the dominant view even today even surrounded by all this incredible technology is that the pie is fixed knowledge is what creates resources before we invented coal that thing was just a rock right I think every Utopia is a dystopia and ultimate anything
however good is sort of pessimistic because then you're not imagining that things could be even better we don't have problems again we're dead the government controls what things I taught in school and what the child should learn why aren't we recognizing that
there's so much untapped intelligence already in the form of children and like if you want to create a general intelligence you can just create a child well hello everyone it's Jim o shasy with yet another infinite Loops today's guest I think very very highly
um my guest today is Arjun kamani who is you're still 17 years old yeah okay I love this he dropped out of school to help lead support on naval's air chat he has his own podcast he has his own substack he has had such notable guests says you're making me Green With Envy
here David Deutsch uh whom I would really really love uh to uh have on as a guest uh you're particularly interested your your interests are broad ranging which I love to see uh epistemology economic history science you love to read people like Deutsch
poer vanon me who is was a favorite of mine when I was your age um what one that's on here that I'm going to ask you a little bit about is I'm brand that's an interesting one for that's a real blast from the past for me welcome Jim thank you so much it's an honor to be
here I remember I was I still remember the first episode of your podcast that I listened to I think it was with Tim Urban and if you would have told me that I'm going to be one of the guests on that incredible list of viewers uh I thought you'd be crazy back then but you
know here we are here we are indeed let's Jump Right In uh you know I I love the way you look at the world we are very sympatico for the Bingo Players out there I've already said zaboo and we're in the first couple of minutes so I might even have to say we're vibing
and things like that but we really we we really do Vibe and I think one of the things that we Vibe around is this idea that you know for people who hate modernity right they really should read some history books would you agree I mean like hob said that life was nasty
brutish and short and you have said said that you know poverty is Humanity's default um let's jump in right there because you also have the opinion which I happen to share with you I don't think I use the term egalitarian but the the dominant view
even today even surrounded by all this incredible technology is that the pie is fixed it is a very much of a scarcity mindset and I think you like me no we're just started baking pies and we can bake many many more pies what do you think exactly yes I think the the wealth
is a fixed pie sort of mindset is really a very very dangerous view to have about the world and even like you know the good old days that never even happened right uh people have this like romanticized view about the world before Industrial ization um that everything
you know humans were closer to Nature although that's not true you know we we we we didn't explore the depths of the oceans we didn't explore the the mountain peaks none of that stuff happened and like trying to so being able to um like actually appreciate
nature requires technology and it requires to for you to be able to you know uh at least go past those basic survival desires and to uh you know have some support against all these predators in nature and all these because nature really is very dangerous people like to
think of it as like this you know Mother Nature like she's really so generous and she's providing us with everything we need uh we don't need anything else we already live in abundance but that's just not true uh and yeah I think it's
very sad because like I don't think anybody who who talks about like you know the good old days would really actually want to be living in those good old days where you're you know your children are dying like half of children like every born die died before the age
of five and that was like you know it's really really hard for a parent to see their child die um at the age of five or below and life expectancy was short everything literally everything um that we appreciate right now um was had it has been created and it wasn't uh
like just existing at the start and so it requires knowledge creation and weth creation that we could get into um but yeah I don't think the good old days ever happened you know I I think that the very term Nostalgia kind of implies a a pining for something as remembered
not as it was right and and basically for for for most of human history uh and your your remark about nature is absolutely correct Alfred Lord Tennison said that nature is red in tooth and Claw and he did he did not mean that as a compliment he me he he meant that nature
was dangerous and that as deuts would point out literally we had to create a habitable world and you know we sometimes forget that we are tool makers we are explainers we are uh extenders of our own nature and it was in the building of those tools it
was in the better explanations that we created a vastly better world and and so I I just think it might be a kink in human OS that uh thinks these the so-called simpler times were were better like there's a great book that I recommend often by Bill Bryson America
One Summer 1921 I think is the title and when you read this book it blows you away because like the president's son died from playing lawn tennis at the White House why because he got a sliver tennis records were wood back then he got a sliver in his hand and we didn't have
any antibiotics and so he got sepsis and died from literally a splinter and and this idea that oh it was so Noble and you know the rouson and uh uh you know man was born in Freedom and everywhere he we see him in chains that was the Romantic notion at the time and
which itself was a reaction against science and and by science I mean real science not scientism I want to chat about that a bit because we really share our Outlook there too scientism in my opinion and I think in yours is a religion it is not a
uh upholding of the scientific method there's a great book if you haven't read it I recommend it to you it's called the new Inquisition irrational rationalism in the Cal of Science by Robert Anton Wilson he published that in 1986 so this is something that is not
new we always tend to think that oh these views are just coming around now no the these are longstanding views and and we've kind of gone from nulas ad verba which is take no one's word for it man to uh kind of uh k k i l it took six
years of Latin but it's gonna get me it's gonna be hard to even get it here uh Kus no which means thrust me take my word for it and and that seems to be the way that the uh establishment oh sorry science has gone and there's a great quote from Ryan nor
the science fiction uh author where he says the pH philosophical foundations of science are actually those of pure punk rock Anarchy respect no one's opinion don't trust Authority find out for yourself do you I know you agree but I want to hear what you have to say about
that right yeah there's a lot there uh I think Peter teal talked about this he said like you know um nowadays when people use the word science it's often to tell of the opposite so climate science political science right like it's like very ironic that like
science has been used as this term to sort of defend criticism off of itself like what science is really about is trying to come up with new things creatively and then uh criticizing them right but then now like some people are using this Noble term signs that Society
really deems something as you know the word right you know like I like to say that um um the data says is the new the Bible says right uh and it's like we we've made sort of like we've people that are using like terms that saying you know uh this we're doing science
here right so it's like it's sort of like deemed as this other kind of knowledge and like it's deemed as like greater importance or the only kind of knowledge that's true but I think that's really really mistake and science was all about um criticizing things and not
