Kind: captions
Language: en
step bonell welcome back to the show hey
thanks for having me no I'm excited to
man obviously everything going on you
are at the center of a lot of attention
right now um there's been a
characterization of your response to the
attempted assassination of trump as
being uh unhinged or a manic episode
what is your best explanation for why
the way you've responded actually makes
sense I think that the discourse in the
United States has gotten so un un
believably out of whack in that the
amount of moral condemnation that we
have for certain types of messages is
not at all mapping on to the amount of
damage uh a particular idea or thing is
doing I don't know how it has happened
this is like a recent idea that's kind
of come to me and I've spent a lot of
time recently thinking about it but
somehow conservatives have managed to
escape almost all accountability for
their actions but for some reason
liberals have to uh you know fall to
their knees and gravel and beg for
forgiveness every single time something
happens that might possibly be related
to them uh you'll see liberals you know
begging and pleading for forgiveness for
the BLM riots or you know we've had over
the recent um few weeks you know every
single liberal news station is talking
about Biden and his s his cility and his
need to step down and conservatives when
you ask them about anything like January
6th that was a false uh false flag uh um
for the governor kidnapping plot uh gret
and Whitmer uh that was uh you know that
was just the FBI they wouldn't have done
it otherwise uh for all the vaccine and
the co misinformation like well you know
it's not misinformation that's all still
true and we just don't trust vaccines
anymore like the worlds of these two
people are totally Divergent and I think
that unfortunately I think I've been
involved in this game of treating both
similarly even though I say that they're
not of the same magnitude that the
problems aren't the same magnitude and I
think I've given by the way that I
affiliate with or the way that I engage
with right-wingers I think that I've
given too much Credence to that side in
terms of making their arguments seem
more legitimate than they are so I am
reentering a lot of my rhetoric and a
lot of my engagement back to where I
think it should have been for a longer
period of time in that these ideas are
absolutely unhinged you guys are in a
totally different world and there needs
to start being like more cultural
accountability for the types of crazy
insane things that you're saying okay so
um would it be a fair characterization
to say that the amplitude of your
response is necessary to get people to
accurately identify the difference in
scope between the um the ideas that the
conservatives are putting forth and
getting away with and the ideas that the
uh Liberals are putting forth and being
um hounded for um yeah a little bit like
I think in a in a more fair world where
the um where the amplitude I guess of
the responses of different behaviors on
both sides was more mapped on to what I
thought it would be my my response might
be a little bit lower uh to be clear
also and I've said this multiple times
like I don't think it's a good thing
when people die I don't want anybody to
die I don't think anybody should be
killing anybody for political reasons
but um to beg for sympathy or to pretend
that you deserve sympathy um because of
you know violence might have happened at
a given event when your side has been
driving up the temperature of this
country and engaging in the most and
celebrating the most divisive politics
in like recent US History uh is is inan
to me so I
the way I try to think through my own
life and the way that I encourage other
people to think through theirs is what
is my goal and what are the actions that
I can take that are going to get me to
my goal um so when I think of what
you've been doing over the last call it
two years you've really made yourself
the go-to liberal that people on either
side of the spectrum are going to want
to engage with and you really have made
uh you've you've been incredibly
respectful you've been very thoughtful
you um are extremely good in debating
and so suddenly it felt like we had two
sides that could really come together
and the response to the debate that you
did with Ben Shapiro on Lex I think is
proof of that huge number of views and
we got to see really different uh
Vantage points politically coming
together to have a fruitful conversation
then after um Corey uh was killed and
your reaction came out that was very
inflammatory I would say it seemed
intentionally
inflammatory uh I was like are you
now rebranding like what you're trying
to put forward like I'm done pretending
to be civil and nice and this is where I
really wanted to be the whole time or
are you going to renormalize like walk
me through the the dramatic change in
presentation so the way that my my
YouTube editor gave me kind of this idea
in that I kind of like I can have long
legs and short arms or I can have long
arms and short legs that at my most
aggressive I have very short legs but
very long arms meaning that if I get you
in my grasp I'm going to be incredibly
compelling uh because I'm going to be
making very strong arguments in the most
aggressive manner possible with the most
overwhelming like style of argumentation
um but my my legs are very short at that
point I can't get out of my community
very much cuz people just see me as
being incredibly aggressive and they
like okay I want to talk to this guy
like this guy's like way too you know
he's way too mean and Deb or whatever um
I think before I had very long legs but
very short arms and that I hate that
comment that you just made it actually
has been eating away at my brain for
months and I've complained about this on
stream this has been building for
probably um probably for the entire year
if you go and you look at the debates
that I've done with Candace ens with
Jordan Peterson with Ben Shapiro the
comments under all these videos are the
exact same wow what a nice debate it's
so nice that these people have spoken to
each other wow cool that we can come
together and talk wow what a nice debate
I hate that because nobody's actually
