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All-In PodcastAll-In Podcast

E8: TikTok + Oracle, how privacy loss will impact society, economy & COVID outlooks for 2021

Follow the crew: https://twitter.com/chamath https://linktr.ee/calacanis https://twitter.com/DavidSacks https://twitter.com/friedberg Follow the pod: https://twitter.com/theallinpod https://bio.fm/theallinpod Articles referenced in the show: America Needs to Lock Down Again: https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2020-09-16/coronavirus-america-needs-lock-down-again A Taxonomy of Fear: https://www.persuasion.community/p/a-taxonomy-of-fear NuScale Power Article: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200828005299/en/NuScale-Power-Makes-History-as-the-First-Ever-Small-Modular-Reactor-to-Receive-U.S.-Nuclear-Regulatory-Commission-Design-Approval Running Tide Article: https://www.fastcompany.com/90548820/forget-planting-trees-this-company-is-making-carbon-offsets-by-putting-seaweed-on-the-ocean-floor Show Notes: 0:00 The besties talk about the bestie reunion mishap, the Code 13 story & more 5:42 TikTok + Oracle, is the escalation between China & US a slippery slope, security threats created by modern software 15:01 What’s the bigger picture of the TikTok debate, what policy could be enacted 20:13 The emerging market for guaranteed privacy & how this impacts society 27:43 State of the US economy, is there a permanent unemployed class & could there be a second wave of lockdowns? 37:44 COVID outlooks for 2021 & beyond, innovations in rapid testing 46:22 Trump’s COVID response, Trump vs. Biden, shrinking impact of the executive branch 55:11 California wildfires, politicization of global warming, financial incentives to solving climate change 1:08:28 Practical ways to impact global warming & the carbon crisis 1:11:57 Sacks on A Taxonomy of Fear by Emily Yoffe, Safety-ism & contamination by association 1:18:58 Could Trump being re-elected eliminate the two-party system?

Jason CalacanishostDavid FriedberghostChamath Palihapitiyahost
Sep 19, 20201h 24mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

  1. 0:00 – 5:42

    The besties talk about the bestie reunion mishap, the Code 13 story & more

    1. JC

      Hey, everybody. Hey, everybody. Welcome to another episode of All-In: The Podcast, Episode 8. Besties are here to talk about tech, economy, politics, the election, and our lives in Silicon Valley. Uh, welcome back to the pod, David Friedberg, the Queen of Quinoa is here from an undisclosed location.

    2. DF

      Thanks, J Cal. Always a- always a joy.

    3. JC

      Yes, and-

    4. DF

      Undisclosed location, somewhere in the Midwest.

    5. JC

      You- you bailed on SF after the smoke. You- you lasted how many days into the barbecue, into the orange cloud?

    6. DF

      I left on the Wednesday of the orange cloud, and, uh, took... It was crazy. Took my kiddos and we're, uh, we're waiting it out the fires in the, uh, in the Midwest.

    7. JC

      Well, it's beautiful the last two days here. Uh, also from an undisclosed bestie location, David Sacks back on the program. Rain Man is here.

    8. DS

      Yep.

    9. JC

      Definitely here.

    10. DS

      Good to be here.

    11. JC

      All right. Well, there you go.

    12. DS

      Yeah.

    13. JC

      A man of many words.

    14. DS

      (laughs)

    15. JC

      And speaking of a man of many words-

    16. DS

      (laughs)

    17. JC

      ... hot off of seven keynotes this week, talking about SPACS, the, uh, prince of SPACS, Chamath Palihapitiya back on the pod.

    18. CP

      How are you, besties?

    19. JC

      Well, we had a little bestie reunion, which I think we can talk about. Chamath invited us over to have an outdoor bestie reunion.

    20. CP

      Yeah, and you gave one of them gonorrhea and you gave the other two... (laughs)

    21. DS

      (laughs)

    22. JC

      Well, we- it- it's crazy to say, but I literally had to call Chamath, uh, two or three days after he hosted-

    23. CP

      Uh, a so- a socially... By the way, a socially-distanced dinner outdoors.

    24. JC

      Socially-distanced dinner outdoors, wonderful.

    25. CP

      Yeah.

    26. JC

      We had some great rib eye, fantastic. Uh, cracked open a nice bottle or- or two of wine and the port.

    27. CP

      And but- but then, what did you do?

    28. JC

      Well, then a family member of mine, who shall remain nameless-

    29. CP

      (laughs)

    30. JC

      ... decided to go to a party-

  2. 5:42 – 15:01

    TikTok + Oracle, is the escalation between China & US a slippery slope, security threats created by modern software

    1. JC

      TikTok is on the verge of being banned from additional US downloads. The Commerce Department has announced that it will ban US downloads and business transactions with TikTok and WeChat, somehow WeChat got pulled into this, on Sunday. Um, this will, um...Seemingly, we're going to allow TikTok, uh, to operate until November 12th, so they got a little bit of a stay, uh, of execution. Uh, but of course, if they can't update in the App Store, that means there could be any security vulnerabilities that get found between now and then would not be able to be updated. (clears throat) And Stephen Muchin, Mu- Muchin-

    2. DS

      (laughs)

    3. JC

      ... is attempting, uh, to push through a TikTok deal, uh, that will enable retaining some Chinese ownership. Um, and there's some sort of agreement now with Oracle. We'll have some kind of an oversight board, uh, to do continuous third-party audits. What does this say, uh, Chamath about, uh, where we're at? And do you believe that, you know, a democratic, uh, leader, let's say Obama or Biden, uh, would have taken the same approach here? Does it worry you that the government's getting this involved, or is this inspiring that the government's putting their foot down and saying, "Hey, listen, uh, we're going to need to have some basic level of reciprocity from China if we're going to allow you in our app store"?

    4. CP

      You know, I think, I think it's kind of like, um, you know, like if you've ever been driving someplace with your significant other and they're like, "Turn left," and you're like, "No, no, no, I'm going to turn right." And then you realize you should have turned left, but then you keep turning right a few more times. Then you take a couple more lefts, but then you end up at the, the same place, but it was complete shit, dumb luck. Um, I feel like we're going to end up in the same place here with TikTok, which is that I think that the Trump administration probably is doing this, and Donald Trump specifically probably does this more as a demonstration of power. Um, and, you know, American exceptionalism, um, which I'm not sure is the right reason to do it. Um, but I think the outcome is right, which is that, um, you know, for years China has essentially been shut out to American companies unless you effectively just kowtowed to these guys. Um, and, you know, some companies have and some companies like, you know, Google have not, and other companies like Facebook have been totally basically blocked from entering. Um, and so I think it's completely right. It's, it's, it's unfair to have the asymmetric market advantage that, that Chinese companies have had. And so you have to play hardball to create a different set of rules. And I think this probably gets us to that place. The reason why it's happening is probably more because the TikTok people played that joke on Trump at the Tulsa rally, if you had- if I had to guess.

    5. JC

      Yeah. Uh, what do you think, Friedberg? Is this a good sign for America and the globe that, you know, and, and the democratic nations of the world, that we're going to put a foot down with China and say, "Hey, some reciprocity, or you're not going to be able to participate in our marketplace"? Or is this pers- a personal vendetta from Trump or a little bit of both?