taking anything um on crust uh which I think is uh yeah has really uh something that like near Generations are really like um mistaking uh what scien is uh meant to be but yeah so that interests me uh because uh you're on usual 17-year-old uh and I mean that in the
most complimentary way I can um what do you think is there a way to help your fellow members of your generation get back on track I know I know you're do doing your best I know you got a podcast you've got a substack you've uh you have many
Endeavors here I know you thought about writing a book at one point uh but like if you were trying to get your generation uh and I don't want to label just one gener because a lot of generations hold these views but specifically you know younger
people like yourself how would you do that yeah it's it's a question of our Times Really Jim but um I'd also be careful about blaming this younger generation because like uh historically let me hasten to that I'm not blaming the generation I I all generations have really misguided
Notions but but the the emergence and coming of an age when when the popular vernacular says science but you and I know they really mean scientism uh that's something new right I didn't face that when I was growing up right um I don't know how exactly I
would address that particular problem but um like I was saying I think uh older Generations have been targeting and blaming the younger Generations historically like it's that's been happening like since forever basically but um yeah um how how would we spread these
ideas that science is about criticizing things and not just accepting something that's uh you know out of the word for it because like it's very easy right like like I don't know uh you you call this like a king human no us but people wanting and Desiring some sort of
Parental Authority that tells them uh what to do or that they can trust in you know that's something that seems like it's kind of a deep desire for some people and then you know once somebody says that this is the science and this is the authority on knowledge then it's
it gets very easy to sort of accept that um and to uh to indulge in that so yeah I'm not exactly sure how I would go about instead other than just like you know uh sort of doing what I'm doing and I don't know what you're doing it's like just talking about these ideas spreading
them and uh yeah not being afraid to just be vocal about these ideas and to uh to talk about them even when you know uh it's something that the other person doesn't agree with yeah and you you know you're dealing with a mostly bankrupt ideology
of one of the things that they persist in is trying to silence anyone whose opinions are different than their own yeah and so I I agree with you that the what you're doing and so I'm so impressed by is taking action you are talking you are uh a young man who is
like literally putting yourself in the arena I really applaud you for that and I and I know you sure some of my ideas about our Antiquated educational system it seems to me that um you know my my f one of my favorite authors Robert Anton
Wilson says uh that in his day what they wanted to do was uh implant a correct answer machine in your brain in other words there was only one right answer and actually mistakes mistakes were bad mistakes were punished and and then I also kind of bring in uh another
favorite of mine Jed McKenna and and he says and I'm going to read this verbatim because I can't say it better than Jed he says the very idea of putting our formative years to good and happy use is so radical as to be practic practically Unthinkable what if young people were
encouraged to explore learn and develop instead of being hered and homogenized so you left that system again I'm going to take another crack at at at how you might be able to help uh people in your generation who didn't lead that system how how would
you how if you were setting up your own Academy right how would you make it different than the old school way we're trying to educate younger people today yeah uh well firstly I don't think I would be I would want to try and set up an academy I think um everything should
uh you know with children with people in general you know it should be happening voluntarily so children should be able to choose whether they want to come you know come to my Academy or even to like learn from me and like uh have a
conversation with me so I don't think I would be trying to set up an academy but uh I think like one of the problems right now is that school and education uh right now is compulsory so like you're basically just forced legally to send your kids to school and like that
doesn't seem to be like this other option um to you know as as you just pointed out about the quote that childhood like sort of has to be about that homogeneity and like every child has to go through the same curriculum and to learn um the same subjects and
you know like what about all the fun and the Curiosity and like all that stuff that's being destroyed in these institutions so um it's interesting how you mentioned that how I would go about spreading this because like I remember when I was in school and this was like
kind of my last parents teachers meeting uh before I left school my my Momom was called and my class teacher would just basically tell my tell my mom that um arent has his unique views against school and authority and that's okay but he's instigating a lot of other students
to disobey the school rules as well I thought that was the funniest thing and a very good compliment although obviously that was not meant to me put that way uh but but yeah um I I still wish I was like even more vocal about my ideas and like I sort of like yeah I
think I could could have done better but um the fact that my teacher said that that was really funny um and and yeah like um I think even the concept of like hard work right like I think it's like really really overrated and um we could get uh get talking about this when we
talk about iron Rand but like I think like I I want to live a life with without sacrifices and without compromises right like uh I hear all of these successful and well- achieved people talk about how much hard work they had to put in and like how much
they have to sacrifice but I I really think like it's just way more creative and productive and like it's just better for you to sort of um follow your interests and to like yeah just see what see where they lead you right like sure you have to
make trade-offs and like but but you choose the better option and I wouldn't call choosing a better option um a sacrifice um so like all of these you know Olympic level athletes who are uh training so many hours a day and sacrifice quote unquote sacrificing on
parties um if if that's something that they really want then I don't think I'd call it a compromise or a sacrifice it's just you know you're following what you really want to do and I think that's that's really really no and courageous a few um yeah so walk me through I agree
by the way following your curiosity is probably the best way to learn about everything um so walk me through the last thing you got super curious about and what' you do what what what did you study what books did you read Walk us through your
process yeah um I think the last sort of big thing was Austrian economics um I I I thought I think that there's a natural Next Step from papan epistemology which I know you're interested in and Austrian economics so um I was having a discussion about uh about just generally
economics with my friend and he brought up Austrian economics and anarch capitalism and all these things that I I just didn't understand back then and uh you know uh I was like I really want to dig into this more because this seems really really interesting so so yeah I
asked my friend for a few book recommendations you know surfed surfed the web online and um just started reading and started talking to people about these ideas hosted a couple of people that are um connected with mus University and like
uh mus Institute and um ideas of Liberty on my podcast and yeah I mean that was sort of my Learning Journey it was very unstructured you know it wasn't like you go to college and you like study this curriculum and do all of these things it was just like I was interested I picked
