Richard Hanania Podcast Transcript

What sort of what I see them doing with the, um, uh, the bills in, uh, uh, at the state legislature, where I was actually actually, I think sort of brilliant in the sense that it is shifting the culture by talking about gooners and, you know, they're sort of like getting a gay panic going. Um, but at the same time, they're avoiding like things that are hard for them to say, like we're appealing, you know, gay marriage, see, so civil rights laws is enforced by a bunch of left wing bureaucrats and they like universities and they dislike IQ tests.

So when it comes to IQ test or anything written a paper test it's easy and simple and differentiates people then its some problem for disparate impact. It's actually the conservative movement is actually a, something of an impressive machine for taking ideas that are inherently very unpopular. Um, and then giving them power in society. And I like those ideas. I like the libertarian economics. I don't think, I don't think society is smart enough for them.

hi. Hi, welcome. Welcome. This is the, from the new world podcast today, we're speaking with Richard Hanania, the president of the center for the study of partisanship and ideology, the author of a new book, public choice theory, and the illusion of grand strategy, a visiting fellow at UT Austin and the author of the wonderful substack richardhananiahdotsubstack.com.

I tried to make this discussion one of the most realistic takes on how politics actually works as much as possible. Listeners who are confused by recent changes and contradictions will find it both relieving and terrifying. As usual the best thing you can do for the podcast is to subscribe and to send the podcast to a few of your friends and family.

You'd never expect how much this actually does for the podcast. And if you've listened to the last two episodes, you'd know that I did an audio essay for the first and no audio essay for the second. Now's the time to let me know which choice you prefer as I'm going to make a lot of decisions in the next few weeks, about what direction to take the podcast in the future.

I'll have an audio essay again today, although a bit shorter than the last one. Who do extremists actually help. That's the title and topic of today's audio essay playing this idea specifically to the democratic party.

Republican politicians are all too eager to take aim at a certain group of people, extremists. They emerged democratic activists, media, politicians, and voters into one huge blob, which they label the enemy and the case of activists and large media companies. I don't really blame them. They aren't wrong to think that some of those groups will do them harm, but the average democratic. The average democratic voter is against affirmative action thinks we need the same or more police funding and is solidly pro capitalism, the politicians, there are somewhere in the middle. While red media takes it to an extreme, it isn't necessarily wrong to say that voters and politicians who in the end benefit and support those extremists and lend them power are a problem. Even if those politicians and voters themselves are not after all, we do the same thing with Republicans.

Perhaps when voters say, extremists are the problem. We should listen to them, but aren't they under the influence of Republican media. But wait, even if Republican media were out of the picture, extremists still hurt the democratic party. In 2016, the Clinton campaign ran an interesting experiment. They tested campaign advertisements among their staff, as well as swing voters.

The ads most favored by progressive staffers and during. Made the average voter, more likely to vote for Trump, not Clinton legacy media coverage follows exactly the same pattern. So out of touch that it wraps around to being benefiting to the opposing party. The action of both his vice president and his allies put Joe Biden's record on crime, which was otherwise solid from a conservative perspective into question, social progressive activists, forced them to adopt unpopular positions on abortion.

Namely the Hyde amendment and transgenderism in general, legacy media, academia, staffers, and activists, all pushed Democrats towards being worse politicians and towards being worse. Reasoners of reality. Let's say we had a country with two rational, broad coalition parties. Then we took the major television stations and newspapers, and we bribed them to do two things.

One pretend to be allied with one of those. And to constantly force that party to discuss issued that favored the other party and fill every screen with those issues until it was all that voters were thinking about, who would we say these people benefit? Of course it would benefit the other party. And it takes a certain type of delusion and tribalism to think.

Otherwise modern social progressives are saboteurs and cysts on the functioning model of democratic politics that have existed for decades. That is why while Republicans are performatively fighting social progressives, their existence ultimately benefits them, especially Republican politicians. So here's a plan that every left leaning American should embrace de-legitimized defund and destroy the power of social progressives and media activism and campaign finance.

Then the 88% of relatively sane left-leaning people can steam roll every election while the Republicans deal with the same problem on their end. Don't forget they have their anti-vaxxers and their election conspiracy theorists too. I think this essay is particularly appropriate for this episode because Hananiah deals with the same problem in the opposite direction.

He's more on the center right and his frustration with the anti-vax and election conspiracy theorists come out in his pieces like liberals read conservatives, watch TV was a great topic of discussion. And while I wanted to get to his take on how to solve that problem from the opposite perspective, we didn't have quite enough time.

We already covered plenty, including crucial life experiences, feminization, "groomerism" as right-wing wokeness, psychological differences between liberals and conservatives mental illness in gen Z demagogues the effect of social media on politics. A thousand true fans, the nature of expertise and the misuse of philosophy of science by the Weinstein brothers. In other words, it's one hell of a time.

Uh, usually I don't have any particular bio questions that I like. So I come up with a new one for each podcast. So this is the one, I think something that almost everyone agrees stand out about your work is your lack of social desirability bias. There are all these quote unquote contrarians who have their own bunch of tribes and mores that they follow, but you seem to get everyone from leftists to Trumpists to resistance, libs, to neo-cons.

So, how do you do it? You know, it's just, it's a lack of something it's not, it's not actually having something it's not having sort of that, uh, you know, desire to fit in with the tribe of fellow has been, you know, a little bit likeness. I mean, I was, I'd never really, uh, uh, fit in as a kid. I mean, I was pretty much, uh, you know, social, socially awkward.

I think I become better over time. I don't think I'm, uh, I'm that bad anymore. I'm pretty good at forming relationships and, and all that now. Uh, but it took a lot of work. So naturally, you know, I just didn't have the sort of herd instinct that other human beings have. And I've sort of learned how to build relationships and try, you know, uh, interact with people.

I've obviously been, you know, very successful in what I'm doing. If you're, you know, if you can't get along with people, you know, people sometimes say, oh, you know, you don't understand social. I'm like, no, I, I wouldn't be as successful as I am, uh, without, so without understanding social norms and without understanding a human nature and then, you know, in such a short period of time, uh, but know, so I did work on self improvement where the same time I.

I want it to keep a, that independence of thought on social and moral and political issues. Um, and, and I have, so, uh, yeah, I mean, that's probably why you don't see me just, you know, being a quote unquote contrarian and then falling into one tribe or the other. Yeah. I think a lot of what creates these habits of social interaction.

I think I'm kind of similar. It's just how you grew up. So for example, I had a real experience in middle school where I was basically just simulating the Asch conformity experiment over and over again, like the teacher gets in front from the class, this is a math teacher and, uh, she wasn't very good. So everyone was just nodding along until I pointed out and did the calculations.

And then everyone says like, oh, they secretly. And this happens again and again, and these are not like stupid people. This is a, quite a good school and this happened the entire year and it basically just taught me that people don't want to be right. Um, so do you have this type of experience growing up? Is this something that you kind of like had a moment where you realized, or is this just like, this is how you've always been?

Uh, yeah. I mean, there was a lot of things that actually sort of a surprise to me. I, you know, I remember, I remember. You know, just the, the people being people being right. And sort of, you know, there being something called truth, you know, just the way, like, you know, there's everyday, uh, events that sort of surprised me.

So I remember like hearing somebody tell a story, for example, like somebody would tell a story about something like a friend in school with all story about them, what happened to them? And I would hear them tell it in one context and then in another way they would tell it, they would tell it in a completely different.

And they would change things to make themselves look good or something like that, rather than just like accurately portray what happened in the story. And I remember finding this out and be like, wow, people are just shockingly dishonest. Like people actually, you know, do this once I've maybe I didn't even generalized to people.

I was thinking my friend, I thought that was very strange to me that you would tell one person, one thing and another person another, that was, that was, you know, that was a strange realization that people did that. Um, you know, there's, there's a lot of other, uh, cases like that. I remember when I was in kindergarten, what's this, this story is almost too good, but it really does stand out to me.

Uh, there was, uh, two, um, there was like two containers, right? And one was a big container and a small container and the small container had more water in it. Um, and the teacher asked which container has more water. Uh, and then, you know, she held up the big container and then. You know, I wasn't even paying attention to question.

I didn't even get the, what she was asking, but I saw everyone in the class raised their hands. I just raised the raise my hand too, because that's what everyone else is doing. And then she asked you to who thinks it's this one, the small container, which is the right answer. And one smart kid that I do, uh, raised his hand.

Uh, and he ended up being right. Of course. You know, I found that when the teachers said so afterwards, uh, so this was all was also a moment. I was like, okay. Yeah, I made the, I made my own decision just based on what the heard was. I didn't even know what the question was. I just saw everyone raising their head and raise their head, my head.

And then like, you know, this one guy was a, this one guy was right. And you know, a lot of things are like this. Yeah, actually, this is an interesting question. Uh, where you kind of like a, uh, early bloomer or like a late bloomer, like when you were in high school or you kind of already like a very, very like exceptional.

Uh, I was exceptionally an exceptionally terrible person. You know, I was, uh, I was my, um, GPA in high school, my GPA. And like my freshman year was like three 90 out of four, 10, uh, and then school and it was a terrible school. It wasn't a good school. Um, and I, I didn't behave. And I was just, you know, I was, uh, I really had behavioral problems, so no, I, I am, I am the ultimate late bloomer, like, you know, and it got successively better over time.

Like, you know, high school, like middle school, just completely worth it, no hobbies, like I'm not doing anything productive, uh, in college. Um, you know, just like sort of going to classes, going through the motions, not really having any ambition, but like, you know, for like a smart person or finishing your four year degree is not that, that hard.

And then like, as an adult, you know, as I sort of developed and dealt with like, uh, social anxiety and just sort of realizing how to deal with people and, um, Coming to sort of understand myself and you know, how I work and how I could fit into the world. Uh, things have gotten a lot better as, as time goes on.

So definitely a late bloomer. Hmm. That's interesting. I feel like a lot of what leads to this kind of more skeptical of, uh, social interactions or social incentives are kind of like the narratives we tell about those things or the narratives that are broadly told about those things is like having, having like an obvious, obvious, uh, comparison every time you just basically like live through your normal life.

I think just the story that I told before and like these kinds of things just kept happening to me with regards to people who were just obviously in competent and in, uh, positions of even just like mild positions of power, like, like high school principals or whatever. Um, I think that kind of experience, and not just positions of power, but also just people in general leads you to, to this kind of understanding.

And a lot of people, I think, especially people who are. In just good environments don't necessarily experience this. Like you can have just like smart people who are surrounded by other people who are actually like reasonably smart and reasonably competent and reasonably, um, not effected or at least relatively not effected by these things.

Like you get this with like the effective altruism community, right. Or like the rationalists that they're kind of surrounded by other like smart people, other smarts, not as socially effected people. And they just kind of generalize this worldview and it's, and it's unfortunately quite wrong. Yeah. I mean, for me, I mean, it was completely different than that because I mean, when I was a kid, like, I didn't like, it was like, I didn't think in terms of, do people know what they're doing or do people not know what they're doing for, for most of my life, it was just like, you know, why are we doing anything like it?

I think, I think schooling, you know, there's a, there's a great deal of nihilism, a great deal of sort of, uh, a morality, but also like, you know, like school, like, I didn't understand why we sat in desks all day and like, had to like, you know, do these assignments and stuff like that. I mean, I was, I was pretty, you know, actually I was, um, a little bit like sort of gifted, but like I never had like a gifted program or something.

Like I knew I was well ahead of everybody and I got bored. So like, it's like in third grade, um, you know, like it was just like so easy. And then at some point I just, I just gave up because it was just, it was so boring. Um, you know, I stopped caring and I started obsessing about, you know, so, uh, social interactions and trying to be cool and stuff like that.

And maybe. You know where I was naturally inclined anyway, but basically there was no, um, encouragement of, uh, of, uh, developing my intellectual skills, not from my family, not from my community, not from people in the school life could have been, you know, probably a lot different if I was in a different environment.

Uh, but, uh, yeah, that was, um, you know, that was my experience. It was like sort of that, that part of me was not nurtured, um, in any way. And, uh, you know, that, that had affected, you know, all kinds of, sort of unpredictable ways. Yeah. So your family was a Palestinian, right? My dad is a Palestinian Christian.

Yeah, my mom's a Jordanian. Yeah. So did, did that have any kind of insight that you have on, on kind of the way the media covers these kinds of foreign foreign conflicts? Uh, not really. I mean, the Palestinian is really conflict was not a, um, uh, you know, it was never like a deep interest of mine. I never, I mean, people find it interesting.

I never really have, I mean, it's one conflict out of, you know, many in the world. Uh, my, um, you know, I think knowing people from the middle Eastern background, you know, can give you a different perspective. So like when, uh, you know, you see, oh, like the Syrian civil war, it's just the people they hate Bashar, Ellis Assad, and.