    6. DS

      I don't see how it's, um, anything but, uh, a slippery slope forward in the escalation of, um, you know, what's going to be kind of transpiring between these two nations in the, the next couple of years and maybe decades. You know, this goes back to the, you know, early 2000s when Google and others wanted to enter China. And China has f- for those who don't know, China has this great firewall, right? Uh, Chinese citizens can't openly access the rest of the internet. And China wanted to censor content and censor, um, what, what their citizens are accessing. Um, and so there, there's been a back and forth between the tech industry and China, uh, going back almost 20 years now to try and figure out how we can bring our services to China. And then China launches a service that's very successful in the US in, in TikTok. And, um, I think it's just a, uh, uh, you know, a, a part of the reciprocity equation, which doesn't resolve anything. It only escalates things. So it's unfortunate, but it's just kind of a- another step in the path, um, that I think is inevitable in front of us here.

    7. JC

      Sax, uh, we'll give you the, the final word here. Uh, is this a good thing for humanity, for international relations, that China is, you know, having a little bit of a hand check here? Like, "Hey, there's going to be a limit to how you can operate in the West?" Uh, or is this a personal vendetta from Trump? And then what do you see going forward?

    8. DS

      Um, it's, it, it, it's true that... I mean, first of all, our social networks are not allowed over there, so I don't think we need to feel bad about, um, you know, not allowing their social networks over here. But besides reciprocity or, or the lack of it, um, I think the deeper reason for this is just around, uh, data security and, and how the... You know, and I think the, the, the CCP has given us adequate grounds here to ban not just TikTok, but, you know, apps like that. Um, because President Xi himself declared this policy of civil military fusion, which means that any business, um, in China, any business asset there, including data, can be appropriated to serve the, the ends of the Chinese military or the Communist Party. And, you know, the, the CCP has set up this vast surveillance apparatus over its own citizens. It's, um, asserted, um, extra tor- territorial sovereignty over former Chinese citizens, meaning dissidents. Um, so the, the Chinese diaspora anywhere in the world, uh, they've asserted sovereignty over that. And, um, you know, recently there was a pretty remarkable speech by the FBI director Christopher Wray describing, you know, operation, uh, Fox Hunt, which is the Chinese effort to track down and presumably ultimately punish Chinese dissidents anywhere in the world. And as part of that, the, the Chinese have sort of weaponized AI and social media. And so, uh, he also described... I mean, this is like pretty amazing. I didn't... You know, that the, that the Equifax hack, which collected data on something like sensitive data on over 100 million Americans, the Chinese were behind that. Um, I didn't know that. And, um, so, you know, it's, it's, it's tr- it's true that, you know, no one piece of data poses a, a, by itself a risk to, to, to the security of a- of America or Americans, but it's sort of the systematic collection and aggregation of the data and the hacking, uh, collectively that I do think pose a security threat. And, um, and I think-

    9. JC

      You got to stop right there, Sax.

    10. DS

      Yeah.

    11. JC

      Actually, an individual's data...... could absolutely be compromised. If they have access to your, uh, passwords because, through the clipboard, they have access to your phone roll. If a young person had photos that were, say, compromising in their photo roll, the phone is, you know, basically given access to that. They upload that. Now you could use that as kompromat against a senator's child, or against a senator themselves. And this seems like an abstract thing, but this is exactly what the Chinese and Russians have been doing for a very long time. If you've seen the series The Americans and you go back to the '80s, to see the weaponization of, you know, somebody who was i- in the closet, who was gay during that time, or somebody who was having extramarital affair. You could compromise anybody with just sexual kompromat. And you hear we're giving access to hundreds of millions of people's photo libraries-

    12. CP

      You, by the way-

    13. JC

      ... and their clipboards.

    14. CP

      By the way, you just said something that's really scary, which is like if you're, if you're the Chinese and, you know, they have the patience to play the long game, uh, you just aggregate and collect this thing for 30 years, on the off chance that one of these people becomes important. I mean, what is the real cost?

    15. JC

      And you got a Manchurian candidate.

    16. CP

      Just, you, you just surveil 300 million Americans and just say, "Uh, you know what? We'll take our shot. I mean, it's gonna cost us a few billion dollars a year in storage. Who cares?"

    17. JC

      Yeah.

    18. DF

      I, I'm not, like, is, is there really a case that what they're doing in the TikTok app... I don't know how much you guys have read, um, some of the studies on, on what they are actually pulling, but is there really a case that what they're pulling is particularly different than what would be pulled by pretty much any other social app or photo sharing app on your phone? Um, there was some in- you know, kind of insight that, hey, they were capturing the MAC address, but that was up until last November. After November, they, the, the app kind of refreshed and stopped doing that, and it was a hack that some number of apps out there were already doing. But my understanding is the way that they've built the app, it's the same kind of ad tracking type, um, approach that, that a lot of apps are taking.

    19. JC

      I, I think you're... I think it's a naive position that because we haven't caught them doing something nefarious, that they aren't actually doing something nefarious right now. If you look at what, uh, MBS did to Jeff Bezos sending that, um... I guess it was a movie file or an image that then wound up hacking his WeChat and his phone. Like-

    20. DF

      Yeah.

    21. JC

      ... I think they've built the software... I think it's purpose-built, uh, whether it's WeChat or TikTok to have these backdoors. It- There's no way-

    22. DF

      Yeah.

    23. JC

      ... the Chinese government is not-

    24. DF

      Yeah.

    25. JC

      ... influencing that.

    26. CP

      Guys, look, if you, if you had to bet, David, um, what do you think the odds are between zero and 100, with 100 being absolute certainty, that there are foreign national spies that work at Google, Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft?

    27. DF

      That's my point. It's... Is it... I mean, look, I think that there are and I think-

    28. CP

      No, but do you think it's 100%?

    29. DF

      Oh, of course it's 100.

    30. CP

      Yeah.

  3. 15:01 – 20:13

    What’s the bigger picture of the TikTok debate, what policy could be enacted

    1. JC

      company.

    2. DF

      But my, my, my point is like if, if, if there is some, you know, access to personal data that we're all concerned about being compromised at literally every other fucking app company, we're exposed.

    3. JC

      Yeah, but every other c- app company is not-

    4. DF

      I mean, there's nothing- (laughs)

    5. JC

      ... connected to, you know-

    6. DF

      But the point that Chamath just made is that they very well could be. The fact is, we as individuals have exposed all of our personal and private data to six or seven companies.

    7. CP

      I think you're saying the really right thing.

    8. DF

      I mean-

    9. CP

      It is a... This is a canary in the coal mine for a bigger issue. This is why I'm saying I think that, you know, Trump is probably acting out of an expression of power. But I think what we're realizing is actually this is about core fundamental privacy and the safety-

    10. DF

      Yeah.

    11. CP

      ... and security of each of us as individuals. And it should start a bigger conversation. Like, privacy, I, I, I, I really do think this. Privacy is the killer feature of the 2020s.

    12. DF

      Right.