up a few books and started learning let me recommend if you have it WR it already hyek book uh the road to surom yeah uh that that's a very good one on on this uh topic um you wrote something along the lines of profits are proof of service I I like that because I think
that people really fundamentally misunderstand you know the function of money in my opinion money is an information technology uh or more prosaically uh like the author I just had on the podcast uh Devin Ericson says money is the equivalent of bucks given and he was
saying he was having an argument with somebody on Twitter basically saying you know here you are whining about the fact that your worthless degree is ain't getting you any money let's just translate it into That's because nobody gives a about what you chose to
study and honestly it's it's harsh but it's really a simple and straightforward and therefore like a czor like uh way of getting people to understand it like so if if if I told you hey I I got a job for you I'm gonna put you out in the Sahara Desert and I
want you to dig holes and it's going to be hot and it's going to be really hard work and everything else what do you want to get paid for that well I know you you're not going to take that job because you're GNA say well nobody gives
a for s in the Sahara desert but you know there's an entire economic school of thought and philosophy that that you know the Marxist theory of value that says the the value is created in the labor that it takes to create it uh well I think that you disagree with
that I know I disagree with it and the idea that the other part of money as an information technology is it does a pretty good job now note prettyy good job it doesn't do a perfect job nothing does a perfect job but it does a very good job of allocating resources when
you look historically at all of the attempts to do top- down command style economies they don't have that asset uh allocation resource available to them and so resources are horribly allate allocated uh generally based on might not right uh in other words the guys
with the guns get all the resources right and we've seen this time and time and time again H how would you if we if we were gonna put you in a debate how how would you convince the other side that wow you you really need to maybe even read some history here and uh and
and then but what kind of case would you make yeah firsty this is why I love your podcast so much you do a good job at summarizing these important ideas and framing questions in such an amazing way um so I just thought i' flag that but um
yeah this idea that profits are proof of service right proof of value it's like the reason I pay $5 for my coffee and somebody's offering me um a coffee for $5 is because I I value the cup of coffee more than I value my $5 but the person who's making
the coffee they value the $5 more than the cup of coffee that they're soaring me and so it's this Mutual exchange that's a win-win and we both have different valuations of the same thing right so it's this subjective uh theory of value uh that you're hinting at um and I think
like sort of if you understand that concept uh you're like yeah you know more than like a lot of economists uh who are like a formal you know who have a formal degree and stuff um it's such a simple concept but it has such amazingly huge implications for how
to organized society and how things get organized Society in society efficiently right so yeah I think like that point about the subjective the of Valu is like uh one of the top ones I would make and like what kind of metaphors would you develop um because metaphors can be very
helpful in helping your average human grock uh again like a great metaphor is is uh Devon's uh money is given right I love that um what other what other sorts of analogies or metaphors would would you uh use to to get people to understand the concept you've just
articulated H yeah I've never I don't think I've ever thought about it in terms of that before but I do think how it could be helpful um yeah nothing comes to mind right now but is there something that you would use especially for this concept or like
the wealth is a fixed pie S type of concept um CU yeah yeah I I mean I think I think that that if you have these axiomatically they're called planted axioms right an axiom is something that is self-evident true right so you don't question an axiom a planted Axiom is
where you take a Highly Questionable uh idea and plant it as if it there it can't be questioned um so the idea again of Simply all you got to do is either watch some history uh videos on YouTube or read a book of History a great book to read would be
the lessons of History by Will and Ariel Durant and uh so I would I would make the case that a fixed piie um mentality is one of scarcity and that leads to people I mean again if uh here here's the analogy if I if I tell you there's one pie and I don't know
there's a hundred people in the room and we're all hungry what's going to happen the strongest mightiest people are going to grab that pie keep it from the other people eat it all for themselves and you know then you'll get a lot of uh disharmony and a lot of uh agitation if
on the other hand you have the idea that no look there there's a stove right over here and look here are all the ingredients for pies I've got a solution there's 100 of us let's make 100 pies right and and that is the idea of of abundance and the idea of course of
progress right in in the past we didn't have that stove over there we didn't have those ingredients readily available to us that came to us through the wonders of innovation and progress and Innovation and progress come out of the human mind uh the idea I mean steel
doesn't exist in nature it came out of a human mind and and so I think that the idea that we can do things in a top- down allocation uh method really uh basically if you boil it down it comes down to the the idea that Hawkins has in this book power verse Force basically
people who love to tell other people all their many failings and that they because they are so wise are going to be very no blessa le and correct your mistaken ideas um I think you make that case about what I think you call the altruism
trap talk a little bit about that yeah uh but just to H not on the previous tread uh you were talking about the fixed pie fallacy and like I I know some people have spent so much time worning about this this nonpr of like you know um maybe like
alien intelligence would want to steal or all our resources you know I think that's like that's just the the most absurd idea like somebody could have like um I I think people um resources are you know just like limited to the amount of knowledge that people have and
knowledge is what creates resources you know like uh before before we invented coal like that that thing was just a rock right we had to invent and make it make it into coal and so I don't I don't think like aliens who have the power to even wisit Earth and like they have so
much of wealth and uh you know knowledge that they could actually visit Earth would would come here all the way and steal our resources they would want to trade with us and try to learn uh with us and Tas right um but yeah uh the altruism trap that that you mentioned is
basically that um I guess like so it can be easy to imagine it if like we think of uh happiness as like a red ball okay uh let's say I possess that red ball of happiness and because you know it's not good to be selfish and because like um
because I should just be parting away with uh whatever uh whatever thing that makes me happy uh I give the ball to you but but you don't want to be selfish either right so you give it to your spouse uh but your spouse doesn't want to be selfish and she gives it to like
this this aunt that she doesn't have any feelings about or affections at all but she still gives it because U she's been told that um selfishness is bad and um you need to make sacrifices so this ball just keeps them getting passed around and eventually like ideally in a world
that's perfect altruistic nobody in the world is ever happy because nobody actually possesses the ball and the person who actually possesses the ball is someone who's selfish right uh like according to like uh the way these terms are put um so so yeah I think like
