan. Yeah, so so anyway people are interested and I, and I'll schedule it for something like towards the end of the day on Saturdays. So that's all my work schedule really allows and we'll see if people are interested. The idea is to just like read a little bit and then talk amongst ourselves about it, not for me to be teaching anything because I'm not in a position to do that at all. It's more of a matter of creating the sense of community where we can talk about the ideas with other objectivists and yeah. I'm a big fan of our study groups as I said in my lecture this summer at Ocon, which hopefully will go up online at some point. And I ran. Yeah, one of our study group in the when it first came out 1992 early 1992 for a year in somebody's house. It was live before the Internet. And it was, it was, it was, it was a lot of fun, but I am I've always been very social in that sense. So I had an objectivist group that we used to hang out in Israel in the 1980s. It was very active almost every weekend we hang out together. We had a social group in Austin that I was a part of every Friday we saw a movie. And then, late in my time in Austin we used to watch movies on Saturdays and do the study group on Sundays and hang out to go to restaurants and do. I mean, all the time we were hanging out together all the time it was pretty amazing. And then I used to have regular movie nights people used to come to our house on Fridays or Saturdays and hang out. I met dozens and dozens of objectivists through that. I still meet people say hey, you know, 25 years ago you used to come to your house and watch movies and all of that disappeared when I became the boss at a right. Because suddenly, it was just not the same because I was everybody wanted to tell me either how I should run a or I what I should be doing what I shouldn't be doing like the objectivists became unfriendly, unfriendly, unsocial with me because I was now a boss in some way. And, and I don't know they look up look down look sideways in weird ways so all of that kind of disappeared once I started running. Really, yeah, once I started running the institute so I that's too bad, because that was a real loss. Community is important is no question. Yeah, I know I know it's tall having that like people coming and raising questions questions at old con about like, why don't we do this to promote objectivism and I like the way he responded he was like yeah everybody's got a thought about how we should promote objectivism why don't you do it was a little bit more gracious than that but it was he was better he's better at shutting people down than I was I completely he's the certain things he's much better than I am at. And that's one of them but but yes I've been getting those questions for 20 something years so it's not it's not surprising the differences that tall came in as an outsider. He in a sense has no real relationships with an objectivism and I was at least to some extent an insider and had lots of relationships when I took that job. And it was interesting how it affected those relationships. Anyway, it's, it is, it is interesting. Let's see. Thanks guys. You've gotten us up to. What was it 200 and I don't know 60, 260 still less than halfway to where we need to be. So again if if there's anybody I did see Frank put in 50 bucks so if anybody else wants to put in 50 bucks no more less than $20 questions $20 above. And see okay Frank asks, he gave the most he gets asked first. Do revolutions occur because society is basically peaceful and government is basically coercive, and therefore an intolerable point is reached. No I don't I don't I don't know what that means to say society is basically peaceful. I mean part of the way societies in olden times achieved, being peaceful is through government in position of a set of rules by force through its course of power. I think revolutions happen when the governments get so detached from where the people are, ideologically from what the people want and for people know they can achieve that the people rise up against the government so it's not that it's a level of oppression. Look at how oppressed and North Koreans are there's no revolution there. Look at our press the, the, the, the, the even the Iranians are. It's that the culture that's being oppressed has reached a certain level of knowledge of the alternative and of frustration with the with the authoritarianism and the courage to rise up. So I mean, there are lots of intolerable societies, there are lots of intolerable places around the world that have not revolted and there are lots of intolerable errors in history with people did not revolt. There has to be a level of knowledge within that society. Suddenly that level of knowledge existed in America when they revolted against the British. A level of knowledge, false knowledge in this case existed in society when they revolted against the monarchy in France the French Revolution. And because the knowledge was false it resulted in bloodshed and ultimately authoritarianism. And, and the outcome was Napoleon. And, and, but the whole French Revolution was a disaster because of bad ideas. But the culture was confident that there