Uh, you know, it's the people versus this dictator. If you talk, if you know, people who are minorities from, uh, uh, from Syria, from the middle east, um, and I know people who are Druze and Christians, of course, who are from Syria or from countries, uh, uh, right next to Syria, like Assad is not the bad guy, the bad guy to that.

Like, you know, the rebels are the bad guys and the rentals are the scary ones. Right. And you just see that, and that perspective is just, you know, not, uh, you know, just not covered at all in the American media. Right. We have these, you know, one dimensional, like, you know, the obesity, there's people in Ukraine right now who are Russian speakers who identify with Russia. I mean, that's clearly the case. There's, there's zero coverage of like what they think or what they care about right now. Uh, so, you know, it does knowing people, I mean, from different backgrounds does sort of show you that it's never as simple as sort of the American media is presenting.

Yeah, big contradiction when I was growing up or like a, or like a thing that was just wrong was a lot of the narratives around, uh, China and stagnation because it's actually people think like, oh, what's the effectiveness of our, of our kind of propaganda or some of it is true, but like broadly propaganda against.

And it's the thing that is like, people are most skeptical about that people know is like, obviously false. Isn't like the human rights stuff. That's totally believable. What's obviously false is when they say like China can't innovate China can't form businesses. Uh, China China's growth is like, almost over guys.

They're not going to catch up there. They're like almost done. And they people keep like repeating that for like 20 years. Um, and I think too, like anyone who has any familiarity with the Chinese people or with, um, even just like what circumstances were like on the ground, this was just like, obviously false.

Right. And it was obviously false and it never corrected, like sure. You can say like, okay, yeah, if you don't just know a lot and you make honest mistakes, you're wrong about that for like a year, but you're wrong about that for, for 20 years. And you make predictions about like stagnation, for example, and they just don't come true.

And you just keep repeating it over and over again. I think that leads to like a very cynical world, uh, or, sorry. We're very cynical. Like I was raised by my mother and she was probably more antiestablishment in this way. Like she would probably be like someone who like follows Glenn Greenwald on Twitter if she was my age.

Um, yeah, no, sorry. Sorry. It was, it was a requested. Yeah, I think, I don't know. I guess we can talk a little bit about foreign policy now, but I think it's one of these things that happens where you just have a contradiction. That's just so blinding. That's just so, um, obviously false that you, you shock people into, into not just changing their mind, but kind of jumping wildly until they reach a new ideology.

Um, do you, do you think that. Uh, so I mean, the China thing, I mean, is, is interesting because there, you know, there's a whole narrative that goes into it. The reason that China cannot innovate and supposedly, and it's going to collapse and have all these problems is because it's not a liberal democracy.

Right. And I think what we've learned from, uh, uh, you know, it's funny cause people think our politics is broken, but I think one thing we've learned is there's sort of cross ideological agreement that democracies are just morally superior to non-democracy. So if you say, you know, you create, you have to tell people Ukraine as a democracy and you know, Russia is not, although it's a little more complicated than that, but that actually seems to work on people.

And so people don't want to hear any kind of narrative or, and China's obviously not a democracy. Uh, that it can do things well. Um, it clearly can do some things as well. And I've, you know, it does some things poorly. I mean, I've become very, you know, the, the zero, the zero COVID thing. I mean, it's frightening at this point.

And I it's really changing. I mean, they're not the main, it's rare that I, uh, one event or one policy has such a, um, a major effect on my worldview, but this is this isn't, this is no small thing. I mean, the level of craziness for you to still be doing zero COVID at this point is absolutely frightening. So it indicates, and maybe something is wrong with this with the system, but that's sort of, that's not the argument that people who are skeptical of China were making, it's like, it's like almost the opposite of what they were saying.

They were all saying like, you know, China has like a plan, but it's like, sort of like incompetent that it can't innovate. And it's like, no, it's very, very competent actually. Um, You know, it's goals just don't make a lot of sense. Are they, you know, or they can, uh, take up goals that are just, uh, you know, there's some pathology that they're, you know, the fact that they're still going for zero COVID, but yeah, their, their ability to do things is actually quite amazing and quite impressive.

The fact that they lasted with zero COVID, uh, for this long is, is actually pretty incredible. Uh, so yeah, it's, you know, if you start with the narrative, that democracy is good and authoritarianism is bad and the only liberal democracy can work. Uh that's. Everything. Right. Um, and it's like, you know, it's very, people are simplistic in their thinking on domestic issues, but on foreign issues much, much more so because people don't know what hung anything about Hungary or Ukraine or Russia or China, you know, they have these very, you know, extremely simplistic models that are, you know, uh, much more simplistic than, uh, than they do on most domestic issues.

And it's just like, okay, this is a democracy, this is an aggressor. Uh, you know, this is a illiberal democracy. Um, and it just sort of like now all good things go together and all bad things go to other it's like, it can't be for Tarion and also innovative or like, It can't be illiberal, but also at democracy, the fact that it's, you know, illiberal that, uh, doesn't have LGBTQ rights and the fact that it rejects immigration, it means it's not a democracy.

You can't just say, oh, it isn't democracy of reflects the will of the people. Uh, but it does things like, you know, liberals don't like, like, Nope, it's just a, uh, you know, it's just, it's not a democracy, you know, it's not competent, it's bad. And you know, it's just, it just sort of, it has to fall into a good or bad category.

Um, you know, it's, it's frustrating. Maybe the conversation on foreign affairs is, you know, much stupider than it is on a lot of, a lot of other things. Um, which is like, I think a good case for not being involved in the world, because I think it at least militarily, because I think we're just terrible at reasoning about these things.

Yeah. I always thought the argument that the democracy argument was more something like, oh, as people, as people get richer, they'll like, they'll, they'll want dignity and they'll want, like, this is like, Fukiyama right. I don't think, I, I don't think that's actually correlated with the necessarily that the government would become incompetent.

Uh, if, if they're, if they're like autocratic, right? Yeah. You spell, you see both, you see both arguments, you see that from a Fukuyama, uh, you know, it is like in Caba and like, they can't maintain control. Right? So they can't brainwash people to like the government or they can't, uh, you know, find a way to stay in power.

They're sort of, you know, they, they at least stopped believing them in themselves. Ah, Fukiyama argument, but I think that like UCS switching, because it's like, okay, first democracy is inevitable. Um, and then, okay, fine. You're your stubborn China. You're not going to become democratic. Okay. You're going to fail.

Like the God of democracy is going to get as revenge on you. And you're going to have like a terrible, terrible system and terrible life, a terrible life. Uh, so I think, I think they're both sides of the same coin. It's both kinds of like democratic triumphalism, uh, just, nobody thinks China's going to call, call, you know, actually collapsed our actually democratize.

Uh, so they, you know, it has to be like, I think they've scaled back their ambitions of what they predict a little bit. It's just, okay. You know, things are not going to work, will work out well, and China's going to face pushback. And you know, some of these things might be true or they might be false, but, you know, to the extent that we believe them it's because people want to know.

Yeah, I think, or actually first I'm going to add a little, add a little note because I think there's a big portion of my audience. That's maybe more tech or econ and they're not as into politics and, and, and in their mind that probably reads as a straw man, like the God of democracy stuff, like people really obsessing over this like magic word democracy.

Um, but I can assure you just like speaking to my audience that this is that this is like, almost like verbatim. How, how many people in, um, in these kinds of, uh, political circles or especially foreign policy circles, think about the world, um, related to that, is there are these kinds of like blobs of ideas that stick together and aren't naturally like are naturally correlated.

Right? You see this with political parties, you see this with kind of establishment thinking. Um, how do you just like in very broad strokes, how do you think that kind of forum. Uh, you mean the correlation between different kinds of beliefs? Yeah. These like clusters of beliefs. Yeah. I mean, it's so in the American, I mean, I think that, you know, societies have different, there's different ways to organize these things, right.

There's different ways. It's a different system. So some societies your ethnic, or, you know, your religious group determines 100% how you're going to vote. And, you know, there's nothing, you know, there's certain to know very, very little, uh, uh, variation within groups. You know, we, we don't have that system in the U S maybe for blacks.

And it's very interesting, sort of like black politics is just how different it is from everything else in America. I mean, I think that's an underexplored topic, how you have this one population sort of behaves, like, you know, they do in sort of developing democracies and every, every other group, you know, it doesn't or does.

So to only a very limited extent, I think that's, you know, that's interesting and that's something that's, uh, under explored. Um, but you know, in our, in our society. Yeah. I think I, you know, I think that, you know, the, the, the, I think the fault lines tend to be, um, Um, I think conf I think conformity is a big one.

I think gender, which is related to conformity is a big one. You know, I used to believe more that some beliefs naturally went together. So like, uh, Thomas solos, like conflict divisions, you know, that kind of argument like, oh, okay. There's it makes sense that you would be a, for small taxes and also for a gun, you know, freedom, uh, uh, uh, you know, for the second amendment, right.

To bear arms, like that sort of goes together. And, you know, maybe you could find a way to like put national defense stuff and like abortion stuff. And I, you know, I don't believe that. I think you look across the world, all kinds of combinations are possible, right? You can have socialists who are anti abortion and anti gay.

Uh, you know, you can have capitalists that are, you know, pro abortion at the anti-abortion and the foreign policy views. I mean, uh, all kinds of, sort of arrangements are possible. So it's, it really is, you know, tribalism, I think it probably best way to think about it is, you know, there's a few. Big personality or individual or demographic traits that put people into one camp or the other.

I mean, like if you don't feel like you're naturally gay in America, I mean, there's, you know, there, there is a tribe for you. There is one side that's gonna say, you know, you're the greatest thing since sliced bread or life science is going to be, you know, more hostile or indifferent. Um, you know, if you're a very masked say, let's say you're a, um, you know, the opposite side of this, let's say you're a male of like average or below average IQ.

Who's highly masculine and you're white. Um, yeah, you're getting just, just as much as that gay person is getting signals from the right, that they're not, you know, they're not the ones who are going to be raised by status by this coalition. You, you can see pretty clearly from the left that there's something problematic about your existence, right?

And so that person is going to, if they think about politics is going to be conservative. So, you know, I think there's these broad mess level. I think. You know, basic, uh, you know, these basic categories of coalitions, right? These coalitions interest groups, coalition makes it sound too rational. A coalition is like, you know, POL political coalitions, like log rolling, like, you know, people want something and each site, right.

It's more, it's more, you know, there's sort of a, a cultural thing and you go into one camp or the other. Yeah. So something that I really, really don't understand, um, is, uh, is Asians, um, because this is, this is where this idea of like, kind of contradicts and contradicts this. Right. And, uh, it's a bit different in Canada.

Asians are actually like swing voters in Canada. Um, but in the United States, in the United States, there is, there was one party that supports active government mandated discrimination against Asians. And, uh, it is the party that Asians predominantly vote for. Uh, and I just really don't understand this kind of puzzle.

And it's all always something that I talk to you with regards to like, uh, with regards to, uh, my, my friends who are, uh, living in America and voting in America, um, it seems like it, it seems to me like when you have a party that is this like actively antagonistic, it is somewhat difficult to, to square that, especially, especially like prior to Trump, especially, um, under, for example, like Romney where, like, I think the kind of error bars, the kind of uncertainty, the kind of like negative, negative stuff coming out of the Republic.

But what if you don't look at affirmative action? What if you look at immigration and you say, well, discrimination might mean what's the worst discrimination, right? Keeping, uh, you know, holding you to a higher standard for getting it to college or keeping people like you out of the country. Yeah. That's fair enough.

Although I don't think, I don't think the. The Democrats are. Very pro legal immigration. Like they're not doing a lot on terms of being pro legal immigration in the actual legislation and Republicans. Aren't that anti it's never rational. It's never, it's never, you know, it's perceptions. It's like, yeah, no, I get what you're saying.

There's, there's discrimination. There's real policy differences, but it's, it's actually, you know, it's like not the exact, you know, it's, it's, it's sort of a, just relative position. You know, Democrats are obviously more, uh, pro immigration than Republicans. Um, whether that has an effect or not, you know, that's not the point people are sort of, you know, they, they they'll DC, you know, they, uh, they form these affections just based more on emotion than, than reason.

Yeah, I think, um, this is a good segue into, uh, some of your articles. You, you talk a lot about these, uh, framings and the first one, I think circling back to an issue that you talked about, uh, before is this idea of feminization and you're not the only one who's gone over this idea. Uh, I think Tyler Cowen has.

Very interesting take on this as well, but there is this kind of evolving process of basically like safety is including like emotional safety ism people wanting to, uh, to address various fears, various, uh, low probability events with some kind of government policy or with some kind of, uh, action in general and not really considering the, kind of the, the downstream consequences of that.

So, um, why do you think that's happening if you do think that's happening and, uh, and, um, what any, if any corrections do we have for. Oh, why people want policies that don't, you know, they don't think carefully about. I took that just, that's just sort of human nature. That's the, that's the, um, you know, th I think that's expected in a democracy.