that's like the altruism trap is sort of connected to the fixed piie fallacy it's that you know it's sort of assuming that you can't create more red balls that you can't create happiness and that you can't like if if you try to pursue what
you want to do that's at the expense of somebody else trying to pursue what they want to do um and just like logically I don't think it's um more efficient for everybody to solve everybody else's problems um instead of you know focusing on their own I think like people make more
progress if they just follow their interest focus on their local problems and try to solve them instead of like people worrying about what other people are um sort of uh going through or you know obviously I'm not talking about like not having um not having empathy or
not caring about your friends that is something that you might want to do but since you want to do it I I won't consider that altruistic you know I would just consider that you following your values and um I think like me following I Rand I viewed the word
selfish in a very virtuous sense so um I would definitely call it you know uh rationally uh selfish rationally self-interested so like Adam Smith's famous line it is not from the benevolence of the baker that we expect our bread but rather his self-interest
and if everybody is acting in a self-interested way it actually creates uh a system whereby goods and services multiply exponentially and uh there's just more of everything I think that um one of the things that as I was listening to that interests me is I
think we spent so long in human society after we emerged from Hunter Gathering uh under the rule of of vengeful religions and therefore and and I'm not pointing a finger at any particular one I think that most religions were used uh to explain things hopefully on the good
side but also used to control um the population uh there there was a disputed finding um that will store told me about it did get retracted uh but the idea is an interesting one to contemplate and that was that um that whenever a society grew to over a million people vengeful
Gods appeared and again if I if I'm running a million person Society well you know what I might want to try to keep them in line with vual Gods with Ten Commandments with uh all sorts of things and I'm not saying by the way that those Ten Commandments are each and
every one of them horrible not at all uh but if we understand that a lot of the words that we use today still have those clinging tendrils to the origins of those words because selfish in the classic sense of the way the word is often interpreted is not a great thing
selfish is like you know I'm this is mine uh I don't care about you at all and I only am in this for myself and that isn't what you mean at least I don't think so that isn't what you mean when you're TR using the term selfish you mean I think that the best way to
make the world a better place is to improve yourself first right yes and it's it's like selfishness at least like the way I would think of the word selfishness is not callousness right it's not about like not caring about people um
and I I don't think like altruism is about generosity either so I think like people can um people can work on problems that they're interested in and focus on you know helping themselves at the same time create this better World create a better Society by just
the indirect um ramifications of their actions so um yeah what do you think is motivating people who is it a desire to control um you know because you make the point that uh like with with compulsory school you're you're that's coversion right you're you're coercing the
children uh to have to go to school and you know that's kind of a like I don't know if you've ever seen the movie Matilda but there's a great scene in it where Matilda is is a lot lot like you and she doesn't take off anyone and and the teacher is Matilda ask why why
should I do that and the teacher's response is because I'm big and you're little because I'm an adult and you're a child because I'm right and you're wrong these simple assertions are really interesting in terms of they're meaningless right I could say uh you
know it's the logical fallacies 101 right uh all men have green Wings Socrates is a man therefore Socrates has green wings no that's doesn't work but it it lets people think that you know they they are justified in this idea of trying to control other people I mean
another one of my favorite bogey men here is the world economic Forum where they're running these things like the year is 2030 and you ow nothing and you're happy and like to me I always laugh at it because there's so toned dep under the the terms of today that they
they don't realize that they're only creating memes and gifts for people like me to to to demonstrate how idiotic and toned death they are and and yet I this seems to be a a constant part of us even today this this will to take this will to control others and and
you see it every day where essentially again back to our friends at the world economic Forum uh it seems to me that they are trying to inculcate learned helplessness they are trying to um take away agency from people and on top of it all it seems obvious to me
that well I would do that too if I wanted to create sheep who were easy to control what do you think yeah and I think it's interesting that you mention it just when we were talking about altruism because I think like the people who tell you to make sacrifices in life
are the ones that are actually the most selfish people right they're telling you how to live your life and I think that's more selfish than anything that we've been talking about um and yeah the only thing that um I really like that's
associated to the world economic forum is Javier's Javier M's recent speech and that was I think that was uh that was that was awesome talk about Daniel going into the lion's dead yeah basically telling everyone in the in the crowd who is a globalist just
said you're wrong this is a better and Superior system um but yeah uh I'm not exactly sure what we were talking about before the S iight no worries uh for our listeners and and viewers uh he just he's a bit jetl because he just got back from the US um so we'll we'll take that in the
while we we were we were basically talking about like what is this urge in a not small part of the population this desire um to control other people and and and why I I have my ideas but I'd like to hear yours uh you you hinted at it with saying the the the
people who are my mom you had a great saying which was the longer and louder he spoke of his honor the quicker we counted our spoons in other words that guy's a thief and and they the the the people who make these great gestures right uh oh I am so virtuous
and you know the whole virtue signaling thing uh like that's your first clue that they ain't virtuous like way before you were born in the 1980s uh a big thing here in the United States were the El evangical uh preachers and like I I was I was absolutely transfixed because I the
performances were so great like Jimmy Swagger was one of them and after he got caught with Coke and hookers and everything else he goes and like this guy's performing ability just still I can still see it in my mind's eye he's sitting up there and he's weeping
crocodile tears I have sent against the Lord but then when you you review the disposition of all of those that gang guess what they were all the same they were all like basically grifters and grooks and you know it it seems to me that younger people like yourself can
help your contemporaries and help olds like me uh understand that even better um the other thing as I was getting into chat with you I was thinking you must have really cool parents okay yeah we we could get to that but but first like I you're talking about like you being old
I just don't think that that that's the case like when I'm talking to you it just feels like I'm talking to a child like you know and I mean that mean that in a very very nice way um and you're just so curious and like you're coding
so many things so you're definitely like you you just read all the time I assume um but but yeah um but I guess like it's an interesting like rhetorical tactic that that some people use use um in a way to sort of moralize their stance and just like shun out all criticism um
