"the following is a conversation with michael malus his fifth time on this the lex friedman podcast to support it please check out our sponsors in the description and now here's my new year's eve 2021 ..."

"dostoevsky wrote in the idiot my favor of his books through the main character prince mishkin that beauty will save the world these words seemingly naive and ultimately at least to me profound what do..."

"a prerequisite and what's the point of fighting for your values if you don't want to make the world a more beautiful place well it's also how you define beauty because beauty could be just aesthetic b..."

"definitely a zoology so animals and plants in the sea and also it's so mathematical there's so many so many forms there's there's this um there's this plant called areospermum titan up soybeas i don't..."

"will save the world was not a careless phrase but a prophecy uh which of yours which of these three things are your favorites truth goodness or beauty what did he call truth and goodness the blatant t..."

"life yeah it's like it's not that much work like it's not like going to the gym and working out that's a lot of work and it's great afterwards but like goodness is easy once you get into the habit of ..."

"will this help one person and i just kind of imagine a specific person depending on the thing that that would help with like what i'm trying to create something whether it's a piece of hardware or or ..."

"one uh it also means we're not all called upon to be superman right you only have a very finite ability to move the needle but at the same time if you have actually you know saved the life you can go ..."

"he's charismatic and the in the humor he has even if he is uh charismatic in the expression of curiosity for science which he did he was curious about like uh not just like boring uh minutiae of scien..."

"what are we gonna do with the body uh they put it on ice in the bathtub they had a party so everyone's going the bathroom while angel's body's there michael got they're like all right we got to take c..."

"20 uh 20. um he was clearly a sociopath and i'd never met a sociopath before now a lot of times we'll read these like you'll take a buzzfeed quiz like are you a sociopath but it's like oh my feelings ..."

"leaked it um so whistleblowers are like the only for example the case in um uh uh eric garner the guy who was selling lucy cigarettes in new york city uh who was arrested he had a heart attack or what..."

"they get off on doing things that if the average person heard about it the average person would be shocked because that gives them this sense of weird above them we're different from them the rules do..."

"activist like so you can tweet about it how courageous you are but just literally see there's something off here there's something off here and i'm not going to participate i'm going to defend these s..."

"it's fun so like it's rewarding like the reason you go into uh science is you can continue really without a boss to continue having fun and solving puzzles that's that's literally so like uh unless yo..."

"gender dimorphism their friends are only going to care so much so if you meet someone who has a lot of money who now cares about aunt spiders it's going to be exciting it will be very exciting but i i..."

"what were we talking about so jeffrey absolutely oh one thing i wanted to ask you so let's put scientists aside what about like uh world leaders uh bill clinton your favorite person why would he fly w..."

"understand that there's people like this out there like there's people that kind of want to use me for stuff and you mean tim dylan tim dillon um uh i love that guy you guys met we haven't met yet her..."

"like that bad example because like let's look at clinton and let's look at obama right so obama even though their politics are very close i'd say in many ways obama is apparent we don't know i don't k..."

"you can see how there's people who want to meet you know the surface bill clinton and i'm sure that guts old for him because he has to be on but then there's the good old boys where he could be a perv..."

"wife like listen it wasn't cheating she only you know performed on me you're going to say this with a straight face like do you at a certain point when something is so brazen you wonder if the person ..."

"so that now of course there's exceptions like i've interacted with a young 20 20 year olds that are like you're way more mature than i'll ever be like the wisdom that comes out of them is quite fascin..."

"to catch feelings and it's kind of like feeling yeah it's true it's just like why would i do this to this kid for what just because i want to get some like momentary pleasure come on beauty is in the ..."

"it's like android and iphone is it's like a cheap version of christmas he's got this girl with him she's like snow white or whatever and russian kids they go to sleep on december 31st and they wake up..."

"i remember you know i my bedroom as a kid was right off the kitchen and i'd be scared in the dark a little bit so they'd leave the light on the kitchen while i went to sleep and at the same time my pa..."

"that kids are allowed to be adults in the following way like you in in in kid logic you're allowed to stay up all night oh yeah okay that was uh as late as you want which actually ends up being you're..."

"it's like it's uh it's joy it's like you get to show off like dresses whatever you got you show it off this is fun and then um men too just like friends laughing and like arguing just showing off the ..."

"are created but that was the ultimate happiness is to experience this new thing sugar i don't know um you know there's like there's scarcity there's like communist czech republic so basically they try..."