    13. CP

      Um, you know, what David just said about like, you know, if you're a, if you're a Chinese na- ex-national, the idea that you're... Like, look, I've been a citizen of three countries. The idea that the Sri Lankan government all of a sudden may not like what I have to say and can spy on me or, you know, root my phone or steal my data, uh, it really disturbs me. Like, uh, "I'm sorry, but no, go fuck yourself. Like, I left that country-"

    14. NA

      Right.

    15. CP

      "... for a reason."

    16. DS

      Yeah, so I think, I think the Republican to watch on this is, um... Well, besides Trump, I guess, is, uh, there's a senator, Josh Hawley, who is, um-

    17. CP

      Crazy.

    18. DS

      Well, he's, he, he's sort of a, a critic of, of big tech and, um, I think he's got some interesting things to say. But, but in this particular area he is proposing legislation to regulate the types of information that can be collected by applications that are based in countries that are fundamentally hostile or adversarial to the US. And th- that to me seems like the right policy. Because, you know, it's not just about TikTok, it's about all the apps that collect information on Americans that can be appropriated by, you know, the Chinese Communist Party or Russia or Iran, places like that. And so I think we need a more holistic policy here than just banning TikTok. And it may not be necessary to ban TikTok if you had the right limitations placed on them. But, um, but I, but I, but I, I do think this, this, this whole, um, sort of compromise solution with Larry Ellison and Oracle, that makes no sense to me. This idea that, you know, Ellison will own 20% of the company but nothing else really changes. It'll still be based in China. Uh, a Chinese company... It'll still be Chinese engineers based in China who, you know... And they still own 80% of it. I mean, how, how does that really address the, the data security issues?

    19. CP

      So don't you, don't you think, David, that that's just basically a way of just... It's a wealth transfer to Larry Ellison-

    20. DS

      Totally.

    21. CP

      ... which I think is amazing. I mean, if I could-

    22. DS

      Totally.

    23. CP

      ... do it, I would do it.

    24. DS

      Yeah, it's ByteDance. It's-

    25. DF

      (laughs)

    26. DS

      No, it's, it's, it's-

    27. CP

      Trump will put it in your lap, yeah.

    28. DS

      It's ByteDance... No, it's, it's ByteDance uh, uh, uh, uh, it's ByteDance paying political protection money-

    29. CP

      Yeah.

    30. DS

      ... to Larry Ellison to be their bodyguard in this political process. But, and I... But that's why I... I don't think it's gonna fly. I mean, Hawley has already said that it's not good enough for him. And so even if, I think... And it doesn't live up to, to Trump's stated criteria even though-

  4. 20:13 – 27:43

    The emerging market for guaranteed privacy & how this impacts society

    1. DF

    2. CP

      This is, this is-

    3. DF

      That exposes us.

    4. CP

      ... I go back to this. Somebody will take this, or many people will take this and run with it. But I think that there is an enormous amount of money, um, that consumers will pay for the assurance of anonymity and privacy. I don't really know how it's expressed, David, but like, you know, for example, like if I could get a phone that was completely locked down and encrypted and, um, uh-

    5. JC

      Like a burner phone is what you're talking about. And like a lot of people are now doing this. They take a second phone, they put a VP-

    6. DF

      Well-

    7. JC

      VPNs are the, are the first step in all this.

    8. CP

      I-

    9. JC

      And you're seeing VPNs-

    10. CP

      Like, I try to use-

    11. JC

      ... becoming very popular.

    12. CP

      Well, like I try to use Signal, I try to use FaceTime audio. I'll even use WhatsApp now just because these things are end-to-end encrypted. And I have nothing particularly important or interesting to say or hide. Um, but I just don't like the idea that in the, in the open wild, um, I'm just, I just feel very vulnerable, um, to data breaches more than any other kind of breach. I mean, I had this conversation with somebody that was, um, you know, sort of helping me lock down, uh, my WiFi network, you know? And for a long time I only had one endpoint. And all of a sudden he's like, "Look, let's have a, a home and a guest." (laughs) But, but in that conversation what he was saying is, um, the, the, the biggest form of theft isn't like burglaries anymore. It's basically people just having packet sniffers outside your house, um, because they can get access to everything and anything. And-

    13. DF

      Can I ask you, can I ask you a question? There's a, there's a book by a guy named Stephen Baxter. It was a science fiction book from years ago, an Arthur Clarke called The Light of Other Days. And these guys developed a wormhole technology. They could put it in any house, and they could see and listen to everything. And suddenly the technology became kind of ubiquitous, so everyone could create a wormhole anywhere and see and hear everything. So effectively information was completely transferrable and free and available to everyone. And, uh, the book kind of highlights how society changed in that context. So in a world where you see where everyone is and what everyone is doing and saying, there's no longer any notion of information asymmetry. And the way people operate and behave changes 'cause so much of our life is dependent on people not knowing things about us that we know. Um, so when your g- when your employee is gonna go interview for another job and they tell you they're going to the dentist, you can say like, "Hey, that's not true." And the guy says, "You know what? I'm actually thinking about looking for another job 'cause I hate working for you. You suck." So everyone starts changing kind of how they behave. Do you think that 50 years from now, that's where the world heads? Do you really think it's possible to stop this train in its tracks and not end up in a world of what I would call kind of like hyper-transparency, where all information becomes kind of... 'Cause it's already being collected everywhere about everyone. And it's only-

    14. JC

      I, I think it's possible.

    15. DF

      ... rising exponentially.

    16. JC

      People are gonna start... I, I, I think that people are gonna start turning their homes into like those SCIFs, you know, sensitive compartmented information facilities. You always hear about like senators going into the SCIF kind of situation for private stuff. I think like people are gonna start taking this very seriously as they get compromised, you know, time after time, and embarrassing them. Uh, you can see it with Apple making it their marketing strategy. Apple's marketing strategy now is-

    17. DF

      You don't, you don't, you don't think society changes?

    18. CP

      Oh, I think it will.

    19. JC

      It's already changed already with like people getting their phones hacked and their, you know, nudes being leaked.

    20. DF

      I think-

    21. JC

      People are now begin- normalize that.

    22. DF

      Right, right.

    23. JC

      I think it makes the world a much shittier place because it basically robs us of our own independence and our fundamental right to privacy. And I just think that's a really bad outcome. And so, you know what, like, i- i- if, if like the need for likes, uh, and tweets, uh, and followers, uh, leads me to a place where I lose privacy, I would just say, shut them all down now. Um, because I think that people's self-worth is much bigger than what they understand it to be if they're willing to make that trade-off.

    24. DF

      But do you think most people appreciate that?

    25. JC

      No, no, no.

    26. CP

      Well, I, I, I would also, I- I would also just add that just because there's more transparency doesn't mean that it serves the interests of truth. Like Jason said earlier, um, this information can be used to create, you know, ops, you know, and-

    27. DF

      Right.

    28. CP

      ... uh, manipulate and, um-

    29. DS

      You know, it's, um... And so, um, yeah, I don't... You know, it, like, like Trotsky said, "Just because you're not interested in war, doesn't mean war isn't interested in you." I mean, this data can be collected to run operations on people, uh, that don't serve, you know, the interests of greater transparency or the truth.