considering any of being said they're
just happy that two people can sit in a
room and talk to each other however for
me to do this requires me to to blunt my
perception of the world so much and to
blunt my desired engagement with some of
the things that people are saying it is
physically excruciating for me uh it is
psychologically uh like destroying me
that
um like an example that I give for Ben
Shapiro is like I had this whole like
train of like I'll plot out rhetorically
and factually like how I want to think
about a debate before I go into it and
all these notes are public I I talk
about this on stream and for Ben Shapiro
I had this whole line of I want to prove
to you that you guys treat Donald Trump
differently than you guys treat Joe
Biden like you guys you great him on a
curve and I asked him that question in
the Le Prem I was like do you think that
you guys grade Donald Trump on a curve
and he was like yeah of course and I was
like
oh and it just like short circuited my
brain I could have had a two-hour
conversation on just that topic alone
and I don't like that I've had these
conversations with people and all I feel
like I'm doing is I'm shortening the
Overton window where you have all of
these insane people the Hans the voses
the people far on the left that in my
opinion are are just insane and then you
got these insane far right people um
that I would say right now is the
majority of the conservative movement
that all follow Donald Trump and what
happens is is when I show up to debate
I'm not as crazy as these guys so I'm
here what happens is when I show up to
debate I've I've shortened the overt
window and now the viewers are like okay
well this guy seems cool and reasonable
he's representing something so like
maybe I'll move from like here to like
here but now I have much stronger
conviction because I see that like this
guy's represented the left and I've
heard their arguments and now I'm like
over here and it's like no to be clear
like my position might be here but in my
mind the reasonable discourse is like
from here to like here like these guys
that I'm talking to over here that I'm
being nice to and I'm being cordial to
are are absolutely insane like we are on
a crash course for this country to like
into Oblivion and I have to talk to
these guys like they're normal
intelligent thinking human beings like I
have to sit across with Jordan Peterson
saying oh 20% excess deaths in Europe
are all caused by the vaccine and I'm
like okay yeah wow that's a that's a
take yeah or yeah yeah I can there's a
million examples but it's not good it's
not okay it's not cool okay so I want to
understand that very last part it's not
okay it's not good it's not cool
um it implies that there is a
destination that you're trying to get to
what is that
destination I think before like before
like uh what six days ago I think my
destination was always like trying to
present a more understandable argument
on my side and kind of like move people
a little bit closer meet them where they
were and move them a little bit closer
but I think especially as I've begun to
read more uh I feel like the time is
running shorter on that so now my focus
has very violent and very shifted to
okay well if you're a liberal here are
the reasons why you about these
particular things and here are the like
three arguments that you need to be
beating every single conservative over
the head with from now until the
election you don't talk about anything
else until you've run through these
three things nothing else is allowed to
be spoken about until you until you've
gotten this it's insane that they're
allowed to skirt by on these things and
nobody makes them like account for them
that's so that's that's where I'm at
right now basically yeah okay so the
three things that you want to go over
and over
um I don't remember all three but I know
that January 6 is one that the it was an
interaction yeah it's like not the
reasonable Minds cannot disagree on this
point okay so the goal behind getting
every conservative to confront those
things namely the Insurrection uh just
cannot be looked past uh is to get them
to vote for Biden to get them to break
out of cult-like thinking what what is
the end game to that confrontation
there's four levers I think when it
comes to mobilizing voters in a twers
race you can either uh and is that the
goal mobilize voters in a two-person
race kind of well there there's four
things there there's four ways to do it
you can either increase or decrease the
turnout on your side or you can increase
or decrease the turnout on the other
side um so I guess my goal is to
decrease the turnout On The Other Side
by demotivating like hey the guy that
you're voting for is an insurrectionist
okay like here are the reasons why you
should not like this candidate even if
you're conservative you shouldn't like
this candidate um and then on my side
it's to increase it's to motivate so hey
this is a really important election
regardless of what you think about Biden
reasonable Minds cannot disagree on what
this election should look like there's
just there's no place for a reasonable
disagreement here um the only people
that are disagreeing are people that are
bought and paid for people that do
propaganda or people that just don't
have the information um so that the
third that third group I'm also kind of
hitting at although it's hard because I
have to be very aggressive and that's a
very uh not good way to appeal to
somebody that just doesn't have the
information because now you make them
feel like a piece of [ __ ] just because
they don't know something but um the
problem is that working against me um
you can also interrupt me at any time
too I say but um no go for it something
that is always been working against me
is you have the left you've got the
right and then you've got this group of
people in the middle that call
themselves centrists and they're all
conservative all of them are
conservative every single one carries
water for Donald Trump you will never
find a person who goes oh I'm like a
Centrist I think I'd probably support
Biden those people don't exist all of
them are the Tim
the the constantines the um the Steven
CR doesn't call cist any any of these