I mean, I think that's been sort of a stereotype, but, you know, we've known about social, you know, uh, moral panics for awhile. Um, you know, when I was, when I was younger, it was like, oh, the Christian. Right. You know, they, they want it to censor people and, you know, uh, you know, like church lady, you know, they'll give you, if you watch a census to people in your generation of the, you guys probably don't watch the Simpsons.

Do you? Uh, I don't watch much of any kind of Western shows at all. Okay. Well, the sentence, I mean, the sentence was good when I was a kid. It's not, it's not good anymore. I don't think it's good anymore. And I don't think people do, but every one of my age, like mid thirties or, or older, um, you know, 10 20 years, uh, knows a lot about Simpsons represent, you know, so I was, I was at a group with, uh, uh, like another fellow, uh, you know, gen X or whenever I am older millennial and then some younger kids and, and, you know, somebody made a Simpsons references averages like, oh yeah, good.

And the other half are like, you know, what, what are you even, what are you even talking about? Um, Why was I talking about the Simpsons? What were we just talking about? I'm sorry. We were talking about like feminization, you're talking about feminization and safety ism. Uh, okay. Well, oh, okay. That's, that's where I was going with it.

So there's a Reverend love joy, and there's Robert, Reverend Lovejoy's wife. And every time something happens, uh, the substance, she goes, oh, why won't anyone think of the children? Now it's an outdated sort of stereotype because it shows you the stereotype of like the 1990s of like the kind of person who wanted to censor speech.

It was like the preacher, you know, the preacher's wife, super prudish, the same thing about the children. Uh, and today that, you know, that part of human nature. It's still there. Um, it's just, I think the, you know, the, the conservatives that cultural conservatives have so little power that they, you know, they can't affect any kind of, uh, uh, it's become so correlated with class that, uh, you know, the people with power and influence, you know, the lawyers, the government bureaucrats, the media, et cetera, are so firmly in one camp on these cultural issues that you don't have right-wing moral panics, able to sort of take over our society anymore. You know, people call the anti critical race theory stuff, moral panics. They don't come out that they're not getting like every corporation to like, agree with them, like the way the, uh, the left did after George Floyd. Um, and so. Yeah.

And so this is part of human nature. I'm going to take it a different form now. I mean, the fact that the class and, uh, political views, social views are so highly correlated now, um, the gender, you know, the correlated with, uh, sex and, you know, the fact that men and women have different beliefs and particularly women who, um, uh, who have careers are different from women, um, who are, who become wives and stay at home moms.

Um, so the career woman have a, have a disproportionate influence on what kind of moral panics we have. Uh, you know, this is, this is, this is something that's, you know, these moral panics are sort of something that's always existed, but there's new manifestation of, of them, uh, you know, depending on social and cultural and political developments.

Yeah. I remember in one of your articles, you talked about how, like the number one, uh, donor group to Republicans is like either welders or homemakers. Yeah. That's not connected to any state homemakers, like retire. It's like retirees, like yeah, exactly. You know, sub stackers are like probably more like non woke that in line here, typewriters, right?

It's like, there's this sort of institutional versus non-institutional divide, which is interesting. One, one kind of frame that I have for this. And I don't think I've seen a lot of politicians talk about is that, uh, basically, uh, the long arc of history, uh, um, bends towards availability bias. Uh, so you have all of these kind of a one-off scenarios.

You have like George Floyd, or let's say you on, on the, on the right wing side, you have like, uh, you have like, uh, whatever libs of Tik TOK is posting, right? Like the, these kind of like individual, um, videos that are just like, they're not a, they're not a policy argument, right? They're not a, they're not an argument about a widespread problem, but they're just something that is like a one-off that is super emotionally triggering.

And then you, you see these things go viral and that's just a potential of, of, uh, that just never existed before potential of technology that never existed before. And the more you get better at basically sharing information and sharing fast, the more of these kind of like availability, bias, driven, uh, driven moral panics takeover.

And right now, I think right now I think the left is a lot better at using them. But I mean, I think the right is catching up. I think like Chris Rufo is like a real innovator. Yeah. I think actually, yes, this is interesting because it's like, yeah, the critical race theory stuff. And now the, um, uh, the stuff about, you know, gender identity and like a great schools.

Yeah. I think we might've reached a point. I mean, it's early to say this. We could get to a point or maybe we're getting to a point where, uh, on net social media is better for the right than the left. Uh, because it's all about organizing sort of people with highly, you know, highly emotional. Maybe it was.

I think before it was actually bad for the left in the sense of winning elections, like, um, just a lot of insane people being exposed, but I will say, yes, that's true. But this is, this is like going back to my article liberals reconstructive watch TV. What's good for Democrats versus what's good for the left and what's good for Republicans versus what's good for conservatism are not the are not the same thing.

Uh, so it's hard for Democrats to be as left-wing as possible on social issues. It's good for leftism to have one party that is so absolute. It's there. They're dragging everything along with them. And, you know, by, by just like, even if you're the most incompetent party and nobody likes you, you're going to win like almost 50% of the elections.

So like to be so radical. Um, if you're a left-wing activist, like you want one party to just be as radical as possible because maybe they'll win elections like five or 10% less than the timer or whatever, then what happens many elections, but they're going to do so much and they're going to be, you know, just really just putting your foot down on the pedal, uh, when they're in power, um, that if you're a leftist, that's great.

If you're a democratic party strategist, you say, no, I just want to eek out as many, uh, political victories as, uh, as possible. Um, so it was good. I think social media has been good for the left bad for the Democrats. Party. Um, and now we're, we are, we could be moving to a point where it might be bad for the left culturally.

Um, it might be good for Republicans, or it might be bad for we're hoping it's I don't know, but it does feel like something's changing. And it seems like the last few moral panics that are driving, you know, so-called moral panics that are driving. Things are coming from the right now. There's something called thermostatic public opinion and political science.

Um, in the sense that, you know, when like a Democrat is in power, like Republicans are more energized. And when a Republican is in the power, as the president, uh, Democrats become more energized, you know, that's why midterm turnouts tend to be good for the party. Uh, that's out of power. This is something that goes back, you know, many, many decades, um, in American politics.

So maybe we're just seeing that maybe the fact that Trump lost and if Trump had won, maybe the loss could be, you know, much more energized. And Chris Rufo wouldn't, uh, uh, wouldn't be as you know, uh, getting as much attention. I dunno. I mean, there's a lot, there's a lot that's in flux. And, um, I think what we've seen in social media is not necessarily, uh, it's not necessarily the death of conservatism or the death of the right.

I mean, even who had advantages in the end change, I think Facebook is, you know, it's sort of like this Facebook was, um, uh, you know, it's sort of an accident became sort of the right-wing boomer site. Um, it w it didn't set out to like, it's, you know, it had censorship, it wasn't, you know, censored, you know, far right beliefs.

It didn't, you know, it didn't have anything culturally that wanted to be this, but just happened that the product was more appealing to boomers. Um, and now you look at like, there's this, uh, Twitter accounts that record like top 10, um, posts a day on, uh, on Facebook. And it's all like Ben Shapiro and like Franklin Graham and like daily, daily wire.

Uh, so, you know, for whatever, you know, boomer conservatism is like, you know, very much, uh, uh, advantaged, uh, by facing. True at all. I think that's, uh, the newer, the newer social media sites are just like very repulsive to anyone who has not like developed under this environment. Right. Like take talk to me.

It was just like incredibly repulsive. I hate things that are just like, um, rapidly, rapidly, like context switching. Right. If, you know, if you know that term, it's just like so irritating to me. And I feel like I have to be someone who like, if you're someone who like reads at all, this is, or like, has any kind of.

Long-term thing that you focus on. This is just something that is like repulsive to you. Right. But this, if this isn't the environment that you grew up in for a long time, then it becomes like hypertension until the point. I mean, the question is not why boomers, why Facebook was more appealing to boomers.

Right. It's just the fact that it was, it ended up that way. So like, what's the politics, it's good for boomer conservatism. And that's not necessarily nobody, no boomer planned that, or know that wasn't Facebook's algorithms doing. It just happened to sort of end up like that. Even for reasons why, you know, you could be correcting it.

Tik TOK is, you know, Twitter. I think you're right about that. I think there's different generations. So Twitter is like, sort of right where I'm at, you know, uh, you know, it makes it intuitively feels right to me and I enjoy using it. And Tik TOK is a little bit, uh, bizarre by that. I mean, I'm not a dancing teenage girl.

I mean, you, of course, tik tok would be for the young, I mean, right. It just makes sense, like dancing and singing. This seems like a young girl thing. So I think, you know, probably Tik TOK will probably appeal to every generation of young girls and probably less so as they get older, Yeah. Going back to the original point.

I, I don't know it, I think I actually just have a very different conception of what kind of conservatism is to the, to the extent that I don't see like the, these moral panics as particularly, uh, conservative, even if they're like right-wing culture, war issues. Right. I kind of see conservatism as, um, holding, holding over, uh, individuals, an immense amount of discipline and order.

Uh, maybe this is just my, my kind of upbringing, but like social media in general, I feel like it's kind of like, it's like pulling the right two words towards like chaos extremely quickly. And it is just like, almost like the opposite of conservatism just as a, as a, as like a moral philosophy. Hm. Yeah. I don't know.

I haven't thought much about conservatism as a moral philosophy. I, you know, I don't, I, you know, it's hard for me to conceptualize sort of, um, Like that as I think of conservative, like I think, you know, I think of these things is very, very context specific. Like I think, I think conservatism in the United States has generally been like the philosophy of just sort of, you know, normal people, um, in the sense that.

Uh, you know, just the, like people don't like innovation and strange things happen in culturally. Um, and you know, those people are now, now it's become a, it's become a thing where like liberalism has become sort of such an establishment thing that if you're super high on conformity, I think you're going to be, uh, I think you're going to be liberal.

And I think this is, this is the Asian thing that we could go back to. I mean, I think Asians are very high on conformity. Uh, so I think that, that this there's sort of, uh, attraction to American liberalism, um, makes sense, but, you know, it's changing American service. I think you're right. I think again, in my article, uh, liberals or conservatives watch TV before, so there's a development right there.

There was before social media, there was, you know, Fox news started in the, I think late 1990s. Uh, but what do you have before, before Fox news? And before social media, you have talk radio, you have rush Limbaugh, but even before that, like that, that wasn't always there. Um, or it wasn't as big a force like before the 1990s, all conservatism was, was like newspapers in that.

Um, it was like, you know, national review used to have a much bigger influence, I think in the 1980s, um, it was like business groups. It was like civic groups that had like control over the Republican, the Republican party. Um, and this was a completely different thing right. Than what the Republican party is today.

So then you have, uh, this, you know, this developments that are, it becomes infotainment. So you have, uh, you have rights, you have the, uh, uh, talk radio, you have Fox news. Eventually you have social media, which eats all of our, all of our brains and conservatism naturally. And politics has to be something else just like liberalism, uh, become something else.

Right. I think that's yeah. Unquestionably. Yeah. So you mentioned your article, uh, liberals read conservatives, watch TV. Can you just give like a broad stroke summary of, uh, what that means? Uh, so basically there's, um, uh, there's, you know, there's, uh, you know what, I it's too it's so I'm just going to get the chart.

Okay. I'm just going to pull up because that sounds good. I, you know, it's a little bit it's, uh, it's this, um, I'll put it in, I'll put it in the show that I'm just going to get the chart because I have, uh, uh, you know, I, it took me so many words to explain this. It's like, I, like, I don't have a good elevator pitch out, uh, for this article, you know, I think it's 9,000 words and I felt like it had to be 9,000 words.

I didn't, you know, I didn't think I can add some of my, most of my articles are much shorter than that, but I think this one could be, so basically, um, if you look at conservatives and liberals, conservatives, get out of, there's not a, there's a more fun way to do this. I can, I can quiz you. Sure. Okay. Yeah.

Yeah, sure. So, um, Obviously, this is a, this is the title of the piece. Um, we're going to go liberal and conservative, and then we're going to go, um, each of these questions. So for both liberals and conserve the empirical background, do you have to give people as we, as conservatives and liberals, um, which, um, uh, you know, where they get their sources for information, liberals are much more likely to read newspapers and serious websites that gets around probably like a lot.

So you can go look at it. It's not that most it's not conservatives are more likely to have talk radio RTD. Not that a lot of liberals don't watch TV, like feeling in the general population, like TV is more popular than reading, uh, obviously, but there's a subset, there's much more of a substantial, um, uh, group within, uh, democratic voters or, or, or liberals, uh, that, that actually reads serious stuff.

So that's like sort of the background. And then I argue that they start different types of different ways of getting. These, these are different, different sort of kinds of people who have different ways of gathering information about the world. And this has sort of downstream effects for how conservatism and how liberalism organize themselves.