and like it's that you know I am like they're trying to get claim the moral High ground and speak from a position of moral Superior superiority and say that uh I am good and therefore if you disagree with any policy or any action that I uh that I
talk about um then you know you're a bad person um and it's like we were talking about scientism before like uh even with climate science you know like um then it's like if you disagree with this zero emissions policy then you're denying science right although it's sort of this like this
argument that they think that's very coherent but it's just it's just not it's just like a moralizing their stance sort of and like the moment you label something that sort of undeniably right in many people's minds you know like like black lives matter is a good
example uh the moment you you name an organization or a movement like that it's like if you if you disagree with like and maybe like then black lives matter the organization has like this this policy or like this action that they want to implement and so if you
disagree with this this x policy then that means you disagree with black lives matter that that means you're a bad person because you think black lives don't matter right um so I think that's like an interesting like moralizing technique that I've seen uh used often
and uh I'm curious what what you think about it and if you've seen it a lot as well well yeah obviously I think that no matter where you stand on issues like so for example CL uh the climate change I I think it's a legitimate problem and um I
think that uh one of the ways that I can distinguish between somebody who's a posure and they're doing it for political or ideological reasons is I asked them a simple question well well so then you must be in favor of Elemental nuclear energy right and the
number of people whose expression gets very very D after I asked them that uh kind of sign to me oh okay you you're actually not interested in clim in solving climate change you you you have you're you want you have a degrowth agenda and you know you must really
admire malus sorry do this meme right like you are the carbon they want to reduce I think like it's it's often like implicit in many of their arguments but sometimes it's even explicit like some people will literally tell you that um it a world without humans would be a
better world and I find that so so ironic and like you know as a joke but as a serious joke I often say that okay then why don't you contribute to that cause um you know people don't like get really offended by that joke but I think that's
a serious joke to make you know why don't you contribute to that cause by sort of you know by doing what right so um yeah I think that um for a large segment of society um the preference is basically they're happy with the shrink wrapped human OS as installed that they got uh
they're happy to most of your beliefs are assigned either educationally because remember your indoctrinator are thoroughly indoctrinated themselves that's why they're so good at it and uh um the the the way to break out is relatively simple it's just uh to say
wow that sounds like a lot of to me and and engage uh again on all of these so-called controversial matters I think they became controversial because the other side wanted uh compliance they did not want discussion or conversation uh again back to climate uh
change I think it's real I I I think that the empirical evidence for it is uh pretty solid I I'm not going to say unquestionable because nothing's unquestionable but it's very solid but that means that we need to do what we do well we need to invent better
Innovations better ways of dealing with it it's like you know um if there's a comet hurling at the Earth uh gosh do I want missiles based uh wherever to be able to take that Comet out and uh you know from my perspective if you really are serious about the sort of big
existential risks and you yourself can do something about it that you should so if you look at a lot of what our uh Venture division does you Ventures you'll see that we're investing in innovations that we think will be very helpful uh in terms of climate in terms
of productivity in terms of using the resources that we have uh to their maximum and best use uh uh ability um and and I think that what you're doing and which I applaud again is a lot of it is just really people bullshitting and they're bullshitting because they what
they really have is an agenda where they want come in and control uh you know scratch any of these people and I think it was M I think it was HL M who said you know sort of scratch somebody who says they want to help and what you'll really find is somebody who wants to
rule and I have I have no interest in ruling I have no interest in telling other humans what to do um and I think that the the best way that you can change Minds is just be an example and and you know Yong had a great line which is you you are not what
you say you will do you are what you do and and again what you do requires agency requires action requires you know walking the walk and talking the talk but more importantly walking the walk right that that is the way to I think G get people to understand wow I I guess
this is a uh this is something that makes sense that I I should be interested in the idea behind let getting back to scientism here for a minute that was a big change over my life so I'm 63 I was born in 1960 and I grew up like um in the age of
Kennedy saying we're going to go to the Moon not because it's easy but because it's hard because we need to push further we need to explore more we need to understand and learn more and those kinds of things were widely embraced in the United States and and
then we hit this Plateau I guess uh I guess the the tagline is always what the happened in 1971 and I always joke I turned 11 but but uh we did kind of hit this area where people became so much more cautious and they became so much more risk averse
um which I'm still trying to disambiguate and figure out why that happened but I I'm very hopeful that we are in especially when I see young people like you uh that we're back in that no we need to explore we need to we need to have better explanations and you you made a remark
one time which was the idea of ultimate anything is pessimism in Disguise I I love that quote um and and and tell me uh what you mean by yeah so it's this idea that you know we can go on making progress indefinitely and that we can go on having fun indefinitely right this
progress on this fun need not stop um but like even like a lot of like uh people that are admire like like like like Richard feeman sort of made this mistake with science when he sort of said that um I don't think that there's going to be a new discovery that's going to be
groundbreaking in science and like okay I'm not quoting him exactly well but he he he was like he was implying a sort of end to science and to scientific discovery um and I just don't think that's the case I think like problems are always going to arise
and the thing about people is that you know we can go ahead and solve those problems as they arise and to create the necessary know to do those things um so so yeah like the idea of like an ultimate anything you know like even like a Utopia I think every Utopia is a
dystopia right like every like an ultimate anything however good is sort of pessimistic because then it's sort of you're not imagining that things could be even better that you could Explore More that you know the universe for all we know practically is uh
infinite right now and so much that we could explore and transform and like uh build out in the universe and you know terraform the entire universe and make it habitable for us because um you know this Earth is not it it definitely is special but it's it's not
like our life support system um we we humans like live in places on Earth that we wouldn't be able to without knowledge creation without technology so um so yeah I think like yeah I think that that's a good way to summarize a lot of ideas that I think are important to
think about is that the idea of an ultimate anything is inherently pessimistic and I think that the other thing I like about what I know of your work is that um the the idea that we aren't going to have problems right I think it might have even been