was an alternative. You could say the same with the Russian Revolution, they do a bad ideas and a complete corruption of the people in power and an intolerance. There was intolerable and a willingness to fight for ideas bad ideas in this case communism. The same with the fall of the Berlin Wall, they had seen enough of the West they had listened to enough rock and roll they had seen enough of the West's wealth to know that there was an alternative to what they were living under. And, and they were willing to march and to some extent risk their lives. Many of them did. They were willing to see the wall topple and embrace what was possible in the West so it has to be a confluence of a variety of different things, but intolerable regime is one of them. But the people have to have a some belief in an alternative set of ideas in order to make it successful. All right, let's see other $20 questions. Somebody made a contribution without asking a question Kevin thank you really appreciate that. It's as time in a bottle, a sweet child of mine Wow that is hard, because they're two completely different genres. I'm just going to say time in a bottle, because I'm a sucker for, you know, his music and sucker for all his songs. So, if I could save time in a bottle, Jim Croce I think it is. And, you know, I'm a sucker for Jim Croce grew up in the 70s listening to his, to his albums, but sweet child of mine is a beautiful song. It's more soul. And it's, it's gorgeous but I probably listen to time in a bottle more growing up and therefore it resonates more with me today, probably. Mike, Jennifer do you want to say something. Are you thinking about the guns and roses sweet child of mine. Oh, that's what I was thinking I don't think you know what song he means he means the guns and roses he means the guns and roses so. So, yeah, I think you're probably right. I do know that one I don't particularly like guns and roses so I'm certainly time in a bottle and So I was I was never a fan of guns and roses. Isn't there another version of sweet child of mine. I don't know that's the that's what I thought he meant. All right, I'm going to do it afterwards and I'll get back to you if I change my mind but right now it's time in a bottle. All right. Mike dial asks, could your could outcome economic policies lead to war so how I doubt it I don't see how our county economic policies in the United States would lead to war could lead to depression it could lead to. But it could lead to war in a sense that its impact has on other countries. So, I think a economic disaster in China could lead to war. It could lead to them invading Taiwan it could lead to them to just just harass India or harass who knows which one of the neighbors Vietnam or whatever. It could attack the United States directly. Our economic policies could lead to crisis in China, but it's more likely that economic policies of China lead to an economic disaster in China so economic policies can lead to war. Usually, by when it's an authoritarian regime, engaging those economic policies. The most likely place war starts is either in Russia in Eastern Europe. I mean, there were, I think it was a week or two ago. Talk about them amassing troops on the on the Ukrainian border. Remember Russia is economy is very unstable, very up and down very lot of wealth at the top but very little. They did a very small middle class very very susceptible to energy prices. So they're doing well right now, but if gas and natural gas or oil drops, they weren't doing very well last year when when energy prices tumble. So very volatile economy Russia could start a war China could start a war in order to distract the people from the hardships, the economic hardships at home. The object asked what are three kind books everybody should read everybody should read economics in one lesson by Henry Haslett. What other economics books should everybody read. It's so hard because the more popular books like freed men or soul, a good but flawed. So yeah, I free to choose by freed men and and Thomas souls book on economics but they're flawed to get really really good books on economics. Now they become pretty technical like Mises, pretty much anything by Mises I would say you should read, but I need developer a better list of books on economics that people should read. I need to do more things like that because I think that that would be of interest to people. I'm taking a note for whatever the help that war. It's on a piece of paper. We'll see if it survives. All right, Bree says the self health book market caters to leftist with accept acceptance with the acceptance movement. They want to be selfish. They, they want to be selfish true. They just need to be gently pushed from trying to force us to accept them to self improvement. I agree. That's right. I think they want to be in some sense selfish, but they pushed away by the notion of selfishness as it explains capitalism by reason is too technical too hard to read. It's not a book I would recommend reading. It's a recommend I would recommend it as a textbook on economics but not a book that you would actually sit down and read. I think haslet is the best in terms of