So that's basically the main argument. And then, you know, the charge is sort of is just an elaboration on that basic point. Yeah. So, so this is the, this is the kind of lightening round. So what is the driving force between liberals and conservatives? Uh, so I think it's, I say it's ideology for liberals and of course, you know, so many qualifications in the sense that this is like, not, it doesn't describe.

Yeah, sure. Uh, liberals are driven by ideology, um, and simply simplifying things conservatives by tribalism. Yeah. Um, how do they differ when they're lying? Uh, conservatives, uh, lie in random directions, liberals lie in a consistent direction. Interesting. Okay. Uh, how do they, how do they, uh, decide on, on, uh, what, uh, opinions.

Uh, so it's um, what did I say for that? I have to, I have to cheat in, uh, look exactly how I put this. So for, okay, so this is cool. So from the, from the middle activist and professional class influences politicians and mass opinion, and I say, conservatives are top-down it's whatever Trump says, whatever rush limbal happens to be talking about today, it's top-down versus sort of middle, uh, and going up and down from the middle, this part is kind of new, right?

This is like, this is like post, post Romney, starting with Trump. Uh, no, I mean, I think when George W. Bush, like, you know, went into Iraq and then like just charged to change the justification from WMDs to, uh, building democracy, like people sort of ate that up. Um, and so I think the, I think it's been there.

At least since George W. Bush, uh, maybe, maybe, maybe George W. Bush was really a, sort of a watershed for conservatism, you know, bump the halls party with something. Uh, George H w Bush, his party was, you know, the more business class, the more, uh, uh, you know, you could say more, more reading, but not, not, not really, just more sort of, uh, uh, mellow, not interested in the culture war served, or just a different class basis and a different, uh, uh, aesthetic.

And it wasn't, it wasn't necessarily top down, they were responding to social forces. I think it was more actually from medium. I think, you know, conservative, uh, politics, 30 years ago, you have Republicans, like 30 years ago were actually more responsive to the activist and professional classes. So they were, they, you know, I think both parties actually, you know, they were more like each other, like these differences are exaggerated compared to what they were 20, 30 years ago.

Yeah. Which ones, which one of these is better at impacting the real, uh, liberalism obviously I think has been much better at impacting the reload with notable exceptions on the conservative side, like, you know, the gun movement and the anti-abortion. Yeah. And how do you left and right. Like to, uh, like to do a tax.

Uh, so they, uh, it's personal on the right. It's more ideologically driven on the left. Yeah. You had this anecdote about like, just looking at the cover of the New York post or something like that, or like Breitbart, right? Yes. Yeah. Names it's like Fowchee, uh, you know, sometimes Hillary that'd be the right-wing media still talks about Hillary.

I mean, after like, you know, it's been six years now and you still like, she'll be like a major, I don't know, still, but I'm Hannity. Like you just like, you know, not that long ago, uh, she was like a major character. I wouldn't be surprised. She still is. I mean, they talk about Michelle Obama. I mean, like who's not a public figure, so it's, yeah, it's a very, uh, sort of tabloidy, you know, this is what TV Watchers, like they, they get bored by ideas.

They like, they like personality. Yeah. And what kind of like it and, uh, what kind of like historical parallels are there? Uh, so I think ideological movements, aren't, you know, communism, uh, Taliban, Islamic extremism, um, and then conservatives are sort of, I always think of them as sort of the right wing, uh, dictatorships that were posted communism, but didn't really have like much of an ideology themselves and eventually just, you know, uh, just became democracies or just sort of became decrepit and just sort of like, you know, uh, uh, sort of a meandering along and these countries, so yeah, yeah.

To me, they always seem like just tribes, right? Just like, it's the human, it's the human norm. It's like, you know, like two tribes are fighting each other in some hunter gatherer. So you know how their hunter-gatherer context. I mean, they're going to be throwing, got to act more like Sean Hannity than like Rachel Maddow.

Yeah. And I guess this kind of answers the next question, but like the type of ingroup signal. Uh, yeah. So it's tribal loyalty versus ideological purity. Yeah. Two, two more left for, uh, uh, we have one, which is, uh, the ultimate orientation, basically how, how, um, how it organizes and the main interests. So the, the, the, uh, of the, um, this is something, you know, going back to what we talked about before, uh, on the left, I mean, the left is basically in control of the democratic party.

The left is basically a advantage. So when there's something that hurts, you know, when there's tends to be some kind of conflict of interest between what the left wants and what the democratic party is in his best interest, um, the left gets its way, um, on, uh, the right it's different. It's the Republican party.

They, they, uh, they, uh, they adapt to whatever, you know, now you could no longer be openly homophobic. And so they'll stop being openly homophobic. Right? Uh, so things like that. And then, you know, that's probably smarter, short term electorally, uh, but changes the culture and the, um, and the direction does favorable towards conservatives.

Yeah. And I think that's kind of this, this kind of connects to your story about like, uh, Dems are the real racists, right? I think that's a good anecdote to have just for that. Yeah. So, I mean, there's a thing where conservatives will say, and this is a big thing is like Democrats are, you know, the, the Republicans are the party of civil rights, uh, that, you know, there's a little bit truth in this and that the sense that Republicans were the ones who, um, who were, uh, more of them voted for the civil rights act of 1964.

And that that's all, you know, that makes sense, but it really doesn't make sense. I mean, because modern conservatism was sort of formed and organized, you know, Ron Garrett, Barry Goldwater and outspoken defender, uh, opponent of the civil rights act, definitely an opponent. The vote came after the civil rights act.

I mean, for good reasons, because he was, uh, you know, he had these libertarian conservative use and what basically the, uh, civil rights, uh, has done, um, asides from, you know, ending Jim Crow, everything beyond that, um, has been, you know, in the front tail libertarian and conservative values. And you would think that, you know, if you will, if you are sort of muddy, logical, consistent party, you would recognize that.

But if you're a party of TV Watchers, you say, you know, we're the real party of Martin Luther king, uh, which doesn't make a lot of. Yeah, I'm actually not sure where you stand on this as a tactical question. Like you, you can do like a kind of Rufo ism where, where you actually just like shout progressives are the real racists in a long enough in order to get it and to get it in like the public lexicon.

And that's not necessarily because of the civil rights era, but because like, I mean, like, especially with regards to Asians, they are like actually, uh, doing racist policies. Um, but, uh, maybe, maybe like less in general, but like definitely with regards to Asians and you can kind of, you can kind of make this a thing if you, if you just like do it enough.

Right. So do you think it's like good for strategy? So I think the ideal strategy, like if I was a, you know, if I'm a conservative and I see what your conservatives do, or what's your Republicans do, it would be like, Republicans should do what they're doing now. Um, publicly, like Dems are the real racist. Uh, I think that's ideal electorally while having like a bunch of like people in the background, like ready to implement like a hard right agenda since they get to power, which has nothing to do with what the politicians were talking about.

This is sort of where the Republican party is, you know, I'm actually, you know, I'm sort of, yeah, it's scott or sorry, not scott. And Mitch McConnell just like keeps telling like Rick Scott to like, shut up about like ending social security or whatever. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. It's like, you know, but, but, but it's actually to the point of.

They've gotten too far in the direction of, you know, uh, uh, the TV stuff, the word it comes to dump, it comes to dominate and then they don't end up doing all that much with power. One thing they do do is they point a lot of, uh, uh, judges. Uh, so it's actually, the conservative movement is actually a, something of an impressive machine for taking ideas that are inherently very unpopular.

Um, and then giving them power in society. And I like those ideas. I like the libertarian economics. I don't think, I don't think society is smarter than the, for them. So you have to sort of sneak them. Uh, you have to sneak them in there. Um, yeah. Wait, can we just do like a quick clarification? I think there are a lot of bad faith versions of this, but I think like people in my audience would like generally kind of, uh, want this clarification of what do you mean by like an actual, like hard right.

Oh, I mean, I want, you know, uh, I think that, um, uh, well, hard right agenda would be, what, what did I say? Oh, for the best. I mean, I would say for the best strategy, so I'm not being dumb. I'm not using the words. I'm not using the words as an endorsement of every single, uh, thing of this, but, you know, the, the, you know, the simple stuff, uh, you know, lower taxes, uh, less government spending, uh, roll back, um, excesses of civil rights, law, guns, abortion.

Let's say, I'm saying like, if it depends on what you, it depends on what you want. Like, so let's say the ideal strategy. So basically we're keeping the elections, right? Yeah. I think we're keeping, we're keeping the elections. Yes. I think you need to keep the elections, right? Um, exactly. I getting rid of that as, as very difficult, uh, But I think that it depends on, you know, w what do, I mean, I don't endorse every part of the conservative agenda, but I'd be saying, like, if you were alive, you know, a person who, you know, wanted war on Iran, for example, uh, which I don't want, uh, you would want to, you wouldn't want a candidate who said, who doesn't like, say that explicitly just sort of says vague things, or, oh, Biden's not being tough enough.

I'm going to be tough and not say like, I want to invade it. Right. And, and then get a power and just even invade invading Ron. Right. That's what I would suggest. And it's like that for every part of the Arkansas route. Now, I think on the social issues, which I care a lot about, um, it's sort of the case it's sort of different from like taxes or foreign policy and why.

The way we talk about it is actually the issue, right? So it's like, okay, we're publicans to just like, use their pronouns to win elections, because that will like, you know, if that, if that worked, which probably, you know, that probably wouldn't work, but let's say that worked like they should. Well, that's the thing that benefits Republicans, like more people are kind of like our, like now I know, but I'm saying for sake of argument, um, so saying like, you know, let's say PR PR or like being, uh, you know, like being open to gay marriage, maybe that benefits Republicans now are, you know, and so they're there at Thai homophobic in their words.

Now, one thing we're actually debating the substance of the argument is like the way people talk, should we be heteronormative as a society? Or should we be a society of this gender fluid now when politicians just, you know, um, uh, when they just, you know, say that they're okay with homosexuality, there's no difference between homosexuality heterosexuality, uh, you know, being gay is okay then, you know, that's sort of that's, that is sort of the policy in and of itself because you're changing culture.

So it's a little bit, it's a little bit complex with the, um, with the social, with the social issues. Um, I think that what sort of, what I see them doing with the, um, uh, the bills in, uh, uh, at the state legislative, right. I was actually actually, I think sort of a brilliant, um, in the sense that it is shifting the culture, uh, by talking about groomers and, you know, there's sort of like getting a gay panic, uh, going, um, but at the same time they're avoiding like things that are hard for them to say, like we're appealing, you know, gay marriage.

Um, yeah, I think like, I think the thing with that is that it's like good tactically, but it's almost like an exact, exact, like imitation of wokeness, right? Like groomer is just like the, the right-wing public of like racist. The context is wokeness succeeded more than, you know, anyone could have imagined any movement succeeding.

So I mean, that, that makes sense. Yeah. The, the thing that I worry about, especially because I think I'm like much more, I think you're like, uh, clearly on the, on the right wing, I'm like, uh, I'm much more of a centrist, I think. Um, like I have this, like, I have this like meme or this like persona of being like a Biden Stan on, on Twitter.

Um, I'm not actually, but like you, you have this, you have this scenario where. I think like politics is just like converging on like stupid. Right? Like, and I, and I know you said that like, the stuff that you actually do when you're in power is not necessarily the same thing, but it feels like if people are just discussing these kinds of things and like, everything is a character, you, you have like one side, like basically calling each other racist and you have the other side basically calling each other, like groomers this just like this ends up in a world where, where like the incentives for, for getting like politicians is just super low.

Right? All your politicians will just be low quality. Well, that's, that's that? I mean, that's democracy. What do you, what do you want? That's the plus that's an important caveat because like, I didn't know, like one thing that I've kind of like brainstormed, I haven't put it out anywhere yet is that we should.

Maybe we should just make corruption more rewarding. Like we should make it so that if you're just like, if you're just like corrupt, but you also like do things. If you also like do things that are like broadly beneficial to the people, like kind of like all of your, all of your, like, uh, 19th or early 20th century politicians, I think FDR is maybe most known for this, if you're just kind of like corrupt, but you also aren't like competent, then you just get like more rewarded.

It's not a thing that made me. Yeah, this is what I, there's a scholar named Yuen Yuen Ang who wrote some books on China, Y U E N, that you, and again, Ang A N G who argues that this is some sort of a benefit of the Chinese system. You skim some off the top of your corrupt official, that creates incentive for economic growth.

You know, the question is, you know, sort of like, it depends on the specifics of the system. Like, you can just say we, if we just go start electing more corrupt politicians today, um, you know, that doesn't mean that the incentives will necessarily line up what will be beneficial for society. So, you know, corruption can be beneficial for society.

You have to sort of, you know, but it depends on the context and you have to think about that. Yeah. Well, well, let's, let's do the thinking about that, right? Like, like I think if, if you're in a context where, where post-modernism is kind of like reality, right? Like. I think like the 20, 20, 22 news environment is like pretty close to what Fuko describes.