    30. CP

      I think, I think people don't think from first principles on this topic. This is sort of like the idiotic orthodoxy of Silicon Valley, which is like they, they wrap themselves in the flag of transparency like it means something, but they have no real idea what it really means at scale and at the limit. And-

  5. 27:43 – 37:44

    State of the US economy, is there a permanent unemployed class & could there be a second wave of lockdowns?

    1. JC

      All right. Well, let's go on to the economy here. We've been sheltering in place, uh, essentially for six months, uh, and now people are starting to talk about, "Hey, uh, maybe we need to do another lockdown." Um, and obviously this, uh, economic challenge is being felt very differently. In some places, it's an opportunity. Obviously, a lot of people with SaaS software and, um, you know, people who work behind keyboards are having a renaissance and a lot of the economy is pouring into their keyboards while restaurants, retail, uh, and anybody who has to work in the real world is part of what's becoming essentially a permanent unemployed class that perhaps this is starting to look like a dry run of UBI. What are your thoughts, Chamath, on this permanent unemployment situation?

    2. CP

      Um, I, I have a, I have a bunch of thoughts here. Let me just go kind of give you the stream of consciousness. Like, um, Jerome Powell gave a speech, I think it was two or three weeks ago, in Jackson Hole, um, and he basically said like, "Look, the Federal Reserve is taking a completely new posture on rates." And, um, you know, they, they basically clarified that in explicit detail just, um, uh, just a few days ago, uh, and they basically said, "We're keeping rates where they are until at least 2023." You know, my personal view is rates are going to stay basically at zero for the next half decade, and I think it's probably pretty likely that we're gonna see rates stay at zero probably a full decade. So, um, what does that mean? Okay, well, in a typical recession, what happens is you, uh, don't know where the bottom is, right? Things sort of, sort of decay. They get a little bit worse, they get a little bit worse, they get a little bit worse, then things bottom out, and then, you know, you start to grow. And you can use interest rate policy to kind of help navigate how soft the landing is as well as how fast the recovery is. That's sort of like classic economics and how bankers in the markets and all these folks used to work, and it eventually would trickle into Main Street. Now we just have none of those things. We have rates at zero. They're not gonna go anywhere. They're not gonna go up, they're probably not gonna go down. They're gonna kind of just stay where they are. Um, that's one thing. Second is we priced in the bottom, which was the first month of the coronavirus. We took the markets basically assuming, "Oh, there's no growth," and now we've priced things back as if they'll recover. The rating agencies are out to lunch. They've basically said, "You know what? I'm gonna look out till 2021 or 2022. Give me a reason to justify not to downgrade you so that you can continue to raise more debt, which by the way, is, um, free." Um, so you have all these dynamics where I think the capital markets are in an expansive mood and an expansive mode, and in that, I actually think there's, uh, a real bid to, uh, employment, because there isn't really that many ways now...... you can, without just getting completely ripped apart, put money to work. And so the, the, the real earnest capital allocation strategy that's left for most CEOs is to actually buy things, invest in things, try more things. Um, and all of those I think lead to net employment. So, in general, I'm kind of constructive and bullish, um, and I don't think that this idea that there's a permanent unemployment class, um, sticks around.

    3. JC

      Freeberg, what are your thoughts? Obviously, a lot of Americans work in retail. Um, you know, we obviously, uh, have all these restaurant workers who are out of work and travel is, uh, now hitting the end of the furloughs at a lot of these, um, different airlines, et cetera. What's your thought on this unemployment middle America, um, catastrophe?

    4. DF

      Well, I don't think, um, happiness comes from, you know, absolute standards of living. I think happiness arises from one's relative standard of living, whether that's relative to how you lived last year or how you're living relative to your neighbor and, uh, and seeing some progression over time is the only thing that keeps people happy. It's... Otherwise, society decays. So, the notion of some sort of flat-lined or even flat-lined and inflation-adjusted, uh, basic income level for a large number of people will inevitably result in kind of what we're trying to prevent, which is, you know, some sort of decay, s- societal decay. We have to resolve the o- the opportunity framework for people, which is how do you give people an opportunity to kind of progress in their lives and earn more over time and have access to, you know, doing more with themselves while they're here on planet Earth? I mean, that's just what humans need. So, um, you know, maybe there's a short-term fix, but I think we've got some structural things to fix to kind of enable, um, opportunities and, and give people kind of an inherent, uh, you know, um, uh, kind of, uh, step ladder i- in life. I heard a really dark theory a few years ago, which is if we do this, we're going to resolve to a world where we're gonna have a bunch of people playing video games because then the only way you can get people to feel like they're progressing in their lives is to give them more medals on their video games and give them a higher ranking and score. And that's where society g- kind of gets to you to kind of keep people psychologically kind of satiated. Um, and it's a pretty dark (laughs) , you know, sad place if that's where we end up. It's like a bad episode of Black Mirror, but we've had a few episodes of Black Mirror this year, so, you know, we'll see.

    5. JC

      Right. It sounds like Ready Player One, uh, with the masses-

    6. DF

      Yeah.

    7. JC

      ... who are playing video games (laughs) instead of actually going out in the real world.

    8. DF

      That's right. Totally. Yeah.

    9. JC

      Sacks, what, what's your thought on, you know, just the next two years, let's say, and how this all shakes out? And, and this will give us a good segue into the coronavirus and, and where we stand right now with this potential second lockdown and the impact that might have psychologically on people and also on the economy.

    10. DS

      Uh, there's not gonna be a second lockdown. It doesn't make any sense. And even if there were, people aren't gonna support it. Um, certainly any of the, uh, red states aren't gonna do it. I guess, the blue states may... They, they still haven't, you know, sort of unlocked now, so maybe that gets more protracted in places like California. But, um, but it... We're, we're not gonna go back into lockdowns and people won't support. And I think the thing that we basically figured out that should have been obvious months ago now is that, um, coronavirus is really like two different diseases in terms of its effects on, on people. So, for elderly people and for people with risk factors, it's very dangerous. You know, I'm very worried about my parents and, you know, for, for people in that group, they have to take, you know, extreme precautions. But for young, healthy people without risk factors, it's, um, it's n- not been that deadly. It's, it's very unpleasant. It's a very bad two weeks, but, um, but, you know, for example, if you look at the data now on, uh, on colleges coming back, um, there's been some reports that the virus is spreading like wildfire on college campuses. That's true, but hospitalizations and, and deaths have not gone up. And so... Because it's just not that... um, it's just not that deadly to, to, to younger people. And so I think this idea of shutting down the whole economy to protect people at risk is, just seems like, um, overkill. And I think if we had to do it all over again, we wouldn't have done lockdowns. We just would have protected at-risk people.

    11. JC

      Uh, we've still consistently had, uh, a thousand deaths a day. We thought this might go down. What are your thoughts on Americans just being okay with that, um, that basic death toll, Stacks?

    12. DS

      Well, I mean, any deaths is, is obviously bad and tragic and, um, you know, and statistically there are gonna be people who, who die even who are in the, you know, lowest group, so for sure. But, you know, but we've had about 200,000 deaths. The original estimates from this virus were two to three million. So, um, it's... I guess my point is not that it's not bad, but it's, you know, but that it's, um, you know, much less deadly than I think was originally thought.