David Deutsch who said yeah there there is a condition where there are no problems it's called debt yeah um right and and I extend that by saying uh you know uh if if an overabundance of the precautionary principle leads to stasis and stasis is that and just like
dogmatism is death of the mind because essentially all you are doing is shouting and chanting slogans and you know that's a really clever way and it actually works to self- hypnotize yeah you could hypnotize yourself into confabulating almost any belief right
and and so the idea what I loved about the the idea of the ultimate anything is pessimism that's very clever on your part because it's a great way to get people to understand what the point you just made right I think it was Edison who said we don't know one tenth of 1%
about nothing and and I look at that and I love that I love that because it's like wow we just get to keep learning we get to keep creating and I always try to to keep myself humble and one of the ways I did at least intellectually hum humble
is I always look at myself kind of as if I come up with something cool I always call myself a co-creator not the Creator because after all we live in this now uh inter networked world and you know maybe maybe I got that idea from my conversation with you you maybe you got
it from your conversation with the ball right and there's this chain of being that when you think about yourself and your ideas that you're co-creating that puts all that ego away and it it stops the Mind mind mind mentality right and and I think that we're getting into a
place now where you know we're going to have new and better problems and and the idea that we don't have problems again they're missing the point in my opinion we don't have problems again we're dead yeah yeah and and life is movement right
yeah and and better problems that that that's the crucial part right like um we we solved starvation and now we have a problem with obesity but I'd I'd argue that it's definitely a better problem to have and something that you know now you can like this promising medicines that
are coming up that that could probably solve obesity but but like even the fact that you know now now you have more Choice with with food and um and all of those things so I think like problems are always going to arise we're going to solve them and better problems are uh
going to come up and that's a good thing I I yeah one thing that after uh reading deuts is that I just view problems in a very good light now it's not something that sure it's something that you want to solve but it's not something that you
know you want to get get rid of once and for all like uh I think like problems are inevitable but not any single problem is inevitable right like every single problem can be solved and yeah we can just like go on doing that indefinitely and as I said just keep on
having fun indefinitely I think I remember asking you on my podcast um do you want to live forever if you could um and and and yeah you said like definitely for uh you know for hundred more years or a thousand more years but uh you were a little averse to the idea
of forever um and I think that that like that's a disagreement that we have but yeah I remember I think that's funny because I was gonna turn that question around on you and ask you whether you want to live forever uh yeah but here here's why I hedge on that
um again it has to do with my ignorance who am I to say that this is the only Dimension worth hanging out it and who am I to say that I understand at all I mean physically I have a high degree of probability in believing that when I die I'm dead and the whole gym
Universe dies with me and uh you know that I'm food for worms but what if I'm wrong I mean what if what if there are other diens energy can't be destroyed it can only be transformed right and so maybe there's and and the reason I edged there
is because I'm I'm willing to say that like if if uh we discover these other dimensions right and we discover that they can be gotten to uh I don't know whether death is one of the ways that we transform that energy or not I'm not smart enough to figure that out so I definitely
Edge on that thing now if we came up with better explanations and somebody said no no Jim actually when you die you're you were you were right the first time dude you become worm food and you're gone your Consciousness is gone well again right like uh when
you're dead don't have any problems anymore uh and so like I I I want to remain open until a better explanation comes around uh that sort of more definitively says yes or no yeah or nay on uh how many dimensions there are how many are inhabitable in what form may we
inhabit them um and and and therefore I don't want to close myself off and just because saying I want to live forever has a lot of implications it implies that I believe that this is the only plan of existence it implies that I believe that um if I leave this plan of
existence um uncooked and worm food and since I don't know that and I can't assert that with any High degree of probability I'm waiting for those better explanations but I'm not getting any younger so if you come up with one please share it with me yeah um yeah I
think I I know a few trans humanists who have like who sort of push back against um like talking about the idea forever um just like just that term you know as you said it definitely has a lot of implications and it doesn't have to be forever you know it have to it can be
indefinitely and you can choose to end your life any moment you know like if if you think that um you know I'm like you you you're you're like bored and you're not having uh fun and you think like you've discovered a lot of things and um
maybe you can take your life like after a million years or something but but yeah um yeah talking about Good explanations right like uh this sort of goes back to um School Matilda and uh you're asking about my parents like I I never heard a good
explanation um to like do what I was doing when I was in school like it it was like always like you know because I said so or because everybody's doing it so you have to complete school so like people often ask me like how how I how did I get like so much confidence to
like take this alternative path and uh to sort of uh go against so many authorities quote unquote it's like they just never gave me a good answer it's all just right and uh I thought like you know there's a different way to live life and a different way to make
money and like I was actually seeing those results in real life and I was like you know I don't need this like they're not giving me a good answer um and so yeah I guess like I was just like a little bit like focused on trying to trying to get to the TRU of things and
like just trying to have fun you know like I I didn't want to do things just because everybody was doing them and because I I just never heard a good explanation and I had a better way of doing things that's why I went ahead and I did those things this kind of a
multiart question when you made the decision to leave school uh first off how did your parents take it uh secondly were you nervous when you made that decision and then the final part of the question would be what surprised you the most since you did that either
positively or negatively yeah um so well my parents didn't take it well and like we it wasn't like this one um like one conversation or one event that happened right it was like it was constantly like day after day me telling them that I hate school and I
don't want to go there and I have this different way and I want to pursue this and uh yeah we definitely had a lot of heated discussions and arguments over those days like I think I like yeah I had wanted to drop out for like a while um until I actually did so maybe like
for six months I was like just constantly telling them that I want to finish uh you know I want to drop out and do this other thing so um yeah eventually uh I guess like some of my real world results and sort of proving to them that um there is just different
way and obviously having a paycheck uh help them see you know uh see that you know uh have have some confidence in me um but then you ask about if I was nervous I was not nervous at all actually I was the happiest man alive when I when I dropped out um and