any of these like people that call
themselves oh we're like Centrist you
know we're not politically partisan all
of them support Donald Trump Elon Musk
right all of them support Donald Trump
and so when I go out and argue I'm
instantaneously thrust to the far left
just because all of these people in the
center give the illusion of me being
further left than I actually am which is
very very very frustrating and those are
the people that have to come out very
aggressively against Okay so so there
are a lot of different pieces here so
one um there's one thing that you left
out that is a potential thing for people
looking at Trump they're not necessarily
just uninformed or whatever you gave
three reasons yeah uh but the one
missing is that they're looking at the
same thing you're looking at and they
see something different so this isoss
well I I will invite you into my
interpretation of humanity and then you
can tell me if I'm crazy and by the way
I consider myself a interest sure uh so
in this show one I if the uh election
were today I'd be voting for RFK which I
think you also have beef with him uh so
we can certainly go down go down that
road um and I can certainly explain why
and what I'm looking for but my point
being that uh the one thing I think when
people assess Human animals is they fail
to understand what I call frame of
reference so frame of reference you can
think of goggles that people wear they
are wildly distorted and so you are
looking at the world through a different
set of distortions than I'm looking at
the world and so we both say hey let's
look at this camera we're looking at it
and we may see two very different things
because of the distortions through which
we view that uh I think there are three
things that make up those um distortions
they are biology so we're all a little
bit different uh then you've got beliefs
and you've got values so beliefs are
this is how I think the world is values
are this is how I believe the world
ought to be
and between those three things hey it
doesn't matter what you look at it only
matters what you see so I I will say I
think you will have a hard time
predicting the outcome of your actions
if you don't account for that
possibility uh because then you can at
least map it right so I understand what
you're saying and I agree with every
single thing you've said 100% I truly
truly with all my heart believe that um
and I've never not a single time and if
any conservative wants to have a debate
with the on this I will gladly do it I
have never a person that will disagree
when confronted with all the facts about
the Insurrection stuff the only way that
they survive that argument is in the end
to admit that it was an Insurrection but
it was one for a good cause that's the
only Escape it is undeniable otherwise
um every single conservative I've ran
through these arguments with um unless
they're denying some fundamental fact
they have to arrive at the end where
they're like okay fine maybe he did do
these things but it's because the
election was stolen it's because of that
then it's like okay that's cool but
you're just justifying the Insurrection
now which and and I'm not I'm an
American I can't say there's no
justification for an Insurrection ever
right that's what 1776 was um but that's
yeah I I understand what you're saying
and I understand now especially people
that listened to me in the past it seems
like I've flipped a switch from like
wait this guy used to be really
reasonable now he's saying it's my way
or the highway it feels like he's become
a demagogue just like everybody else but
I think that the I've been I've paid too
much lip service um and I hate myself
for it because I've made it seem like
these arguments on the right had so much
more validity to them than they ever did
and they didn't if two people are in a
room and one tells me that humans can
fly and the other tells me that humans
can just jump there is no middle ground
between these two people and it doesn't
make somebody close-minded to to say
that the person who says they can fly is
just completely and totally factually
incorrect but uh so without derailing
into that just uh I guess I I'll plant a
slight flag to my point about these
narratives is the person hearing that
humans can't fly are going to be like
bro I flew to get here like I was
literally in an airplane yesterday and
now we're going to get into definition
of terms which is what you meant was
without the a like right but this is
exactly where I think another exit ramp
for people that don't believe January 6
was an Insurrection is that it simply
doesn't meet the legal definition of an
Insurrection so one of the things that
may or may not come out today as we talk
is I think a lot of these things are
really meant to find out what does a
person value and right now
um people often don't drill down into
that and if we ran it rather than um
asking somebody to believe in or not
believe in January 6th which they're
going to have arguments preconceived
notions that they may be blind to
themselves you just say imagine a
president who did an Insurrection and
they were rerunning against a candidate
what would need to be true where you
would still vote for that candidate and
then you can just begin to figure out
what their value system is and and where
it breaks down then we can now have the
argument at the level of how we believe
the world ought to be so for instance I
have a value that says you just Prima
fascia you cannot elect a president that
has declining cognitive abilities so
okay you don't even need to debate
whether yet whether Joe Biden does or
doesn't we just talk about whether
that's a logical way to approach this or
not anyway we'll get that get to that um
so you've got this layer of what I call
narrative so people are wearing these
Distortion lenses and they're seeing the
world in a way that is wildly different
than you um and what I worry about and
what made me reach out to you and say
hey I really want to uh book a sit down
is I saw people trying to dismiss you
because of the way that you were acting
so there's the performative layer of you
were clearly pissed it is how it looked
you may use a slightly yeah I was upset
I do stand by everything I said though