    13. DF

      There's an argument that that's not d- deaths directly attributable to coronavirus, right? And that, um, the vast majority of, uh, of those folks had comorbidities and that, you know, the, the primary driver... Th- this is an argument many have made, I'm not gonna take a strong point, um, but, you know, 85% plus of folks have significant comorbidities, um, and, you know, this virus maybe, um, kind of has a con- contributing factor to their death. But if... Let's assume everyone in the United States had coronavirus today, then every death that was reported today would be reported as a coronavirus death. Um, and so they're testing a lot of folks, um, uh, you know, in the hospital, finding that they have coronavirus, it's un... You know, it's very difficult to then prove that the reason that they died or the sole reason that they died was coronavirus. So these-

    14. JC

      If you had to pick a percentage, Freeberg, where would you put it? Half of all deaths? If you just had to guess.

    15. DF

      But that's my point, is I don't think it's one thing, right? I, I'm not sure that it's someone goes into the hospital with coronavirus and they've also got severe diabetes, heart disease, cancer, they're on chemotherapy. I mean, you could list the other things that they might have. What caused their death? You know, you can't... As, as a coroner, it's very difficult to say this one thing caused the death, but when they test that person and they find out they're coronavirus positive, they're... that number is now being counted in the statistics that say that was a coronavirus death that day. And coronavirus is so prevalent in the United States right now, it's such a significant part of the population, it's also very difficult to say, "Hey guys, like, you know, these deaths are, um..." So, I, I'm not trying to belittle the fact that people are absolutely dying and they wouldn't have died if not for coronavirus. That is absolutely happening. Um, but it's very difficult to say what is the net e- effect on life right now. Uh, we're still learning a lot about how this virus interacts with different people based on their genetics and based on their disease state and, and, and other factors.

    16. JC

      Let me ask you one more way for you, Freeberg, and then I'll, I'll give it over to Chamath, which is...... Freeberg, in your estimation as a scientist and somebody who's, uh, uh, I would say, a man of science on the call here, uh,

  6. 37:44 – 46:22

    COVID outlooks for 2021 & beyond, innovations in rapid testing

    1. JC

      are you optimistic about us coming out of coronavirus in 2021? And what's your best outlook for our return to normalcy? If you had to pick a time when it feels like we can go to Warriors game, or play cards regularly, or go to the World Series of Poker, when do, do you have a, a, a time period where you think that could possibly happen?

    2. DF

      It's all politics and social behavior. It has nothing to do with science. Like, after 9/11, there were no more serious, like, terrorist attacks on the United States, but our fucking lives changed dramatically. We go sit in TSA lines and, you know, get our asses swabbed when we get on an airplane now. And that's still going on 20 years later. So I'm, I'm pretty sure there's a lot of change that's here to stay in the US because of coronavirus, and will be even after everyone gets vaccines and the deaths drop below 10 a day, and yada yada. So, um, uh, you know, I'm, I'm not convinced that this is, like, "Hey, here's the date we're all gonna be out of it," and then we're safe, 'cause people are psychologically scarred. Behavior has changed. Businesses have changed. The landscape of how we work as a society has changed, and that's not going away. So it's, it's, it's, it's not like we're gonna go back. I think it's like we're going forward into a different world where we operate differently, much as what happened after 9/11.

    3. JC

      What are, what's your take on that, Chamath?

    4. CP

      I think that, uh, David's right that, you know, were it but for coronavirus, I think a lot of these people that died would still be alive. And so, you know, I don't think it really matters how much of the blame we're trying to ascribe to it. It's just that it was a meaningful non-trivial contributing factor. So these deaths are avoidable, and we have to deal with that. The second is, I don't think what we know what the peak to trough looks like because we haven't really gone through a real full-blown flu season yet. Um, you know, s- coronavirus came to America at the tail end of the winter. And, uh, it's gonna be, um, (smacks lips) I think, tough to figure out what it's gonna do in October, November, December, January, or February when it's really cold in many parts of the United States. And, you know, uh, whatever effects, again, we still don't know it in totality, but whatever effects, uh, the warm weather had in muting it, or whatever mutation muted it, uh, may change. So I tend to think it's another 18 to 24 months of this posture. But Freeberg is really right, which is, like, this is what's so sad, which is when you could point a finger and look at somebody and say, "You, you're the cause," it was much easier to react and create rules and create boundaries as uncomfortable or as inconvenient as they were and live by them. And because this is more nameless and faceless, it's impossible. Um, so...

    5. JC

      All right. Well, here's some good news. I was able to acquire, (laughs) uh, I've been on a little investigative journalism kick asking people if they have access to rapid testing, uh, kits, uh, i.e. they have them in Korea. And I was able to get, and I'm curious your thoughts on this, Freeberg, the Rapid Response Liberty COVID-19 IgG/IgM test cassettes. Um, and they cost 15 to 20 bucks each and they take 10 minutes. Um, they're easy to use. Um...

    6. DF

      I mean, I've had those since March and they cost 50 cents each, so, um, nothing's really changed.

    7. JC

      So these are now officially available, though, in the United States. You had those from some other country, correct?

    8. DF

      I got from China and I got from the US and I got from Korea. Um, and, and, and they're, these things are just made everywhere, dude. And they're, like, they're, these are the, um, antibody tests, right?

    9. JC

      Are they accurate? Yes.

    10. DF

      Yeah. The, so there's a paper that was published at UCSF. Um, I, uh, I got an acknowledgement because of my donations to support the research. Um, and it showed that it, uh, these tests have, uh, actually very good, um, specificity and the sensitivity is, um, is gonna be, call it 85%. Um, but these are antibody tests. And, and further research has shown that not everyone has the same antibody response after getting infected. And there's a relationship between how severe the disease is for you and, and various other factors. So, uh, and these will only show up typically, you know, days to weeks after you get infected. The antigen tests, which are the more common kind of ones that everyone's looking for now, are these tests that can actually find the virus itself. And so they'll take a swab of your nose or some saliva from your mouth and see if there's any virus in there. And it's a much, much lower sensitivity than the PCR test, which is the expensive, you know, lab test. But it can be done on a stick and it's a good enough thing for letting people in to say a football game. Um, and our, our, a good friend of ours just texted me and told me that they're doing this at the, the UT Austin game. They're using this antigen test to let people into the, uh, uh, the football game today, so, um, or this weekend. So it's getting kind of more widespread use.

    11. JC

      And so-

    12. DF

      Mm-hmm.

    13. JC

      ... when we have those tests at scales, what will the world look like, Freeberg?

    14. DF

      I don't know. You'll, uh, just like the TSA. You'll get swabs and, you know, these things. It's great business to be in, by the way. If you guys, you know, want to spack a Korean, uh, antigen test (laughs) business, these things are gonna sell like crazy.

    15. JC

      There, uh-

    16. CP

      Yeah.

    17. JC

      ... there's a company that, um, I heard of through a friend, which had, it's an Israeli company, I never followed up on it, uh, which was, uh, uh, effectively a breathalyzer. Um, which would be ch- could you just imagine? That would be incredible, right?