that. I think that's right. A lot of the self-help market are people who are trying honestly to get better and they want to be in some self selfish. They don't have the words for it. They don't know how to do it too little of the self-help world is focused on reason is focused on the mind is focused on rationality. It's way too focused on emotions and being emotional list and making lists and using apps and organizing your life, which is all good. Maybe I could use some of that, but it's all good. I'm not against that, but it's more about getting connected with your emotions than actually using reason to guide your life. Some pragmatic 10 things you can do to get better to move forward in your career. Some list of concrete people like lists, but the whole premise behind it is inherently selfish. It's called self-help, not other health. There's kind of this underlying selfishness in it even though then when you get into the content it's not unfortunately selfishness oriented. A lot of the ones for women specifically like how to overcome gender bias at work and those kinds of things they'll say explicitly. They're basically telling women to be selfish because I think we got in the short end of this altruism stick in a lot of ways like born with a brunt of altruism like your life is about serving your husband and children and those kinds of things. There is this push to rebel against altruism, but then they'll say well you should take care of yourself and focus on your career and you shouldn't always prioritize your kids and your husband. It's not selfish to prioritize yourself. You're not being selfish if you take care of yourself. It's crazy. It makes no sense, but there is still this underlying pressure of because insofar as people want to live they do have to be selfish. So yeah, that's another reason why I think self-help has opportunities. Absolutely. I think there were opportunities there. I don't know if I'm the right writer for it because I'd love to see somebody in psychology do that with more of a psychological band, but I can do what I do. And I think that could be helpful to some people or maybe we could break in some way, some place. People are making lists of econ books, human action of course, but it's not an easy read and skip the first 70 pages or something. Skip the whole praxeology part. Go right into the economics. This praxeology is not very good. Capitalism by reason I said, winning through intimidation, maybe just as striking as an economics book. Let's see. Robert Hellbrough books. I don't know. Mises, the anti-capitalist mentality. Yeah, anything by Mises is going to be good. Principles of economics by Karl Manger. Brilliant. In many respects, the most brilliant of all of them. Karl Manger was the founder of the Austrian school, but not easy read at all. Yeah, I mean, if you're still confused about trade, not bad to go back 250 years and read The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith. All right, let's see. I've got a few, a few more super chat questions. We are, I don't know, 260. Let's get a 400 at least, which used to be our goal. So we're short about 140 bucks. So if somebody wants to step in with some super chat to get us to 400, that would be great. While I answer these few last questions, if not, then not. All right. Scott asked, Peter Thiel spoke with the National Conservatism. He was against MMT and praised the individual. Were you using two waterbush to paint them as pro-MMT and anti-individual? I didn't, I'm not saying that pro-MMT explicitly. Of course not pro-MMT explicitly. MMTs are left to theory. Nobody is pro-MMT explicitly. They are pro-government spending. I haven't listened to Peter Thiel's talk, I'll listen to it, but they're pro-government spending. They're pro-expansion of government. They're pro-unlimited debt. That's equivalent to MMT. Of course, they're not going to say that. And look, some of the speeches there were pretty good. I'm sure Glenn Lowry, who was at the conference, gave a good speech, but Peter Thiel is mixed. Peter Thiel has been and can be a pretty good free market guy and can be and has been and is promoting a brand of nationalist conservatism that is really, really bad, which is about the growth of state power and the use of state power to impose social dogma on you guys. And I think at the end that's anti-individualistic, even if in a particular speech, he praises the individual. And of course, Peter Thiel praised the individual, but what about all the other speakers, the majority of the speakers who praised the common good and the public interest. And what about Yoram Khazoni, who was the organizer of the National Conservative Conference, the organizer of it, who is debating me on conservatism versus individualism. Even in the title that it made is rejecting individuals. So, even if there's one speaker, you can find it's good. I'm sure, again, I'm sure there were good speeches there. I and Hosea Lee probably gave a good speech. Peter Thiel is good on some issues. Glenn Lowry is good on issues, but there are a lot of people there who are no good. Scott says, let's see how it goes. So far, I've been right on most of my political