yeah yeah which you'll notice I'm not
asking you to take it back nor do I even
care I'm just my thing is that I look
out at the world and I'm looking for
people to be a part of my sense making
apparatus I don't agree with everything
that Sam Harris says but I think he's
wicked smart and I want to be able to
use him as a part of my sensemaking
apparatus and I get very worried that
the world just wants to discard him sure
it's one of the few people I would agree
with you on I think amazing I think you
are an incredible part of the sense
making apparatus just kid and I worry
that you you have given people the
world's easiest way to dismiss you and
people are lever in that and it will
work very well for a huge swath of
humanity now my gut instinct is that
you're
so you're so smart that either you
really just got so pissed you snapped
and and used a um not worthwhile tactic
from my perspective or it goes back to
the initial thing that we said which is
that uh I am not going to be able to
persuade the people I need to persuade
unless I go black to back to my blood
sport
era I think that um so I'll say this as
a precautionary thing um just to let
people know that I keep this in mind and
it's important for everybody to keep
this in mind um and I'm sure you do as
well you seem like you keep a lot of
things in mind that uh it's very easy to
rationalize any Behavior Uh and you can
fall into a trap of post talk
rationalizing it and you're actually
just being emotional uh so I do keep
this in mind um because it's easy to act
out and then to post talk like okay well
actually it makes sense because of ABC
you know to write the reasons for it but
the way that I see it is um my
goal if we go very very very very
foundational okay so I believe I exist I
exist as a person um there are other
people around me I think that in order
for me to live the best life that I can
I have to collaborate with other people
that two or three humans together can
produce something far greater than these
two or three people operating
independently right so we have we're a
collaborative species we specialize into
different tasks as we come together and
we work there's like certain kinds of we
need a system to make that work because
we specialize and because we don't have
the ability to do um everything not even
just in terms of work but in terms of
like securing our possess uh our
possessions securing our family members
and all this we have to agree on some
rules um like you know let's say that
there's 10 people that live on a block
and they all have a house and they all
buy new couches if you're allowed to
steal couches from each other it might
seem cool because today I can go and
steal couch but tomorrow any one of
those people could steal your couch
right it's not good so you all have to
agree on some rules as part of agreeing
on those rules at some point you can't
enforce them so you UST like third
parties to enforce those rules for you
uh so institutions like the police or
executive agencies or whatever right um
all this to say that you build all of
this out and you end up with some form
of governance that ensures like the the
best balance of personal freedom with
rules and regulations that allow you to
live in the freest way possible Right
Where as long as you're not a toddler
you understand that like the freest way
possible doesn't mean you have absolute
freedom um I'm sure you know this
because you seem like you do a lot of
self-improvement stuff I think that when
people go from being uh very um I don't
want to say lazy but they have a ton of
time and they don't do anything and
whatever into scheduling their time that
sometimes through discipline you find
more freedom like oh my God if I start
scheduling I didn't realize how many
hours there were in the day if I more
strict scheduling my time right so
sometimes like having more rules more
restrictions more agencies more
regulations like enables more types of
Freedom right all of that to say okay so
you build this out um I believe that I
don't know if it was Churchill that said
it somebody said that like democracy um
what is the quote it's like or maybe it
was a capital either capitalism or
democracy is it's like not the greatest
but it's the best we have or whatever
there's a there's a much better best of
the worst system something like that
yeah do a voice over me nailing that
quote okay I don't remember what the
quote was but okay you'll get that in
post okay um yeah but the um the system
that we have the principles that this
country was built on are very very very
awesome okay you had a unique
opportunity to get very intelligent
people together to like Theory craft
like the best government how often are
you checking your credit score afraid of
identity theft or account breaches we
all use the internet every single day
for important things like Personal
Banking and remote work so why not
protect yourself with our sponsor Aura
Aura is an all-in-one cyber security
service that keeps you safe online AA
identifies data Brokers exposing your
info and submits opt out requests on
your behalf Ora also monitors your
credit tracks your passwords for data
breaches and secures your online
activity with VPN and anti malware
protection you can try Aura for free for
2 weeks by clicking the link in the
description or scanning the QR
code right usually things develop way
more organically you know you've got
Empires and kings and these things kind
of you know spell out from here but for
the US you know you had a bunch of
people sit down like okay well what's
worked and what hasn't worked you know
and then we're going to like we're we're
going to make these like corny names you
know puus we're going to write papers to
each other we're going to argue and
debate and it's going to be this Lively
huge thing to form like the coolest best
government ever and there's a reason why
I believe that two things one the United
States is the largest most dominating
country in the world right now that's
undeniable and two the United States has
the oldest surviving constitution of any
country in the world even though we're
relatively Young country our founding
document we have the longest surviving
original constitution of any country