    18. DF

      Right.

    19. You just-

    20. Well, they're

    21. DS

      We've-

    22. DF

      ... reading-

    23. DS

      Yeah. ... seconds- W- we've talked about this in our chat group. There are, there are startups like, um, (smacks lips) uh, was it Quidel, Homodias, Q who've got these little, you know, two or $300 little handheld readers, and the cartridges are basically mouth swabs or lower nail- nasal swabs, you know, cost 10 bucks. And I think, you know, I think that they'll be, they're gonna be rolling out over the next few months. And assuming we can scale the production of them, I think they will be everywhere. And, uh, you know, it'll, it, I don't think it'll be a government mandated thing 'cause I don't think the government will get its act together, but it'll be the kind of thing where you go shopping in a store or whatever, and there'll, there'll be early adopters or a restaurant, they'll start using it. People will realize, "Well, wait, I don't wanna get swabbed three times a day," so then they'll get some sort of, like, receipt or voucher they can take with them to the next place. And so I, I think, you know, I, I'm, I'm like actually-... like, I think I'm more optimistic than you guys about COVID right now. I think that whether it's because of these rapid tests or because of treatments coming, or just this fundamental fact about comorbidities. Again, not absolving... Not, not saying that COVID isn't serious, but this is the fact that we've learnt that it's, um, you know, that it, it's, it's really deadly primarily for people who have comorbidities. I think for all of these reasons, I think COVID's gonna be a distant memory by next summer. I really do. I think, um, I think s-

    24. DF

      Behaviorally too?

    25. DS

      What's that?

    26. DF

      You think, you think behavior changes as well? Like businesses and movie theaters and-

    27. DS

      Yeah.

    28. DF

      ... sports arenas and all that?

    29. DS

      Yeah. I think s- I think people will be... I, I think people will largely be back, um, to what they were doing last summer, or by next summer. Um, I think we're gonna have like, you know, call it a six-month period where, you know, we, we do these rapid tests just to make sure. Um, and, um, but, but I, but I think as the case rate starts dropping off, um, things will kind of revert back to, to where they were. I mean, the, the question to ask is kind of, you know, which trends were there before COVID and have been accelerated? Like, I would say that the move from, like, death of retail, the shift to e-commerce, that feels to me like it's here to stay, but, um, you know, food delivery, things like that. But there was no trend of people not going to sports games anymore, you know? There... And I think, like, stuff like that will just snap right back.

    30. DF

      I don't know, I don't know about you guys, I'm still, like, feeling fucked up by the whole thing. You don't really realize how much your psychology has changed (laughs) until you kind of reflect on decisions and behaviors. Like, there's still a fear factor that I think needs to kind of be ironed out, but, um, you know, we'll see how long it takes for people. It's just, like, it's so different when you're so used to just waking up and hopping on Zoom for work and avoiding people and putting masks on when you go walk your fucking dog. I mean, it's like...

  7. 46:22 – 55:11

    Trump’s COVID response, Trump vs. Biden, shrinking impact of the executive branch

    1. DS

    2. JC

      Uh, well, this has been certainly, um, driving a lot of our politics right now. You probably saw, um, the, uh, book, uh, that came out with the tapes of Trump saying that, uh, you know, he was trying to play it down. Sacks says a lifelong Republican. What were your thoughts when the Republican presidential candidate, uh, R- Republican President said, uh, "Hey, I'm trying to play this down," when he was at the same time saying it was deadly serious? Does that make you worry about Trump as a candidate? And, and what do you think that's gonna, how that might play into the election? It must've been disappointing for you to hear your candidate, Trump, say at the same time, "This is deadly and I want to play it down."

    3. DS

      Well, Tr- Trum- Trump's leadership on this has been a little bit erratic, for sure. Um, and, and by the way, let's go back and remind the viewers here that in the first pods we were doing back in April, I think we kind of nailed what the right policy response should be. I wrote a blog on April 2nd talking about that mask should be required, that that was the right response. But we also said that lockdowns r- we, uh, very quickly after the start of lockdown said that it was, um, excessive, you know? And that what we should do is b- be going all in on masks, not lockdowns. I certainly would have liked to have seen Trump get that right several months earlier. Um, that being said, let's not forget everybody else who got this stuff wrong too. I mean, you look at CDC, um, you know, uh, or WHO. We had talked about this on a previous pod. Uh, I mean, WHO, um, s- was, wa- was also, uh, unclear about masks and, and Fauci, I guess, now retroactively saying that he didn't s- think that masks were necessary because he's trying to prevent a run on supplies. I mean, the whole, the whole response of the healthcare, um, establishment, they were all-

    4. JC

      Nobody missed.

    5. DS

      ... they were all, like, really bad and so I have a greater degree of forgiveness for people who made mistakes back in March or April. But what I think is hard to forgive now are these people who are promoting the wrong policies now that we know so much more. And, I mean, at, at this point, I would thin- I think that COVID is, COVID policy is a net plus for Trump in this campaign because, you know, the other side of it is, um, is, is, is these permanent lockdowns. You know, there's just an article in, um, what is it? Foreign Policy saying that we need to go back to lockdowns and I think Biden's said that we need to have lockdowns again and, you know, his policy would be to listen to the experts but all these experts, again, were wrong about so many things and... And so, you know, again, I think w- this, this idea of permanent lockdowns, if that is the alternative to Trump, will help Trump win.

    6. JC

      Uh, and so you don't think that this Woodward book and, and that kind of stuff plays into the election or the debates in the coming weeks?

    7. DS

      I, I think it's sort of priced into the stock, you know? I mean, look, if it weren't for COVID, I think that... If you go back to, like, January, February when Trump gave that State of the Union speech, his ratings were the highest they had been, the economy was on fire, um, you know, he kinda... It looked like he was on cruise control to winning re-election and then COVID happened and, you know, um, and his ratings went down to their, to their lowest point and, um. And so I think he already paid the price for, you know, the, the, let's call it inconsistent leadership, that, um, that Woodward described so I think that's priced in and, and now the question is if the economy gets good enough fast enough, um, and the other side is on the side of lockdowns and Trump is on the side of re-opening, um, you know, I, I, again, I think COVID policy becomes a net plus for him.

    8. JC

      Chamath, uh, 538 has in its simulation 77 wins and 100 for Biden. You think that's accurate?

    9. CP

      Yeah. I mean, I, I, I think that un- until, uh, the debates, I think that this thing is basically where it's been for a long time. Um, and if, if Biden flubs the debate and basically comes out as, um, you know, intellectually too inconsistent to be voted in by a plurality of Americans, he's done for and Trump's gonna win. Um, so he can't have these, you know, verbal gaffes and basically seem like he's a, you know, a senile octogenarian. If he does come off that way, he's going to lose. Um, but if he doesn't then... Look, many of the moments you see him now, he's actually pretty crisp. Um, that probably gets the job done because like I said, I think more people just want a non-Trump alternative, um, than want the Trump alternative. E- Even within the Republican Party. And look, like, preference falsification can cut both ways. All the people that said they weren't gonna vote for him but then did, um, you know, there's also probably a cohort of people that now feel obligated when they came out of the woodwork as supporting him, now they just feel like it's easier to be publicly supporting him. But then in the... You know, they may go the other way. So it all kind of works in both directions. Um, but I, I still think on the margin, uh, Biden is the, Biden is the favorite. Uh, and, you know, has a- has a-

    10. JC

      How different will the world look, Chamath, in your estimation, uh, under a Biden presidency? We get to January 1st, how different does the country feel? Is there gonna be some great relief? Is there gonna be some great joy like when Obama won?