yeah I was ready I was ready for for the increased freedom for the increased creativity not being told what what to do and um it's interesting like when you even when I was in school right like I didn't really feel that trapped although
I did feel like physically trapped because I had to be there and like I would sneak out sometimes but um I didn't feel that trapped because I knew that I I I disagreed with these people and I had ideas that were different from them and like I was like constantly
thinking about those ideas even though like you know I wouldn't care whatever people would tell me to do like you have this project that you have to finish on this this dead line and if you don't do it then we'll uh then you'll get a bad grade I'm like okay I don't care so I
was kind of like free in that moment in school but then obviously like when I dropped out it was like just you know much better like I don't have to go to this place every day and sit in this classroom and listen to um answers that I haven't even asked questions
about sorry was the third part yeah the third part was what has surprised you either positively or negatively about your time since quitting school well it's definitely all been positive I get to spend more time on um on what I want to and you know on my on my own interest
and uh just sort of talking to people that you know the conversation that we having now it's like so fascinating I want to do this like every day right and um I guess like what's sort of been surprising or maybe like what was something I was uh what something uh
something I was expecting is that dropping out of school was is kind of now becoming like this school thing um you know like uh so it's interesting to see that um sure like we have those Mark Zuck and uh Steve Jobs who like drop out of these uh pretentious universities but
now like dropping out of school is sort of being viewed as dropping in high school is being like sort of viewed as like this cool thing that you do and like is um more and more being appreciated um by some people like this rebellious kind of nature where you
question things and you have creative thoughts like um that's I guess much more appreciated in an era where robots are automating everything right like um I find it very ironic that you know people are trying to create AGI and I think that's a good thing people should
definitely go ahead and try to create AGI but like we are sort of not appreciating so much untapped intelligence in the form of children by sending them to these institutions where like they're all told to Pink alike and to be more like like specific narrow
intelligences right like to to be like a robot or a machine um so I find that contrast very interesting and like um yeah why aren't we recognizing that there's so much untapped intelligence already in the form of children and like if you want to create a general
intelligence you can just create a child but I do think AGI is important I do think AGI is great and it's like it's it's a goal just to flag that yeah the author that I had on and quoted as uh money being shorthand for given in his book uh uh AGI uh was achieved by uh
using a child's Consciousness um and I don't want to give away too much but I I thought that was a really uh a really cool uh thing and and look uh just for everyone listen thing I think it's cool what he's doing I'm not recommending that you drop out
of school if you like if you want to be a doctor or you want to be something where you really do need to have that training uh go for it go for it I think that sometimes again we get caught up on on definitions like so you know we have the fellowships and we went out of our
way not to require that anyone quit a job or drop out of school or anything because we felt you know what who are we to say whether that's good or bad for that so we tried to make we tried to make our fellowship as uh strings free as possible um
and uh so uh we're really talking more about here I think the the aifi nature of the current educational system and uh you know Bucky Fuller at a great quote which is if if you've come to kind of the end of the line of a old system it probably is not a great idea to try to
reform that system uh and and he says just invent another one that works a lot better and and so one of the ideas that you have in that regard is the idea of voluntary schooling um and and I just wonder about that um just practically speaking
um is such a system tenable if so like how would it work yeah um firstly it's interesting that like you've not seen something like that happened with the Advent of the internet and like so much information and knowledge being available online right like nval has
this quote that did like there is no um scarcity uh like the what scarce is the desire to learn not not knowledge right like there's so much information that's already available so it's interesting that we haven't sort of revolutionized education yet with these uh these
increasing Technologies um but I would like um I don't know if you've read Ivan illich's um deschooling Society um no I haven't read that one yeah so he proposes like this idea of networks where you connect students and teachers quote unquote that
um you know the teacher that wants to teach a particular subject and the student who actually wants to learn a particular subject and like you connect them and like you serf like just are able to allocate resources um to to students and to teachers to just sort of
follow their interests and to to to learn what they want to learn um and I think like what would be even important uh is that like private companies and uh competing uh to give their service of privatized education um to these children like I think
there's a big La of um competition and like you know it's kind of Monopoly right now uh where like the government controls what um things are taught in school and what the child should learn so when there's like just more of that and you have schools that you know are
very very wide ranging and then families and then hopefully the child themselves has U an an option to choose um what they want to learn and which school if doesn't even exist they want to go to like they can just like be part of these networks where they're connected to um
to like the thing they want to learn and they have uh the tools and the resources necessary to to get that um obviously it's like it's difficult right now because like as as we're talking about like this right like um a lot of uh a lot of people in like Society is uh you
know like in certain societies women are banned to uh or goals are banned to like go to to school and to study right and like they're fighting uh to to actually get that education and we're talking about like uh like all these like very
very different things from you know a normal education um but yeah I think like it will be like a slow adopted thing where like um I don't know if you've read like the uh sort of the model Elon proposed for Tesla which is like uh starting with the Roadster uh
which was like a very elite car and like uh just meant for for rich people and like they would adopt those first and they would get the funding from selling those cars and then they would produce cars uh for for the mass market so I think like I would expect something like
that happening for um for education and for privatized education in particular um yeah that's kind of my general thoughts on that on that that's the uh the mimetic nature of humans is what Elon is trying to take advantage of there um you know in other words do the Roadster for
the rich folks uh that becomes aspirational for other people you know R it or repeat yeah I think it was like the road store would give them funds to create these other cars that were specifically aimed for um you know for for people who could afford them like uh
cheaper cars so uh it was just like infeasible for them at that point to create a mass a mass market car so I don't know if I would exactly put it in those terms like mematic desires but it was definitely like something that uh Elon had in mind strategically
to to sort of be able to produce for uh for the larer world even if like it wasn't the same car right like it was like different different cars um for the affordable yeah and of and of course that's how books uh got uh uh funded as well uh the original books were highly