that exists in the world I think that
these systems are really important I
think that somebody like Trump I don't
believe a reasonable mind could disagree
with me when I say that he represents a
threat to that order and that to support
him in any way size shape or form
represents an existential threat to that
order so when I'm arguing with people
now if they're too far gone to that side
and it would require me to compromise on
so many principles I think I would
rather energize people on my side more
and give them more arguments and be
involved in a more kind of like uh like
shaming or bullying of like certain
types of ideas that I just don't think
should be able to to pass
um you know unchallenged in in a highly
critical sense rather than going to
conservatives and then them thinking
like oh cool yeah that Destiny guy like
he's real reasonable I'm glad that we
could have a conversation about whether
or not mRNA vaccines are morphing your
DNA and now I don't believe in like
polio vaccines anymore like I actually
think that yeah this guy's really cool
that he could like hear that opinion and
like be chill with it and it's like what
are we talking about right now that's my
yeah that was a very very very
roundabout answer that I hit your
original question I think which well we
we certainly have gotten to somewhere um
really useful which is that
revealing somebody's underlying base
assumptions is exactly what you have to
have what you need to do to have a
substantive debate or conversation and
so one of the things driving your
animist so the the real thing I was
trying to get to in the beginning is
dude you're so effective at getting
people's attention I think you maybe
don't understand how many people like me
um never heard about you in the blood
sport era but did hear about you once
you were like I'd be talking to people
that helped me run the show and they
would say oh cuz I don't want to be
unbalanced so I want to bring people on
from both sides when I'm dealing with a
political issue or a cultural issue
which is where I spend most of my time
uh they were like oh Destiny's the guy
had never heard of you went and looked
at you and was like oh wow this guy has
like really got some of the um
aggressive debating tendencies that you
do traditionally see more on the left
it's not name calling it's going Point
by point and so watching you switch your
um your performative layer and turning
off so many people uh I was suddenly I
could no longer map you I couldn't
predict your behavior I didn't know
where you were going so um but Trump is
an animating Force for you so uh Trump
is an existential threat to the systems
and the documents that were founded upon
and that's part of what's driving your
animus yeah and um this goes back to the
same Collision that I'm having with Sam
Harris which is brilliant guy um but he
is
now viol he he now sits outside of not
just disagreement with me on where we
necessarily want to end up but we start
disagreeing on how people ought to
behave and so um I for one am willing to
suffer the consequences of letting a
mixed bag in terms of Education in terms
of intellect awareness of policies and
consequences and all that group of
people um vote I I am perfectly willing
to live in that country knowing that um
anything else is just going to be worse
than that that's that's my base
assumption now you have something
different which is when I see that we
have somebody who has presented
themselves as a threat I and this is a
paraphrase of something you said on a
previous podcast by all means if you
think I misunderstand it let me know but
you said um I don't even want to live in
a country where roughly half of the
country want want to see our
institutions deteriorated yeah um so
that then to me now okay now the way
that you went on the attack uh where it
was I'm not even sure how to categorize
it but the lightning rod moment was
where you said I have no sympathy for
Corey uh comparator who was killed at
the Trump rally that was just the the
thing that everybody grabbed a hold of
including myself where I was like I was
really trying to parse what you were
actually saying which is the argument
that you would die on is that that
person is not worthy of sympathy and I
was like that person is not worthy as of
sympathy as an argument just made me go
okay I I can no I no longer have a
reliable map of where you're at so when
I look at Trump is a threat to order but
the tool used is to say that people that
show up at Trump's rallies are not
worthy of sympathy that's where I'm like
now you trigger my thing about division
is the only thing that guarantees us a
bad outcome and so I have a
um knee-jerk reaction that that will not
get you where you want to go so far the
only thing I know about where you want
to go is you want to make sure the
people vote for Biden that's very acute
but so far um that's what we've mapped
in this discussion so I don't agree that
division guarantees a bad outcome I
think that the I think that that demands
greater attention I mean by definition
there has to be some division in the
country because we're a two-party
country right so the structurally um
there has to be some division there um I
think that division is only good or uh
alternate points are only good if
everybody is representing things and
they're making Fair justifiable
arguments that ought to exist in your
system um you play the game EV online no
but I know of it okay I I learned a lot
of like weird management tips in that
game one of the things I learned uh we
would fit our ships out to do like
doctrines or whatever and we would have
a couple encounters and we were getting
like wiped it was horrible and one thing
that I realize is that when we make a
new doctrine I always have to appoint a
guy to argue against it like as be best
faith possible um and I think in like
intelligence and I think in large
companies you would probably know this
more than I would actually you have like
red teams basically people who do like
penetration testing to make sure that
you're like staying honest um if you
wanted to move in a direction for your
company
and let's assume that you have a guy and
you're like tell me why this isn't a
good idea what would you do right or how