observations, so I'm also willing to see how it goes. And if I'm wrong, I'll be the first to admit it as I did on the, what do you call it, the lab leak theory. I admitted beginning of the show that I was wrong on it. Yoram, I highly recommend a show on Netflix called the Club Search Kulip Kulup Kulup, K-U-L-U-P. I assume that's German. All right, I'll look for it. I'm watching a bunch of, I've watched a bunch of Netflix German shows. I don't like that language, but I'm willing to watch German shows. Sorry, don't like German. John Wayne asks, God, do I really need to read this question? All right, supposedly there's a video out there which I have actually watched the first meeting of Yoram Brok and Harry Binswanger. It's an animated, stupid movie. Please don't go and watch it. It's complete nonsense, complete BS. It's not based on anything. Why you would come on my channel and want to promote this nonsense? I have no idea. I'm only doing it because you put five bucks on it, but please don't. And I saw in the chat, he says, oh, I wonder if there's any truth to this. It's just stupid. How would anybody know what my first meeting with Harry Binswanger was? Were they there? Was the person who did it there? Did they claim to have been there? It's just stupid. Frank asks, have you ever served jury duty? I've never actually made it onto the jury. I've been kicked out on several occasions before I ever made it on jury. I think because I have a PhD, God forbid you have anybody with a PhD on a jury. And once I think I, like, it just was inconvenient. I had talks to give, I had commitments and so they let me out. Whether you have or not, do you believe objectivism can be used to help jurors come to correct verdict? Yeah, I mean, suddenly, objectivism could be helped. Primarily the objectivist of psychology and the ability to look at facts and understand what facts are and what you know and what you don't know to resist many of the biases that many of us fall into. And if you want to see maybe the best concretization of this ever, it's in God, what is that movie? Something with 12 Angry Men. Particularly the original, which I like better, but both of them are good. The original with Henry Ford is it's brilliant. It's just brilliant. It's so epistemological. It's so beautifully done. You know, watch that and you can see in a sense of objectivist epistemology being applied. Shay asks, why does it matter if one side will kill us in one month and another in two? Why do people waste so much energy and who is the worst question? Only in a sense that if it's going to be two and I have a chance to stop them, then I prefer two than one because two gives me more time. So I think that's the only reason to think about it. Henry Fonda, is that what I said? Did I say Henry Fonda? Did I say somebody else? I think it's Peter Fonda. But yeah, you said Henry Ford. I'm a little confused. Yes, it's Henry. It's Peter Fonda. No, it's just Fonda. It's Henry Fonda? It's definitely Fonda. That part I'm sure of. Henry Fonda, I don't know what I said, but that's what I meant to say. If I said Henry Ford, I'm losing it. I'm losing it. We can all see that. So the only reason to care is in terms of do we have enough time to save the world. Stephen asks, how was moving to PR affected you tax wise individually and with the show? Basically, I paid very little taxes. Any money that flows to me from outside of Puerto Rico, the only tax I pay on, for example, on the show is a 4% copper tax. I don't pay any more taxes than that. So I've gone from 54% taxes in California to 4% in Puerto Rico, 4%. I mean, that's about as utopian as it can get. So that's a big difference in terms of Puerto Rico affecting me tax wise. All right. Thank you, everybody. If somebody wants to pitch in 100 bucks to make it a 400, that'd be great. Otherwise, we are going to call it a day unless Jennifer Debbie, you have something urgent you want to ask or comment. I never run out of things to talk about your own but no, nothing urgent. Okay. All right, keep something for next time. Yeah. Thanks guys. Thanks Jennifer. Thanks Debbie for the support. Thanks for being here. Thanks to all of you. Thanks to all the super chatters who participated today. If you'd like to support the show on kind of an ongoing monthly basis on a regular basis, you can do so at your own book show dot com slash support patreon subscribe star and locals. If you'd like to join Jennifer and Debbie on the show by video, you can do that by contributing $100 a month or more to the run book show. And once a month, I will have you on and to chat and to ask questions. And with that, I will see you all tomorrow will probably do a show tomorrow 8pm. No, 7pm. All this moving of time zones. It'll be 8pm. My time is 7pm Eastern time. So the all the world shift the time zones and Puerto Rico State put. And that's super confusing. So it's, it'll be a 7pm tomorrow. So see you all tomorrow. Have a good weekend. Don't forget to watch the interview with Matt Ridley on the ingenuism channel to subscribe to ingenuism platform at ingenuism.com and share that interview with Matt Ridley. If you share that, that would be great. Thanks everybody. Bye.