"also me i'm just a deep introvert you're also the hardest working person i know yeah so it's time but you know like it's not like i'll go in the middle of the night at like 4 a.m and go to 7-eleven ju..."

"also remember the arguments and i've i've been uh going on um clubhouse recently into russian rooms well just to practice russian and uh they it's so beautiful to watch i mean clubhouse is a very spec..."

"because uh in one sense you could see it as negative in another you could see it as free to express yourself because it feels like you can solve a lot of problems by allowing yourself to just uh be em..."

"how people are talking and um yeah i don't know and i have those memories of childhood of of friends that i had of just having that true freedom of talking and somehow that leads to uh deep bonds toge..."

"cynicism and the depths as i see the beauty of the russian soul so we like yes that cynicism can negatively affect a lot of people like you i think you've talked about like as a parent like being cyni..."

"it's your job to resist against it so it's a test i love the idea that if you're going to be creative and innovative you don't have enough up against you yeah exactly this is exactly oh i don't know i..."

"no not well yeah i mean kamu kamu doesn't think that now we're going into uh definitions of suffering then because absurd what see life is absurd is life is suffering or not even close to the same con..."

"there is if if you're not careful life was can appear meaningless you can fall into a nihilistic view like it it's it's it's difficult to have the responsibility of freedom to act in this world becaus..."

"ups and downs of life and what it means like i don't this i just i don't agree at all that you need to suffer in order to be happy i agree you have to work hard but that's not the same thing yeah all ..."

"absurd i think to me oftentimes the way i think about the word suffering is synonymous with absurdity this is not suffering but this is absurd i just noticed there's a box with the big bow on it next ..."

"you've got a powerful voice you've got a powerful voice deluxe thank you maybe i should read the other card first you've got a powerful voice listening to what you have to say always puts me in a hope..."

"i hate you so much what what oh is it the other way no just pick it up yeah we uh fell for that thank you so much wrenches they're my favorite i can't believe i fell for that okay and there's box numb..."

"wrenches okay so let me tell you the story behind that toy tonka robots that turn into vehicles so when you there when i was a kid you had transformers but for us poor people you had gobots right so t..."

"and i went once to the toys r us in caesars bay in brooklyn with my grandfather my grandfather was always very lucky like just good things happened to him every so often and i went there i remember ve..."

"the poor man's transformers i think there's instructions on the back how to transform her to her i only found out as an adult that it was supposed to be a girl yeah wow this changes everything thank y..."

"i'm gonna follow the instructions in a bit and i'll leave yeah i'll leave this failed project of yours oh there's a wheel out look i don't like this in between form well this is how it's gonna be okay..."

"oh yeah yeah yeah um this has to do with in terms of resist you often bring up the book uh machiavellians by james burnham and uh so as i was looking through i was reading different parts it's it's tr..."

"own i think his point broadly speaking which i agree with is the only thing that can work to mitigate power is other power that it's um uh talk is cheap and persuasion it has very limited efficacy it'..."

"next topic one wow i'm playing 3d chess here okay this is new year's this is this is now december 31st i think that's how it works but in 1973 okay actually we recorded this before you were born oh no..."

"new york was what did you learn about human civilization just life that was beautiful from new york i learned that there's a lot of really unique special people out there who are doing their little pa..."

"again it wasn't all of paris it was the left bank of paris and gertrude stein and hemingway and all them in a little area so you know when you read these history books these scenes it's like 50 people..."

"truly happy for you man it well it's i'm so proud but it's also i i'm proud because these are people who had points of view and they didn't have it easy and they fought for what they believed in and i..."

"i love being able to do that so you have a strong voice yourself and to sort of join them in it's like john lennon joining in with the beatles as like a a chorus of very different views on anarchism j..."

"he's in there uh he was an anarchist so um it was it was a big accomplishment it was really cool to get a chance to do the audiobook for you you did an incredible thing which is got a bunch of really ..."

"going to read my chapter wait a minute like all the other authors are being voted by somebody else let's have lex read mine the one chapter i am most moved by is i d uh lauren chen she's a podcaster a..."

"so i wanted to talk sound like the seductive aspect of violence like that's the problem like when you deal with terrorism when you're dealing with political violence to be able to understand how peopl..."

"because violence that's uh violence is part of human history uh to a degree that it must be seductive it must be there must be a strong pull like it's not insane people it's there's something probably..."

"just laying maxwell into the trial and so on again maybe the interesting story there is about the coverage of the trial so like the story is more complex and interesting than the actual horrific acts ..."