would you do this right if you had
another guy who was trying to tell you
like hey uh I think that uh expanding
internationally is bad here's why or I
think that you should focus more on this
demographic or whatever right like this
is a good type of tension it's a good
type of division it's another person
who's representing fair and reasonable
arguments and the ideally that tensing
of both sides is creating something
stronger and better on both sides I'm
not even necessarily saying that the
truth is in the middle I'm just saying
that the tension is keeping both sides
grounded and Tethered to reality if you
um in the management of your company
appointed another guy to argue against
you and you're like okay I think that
it's time to I want to expand offices in
this state and he's like we can finally
execute this plan I've had where if we
were to just like abduct like 400
children and hold them hostage okay and
you're like stop okay and he's like no
no no this is the time for the the child
hostage plan trust me right this is not
valuable it's not worthwhile it's not
good that these arguments aren't
furthering anything uh if anything
you're wasting time now dealing with
this guy who it's like I don't want to
be arguing about taking 400 children
Hostage to expand my market into San
Francisco I don't need to have this
conversation I don't want to be arguing
whether or not George Soros and Bill
Gates caused the government to have
covid lockdowns to destroy our lives I
do want to have good arguments about
lockdowns though uh was it an
appropriate decision uh you know in
retrospect it seems like it could have
been less um should it have been more
top- down organized uh did we make the
correct decisions with the information
that we had at the time because you have
to make decisions perspectively not
retrospectively because time only Moves
In One Direction right but because we're
wasting so much time talking about
whether or not the world economic for is
trying to get us to all E I guess
crickets for the rest of our lives we
can't even have the reasonable
conversations anymore and that's the
damage that's the issue that um that so
much of our discourse is now occupied by
otter putrid filth and garbage and trash
that there are no more good
conversations to be had you can't have
good conversations about policy we can't
take credit for any of our achievements
everything is politicized um it's just
it's it's all horrible so just centering
back on I don't think that division is
necessarily bad and and I'm sure you
agree in in principle what I'm saying
I'm harping on just the word you use no
please yeah yeah but I I mean I'm sure
I'm sure we agreed largely on that that
like division isn't necessarily a bad
thing it just depends on what the kind
of division is and then how the division
is like interacting with how both sides
are interacting with each other yeah so
I think that's exactly correct so this
is something we talk a lot about in
business you need Dynamic tension yeah I
also think the evolution gave us people
that are I'm rounding it to politics but
politically left and politically right
there is a reason if you're trying to
get a large group to cooperate flexibly
you're going to need some people that
are like hey we can't leave anybody
behind that's the left and then you have
people on the right that are like hey
but personal responsibility because of
something known as the freeloader
problem so if you evolutionarily program
a species to just make sure you take
care of everybody no matter what uh Game
Theory says that there will become a
parasite problem where a bunch of people
just do nothing and they still get the
thing um so you do want that Dynamic
tension there's no doubt about that you
talked about disconfirming evidence or
what I call disconfirming evidence uh if
you want to be successful in anything
you have to hunger for somebody to
remove your blind spots because the only
thing I can tell people is uh that some
part of your proposed solution you're
thinking is flawed you just don't know
which part and so you want somebody to
help you tease that out which most
people definitely do not do but the
thing that you brought up which I think
is is really important and boy oh boy do
I PE hope people hear me on this there
is a weird thing happening in culture
right now uh that I think is brought on
by social media that is I don't want to
waste my time arguing that and
unfortunately I hear this argument from
the smartest people and I can only
imagine that the smarter somebody gets
the more frustrating it is to interact
with people that process data at the
level of a mortal uh so I just went
through this with Eric Weinstein and
Terrence Howard that whole thing and I
went to Eric and made a very aggressive
appeal to please for the love of God go
address this uh I wanted him to do it on
my show he ends up going on Rogan fine I
I'm just very glad that it ended up
happening and the reason that I am very
glad that it ended up happening is we
are living in the age of conspiracy and
the reason we are living in the age of
conspiracy is it is excruciatingly
difficult to both live a life and
educate yourself on everything so for
instance I'm reading a book right now
called JFK and the Unspeakable and it's
awesome and it makes me believe that
almost certainly JFK was assassinated by
the CIA but I'm not researching any of
the points so I'm just going if these
things are true then that is almost
certainly the right outcome to make but
the reality is I would have to go in and
do all the research I'm not going to nor
is anybody else the reality is that you
are going to live largely by heuristics
people are going to make these shortcuts
so what I'm saying is let me finish this
point so what I'm saying is that you
have this world where humans need
heuristics and so somebody puts out a
compelling argument that they follow
they now have their shortcut in their
mind to what happened oh January 6
wasn't an Insurrection cool I know my
talking point there uh and
now you've got people going I I'm not
going to debate all of these points and
so everybody begins to fracture into a
thousand little silos and what people
end up realizing is I either have to go