Right. Um, or even closer to you, like what boatyard describes, right. Everyone is just like copying things until they're, they're like, no, nowhere resembling the origin. Um, then you do kind of want, you do kind of want these kinds of like Machiavellian, uh, pipelines or these Machiavellian incentives where people can just like, come in, make things better and then like profit off of it and then leave.

Yeah. How do they, I mean, how did they profit off of it in the current American system? So if somebody comes in, they take a bunch of bribes, like, okay. So Amazon is like very, you know, sort of becoming unpopular, not with the public, but like with the idiots on Twitter. And so like, and an activist, like, you know, the worst people.

Uh, so Amazon is, you know, sort of, um, you mean like the right wing ones or the left wing ones, both of them, the worst people, the worst people of everywhere. Um, So somebody come and go. Like maybe if that, if they actually succeeded, like a president could come in, like you could just take all this money from Jeff Bezos and keep letting Amazon do what it was.

And that unquestionably, I think, would be good for society. Um, and then like, okay, like that can, uh, that can work. Um, You know, so like th that would be like an interesting, you know, scenario another. Yeah. But another scenario would be like, you know, they just like, just start extorting, Amazon. And like, I think this was like, if like someone was like, Elizabeth Warren was, was in power, they would just use it to build up their own, you know, donations to them, or they would hurt.

Amazon succeeded, uh, or, you know, are failed. They can extract something from Amazon just to like, make sure they don't like go harder on them. Right. Uh, but they don't, you know, so, so you can imagine both ways, you could imagine a corruption that destroys society, and you can imagine a corruption. I think like, uh, kind of oligarchy where the rich people are in charge is better than one where the politicians are in charge.

Because I think the rich people are the ones with more of a direct, uh, interest in the well-being of society, right. With the wealthiest society produces the most by far the most millionaires and billionaires and the richest millionaires and billionaires. Right. And so like, you know, if you're, if you're a billionaire, you know, like, uh, maybe be, or you wouldn't care that much between one, 1 billion and 2 billion or 3 billion.

Uh, but you know, some, there are a lot of people who do keep working hard after making hundreds of millions or billions of dollars, um, and how big the pie is. Wealthy society is, um, does actually matter to them how, while a politician, a politician is just, you know, trying to skim, you know, as much as possible.

And like, it's not like a pop, you don't have the, uh, uh, economy like doubles or contracts or whatever. Like the, you know, there'll be that strong of a correlation with how well the interest alignment. Right. And, and, and their utility function is not money. Their utility function is often power right. And influence.

So that's a really good point. That's a really good point. And so the, and this is a problem. And so yeah. You, and so, um, yeah, it's, um, it, it is interesting. It's worth thinking about, I mean, I think people think like corruption is, you know, I think what we're getting at is like people think corruption is good or pro corruption is bad. I'm sorry. And like anti-corruption is necessarily good. And it's like, no, I think it's, yeah. It's something that's very highly complex.

Yeah, here's an idea. I think actually that that's kind of inspired, uh, by this, or this is an idea that I, that I had before, but now I think it's slightly different is that, um, I've been trying to book, I've been trying to book Amy Chu on this podcast is involved and she wrote this book called a political tribes, which is basically talking about like, oh, there's all these kinds of, um, uh, minority groups that are very, very successful in these, uh, in these Asian countries and these African countries.

And, uh, this creates like a room for demagoguery when we introduce elections in, uh, in these countries. And you get like these, these kinds of like, um, majority demagoguery situations, uh, and, uh, uh, she, she like takes, it, takes the U S and says, like, this is basically Trump. Right. Um, but that actually seems to me like an incomplete explanation of demagoguery because.

What I really see is like this kind of like progressive wing. Most Democrats aren't are not like this, but this progressive laying, which is like overrepresented in, uh, overrepresented in media and overrepresented in like universities and stuff. They really are like, kind of like following this, this like demagoguery playbook, but, but not against like a minor minority ethnic group, but really against like the self-made basically like this, there's this kind of like idea of the coalition of the ascendant, um, from like Roy to Shera.

Um, and I feel like it's actually like literally the opposite. If you say, look at the things they're attacking, right. They're talking like SATs, they're attacking. Like, um, if they're attacking, like all these like tech startups, they're basically attacking and you, where, where power is like created where power is like earned by like individual individual, like ability.

And you can really see like the, the entire apparatus of progressivism as basically like, as basically trying to like fill in, fill in the blank with like the best answer of like, how do we say, how do we say that better people are bad and this obviously ends up being like anti-Asian uh, yeah. I mean, if there's a, yeah, there's, there's a, there's a lot there.

Yeah. What bribes, demagoguery, I mean is, uh, uh, is an interesting question. It's sort of, you know, it's just sort of, it's certainly there's human nature and then there's these buttons you can push. And I think one positive thing is it doesn't appear to have that much. Uh, I think people are too indifferent for it to be that popular.

I mean, I think the biggest demagogues tend not to get a lot of support and they tend to isolate a lot, alienate a lot of people, like, I think Warren and Sanders are, you know, the biggest demagogues in our, uh, politics. Um, I'd say more so than more so than Trump. Well, I mean, I think even more than Trump got Warren, I, you know, I think, I think Warren and Sanders are, you know, that, you know, would, would alienate the sort of dispossess and, you know, harm, but much larger percentage of their citizenry.

And, you know, I think Trump is more, you know, demagoguing outsiders to society, um, foreigners, including, uh, immigrants. But no, I think, uh, you know, the, the class-based stuff is very ugly and it goes, you know, it cross cuts a lot of American society, a lot more, uh, Uh, destructive, but the, but the point is, I mean, they're not very, I mean, they're not very popular.

I mean, they're popular in the sense that they do all, I mean, like, you know, like 20% of the population loves them, but they can't win the democratic primary. And the, and I think Sanders or Warren would have been done relatively poorly in, um, in a presidential election. So it seems like, you know, and even the so-called Reichman populace in Europe, they never, you know, they usually don't do that greatly.

I mean, they usually, you know, they'll have like a 20% cap or something or a 30% cap with people who really support them. So, you know, one thing we can be thankful for is that like, people are not, um, you know, people are not, you know, like if you look at communism, like the ultimate democratic, uh, ultimate kind of demagoguery, I mean, they tend not to win democratic elections.

They tend to come to power through force and sometimes they do okay. In democratic elections. But usually not that, not that well. Uh, so I mean, I think maybe, you know, I've talked myself into a little bit of a sense of optimism about, uh, demagoguery and how far it can go in a democratic sense. Uh, that that's really interesting because maybe this is not an exact map onto demagoguery, but something I'm working on and we'll probably be out.

Um, we'll probably be out by the time this podcast is released is, uh, one of my big ideas is that, uh, this kind of conspiratorial demagoguery either, either with like the left wing wokeness, like there, there is like all this hidden racism or like the obvious conspiracies, uh, on the right, like anti-vax, uh, election, whatever.

Um, It's basically really good at creating an like a permanent activist class. I think this is something that's going to happen on the right. Very soon as you'll have all of these people who like really care about anti-vax or really care about the election, uh, so much that they're willing to like put all of their, all their time in it right there.

I think there's just like this kind of subtle envy, and you can see it with a Rufo ism as well. There's a subtle envy of, uh, liberals ability to get people to like, kind of be cultists and to like put all of their, like, like you talked about in a, in another article, why everything is liberal to get their like Cardinal preferences all the way up and get this, like, get this like permanent bureaucrat class.

Um, you can kind of do the same thing. And they're like, anti-vaxxer was definitely that I know who are like, even like fairly high level, like executive positions, right? So if you get this like permanent auntie get this like permanent kind of a conspiratorial class or this kind of like demagoguery class, right.

If you want to, if you want to compare it towards like the sort of role, for example, this can actually make a pretty big impact on Baraka. Yeah. I mean, there's always been sort of activist classes. I mean, the, the, you know, there's, full-time people who are conservative activists who are, uh, you know, people who work in, you know, think tanks or journalism that do a kind of activism to, um, and that's, you know, and you know, that could be good or bad.

I mean, you could, they could be, they, I think it more depends on the, cause I think the left has a lot more on the left is much better at getting there, uh, active in silver sort of intertwined with, um, uh, state power, you know, a lot of like the university's education system have people who are self-identified activists who are trying to, you know, change the world.

Um, but you know, yeah. It depends on, you know, it sort of depends on the substance of what activism has I taken, whether it's good or bad. Yeah. So actually we should, uh, focus a little bit on why everything is, is liberal, your, uh, I think still your most famous article. Um, and just talk about. Uh, th this underlying theory of activists and of, of kind of like Cardinal preferences.

So, um, what are Cardinal preferences and basically why do they matter? Yeah. So in economics and in Cardinal preferences are basically, you know, how, uh, how important you, you care about how much you care about things, or how much you want something and ordinal purposes, just, you know, how much, you know, whether, whether you prefer a to B it's like very, uh, sort of, uh, binary, just, well, you know, well, how you rank things.

Um, and then, or, you know, so I, you know, you look at the country like conservatives and liberals, it's pretty, um, it's pretty, uh, evenly divided. Um, and then when you, but when you look at like how much people care about politics and you measure that by donations, you measure that by activism. Um, you measure that by, you know, protesting or assigning, uh, petitions, or, you know, yelling at people on social media or like caring about politics in your own life.

Um, whenever we went, we met with all of these different measures. We have, we see liberals care a lot more. And so that matters because, you know, there's an election it's sometimes publicans win and sometimes Democrats win. Uh, but then when we, um, and then, but the real world war, the way the real world works is it's, it's a responsive to activists.

And I think the biggest, you know, biggest kind of activist tend to be journalists and academics who, uh, earned less. Smart enough people that they earn, they pick jobs where they tend to earn less money or have the PA uh, usually, um, uh, will have a, less of an expected monetary payoff offer the careers that they chose.

But what they're getting out of it is they're getting, uh, they're getting influenced on they're getting power, or they're getting to sort of engage in self fulfillment. Also, it's the fact that, you know, liberals care more than the general population liberals go into these, uh, relatively influential and less lucrative fields, uh, explains a lot of why they tend to be, um, you know, they, the institutions tend to be liberal rather than conservative.

Yeah. I think empirically this makes a lot of sense, especially in a, in your article, which I'll link in the show notes, but do you have any kind of like, um, any kind of like explanation as to, as to why activists matter? So. Well, I mean, I don't, I don't think it's, you know, I think it's sort of, it's sort of obvious and I don't know if it's, you need like a complicated theory for this.

I mean, like if you're a corporation and you know, you, uh, you know, you're deciding whether to adopt some kind of, you know, statement on a public policy issue, and you have like a hundred people here who are going to yell at you, who are going to pick at your store, who's going to make, you know, even, or even if you have like your own employees, like, you know, you know, your, your, your employees are evenly divided, but like half of them are really going to be demoralized.

And like, not like the corporation, if it goes on a, you know, if it doesn't take their position and the other side, you know, doesn't care, um, you're going to respond to the people who care. If you're like, you know, you're worried about angry consumers. If one side Mike boycott you and, you know, cover you in the media and, you know, and, and, you know, try to ruin your reputation and the other side doesn't, uh, people, you know, institutions are naturally gonna respond to that.

So I, you know, I don't think that's, uh, that's all, that's the. Uh, but to me it feels like it's just easier to, and official activists. I mean, it's also more just who wants to speak up and who cares to like do something to them rather than someone else? Yeah. I, to me, it does still doesn't make sense though, because why don't the corporations just like fire these people.

I know you talk about like sometimes a civil rights law per se, sorry. Protects them on some of these kinds of assets in Canada. Absolutely not that employers don't have absolute power. I mean, the employees have valuable skills. Um, you know, they, they have access to the VDS so they can complain, but, you know, I think this is a sort of a left there's sort of a left, you know, this is a here sort of a leftist assumption that they, you know, it's sort of asymmetric bargaining where the employer has all the power on the employee.

Doesn't and I don't think it works that way. They think the employee employees are competing for jobs to, you know, for different, through different employers and the employers are competing for employees too. So it's more of a symmetrical relationship and both sides sort of have to, you know, if the employer doesn't care, if the employer is completely different.

Yeah. How do I make the employees a little. Uh, I think this is just like, not true though. Um, I don't think, for example, like let's take like apple, apple workers right there. There's these kinds of like, brouhahas over like Antonio Garcia Martinez. He wrote a book and they were kind of like stupid, like spurious accusations of sexism against him because of the book that was published for like five years, uh, before I got hired or something like that.

Um, and there's all these other stuff about like ice and like Israel, Palestine or whatever. Um, and there just aren't that many people who care, like the number of people who care about those issues, like just add all are just so small compared to the, and if you've ever been in a meeting, like one person is like really like into something.