"because i think in that case you can kind of check out you could be like this isn't my i'm just doing a job yeah i i don't you know you kind of can i think in a sense if you have a certain mindset lik..."

"their that people are i saw people respond like oh that was you know cutting edge technology at the time haha but i'm like i don't think that that was really uh done that that frequently or be hearing..."

"things and have no consequences do you think uh in the just lane maxwell case and epstein case would do you think they were trying to blackmail people like trying the what the conspiracy theorists kin..."

"but i also see a lot of evidence that he's just very charismatic in a room so so and i've also seen you know that's how human connections get made like business deals get made yeah but how where's his..."

"it just really stands out to me it's very moving which is why i bring it up no uh moving here so move moving here but for me i i think we actually didn't cover that with you and i'd love to get your c..."

"just giving away the salary not giving away all that but the whole thing that's it you just move to a place there's an empty building you know and you're moving into it um and this is a new life and t..."

"there's no sense of hope you don't go to new york now if if there's been such an assault and intentionally are there otherwise maybe it's inevitable they didn't have a choice but there's been such an ..."

"is like a religious experience for these people but you forget who he is because he doesn't carry himself like a big shot yeah yeah and still i mean he gets competitive as fuck like i argue with him a..."

"the past yes and so saying like okay this is how things have been done but can be done much much better and uh that has to do with manufacture like how do we how do we do this 10 times cheaper like ev..."

"feel is is doing that i really am curious to be a fly on the wall i'm sure it'll happen at some point watching you and elon talk to each other because he's even more of a robot than you he was on the ..."

"this mind-meld well that so there's both the humor of that but also the practical nature of the kind of conversations to have it's so great because it's uh it's problem solving mode okay yeah yeah oka..."

"eloquent communication style but i um i love it what about you so you said moving the book the book what else um and you've been really excited about so that's anarchist handbook but you've also been ..."

"attorney you have a lot of fondness for your client but you realize that they probably did this thing or you could not they could be the other way like they're innocent but you you're it's hard for yo..."

"wrote speeches for him how she'd you know i'm paraphrasing her and this i haven't read her book in a couple decades but basically she would write like a brain dump and it's just garbage and she was li..."

"is one of those cases so you know i had the book took on a life of its own it's very different from how originally conceived it i originally conceived it as a kind of retelling of camus philosophy um ..."

"books i i really appreciate that don't have a plot i mean uh no uh notes from underground so obviously this desk has a huge amount of plot in in most of his work herman hess has a huge amount of plot ..."

"it has to do something it makes me think about like don't become the way you live don't become like a freak show a circus act like live for an idea live live for um something that brings you joy or do..."

"and so then it became how are you so optimistic in the face of everything that's going on in the world and i started writing it when kovitz started hitting and i because again i'm not optimistic becau..."

"also trying to drive and then doing reverse at the same time it's it's a completely nonsensical way to do it get it all out there don't look it over if you have a great line put in your phone and then..."

"specific things like finish the book i years ago and i'm so i'm i think on some level you much less than me but i think you're increasing in this direction i realized it's more i have to learn how to ..."

"heaviest i've i'm i'm 4-8 the heaviest i've ever been was when and this is when i was like he's exaggerating he's not at that that's the metric um oh sorry are you talking about your height yeah um ba..."

"and then uh we run into david goggins at vault this is my first time meeting david i i've talked to david a lot over the phone and we were supposed to do a thing together and this is me trash out of m..."

"okay fine it took me a long time to realize that that expression means the other thing what's the other thing if things are going great this too shall pass yeah i always talk about suffering no i alwa..."

"do you have specific things in mind or no or just a sense about human civilization about society waking up i don't know about waking up but i think the um increased understanding on all sides of the p..."

"win i certainly don't mean donald trump i don't think victory is going to come as a consequence of washington do you want to make america great again i think america is great so uh this is my failed a..."

"could run as a as a republican that's a good example yeah yeah that would be interesting so military person right yeah but already like for example dr oz is thinking of running force is going to run f..."

"i think there's still time too because people are trying to figure out what to do as we emerge from the fog yeah so i'm excited by 2024 somebody said this dark cynical thing i i hope this is not true ..."

"to ask about something else that glenn beck said that i thought was really interesting i agree with him very much on this and it was refreshing to hear although he kind of made it turned into a point ..."

"see the same thing with actually uh one of the reasons i always found joe biden fascinating is he's had a lot of really traumatic things happen in his life yeah and uh if i shit my pants in front of t..."