really super expensive and many of them were actually encrusted with jewels uh they were thought to be so rare and obviously only Rich folk could uh could uh afford them but then that allowed the printer to get more printing presses and
make it cheaper for other people so so I definitely get that uh I was thinking as you're talking about like um the idea of voluntary schooling of you know that great English Mystic William Blake who said I I must create my own system or be enslaved by anothers um and I think
that's uh I I I love William Blake but just to kind of play Devil's Advocate you also quoted nval saying hey the resources for learning are a abundant you can find them anywhere and the problem the scarcity is in you know where are all the students and so if if
we accept it that uh he's probably right there and that many people even though they do have all of these uh resources that they can learn tremendously with and uh pretty much free also to boot um do you think that there is any Merit to the argument that
uh to to have a well-functioning society we at least have to get uh those who are like not seeking out knowledge and learning into a position where they can at a minimum read write and and Recon I don't think so and I've thought about this a
little and um I think like you know the problem with like people sort of uh not accessing these uh these Technologies and this abundant information um could be like a a cultural problem where like you're you're told that you know this is something that you just have to do and
then um I found a no surprise that a lot of people tend to dislike reading books when they grow up because like in school you're just forced to read these boring textbooks that you probably not interested in and then people sort of associate reading with those bad times that they had in
school and like um you don't find a lot of readers yeah especially like um in nearer Generations so um yeah I wouldn't say that people need to be coerced to or controlled to like learn basic things that like I think like people are naturally interested in
learning and they know how to learn um you often hear this phrase right like um don't teach a child like uh what to learn teach them how to learn and I think I agree with that but like I think like people already know how to do that it's just that we don't
need to inhibit that knowledge Creation in any way and just to allow them to sort of flourish um by by following what they're interested in and like they will naturally learn how to learn uh how to how to like speak and to to write and to to do all these things um because like
those problems are required for them to solve to like maybe like you know U go about following this this other interest of theirs so like maybe if somebody hasn't done mathematics in in high school or even in Middle School like but they
want to like do this computer science thing where like they have to uh have to have that that knowledge of uh certain basic algebra and like all calculus then like if that's something that's in their problem situation then they will go ahead and try to try to learn those
subjects to to actually uh do the do the thing that they really want which is computer science right so yeah I could argue that um at least uh providing if we were going to stick with a compulsory education system uh that uh you know one
of the first changes that I would suggest is at least acquaint people with things that they that might spur their curiosity right uh I I agree that if if you're passionate about something you'll find a way to learn about it right um but gaml for example you know so many
people cluck their tongues at it but I think that it's a great way to learn things um and uh you know it trying to uh it's a very Dost concept right will we you know actionless activity go with the flow and and the way of making you make the point of reading kids making kids
read boring textbooks I agree completely I taught myself how to read reading comic strips um because I thought they were great and uh and you know my dad also read to me as to my mother um so I was kind of reading from a very young age and and and loved it um I wonder uh
basically what what what are you passionate about that's next what what are you gonna dive into um uh on the next leg of your journey yeah well I'm pretty excited about what I'm working on right now at air chat I really love the vision and it's a way for you know for people to
have better conversations on the internet and uh that's something I realized that I really crave and I want to have more of so uh it's definitely a p project that I'm really passionate about and you know that that having being passionate about something really
really helps in in the work right like you can you can see it in the results and like how you're uh how you're going about your day-to-day and um just your mood in general but I guess like broader things um well I'm really interested in
um in longevity and life extension so so maybe like that's something that I I work on next or even like just you you know sort of think about a lot more um next or I could probably even do that right like right now um I'm actually gonna have someone on my podcast uh in a
in a few days who who did uh full haen gene therapy and um I would call it like it's something like really kind of I mean it's really new and revolutionary so I'd call it bold but um there is a lot of empirical data that suggests that it's it's safe and like it's actually
beneficial so I'm really looking forward to that conversation but um yeah I guess like generally in the longevity space I'm really interested in because like as I told you my desire already is to live at least indefinitely um and just to do
these amazing things and to uh yeah to to keep having fun inde definitely that's a great answer um well we're gonna we're going to include uh the links to your substack and your podcast and and everything else uh uh with the show notes any other place you'd like to
point uh listeners and viewers uh if they want to learn more about you and what you're up to um pretty active on Twitter so uh my TR handle is just my full name perfect same with me my my initials JP CH all right well if you've listen to the podcast you know what's
coming next and that is we're gonna wave this wand and we're gonna make you emperor of the world can't kill anyone you can't put anyone in a re-education camp I'll add to your prescriptions you can't coarse anyone but what you can do is you can incept them and we're going
to give you a magical microphone and you're going to speak into it you're going to say two things and the next day whenever the next day is for all eight billion plus people on the planet everyone's going to wake up and they're going to say oh my god I've just had two
of the greatest ideas and unlik all those times of the past I'm actually gonna act on each one of these what two things are you going to incept in the world's population well uh that's that's quite something I don't know you've asked like
every guest of yours this question but um but as you know like you know humans are fallible and I I could definitely be wrong about about things but this won't be news to you but the two things I would say is quoting deuts U entirely is um problems are soluble problems are
inevitable and love I think like just that those two things have so wide ramifications um you know they sound they sound pretty simple right like um and I feel that that that that's the case with a lot of do stuff it just sounds so simple that it can often just
go over your head really um but like once you go into like a second reading or the third reading like you start really try to understand those Concepts and like what knowledge really means what uh what wealth means you know what like the set of physical transformation
that you can cause and like uh even viewing problems in a better light than you would perhaps before um so yeah those are those are the two things I would incept I love them I love them well Arun love what to see what you're doing love to see uh a young person
taking uh this kind of bull by the horns and uh going out and as living your life so successfully thanks so much for coming on the podcast I I look forward to yours as well so we can have a mutual admiration Society thank you so much for having me Jim