and debate these one by one a lot of
these things I think are so stupid I
don't want to so I hope people use a
threshold of public awareness public
awareness with like that veracity of
belief and then the other is to
understand if you don't attack them what
you're doing is you're left with the
option to manipulate and this is what I
see the elites doing this is what I
think so many people on the right are
pushing back on is that they can tell
they're being manipulated now the people
the elites just to use the word that
people use they feel like I'm so smart
that I actually understand what's good
for everybody and since I'm not I don't
have the time nor the will to go out and
convince them and they may not even be
convincible I'm just going to move them
silently along in in the right direction
and I think that manipulation is
excruciatingly
dangerous okay um the first thing I just
wanted to say is um I don't know if
you're aware of this or not You' have a
lot of very good you or from my
perspective you a lot of very good
thought processes um the idea of what
you just said right there that your mind
you you try to structure your mind um in
that you're justifying your conclusions
and you view those conclusions as
Justified but if the legs of the table
are removed that the conclusion no
longer follows is a very very good
thought process to have that um if
somebody tells me a particular thing and
they're like hey uh did you know that a
recent study just came out and if you
drink four Pepsis in one day you're
going to die well now how do you feel
about Pepsis that your answer shouldn't
necessarily be like you can either say I
I don't trust this so I don't believe it
or you can say well okay yeah I'm going
to stop drinking Pepsi or like the best
the the best thought proc you can is
like if that's true then I would say
that yeah Pepsi's horrible right um when
you structure your thoughts like that
you give yourself you give yourself
emotional wiggle room in the future
because now you're not like a slave to
whatever idea that you've identified
yourself with in an IR removable context
you've given yourself like a
psychological out and it's just a really
good way to frame your thoughts I just I
I I hear you speak like that a lot where
you're like oh given this like for the
for the JFK assassination thing right
that like well if everything said in The
Spook is true and maybe it is maybe it
isn't I don't have time to fact
everything but if it's true then I
believe this but if I were to discover
something different I would change my
belief obviously right being able to
update your beliefs based on acquisition
new information is so important um you
said so many huge things we could spend
15 hours talking
about everything you just said there but
um uh I had a viewer email me once I got
a lot of emails a lot of my viewers give
me a lot of really good information uh
and he said he called this like the
magic box idea and he said that uh
basically the idea was when you if you
go to ride a horse you basically know
what's going on you're getting on top of
a big creature you feed him you kick
them you you you know what's going on
have you uh have you used an abacus
before maybe in grade school okay
there's no room on the abicus for the
government topar on you you see every
single thing going on you know what's
happening what's happened is is in our
life as technology has grown and
Technology represents like this
accumulation of information passed on
through generations right as technology
has grown and the devices that we use
become more and more sophisticated they
require a greater level of understanding
to even know what's happening and as you
become more abstracted and removed from
that underlying process it becomes so
much easier for conspiracies to manifest
just because you don't know what it is
that you're engaging with right um this
applies to not just cell phones but it
applies to every single thing in our
lives right where when I talk to people
about um government conspiracies or
anything like I noticed for a lot of
people they just don't know how any of
this works they have no idea how any
part of the government works they don't
know how any part of the military Works
they don't it's like that's like
if they understood this thing then
they'd have like 98% different opinions
on a particular thing they just
understood more about like the
underlying stuff um the the magic box
thing is a concept um all this to say
that you were kind of speaking about how
like we become so specialized and so
conspiracies are manifesting more
because we're kind of like in our own
little worlds like I I agree that that's
an issue um when you talk about like
wanting to debate every single thing or
attack every single thing that meets a
threshold I just want to be clear about
that okay that's a really important
qualifier but even threshold is
difficult because it's like now in my
mind there are so many things that are
exceeding that threshold in terms of
what percentage of the population
believes in it that I just don't think
are really worth debating uh when I say
not not what so when I say not worth
debating what I mean is that like I
think that there are there are some
ideas that lack any reasonable
justification the the we would have to
we can dive into like empirical
discussions on these particular things
and have a conversation about these
things is a waste of time and there's
only so much time and there's only so
much attention that you can give because
the world is a complicated place um I I
and the issue too is that like when you
have certain ideas there are people who
have a conclusion and they want it and
they will just hop from bad idea to bad
idea to bad idea to bad idea and to
spend your time going through each of
these is excruciatingly painful uh for
me the example I I don't know your
position on any on vaccines or any of
that stuff so we might if these are
major areas of disagreement we can
always talk with them or you know
whatever but I can sum up my belief or
my position on literally everything by
saying uh what leads us to human
flourishing sure it it needs to be kpi
based we have a number I can go into my
whole detail on that but just just by