And like other people are like, it's like that person can have a big influence of like, really you don't. I mean, you don't fire, you don't fire them because, well, first of all, there's not just one. I mean, there's, there's probably at least, at least a few. Um, it's such a small percentage, like, especially for a larger company, it's like, it's like, this is not.

I mean, it's significant. It depends on how much they care. Like, okay. Like a fleet of 5% of your workforce is going to, uh, become less productive or like leak things about you to the media or ROI, uh, you know, maybe go work somewhere else and find the other, you know, it's like, even if they, even, if they're like, all they're going to do is, you know, you're going to fire them.

You know, you're, you're, you're restricting the field of the employees. You can hire, right. If like 10% of these people and maybe they're disproportionately, you know, good employees or not. Um, you know, you're just going to say, I'm not going to, you know, I'm going to fire 10% of the people who care about a lot about politics.

And I probably think it's probably like, you know, more than 10% at this point. I mean, there was one of these, uh, corporations, I forget which one. I don't think this is like anywhere close, but sorry, go base camp. How many, what do you remember base camp? There was a, there was some brouhaha about the corporation.

Like the leadership didn't want people to be, uh, to walk and then like, you know, a huge portion quit at the workforce. It wasn't a huge corporation, but it was, you know, it was like, yeah, it was like, it was like 60 people. Right. Who in total? Like at the corporation? Well, I mean, that shows you percentage wise, right?

That's that's tons. The thing is they weren't just like firing people. They were saying like, oh, we're going to give you like this. Just like Mary nice benefits package. I like, yeah. I think that is definitely a super inflated now. Uh, okay. I mean, if it was, if it was like inflated by all, I mean, there's so much going on here.

Why are they, why do they feel the need to give them this? No, because the media I'm in the media is there too. And the media is to like, yeah, try to destroy them. Civil rights law is going to be there. So it would be, I think there's a, there's a natural thing to bend towards people who care more. Um, and then there's also the media, there's also civil rights law.

So, you know, there's a sort of a perfect storm is, uh, Gabriel Osman. Um, my friend set up a foot where it's also sort of like a force amplifier for these people and I think that's right. I'm trying to get them on as well. Oh yeah. I'm sure it'll go on. He's a nice guy. We'll talk to you. Maybe. Uh, I don't know.

Uh I've I I've sent her like one email. Uh, but uh, probably not at this point, if he replies to you, if you revise to my like third follow-up then maybe, but I think I'm like, I think I've done that trying to get and sold yourself up first. I think before you go for the big people, cause let them see, oh, he's got other important people on, you know, he's going to go off cause people are busy.

And so they use like quick, you know, uh, you know, they use sort of a quick heuristics to see whether they should, you know, they should not bother with something or not. Yeah, actually I want to, I want to get your, your take on this because, um, basically, you know, like the thousand thousand true fan model, right?

Basically you have all of these kinds of like micro creators who are famous towards like a small number of people, but are like very famous towards them. Um, I think you can count me in this category. You're probably, um, you're probably past that point at this point. I'm not sure. Okay. So like a thousand true fans, basically like a content creator or something like that, like a writer or YouTube or whatever can sustain themselves based on like a thousand people who care.

Right. If you have like a thousand people who are paying you like $5 under sub stack, I guess I'm not quite there. Right. But if you have that, you don't really need to be famous towards like that many more people, because like, um, $5 a month, times, 12 months, times a thousand people, that's $60,000 a year.

That's a pretty, that's a pretty good living. Um, even though you're not like super famous, right. You're not like a real celebrity. Um, and something that I think I've noticed is that like the long tail of left-wing people is way worse than the long tail of right-wing people. There are some pretty obscure, uh, right-wing people who just have like incredibly unique insights.

Um, and there are some like kind of, uh, people who, who will, um, who, who will like, uh, I get on these podcasts and stuff. You're like literally no one has heard of. And it's like a, non-zero, it's a non zero chance that these people are, um, really kind of amazing. But I think like, I think like there's an equivalent number of good left wing people, insightful, left wing people, but they're all like famous and institutionalized right there.

Like Matt Yglesias as reclined David shore. Um, I guess like Freddy Devor, isn't institutionalized, but he's also like super famous. Um, and I, and I do a lot. I actually spend a lot of time looking at these like left luffing circles, finding like smaller creators to kind of, uh, kind of reach out to, and. I just can't find that many, like even just like saying things that are like new, not necessarily that I agree with or any kind of, I mean, there could always be biased, but I think I've tried my best to like de bias myself and just judge based on like, based on like the ideas are just wrong or stupid.

And maybe that's why, like, you know, there are many people who can say things that are interesting again. Okay. There's like big ideas in like in like the right way that are wrong and stupid as well. Right? Like the election stuff. And you don't want to talk to those people either. Right? You want to talk to those smart people, have insights and maybe in like, you know, like the left-wing orthodoxy now is blank slate as them, right.

That there's no differences between men and women or social class. Like one group is like richer than the other. It must be because of, you know, uh, something, you know, society did. I mean, maybe there's ideas are just not true. So people who have a tendency to accept ideas that are not true on false premises, um, might not be, don't have great insights in.

Yeah, this is actually kind of related to something I wrote a while ago, um, that I think you've read called like, um, uh, it's the Midwest stupid, um, which is basically like my reply to your like liberals read conservatives, watch TV things, which is like, basically like the midfoot beam, right. Or like maybe a slightly shifted Medved meme.

The conservatives are kind of made up of, uh, uh, of a constellation of like, of like weird hetero heterodox people. Um, and then like a lot of like, uh, a lot of like, very like tribal, like it was like TV washers basically. And then, uh, and then the left wing is made up of like made up of like all of the people in like the middle or like mid middle to higher, but not that exceptional kind of range.

Obviously there are exceptions, but like, I didn't know. You think about that. Uh, you know, I think the, you know, the mid, I mean the mid with theory of, um, I think I, yeah, I did. I think I did read that and I think you're, I think you're right. I think that striving force on the left right now is sort of like the HR, you know, school teacher class.

Yeah. I do think, I do think it's not like the professors at Harvard that are like trickling down. I think it's really, you know, people like Robin D'Angelo have like a lot more influence, uh, then, um, you know, like New York times, not that much influence, like, I don't know this. I know she had like one, uh, she had that, I think like the, one of the best selling or the best selling books, like the last few years, um, and you know, whatever non-fiction or whatever, um, Yeah, I'm in cheesy, she's mandated, mandated in and like everyone, you know, and everyone you see on Twitter, even the left, when people that I see, like, you know, think she's a joke.

Uh, but no, she has popular appeal. A lot of people, a lot of HR departments are looking at this and saying, this makes sense. Let's, let's make everyone read it. Um, and let's have, you know, trainings on that basis. Uh, so yeah, no, I think you're, I think you're right. I think that, I think a lot of the what's going on, I think a lot of our politics is driven by, you know, not very smart, but like, you know, the most important thing is, um, you know, sort of emotionally, uh, committed or at least emotionally, you know, fragile and aggressive, uh, people.

And then a lot of the, you know, the ideologies we talk about are a lot of the policies. We justify our sort of post hoc rationalizations for, uh, you know, getting women to stop crying or getting to know people, not to burn down the, you know, buildings anymore. I think there's a lot of that.

There there's something that, that doesn't quite sit right with me about that. And I don't, I don't quite know what it is. I think it might just be like, it might just be like, why are we even like putting up with these people? Right. Like, I, most people don't care. People are in different than like, they just, you know, they don't want to see a woman cry.

They're not like you, you, you seem to care about truth and logic and you know, most people don't care about those things. Um, yeah. I, I don't really have I work on you. It doesn't work on me. Yeah. Even like the corporate situation though. I think like a lot of these corporations, they're like reasonably smart people there.

Right. I guess that's not the same as caring about, I think they're making smart. I think they're making smart decisions individually. I mean, I think that, I think that you're giving them to walk them off. So that's, it makes sense. You know, I think there's, uh, for all the reasons we talked about. Yeah, it's kind of this, I don't know, maybe, maybe in software it's a bit different and that's, that's also why you're seeing more people sending up to that.

Right. Whether it's a sub stack folks, whether it's like Shopify, whether it's like Coinbase, all these companies that are saying like, um, re we're, basically just going to enforce, enforce being a nonpolitical company. And maybe they're a bit more generous with their severance packages. Maybe they just have the money.

Right. Um, maybe, maybe it's different if you're trying to actually do something, right. Maybe if you're, if you're like the more real your company is the more, the more this matters or, sorry. The more like the more like getting rid of these people matters, do you think. Yeah. I mean, you know, if you look at, yeah, I think that's true.

I think a lot of things are, you know, there's corporations that are just, you know, figuring out there are PR firms and there are just journalism and, you know, you're not building a, uh, a bridge or something. So yeah, these, you know, these attract different kinds of people and you have different detracts, different kinds of people, they have different, uh, incentives and they have different way of thinking about the world.

So it makes sense. The institutions sort of, depending on what they're building and what they're doing are going to have different sort of politics or engagement with politics. Yeah. And do you think we're ever going to get like a time in like in like 20 years where this kind of situation flips, like roof of ism just wins and then we were dealing with the exact same thing, but like from the right way, it's really hard to.

Uh, imagine I think we, the best we can hope for is a, um, you know, cause that would require such a turnaround. I mean, I think we can, I think one of the best things we can hope for in this sense as a, uh, uh, you know, going after the civil rights laws, changing things, um, having new corporations and new businesses sprout up.

And I think they'd be more apolitical because I don't think it's gonna, I don't think women's tears are going away. Like I don't think you can like offend, I think the bigger problem is that you're just going to replace it with, uh, you're gonna replace like left wing, moral panics with like right wing world and rightfully women's no, but right when women's team, what right-wing women who cry are at home and caring about their children in school.

So maybe. And the ones who are in corporate offices are left-wing women. Uh, so if women, if everything is just women, you know, what is this true? Like, is there like a breakdown of, oh, you think it's, do you need data to think that, uh, uh, can some women who get married and have children are more conservative than single women who have careers?

While again, there is data. Yes. But you shouldn't need data for that. That's a basic background factor. Okay. That's fair. That's fair. I guess like, I, I still think there, there is like a remnant, there is like a remnant activist class. Right. And actually, um, I want to put out a pin on like the feminization framing because I don't think it's like exactly right.

Um, Just with regards to the activists in general. I think like if you get like a body of conservative activists who are just, just like more willing to do this stuff and kind of maybe like slightly more socially accepted who you kind of like get a flip in there, they're the more socially accepted ones then I think you will have the same kind of like censorship.

And this is like a big reason why I'm like, not more right wing is I think that they're kind of like, they're kind of willing to pull like the same jackass stunts as people on the left. I think they are. I think they are. So if you look at things like the anti BDS laws with it, for on air Israel, right. I be there, I think you're having to shut down speech when they, uh, when they can.

Um, I think the gender thing is huge. Again, I will go back to that. Um, and you know, you could, I mean, you could imagine. I mean, you, you know, I think that social conservatism is sort of a outnumber here by the fact by women's representation and, uh, you know, in corporate and corporate and public life, uh, left-wing women's representation and right when women, uh, being more concerned with sort of personal things and family, I think there's been a social change, you know, it's hard, it's hard to predict, but I think there's been a social change, uh, here and, you know, and I, I mean, it's, it's difficult, you know, just, just to imagine, uh, politically neutral institutions is like a big enough jump from where we are right now that it's like, you know, it's like to imagine like that there are right-wing and, you know, crazy.

And, uh, and having these moral panics and shutting people down, you know, like society doesn't change that fast. So like, you know, maybe a hundred years who knows, but like 20 years, like, no, I don't think it's enough time for things to flip that extreme. Yeah, but I guess I, I guess like in, in the framework of like someone who is actually wanting to change these things right.

And by someone, I mean, me, who's actually wanting to change these things. I, I don't want to just like, just like flip the polarity on these things. Right. I want to kind of like navigate to a place where you, you don't have, or like these moral panics are like much weaker. Right. Um, Yeah, I just don't think about it right now.

One way to think about is right now, liberals have power and conservatives down. So like conservative, moral panics, or less, you know, maybe 50 years from now it'll be different, but conserving more panics are less likely to be, you know, sort of totalitarian. And, you know, you also have to think about like the direction of the moral panic, like, you know, become like too pro criminal or like to, to anti-crime like, I think these are like the directions of world baddies.

I think be, you know, too far in the direction of product to stop crime is usually better than too far in the direction of like wanting to stop police, which I think is, you know, sort of a left-wing, uh, uh, left wing, um, moral panic. So yeah, you know, there's ways to think about, think about these things as sort of try to calibrate, uh, how do you get a perfect world where you have no moral panics and, you know, everyone is rational is probably not in the cards.

I think it's not in the cards, whether most people become rational, but it's, it's in the cards. Whether the irrational people are subjugated under the rational people, basically like one idea I had when I was talking with Steve Hsu is like, should we like forced journalists to like take stats classes and do well in them.