    11. CP

      No. No. No.

    12. JC

      What do you think the feeling is in the country and the reality is?

    13. CP

      All, all, all... No. All, all these things are emotional overreactions in both directions. Um, the reality is that if you, if you actually graft substantive policy that affects your everyday life, the magnitude of the impact of the presidency has been shrinking since the 1980s. I think the most impactful president of our lifetimes, our lifetimes, so, you know, '70s onwards, um, uh, was Reagan. And it's basically been decaying ever since. Um, and, uh, so I think, you know, I think that, uh, the, the pr- the job of the presidency is mostly window dressing, except for foreign policy. That matters less and less. And I'll tell you why that matters less and less. Because all the things that the president used to c- you know, really govern, like foreign policy was a byproduct of a whole bunch of other things. For example, our entire posture on the Middle East, which has been a fucking shit show, or our entire posture on Russia was in part because of, uh, our energy policy. And in a world of sustainable energy, those entire regions are, uh, not important anymore. So it doesn't matter.

    14. JC

      We can let them basically fend for themselves. We do not need to be involved.

    15. CP

      They're, they're going to. They're going to devolve because they're gonna have to suck out all the oil out of the ground to try to monetize it before wind and solar and everything else become the dominant form of, of energy. And so if you take energy policy off the table, all of a sudden the national security interests to care about large swaths of the world go to zero. Right? So, so then there's less and less for the president to do.

    16. JC

      Right. And there's, there's less and less for the president to do. Monetize is pretty, pretty, pretty short, isn't it?

    17. CP

      Yes. So, so my p- my, my, my point is, the surfa- the surface area of the impact of the president is shrinking and it shrinks as technology... But like, if you think about it, what is driving foreign policy and national security policy changes over the last 10, 15 years, definitely over the next 40 or 50, is technology, right? If we get, if we get, for example, if we get any form of like carbon sequestration, um, at scale broadly available, um, you're gonna have a complete resurgence of Western economies if that technology is invented in the United States or Western Europe.

    18. JC

      Freeberg, uh, quickly, you think that Biden is gonna win? And then what do you think the country feels and looks like into a Biden presidency? And then let's move over to energy and sustainable energy and carbon after that.

    19. DF

      I, I don't know. Um, you know, I'll say the same thing I've said in the past. I, I don't think, um, the, the notion of a sense of relief is, is realistic. I, I don't think this is about, uh... People think it's about Trump, but Trump is the product of what it's all really about. Um, and so I'll just, you know, kind of highlight, I think, you know, Biden is, is a c- Instead of thinking about things as Democrats and Republicans and left and right, if we think about it as kind of populism and free marketism, and in the middle is centrism, you know, we're probably taking a notch, um, towards centrism. And, um, at the end of the day, uh, the march towards populism seems to be continuing. And, you know, whether Trump is kind of the product of that march or maybe the next one will be Elizabeth Warren or AOC, it's kind of the same thing in my opinion. Um, but I, I think that's the bigger kind of concern is, um, you know, how do we, again, keep general- generally keep most people in the United States feeling like they can progress in life, feeling like they can find happiness in life, and feeling like, um, there's opportunity for them to kind of, you know, achieve their objectives? And if they don't feel like they're getting it, they're gonna try and wrap it all up, um, and unions will continue to scale and AOC will become the vice presidential nominee in 2024 and

  8. 55:11 – 1:08:28

    California wildfires, politicization of global warming, financial incentives to solving climate change

    1. DF

      yada yada.

    2. JC

      Uh, Freeberg, what are your thoughts on the wildfires, global warming and the politics of all that? And then we'll go to, uh, cancel culture with you, Saxum.

    3. DF

      Um, California has 33 million acres of forest land. It's about 100 million acres in total land. So the forests make up about a third of our land. Um, so far we're, we're burning three and a half million, so about 10% of our acres. Um, when we burn an acre, we release, uh, about 15% of the carbon that's stored in that acre into the atmosphere. So thus far, if you do the math on that, we've released about as much, uh, CO2 as we've, uh, as the California cars release in a year by the wildfires, um, and the politics we're seeing play out. So it's, it's, it's a significant problem, but over the last 40 years, we've added about a quarter-... A ton of carbon to each acre, per year. Um, and the reason we've done that is we haven't kind of, you know, uh, lit fires and managed the forests and cut down trees, and there's been all these restrictions in California. So there's an argument that some are making that this is about forest management, and then there's an argument that others are making that this is about climate change and dry weather and hot weather causing the fires. And the reality is it's both, but it's, as everything else in this country right now, becoming highly politicized that, um... And, you know, Trump visited Newsom in a very kind of symbolic gathering this week. I don't know if you guys saw the packet (laughs) that was handed out to Trump. It was awesome.

    4. JC

      (laughs)

    5. DF

      It was like 24 point font (laughs) . And it was like-

    6. JC

      Four words? Fire good bad.

    7. DF

      Yeah, it was like... Yeah. (laughs)

    8. JC

      Fire good.

    9. DF

      (laughs)

    10. JC

      Temperature up.

    11. DF

      (laughs)

    12. JC

      Weather hot.

    13. DF

      Right. Fi- fire is burning, uh, state, you know, it was like... (laughs)

    14. JC

      (laughs)

    15. DF

      And, it was... I mean, you guys got to see it. It's awesome, the little packet he got.

    16. JC

      It's awesome. (laughs)

    17. DF

      And then, and then Newsom sat like exactly six feet from him with a mask on, and Trump sitting there without the mask on. I mean, it's such a fucking political circus. Um, and, uh, you know, I think all things are true and all things are false, and we can move on. Uh...

    18. DS

      Well, the- the- the- the- the debate on the fires is, I mean, it- what- what it's- the- the debate has- has become sort of, uh, climate change versus forest management. You know, that's sort of the debate about it. And like most of these debates, you don't necessarily have to choose. There can be a element of truth on both sides. Um, you know, r- regardless of how much, um, climate change has caused these fires, we've done a very, very poor job in the state managing them. And, you know, this idea that we can just fix global warming and, or- or wait, you know, not have good forest management until, you know... A- and just kind of wait for global warming to be fixed is, um... I mean, that's a really stupid idea. So, regards to how much climate change is to- the cause of this, I think we need a much more competent state reaction to, you know, to- to the- the fact these fires keep coming here.

    19. JC

      Do you believe in global warming, David Sachs?

    20. DS

      I- I believe in the, you know, in greenhouse- the greenhouse gas theory, and that... Yeah, that it's, you know, that man-made CO2 emissions are gonna have an impact on the environment. I think that, you know, what- what's a little bit harder to know is the exact timing and magnitudes of some of these things. But I agree with what Elon said, which is that we're running a very high-risk experiment here, um, continually putting out, you know, CO2 greenhouse gases into- into the atmosphere.