way of quick note that's that gotcha
sure okay um for the like for vaccine
stuff this is probably one of the first
areas that I became like very
knowledgeable in um what I found was you
there would be a new conspiracy uh you
know it might be
um uh [ __ ] what did AD stand for
something um acquired development
basically like you could give a vaccine
it would make the virus resistant to
your uh immune system and then the virus
like a super virus um this was a big
thing for a while and then it was the
died suddenly documentary where huge
strings of stuff and then it was like
myocarditis and pericarditis and then it
was myocarditis for young men and then
and it was just like every single week
what did Dr Malone say what was on the
last uh Joe Rogan show uh you know what
did RFK say uh you know about the polio
vaccine and what is every and and what I
realized is like I'm debating like a new
I'm debating like a new topic every
single week just to say the exact same
thing and the argument the evidence for
my argument is overwhelming and the
evidence for these other arguments that
I'm having to swat down is non-existent
like why am I having so many debates on
is hydroxy chloroquin or Ivermectin
valid treatments for covid-19 there give
an answer though what do you have an
answer to why so many conspiracies won't
go away yes um yeah we'll get there
that's part of next thing um but just to
say that um in wrapping this up that
there you can only talk about so many
things like when I go live like
sometimes I'm fighting on a certain
thing and I realiz like eight hours have
passed like [ __ ] I wanted to read this
today or like I wanted to go over this
and like I've just spent so much time
like arguing about this particular thing
and obviously the the for whatever
reason right now we can only have about
one idea in our head at a time as a
country right like who knows it's
there's a recent attack in conun I think
or might have been the alasi uh beach in
Israel Palestine nobody knows about that
nobody cares about the Gaza STP anymore
nobody cares about Ukraine anymore now
it's election time right nobody cares
about yeah we have like one idea at a
time um so so basically to say that like
yeah there's only so much time to talk
about things and if we have to deal with
every single dog shed idea we don't have
time to talk about like the important
conversations um so you asked like where
do these come from what's Happening you
mentioned something about how there's
like a weird social media thing and
there are Elites that manipulate people
I think that the weird social media
thing is all of these alternative media
influencers do not do any reading or any
homework I don't expect the average
person to sit and autistically you know
read like oh what are the New England
Journal of Medicine say oh well unless I
got to read all of Robert's opinion in
the Supreme Court case I I wouldn't
expect a normal person to do that I
would expect them want to do that but my
God none of these streamers do none of
these YouTubers do nobody in alternative
media does I don't think there's a
single person out there that I saw give
their take on the chevron case on the
Trump immunity case nobody read any of
the case even read the syllabus uh for
the Supreme Court decision which is like
15 pages and these are these are small
Pages there's not like 15 like huge P
it's like Harry Potter Pages um that's
not acceptable and you end up in this
world where all of these alternative
media influencers have huge incentives
to lie to you to sell you conspiracies
they make a [ __ ] ton of money like
hyping you up they make bad predictions
Tim p is going on right now on Twitter
about how like oh yeah this is any like
no sane person thinks that this was a a
normal shooting this is definitely a
conspiracy I tweeted out I was like well
let's spend $10,000 on if you're so
confident no response why not you're so
confident you should be willing to give
me odds on that if you're that confident
but they're not there's no
accountability mechanism nobody keeps
track of like all the lies that people
say and um I think that yeah I think
that right now there are so many people
scattered across media that are just
repeating these horrible talking points
with no research with no backing to
anything they're saying and it is
destroying it is destroying the
discourse go ahead dude you you make a
ton a ton points and as we're sitting
here I am reminded why I think you're
such an important part of the
sensemaking apparatus and so the
overarching theme of why I want to speak
to you is um I think that I'm so driven
by what's the outcome that you desire so
I'm trying to piece together what you
want I'm trying not to paint what I want
on to you uh what you want is to make
sure that um people are voting for the
right candidate who you see as Joe Biden
um that you have tried these very
sensible um debates that you've done
historically but don't feel that they
were very fruitful uh and you've gotten
to a point now where you realize to um
dial up the voters on your side and to
dampen the enthusiasm of the voters on
the other side you are running a new
tactic which is this um hyper aggressive
you use the word bully so I'll use that
as shorthand I'm sure it's more
complicated than that bullying is good
you uh like you said some leaders
encourage you to move some leaders say
we should uh you know help people that
are falling behind other people bully
people it's an important social
mechanism yeah you uh you you definitely
bullied in that uh the 1 V10 uh Twitter
space that you did which I highly
encourage people to check out was um
utterly fascinating but
the that is the tactic that you're using
to get the outcome that you want that I
just laid out now part of the issue is
you and I um
diverge very much in uh our local the
local outcome that we want so um I don't
know that we would disagree on human
flourishing but that would require a lot
of definitions anyway so I'll I'll leave
that aside but the outcome that I want
right now is to make sure that we bring
order to social media cultural and
political discourse so uh when we got
the printing press we got a lot of
religious wars when uh we had
governments or written language we
suddenly ha