"do that quite naturally maybe sometimes obama wasn't quite able the question i who's more blue collar trump or or biden and you you can easily make the case for both i think you could no not the blue ..."

"it is absolute big step backwards in terms of power uh there's no question that you know when you're trying to reestablish a society there's going to be a transition period that transition is going to..."

"shut the lights so that's a i think a reasonable argument so those are the um biggest ones i would say and and still what is the case for national divorce and along which lines so like um in making th..."

"carries through you can't just say here's an unlikely thing that happened therefore anything can happen i just said you just earlier said anything had happened this episode didn't you life is sufferin..."

"revolution is should be avoided as much as possible i agree and so it's kind of interesting so he makes the case that there's something fundamentally powerful about the nation that we uh it's a it's a..."

"paris has not been a cultural hub for a very long time yeah yeah you know the days of matisse and picasso and gertrude stein are long gone it's still it still is a hub even london isn't like yeah you ..."

"maybe it's just uh two or three affordable i mean there's been no shortage of articles talking about austin and what's happening here um and i know some of joe's plans and and you and i and and blair ..."

"it makes no sense to me um we could still have debates i mean like i would still like to have those conversations and still have disagreements like uh i disagree with joe and kovid a lot on a bunch of..."

"babylon b were interviewing elon and he had this thing he goes well i don't know anyone who wants to you know abolish the fda and the faa and i'm standing there and i'm shaking and the guys look at me..."

"that's actually really interesting just to link on that just just just just a little bit with the vaccine and stuff like that with the antiviral drugs the fda say like are you comfortable like who sho..."

"dangerous thinking in general by the way i don't know if you saw i got a chance to talk to the pfizer ceo and uh i had uh help collecting questions i got a lot of questions and people put at the top a..."

"um also not being a coward i was afraid of nothing like what it what do i have to gain or lose exactly well you have something to lose because if you're i do so only to do softballs because if i'm goi..."

"that one of the beautiful things about america is that the the you can criticize the rule of law currently but it's still it's better than soviet in the in the soviet union where people bribed each ot..."

"you're gonna have to deal with this so how did you deal with that i mean were you scared of getting aids you know so on and so forth but also there was that comment when i and correct me if i'm wrong ..."

"how has that changed you like if you like in the privacy of your mind michael malus like how did you change now that you've gotten more attention let's say you know or even the success of the book lik..."

"i mean the big problem with the masks the changing mind and the mask is the arrogance and how it was communicated to me a lot of this boils down to uh how things are communicated it's like it's obviou..."

"i don't know i don't know how joe does it i don't think joe cares as much as you do it's more fun for him in a sense and he's less concerned about the i mean he's not unconcerned with the cultural imp..."

"meta piece of advice don't ask your friends for advice because you're an idiot at your age and they're all idiots and they don't want to seem like idiots so they're just going to give you advice they ..."

"the other piece of advice i would say is join a gym or have some kind of quantifiable daily improvement to keep you sane so the reason i always say weightlifting and it could be running it could be ju..."

"when you tweet i wouldn't know i don't know that's a good point is it on the toilet how much what percentage is on the toilet very little on the toilets i usually more reading okay um so even though m..."

"that was really um the guy in the lecture hall giving you a pat in the back i wrote uh joe giving me the the watch was um he has life changing for me yeah yeah yeah it doesn't even it didn't the fact ..."

"your 30s because it's like okay old man you're that's all cope i promise you it is yeah i think uh he says so many beautiful things i i would say another version of the openness i'll say take big risk..."

"the goodness thing is be kind it's like some of it is also skill allowing yourself to be kind i found myself earlier in life i still do this i find like when i hang out with people people are often li..."

"um but the cons the negatives what was the conversation like about that like well my sis i talked my you know my sister has two kids my nephews who i absolutely adore whatever their names are and she ..."

"to be the right woman like like you're making a commitment you know and since you know they're all crazy you have to find one where you can handle the crazy oh all women are crazy yeah they're one and..."

"like long-term love for another human being which is like marriage and then love for kids yeah and it almost makes me sad like not getting to experience that you know because i'm also really scared of..."

"you know what i that's that couldn't happen because every relationship i've had uh they've been very beyond supportive like don't they'd rather do the i take an hour and do your work than spend time w..."

"you uh think about your death mortality yes fear what do you feel about it i'm just worried i want to take as many people out with me as possible so suitcase news that's what nuke suitcase i'm thinkin..."

"well i think you do just this you do this today you do this in our friendship and you do it for a very large number of people is teach them how to be how to have hope yes and teach them how to be free..."