Right. I would solve the problem, but I think it would make it better. Yes, you would have, you would have a disparate impact. Um, and then you'd have to deal with civil rights law. Yes. But yeah, they use you should, you should, you should repeal those two. So great idea. I'm fine with that. Uh, w would that actually run into civil rights law?

Are you crazy? Of course. No. I'll be doing more on this. Yes. This is like the sort of prototypical thing that would run into civil, right? Like a written test on like mathematical ability. That's like, you know, that's the easiest, possible case of something that you can't do, or like, you can just say like, okay, we're going to get, okay.

Maybe this is also unrealistic. But like, if universities just wanted to say, like, if you want to graduate with like a journalism degree or with like these other degrees, so that's different. So universities can do what they will see. So civil rights law is enforced by a bunch of left-wing bureaucrats and they like universities and they disliked IQ tests.

So when it comes to tests or anything written a paper test that's easy and simple and differentiates people, then it's a, it's a problem for disparate impact. Uh, by the time this comes out there, there's a conversation with Gail Harriet. Yeah, our IOT on the CSPI podcast, um, that I have, uh, gonna have a transcript of on my website by the time people listen to this podcast right now.

Um, but you know, the people who, uh, who, um, to enforce civil warrants on the verification is this on, uh, Richard CSPI podcast, if you want the podcast, but, but the transcript is on my self stack, which are commended on subsect.com. Not today. I'd like by the time people listen to this podcast, I will be there.

I'll be there. Um, uh, but you know, loved when people enforce civil rights and they like universities. And so therefore university, you know, requiring a college degree has a disparate impact, but it's never counted as a disparate impact because they basically like university. Some, they dislike the idea of IQ.

I think that makes sense. I think with regards to stats, it's like, this is actually something that like other mathematicians dunk on duck, on like stats majors for us is there's a lot of just like general knowledge stuff. And like, it's just like, so obviously directly relevant, like you're reporting on yeah.

For hiring AI, for hiring. I mean, you have to, you know, you have to show it's business necessity, like, and so like it's controversial what that means. Um, and you know, it's arbitrary too. Like if you anger woman by doing this, like then they start complaining about other things. And so much of civil rights law is sort of ambiguous and part interpretation that if they get mad at you for one thing, and it's sort of, um, you know, technically you can get away with it.

Uh, you know, they can come after you for a hundred different things. So it's, uh, you know, it's just terrible. So this is, uh, why it constantly, my work is just how terrible civil rights laws are for, for freedom, for progress, uh, for human. Yeah. And I think we want to be really clear because it's a big part of my audiences, like worldwide and in like Canada and other places, uh, as well.

I think this is actually kind of why, like, um, there's like some work stuff that that's in Canada, but in general it's more like it's more like economic and it's more like, um, it's, it's more like climate stuff, uh, because Canada does have this and this goes to like Asians being swing voters as well.

Canada does this have this like long standing narrative of being like super multi-cultural and super kind of like colorblind. Um, and, and th there were like very big fights over this with regards to like Quebec separatism as well. Like th this like national narrative of being like one country. Um, but American civil rights laws are quite different.

They're they're they are, uh, not colored winded at all. They're like, kind of the opposite. Uh, yeah. I'm I don't, I don't know if I'm Canadian. Yeah. Wokeness is colorblind. I mean, they have these, you know, first nations. Or it's less politically popular or I guess wokeness isn't politically unpopular and the Canadians are better at staying away from it.

That's what I should say. Canadian politicians are better at staying away from it. It's like, no, not a lot of the discourse. There's still like corporate stuff, but it's like, they're, they're kind of doing what, like Republicans in the U S are doing. Uh, so Kennedy, I don't know if they still have the, um, uh, the, uh, hate speech regulations.

Like they call it the human rights commission or they can drag you before. I don't know if I, I dunno if they, they were taught, there was talks of repeal you had, I don't know if they ever did. Uh, but yeah, it was like a bunch of controversial internet regulation. Uh, right now it's kind of still, it's kind of still like in the process and, uh, there's a bit of a public backlash to it.

So, um, I dunno, it could go either way. Well, that's interesting. You think Canada is less woke than us. Definitely woke in different ways. Yeah, but they're, they're like a lot more leveling on economics and a lot more, a lot more like restrictionist on COVID for example, I think I like eating up now, but like beforehand, certainly.

Right. Um, I think this is actually a good time to push, push back on the feminization framing, because like, I think politically, it just alienates like half of the population a little bit. Um, and also I think it kind of like misses the misses the main point. Right. I think it's actually like both better, both in framing.

And in terms of like finding accuracy to just call it like neuroticism. Yeah. I actually don't agree. I don't agree that I disagree with both points, but go ahead. Uh, okay. Actually, I want to, I want to hear your foot push back. So the idea that it alienates half the population, like, uh, no, I think that, um, I think that a majority of women, at least, you know, before, I don't know if it's still this case, don't get, don't call themselves a feminist.

I think that, uh, what basically sort of, uh, liberals, uh, their ideal of womanhood and what women should be, uh, I don't think has, you know, popular mass support. I think it has support with sort of, um, a certain kind of woman that, you know, just like, you know, uh, just like, uh, with, um, any identity group, it tends to be a very small, uh, group that, you know, claims to speak, to speak for them.

And I think it's like different even from like minority racial groups in the sense that, uh, the women who become activists are so atypical for their sex, that they really don't represent a women. So I don't think it's actually, uh, uh, I don't think it's actually bad politics necessarily, but yeah, go ahead.

And you can respond or go on with the. We can talk about the other point later, but like staying on this one, I think it's like, not necessarily like the policies that you would do to like reverse this or like the problem itself, but it's just kind of like the framing, right? Like, let me know if you think this is like a waste of time to talk about, but like, I think like the framing of, for example, like women's tears, like I think if you're just like a woman and you hear that, right.

You're just like knocking the, like that it doesn't matter what the underlying point. Um, yeah, I mean, sometimes people, I mean, I don't, I don't disagree that it can be alienating to some people. Um, it's a way to understand it's way to understand that you, but there are, you know, there are payoffs too. There are payoffs in seeing the world accurately.

Um, there are payoffs and sort of, uh, you know, like helping men understand what has, uh, what has gone wrong, um, in society. Um, and you know, if you don't, I think if you don't deal, honestly, I don't think you have much of a, I think this is such a big and important factor that I think if you, don't sort of, if you're unable to see it or deal honest, honestly, with it, um, it's gonna be, you're gonna have major problems with trying to do anything about it.

Okay. So that, that gets to the, that gets like directly to the second point. Right. Which is that my, my, uh, my argument is that it's better to frame it as like neuroticism. Um, because I think people like, like, it's a, it's kind of a trait and there's like pathological versions of it that are like, nobody cares about, but this is the art.

This is my argument in the article. Nobody cares about neurotic men. If men come to you and start crying in a classroom, people are just disgusted. They say, get out of, you know, like they don't have sympathy to like change the bureaucratic structures of a university or a corporation. If women cry men give up, it has to be women's tears.

It's not a, it's not a neutral sort of a, it's not a neutral thing. Now you could just say like, you know, we're just going to deal with everyone crying and, you know, ban that, but that's going to have such a disparate impact on women that it's gonna be like, oh, wait a minute. If you're excluding all women from like the conversation, like, okay, like, are the people that you're excluding are disproportionately women by, you know, a huge, uh, a huge percentage.

Um, so like, you know, you need to, you know, you need that sort of have a response to. Yeah. I'll I think I'll concede on their crying point. I think that is true. That is true. So I guess like women's tears, like maybe like, even if I, I think it's like bad messaging, like it, it's a very literal theory. This is not a man.

This is not really a metaphor. It says women cried, politicians do stuff. Yeah. I don't know though. I think like you can. It's not just this, it's kind of like, there's this kind of thing in like startup culture where you will just like cold call, cold call people and like ask them to like invest in your company.

Right. And like, sometimes this works because people just kind of like, or like investing is a bit different because like, there's, there's kind of like a pay off for you. But even if you just like randomly ask people for favors, right. A lot of people say yes. Right. And it doesn't matter too much. I think if you're a man or a woman in this, in this frame, and with regards to a lot of how, like the activism works, I think it is kind of that, right.

It's kind of like you, you just ask and a lot of the time people say yes and, and I don't think it's necessarily, if you're, if you're a man or a woman, right. Sometimes yeah. There's different. There's different things. Right. Just asking, you know, and just sort of, you know, writing a letter or something that maybe we're like, we demand, we demand X.

We are like signing a petition. And we were like, yeah, the typical stuff, like, I guess. Gender coded, but not all sex can be less salient in those circumstances. I think like, you know, that article is really thinking a lot about universities and thinking a lot about like public debate. And so like journalists on Twitter are like universities, like shutting, you know, peak students, university.

They shouting out students that's like personal stuff. Like, so you look at the stuff of like women, uh, you know, like Taylor and the runs on Twitter. Oh, you know, like nobody would take this seriously from a man. You know, there's so much hate out there. You know? It's like it drives calls. People take it seriously from Lorenzo.

I think that, um, the people you follow on Twitter probably don't. I mean, I think she gets on MSNBC and they take her very seriously. And like the people who, you know, the people who watch MSNBC, you know, and, and, uh, um, fall take this on and follow, you know, Russia gate and, you know, get into the current thing.

I think those people do take it seriously. Um, and so, um, and yeah, and then when you get to universities where so much of the university stuff is like personal people complaining about feelings, people get complaining about getting hurt. This is, so this is such a gender issue. It's like, it's like a, it's like a gender issue, you know, as much as like, uh, you know, um, you know, as much as like professional football is like a male thing.

I mean, it is just so extremely, like such a sex issue that it's like crazy that we don't talk about it. And we talk about quote, unquote, these millennials are quote unquote, these college kids. Uh, no, it's, it's a, you're, you're missing a lot. If you look at it, Yeah, I think, I think that differentiation is very strong when it comes to, like you said, the impact.

I think you have a, obviously it's still correlated, but I think like the difference isn't that big in terms of like, who is neurotic and who is like doing these like overreactions and like the safety of them. But I think when, when it does you, you are right for like, when it comes to like the reaction, um, people, people are more reactive to when, uh, when we do this than when men do this.

Um, I guess like the, the counter framing is kind of the, um, the Lenore Skenazy Sean 20, like gen Z is just like suffering from a lot of anxiety disorders thing. Right?

Like you can, you can argue like, okay, here's the, here's the counter-argument I think. This has always kind of been a thing. It's just that we've kind of like turned up the dial on neuroticism for both sexes and like the last like 15 years ish. Right. And that's, what's made the difference. I don't think we've necessarily, ER, okay.

Actually, like I'm saying this now and I kind of feel like it's, it's like false. You, you can just like tear it down if you want, but like why, why is that? Not like the major cause and like using, we've kind of like significantly changed in how we react to how we react to anything. Um, so, so like the counter-argument is not like the main thing that's changed is that like.

Generationally. Um, my generation has just gotten much more neurotic. Zoomers have just gotten much more neurotic and, um, that's the main difference in, instead of like, we've just become more favorable towards these kinds of like, uh, these kinds of like quote unquote, like lemons. Kind of tactics. Well, I think women, I think there's, you know, a lot.

Yeah. I mean, there's many ways, you know, it's understanding cultural change, you know, there's a lot of ways to understand it. So yes, I think you need the neurons. You think you, I think you need the neuroticism. I think people are more than erotic. I think the, you know, the role of quote-unquote mental health as like sort of an ideology is like a bureaucrat bureaucratized thing I've already the boar, uh, has, you know, that are very well good.

I've wrote about this recently. I think, you know, this is, uh, this is a major problem, you know, there's sort of the, you know, there's sort of a, um, there's sort of a permanent. Uh, permeability between like, uh, identities that are like identity politics, identities, like LGBTQ in my psychiatric diagnoses that people are diagnosing themselves with, you know, well, I got the sticks.

Well, you know, there's a, um, there's a person. Yeah. There's a person from Beretta that like, uh, uh, effort, he quotes, he says, you know, these kids, these days, they'll, they'll find themselves as, you know, polyamorous and autistic and like ADHD, you know, and trans and, you know, whatever. So it's like, it's like, it's a, there's almost, you know, they're almost the same thing.

They're blending together. Um, the mental health and the politics stuff. Um, I think that's right. Um, you know, women's tears don't work if, you know, if women are not, you know, uh, highly represented in major institutions. So you need that. You need like to set the stage in like, you know, a way that, like the idea that this.

You know, there's something wrong with the old way of doing things. So you need like some kind of critique of like the old system that, uh, and there you need like political correctness and needed social desirability bias and yeah, you need, you need the young people to be a little bit, uh, crazy. You know, society is kind of crazy in a very ass specific way, and there's a lot that goes in.

So the last issue that I really want to talk about is the, is the nature of expertise and credentialing. So you are this article called, uh, Tetlock in the Taliban about basically how we have these. We have these kinds of like prestige structures that, that say like, oh, these people are experts, but in a, in a lot of these cases, these experts are not really good at, um, at doing the thing they claim to be experts in.

So do you wanna elaborate on that? Uh, yeah. I mean, people are, you know, they get called experts in public health or they are called experts in something. And, you know, often that means that they went to a school and they got a degree and they got an advanced degree, a PhD often, and then they, you know, they're often professors.

Uh, so that means how do they become professors? It doesn't mean that they necessarily. You don't have any proven track record of predicting things. They wrote a bunch of articles that were peer reviewed. They were of a dissertation that somebody said, okay, this is plausible. And then they wrote them a bunch of articles and publications, and these were judged by other people.

There, there wasn't necessarily any kind of track record of being able to explain the world. There's no, they never got a plan off the ground. They never even showed, you know, forecasting skills. And then at the end of the day, we say, okay, this person's were in a rut a lot about epidemiology or gender or, uh, or crime or whatever.

You know, this is an expert. And you know, this is, this is not, you know, there's not the mechanism here. Too, you know, there's not the mechanism here that would make you think that these people, uh, the people that we call experts aren't necessarily, uh, do necessarily, um, understand the world better than the rest of us.

So when tough block, um, you know, and, uh, you know, a few others have done research on this, they've shown that amateurs can often, you know, at least equal, uh, you know, sometimes beat, uh, the experts. And if that's true, then, you know, just as the fact that someone has a degree or something and something that the professor is something you might want, you might, you know, they might have more domain specific knowledge, but domain specific knowledge is not necessarily the most relevant knowledge or, or the are, uh, an ability to put together that knowledge in a way that leads to a more accurate understanding of the world.

Uh, so this is, you know, this is the idea behind sort of a lot of modern expertise just being completely fake. Yeah. And I think we do need to like really delineate there, right? Because. I think we can be pretty calm, confident that like the experts in like, in, in like rocket engineering or like actually experts while the, while the experts in like, um, in like IRR, I mean, like, I guess maybe here one of those experts, sorry, you can define the IRR, but like, there are other areas like IRR that are, uh, let's say have like a shoddy or shock.

Yeah, no unquestionably you're right. Yeah. I mean, uh, the rocket scientists, uh, even some things like, you know, string theory, like things that are, there's some things that are not really testable and physics, but you know, the math, I think is a, um, you know, is a good sort of, um, uh, you know, the, the, you know, the math is, um, yeah, I should probably, I probably shouldn't say too much of that.

I'd love to stick to the hard sciences just for, uh, just for simplicity, stake, likes things that are, have like ag practical implications, like yes. You know, the bridge either collapses or doesn't the rocket goes to the Boone or it does it, the plane gets off it, you know, flies or does it, you know, the, the vaccine works or it doesn't, um, yeah, that that's reality now.

Like you have like, Uh, you know, you have like three areas, right? Yeah. So you have a criminologist. I mean, often they will like, they'll recommend something. People will listen to them. It'll, you know, it'll go to it. Sometimes it might go right. Sometimes it just goes terribly, but no one is keeping track. Um, and you know, like there's no, there's no, um, you know, there's people in like international relations who you could look at, who've been wrong time and time again, or criminology or epidemiology or something.

And you can find like, you know, rocket scientists who have like, you know, uh, who've seen like, you know, have blown up like rocket after rocket and never accomplished anything. Um, so yeah, this, th this is a clear difference. I was focusing mostly on, uh, the social sciences where yeah. Expertise is in, you know, I think it's, I think it's sort of a, it's a crisis.

It was probably all was fake. Um, but it's much worse than I think it's much worse. Cause there's been a proliferation. X, you know, so-called experts like I'll hear stuff like, oh, will Smith's slap Chris rock, you know, experts that could have been very expert in one, you know, watching TV and watch it, you know, to, uh, celebrities fight.

Like there's no, there's no expert of that. Uh, but there's more people go to college. Uh, you know, the, the, the, uh, proliferation of narrow fields and, you know, uh, IQ sort of the average IQ of who gets called an expert and, um, who was a, um, you know, who's a professor and who was, you know, speaking about public issues, um, and from an authoritative way, that's the colliding.

So I think it's probably getting worse. Yeah. And I mean, like, w this is returning to maybe the first thing we talked about, but I think there's also kind of an overreaction on the, on the right wing side where they're just like, they're just like, oh, some of these experts must be wrong. Maybe, maybe all of them are maybe like, uh, maybe like the vaccine is, is like fake or whatever.

And like, I feel, I feel bad for those people because I think the vaccines, you know, the experts are right, but you know, the epidemiologist and the same people who like the vaccines are pretty much wrong on, um, uh, most other things. So like, you know, fucking how can a normal person? No, it's very, it's very hard.

Yeah. Do you have any tips on helping us different? Um, you know, when the issue is important enough, like the vaccines, which we're going to, you know, we gave to, you know, almost everybody in society, um, you can just look at the data yourself. I think that's, that's something that's important enough to, uh, look at.

Um, you know, th there's a, yeah, there there's different kinds of juristics. I mean, I would be careful about people who don't even pretend to do cost benefit analysis. You know, if somebody says I want to do X, so they don't like tell you, like how it's, you know, Wanting to know what the costs are of X, but they only tell you the benefits.

I mean, that's, uh, that is suspicious. I think, complicated statistical methods, um, that I think are generally most of the time, almost always useless. I think Phillipe's, uh, uh, stuff on them for the blind one, uh, has, uh, posts on COVID 19. Um, I think do a good job of making that argument, um, about epidemiology.

Um, uh, yeah, and, you know, and I think you have to trust her, uh, communities and individuals with the right priors and those with, so if someone has something or have a school of thought or an ideology is based on blank slate as, um, I mean, that's, that's false. Um, if people are skeptical of markets, I think that's, you know, a good, probably a good red flag that they're not very rational in their thinking.

Um, and yeah, I mean, this is something that's worth thinking about. I, I think that, you know, I just did an interview actually that again, it'll be, probably be up by the time. Uh, this is, uh, this is released where I do talk about this a little bit and it's probably something that's worth, uh, building more, building more.

Yeah. And I do want to push back on, I think like, or not push back necessarily, but like delineate further in this category. Uh, I don't think like what Phillipa is doing is wrong or what you're doing is wrong, but I think the, this kind of like philosophy of science stuff, there are people who like do that, uh, who, who say like, oh, these assumptions are silly.

Who are like, if you are really doing it, I actually, I don't want to say in bad faith, but I just want to say, like, I disagree with them. I think what they're doing is like kind of silly, like the best example is like the Weinstein's right? Like, uh, Brett and Eric Weinstein, like they'll, they'll do like this philosophy of science stuff.

I think the, the, the conversation, like best illustrated, this to me was like Eric was talking with, uh, was talking to like Tyler Cowen. And he's talking about how like, inflation is fake, right? Eric Weinstein thinks like inflation is fake basically, or not that it isn't happening, but like the measures of inflation are like completely wrong.

And then like Tyler just keeps asking. How much do you think it's wrong by like, like what do we do? Like, how do we like, uh, adjust? What do you do to make money off of this? Or like all of these kinds of like questions of like, how wrong could this actually be. Right. And Eric, just like, doesn't answer. He just like completely Dodges the question every single time.

And I think this is like the, the, like the bad faith, um, version of this right. Where you're like, These assumptions are bad, but you don't really kind of create a better way or you don't even prove that they're like bad in an impactful way. Like, I don't think the inflation index, like maybe it's off by something, but I don't think it's like that off.

Right. Uh, and so I think a lot of people will do this kind of like philosophy of science stuff. And they're just kind of like, they're, they're just kind of like doing sophistry and to be clear, I don't think like Phillipe is doing this. I don't think you're doing this, but like, I think this is a problem that we need to be like more vigilant of.

Yeah. I think I agree with that. Yeah. How would you make money off of this? Or what kind of bench would you make is often a very good way to sort of sift through, um, you know, who's, who's credible here and who's not, you know, sometimes I think the radical skepticism. Makes sense, like, uh, like I think, you know, for the macroeconomic stuff, like, I don't know enough about it, but I I'm, I'm inherently skeptical.

I think if I looked into it, I suspect that I would be, I would find a lot where it's oh, you know, I don't even know how to make money off of this. I just think the way they're measuring and what they're doing, this is wrong. Now I should probably actually, now that I think about, I should probably find a way to make some money off that on certain off that, but maybe that market, when the market does factor, maybe the academic economists say one thing in the market actually is much smarter than them.

And there's no, and you're just verbalizing what the market already knows. Maybe, maybe, uh, I don't know. Uh, but you are, you know, you're smart to sort of, uh, draw the limits of what we mean when we say expertise is fake or science is fake, which is fun to say, because it's like, you know, it starts a conversation.

Um, but yes, it's, it's more complicated than it's good to get into the details. Yeah. I think like, just the way I think of the world is just the. I kind of visualize error bars with all of my statements. And I realized that when you compound these error bars together, they become very big error bars. And so, like, I think that's like if you do that, you, you get a way of questioning the main stream, but also being able to like reasonably look at mainstream sings and just say like, these things are like, there there's a, there's a chance that these things are wrong, but also.

Most things are like very wrong rate and these are like less wrong. And I think like the ability to, to just do that is very important either like with mainstream stuff or with like non-mainstream stuff to just say like, Hey, this is kind of sketchy, but also like everything else is more sketchy. Yeah.

Well, well, less wrong. I mean, yeah, this seems, sounds like your you're ordering the compliment because I think you're also very good at this. Oh, well thank you. That's that's yeah, that's very nice of you. I, I agree with all of that. That, that makes sense. Yeah. So, uh, the last, the last question of the show is always lists.

You can choose one of the two or both. Um, what is something in the world that you think is too ordered and needs more chaos? Or what is something in the show or sorry, something in the world, um, that you think is too chaotic and needs more. Uh, yeah, I mean, I, I wanna, I wanna not say something that's too obvious.

I mean, I think that labor markets need more chaos in there too orderly. So that's part of why I think civil rights law has led to a standardization. I don't like labor unions that I don't like any kinds of government regulations. I think labor markets need to be chaotic because markets need to be chaotic because we all have no knowledge or ability to engage in central planning.

And that's, you know, the, the markets are the way we know how to aggregate, uh, human preferences. Um, is there something less, uh, obvious? Um, I can, I could say, um, I think, uh, you know, I mean, because it's true, right? What's that, or like, I disagree with some of it's obvious that I would say that again. It's obvious that I would say that given my exhibit will be over this conversation and given what I've been saying before that, I don't think it's that obvious.

You're right. Um, is there something, you know, is there something like that I haven't talked about before, or I haven't thought of, uh, that can, uh, that can, um, benefit, uh, for more chaos? I think people's individual lives actually. Like I think you should experiment. I think people don't experiment enough.

Like people are like, oh, uh, especially with my generation. This is just awful. When people are just kind of. Looking for scripts. And like, all these scripts are bad. Yeah. Well, people are like, you know, what, what diet works. Let me look at the literature. And then it's like, you, you know what? You have enough time in your life to try every diet imaginable.

Right. You can take a year and be like, you know, what, what keeps you from eating too much? You can do like three weeks of each diet and see what works for yourself. Like sleep, like people say how many sleep? I, you know, try a lot of sleep and try a little sleep and, you know, see, see how your life works.

Drugs too. I mean, it's good to, you know, it's good to try things. Uh, so I think, yeah, I think I I'm a big, big believer in experimentation in people's lives. I think you shouldn't like people either rely on conformity or people who are, you know, even the people who are, you know, sometimes smarter, they, they tend to try to say, oh, what does the science say on?

It's like, you know, even the science, even if it's clear, it's not going to apply to every individual. So what you should be doing is just, you know, experimenting on yourself. Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. And I think that's actually advice that I don't hear too often, even from like self-help people probably because they're trying to sell their own stuff.

Right. Yeah. Now I kind of want to talk a lot about, uh, about life philosophy or like individual philosophy, but uh, it's uh, it's about your time to go, right. So I think this is goodbye. You should save something for the follow-ups so, yeah, I'd be happy to do that some other time. Yeah. Awesome. I'd love to do a follow-up eventually.

Uh, goodbye. Thank you. Bye.

That was the interview with Richard it came together really well. So I don't really have many regrets. The one I already mentioned in the intro is that I do like to do a bit of Trump dunking as well, and we didn't quite have enough time for that, but, well, it's a kind of, it's a kind of food group thing, right?

You get in what's important. First. Other than that, it was just a very satisfying interview. There's plenty of room for more. So I'd be happy to see Richard again on the show. If you'd also like to listen to such a show, then you can of course subscribe. And if you like this show, then as always please share, and please just let people know about podcasts, especially since it's just starting out.

See you next time.