    21. JC

      Why is it so difficult for the Republican Party... And I- I feel like you're almost straining and couching your words there, David, that you believe in global warming, you believe in what Elon's saying, it's not worth doing this at risk. Why do Republicans seem to have such an aversion to just saying, "Hey, global warming's a thing and we need to fix it."

    22. CP

      Because, because, because Democrats wrapped those words around them like a flag, and so it became a political issue, um, like with everything else.

    23. DS

      Yeah. I mean, I- I think... So- so again, it's- we have this false choice now of whether you want to save the environment or- or save the economy. And, um, and- and the- the problem is, I think- I think the- a lot of Republicans don't want to concede the issue... Oh, hey, little guy. Um, a lot of Republicans don't want to concede the issue because they're afraid it'll lead to something like the Green New Deal. And so what we need to do is figure out, um, some responses to the problem that don't require us to destroy the economy.

    24. JC

      Right. And for you, if we did incentives, if the- if the country spent incentive sacks to get solar on roofs and stuff like that, you wouldn't be opposed to it, would you?

    25. DS

      Um, you mean like taxing carbon emissions?

    26. JC

      Or just giving discounts on putting solar in, subsidizing solar for people's houses, or maybe the middle ground of creating more nuclear reactors, which seems like something that neither party can agree to.

    27. DS

      Ho- hold on, little guy. Sorry, I got... Hey.

    28. JC

      (laughs) Got a little guy coming in.

    29. DS

      I'm doing a podcast, okay?

    30. JC

      (laughs)

  9. 1:08:28 – 1:11:57

    Practical ways to impact global warming & the carbon crisis

    1. DF

      creating these nice luxury markets-

    2. CP

      By the way, here's a-

    3. DF

      ... and so on.

    4. CP

      Here's an incredible example. So when you look at sort of where, um, you know, methane is a really problematic greenhouse gas, and, uh, most of the methane emissions, uh, are from cows, uh, but it's from enteric fermentation, which is, you know, fancy language for burping. Um, and what's incredible is there are now efforts to use CRISPR to genetically engineer, um, you know, cows that don't necessarily have that same gut biome, you know, dynamic, so that you're burping methane. The- there's also feed that you can actually give a cow that'll minimize methane emissions, burping, by 30 or 40%. All these things are, to your point, David, they're, they're so fantastical if you think about it, but they're possible today. And we just need to organize and get a s- a kind of, like, a center of gravity around these things and they'll happen.

    5. DS

      C- can we get, can we get Jason the, uh, human version of that?

    6. CP

      (laughs)

    7. DF

      (laughs)

    8. CP

      Does it also cover tooting?

    9. DS

      (laughs)

    10. DF

      Does it work for flatulence? Uh, uh, interestingly, Chris Sacca tweeted about investing in a company called Running Tide, um, which grows kelp and, uh, will suck carbon from the atmosphere, um, and it just sinks into the ocean floor, and they're selling carbon offsets by putting seaweed on the ocean floor. So... Such, such a no-brainer, right? I mean, like, the ocean is so big and it's this per- and, like, it's not getting in the way of land-

    11. CP

      Yeah.

    12. DF

      ... where you don't have to go figure out licenses and rights. You got, you got to basically get carbon to go into the ocean. And so then you basically need an organism that can grow and self-propagate quickly and radically accumulate, uh, biomass in the ocean, and then figure out how to get rid of it. So the, the best way to get rid of it is to have it sink, it's got to be some sort of seaweed or kelp or algae, and you just put it in the open ocean and it'll propagate. I mean, that, that's just such a great obvious... Uh, s- and there's a thousand scenarios like that, that I think, you know, we're gonna kind of creatively, uh, come up with and, and resolve here in just like a second. Why is nuclear not even on the discussion, Freeberg? I'm curious. Like, is it just too tainted and we, we can't- Look, the work I've done, the work I've done on nuclear, it used to cost something like some number of dollars to get a nuclear power plant through the regulatory barriers in the United States, and now it is so cost-prohibitive, it's something like $10 billion now, from maybe, you know, $100 million, uh, you know, two decades ago, there's something about the regulatory barriers. Yeah, that's a problem we need to address.

    13. DS

      Well, there's a huge, there's a huge NIMBY problem, right? I mean, who, who wants a nuclear power plant in their backyard? Nobody. I mean, nobody wants it, Jason. But, but I agree with, like, the larger point here, that the solution to the problem is ultimately gonna be all these new technologies, these innovative solutions, not making people feel bad for consuming and, you know, being alive. Um, you know, you, you look at Tesla, and it's moving the whole world to electric cars, not with a government mandate, but just by creating a better car. And so it's ultimately gonna be technology companies, you know, in- i- increasing the solution set, um, and giving people new choices. That's how we're gonna ultimately solve the problem.

    14. DF

      And interestingly, in the news, uh, NuScale is creating small nuclear reactors, and they just got approval. Uh, and this is a, the Portland-based NuScale Power. Uh, they had a small modular reactor. Uh, that has been approved, uh, by the US Department of Energy for a site in Eastern Idaho. We'll see if that ever comes online, but it does seem like small nuclear reactors could solve part of the NIMBY problem, in that they're smaller, so if something were to go wrong, uh, we would have, uh, some ability to contain, uh, or have a smaller footprint in a disaster-like situation.

  10. 1:11:57 – 1:18:58

    Sacks on A Taxonomy of Fear by Emily Yoffe, Safety-ism & contamination by association

    1. DF

      Let's wrap with the Overton Window. Uh, Chamath talked about it closing in Sax. Uh, there was a good article there, Taxonomy of Fear, uh, that you-

    2. DS

      Yeah.

    3. DF

      ... shared with the group. Tell us a little bit about that article, Taxonomy of Fear by Emily Yoff. I think it's how-

    4. DS

      Yeah.

    5. DF

      ... you pronounce her name.

    6. DS

      Yeah, she's a writer for The Atlantic who wrote, uh, this, uh, again, it's called Taxonomy of Fear and, and Persuasion. I think it's an important article. What it does is analyze, uh, cancel culture and the language that's used to cancel people. And, um, one, one of the, you know, o- one of the things she diagnoses is, is what she calls safetyism, which is any time somebody doesn't like, um, what, you know, an idea or what somebody else is saying, they claim that their safety is being threatened by that idea. And it's kind of invoking these magic words that HR, you know, ha- has come up with where, you know, if anyone is, is creating an unsafe work environment or an unsafe college campus, well, the s- the, the source of the problem has to be removed immediately. And so this is the, the language, um, of cancel culture. And, you know, the, the problem with it is that it doesn't really matter what the intent of the person was or, um, you know, intent's sort of irrelevant, or whether the objection is reasonable or not, you know, whether it, it, it causes, uh, whether it actually, you know, threatens anyone's safety. And so there is an example of this when, um, 50 prominent sort of writers, intellectuals wrote a letter to Harper's Magazine, including J.K. Rowling and, um, Matt Yglesias, who's a co-founder of, uh, Vox. And so there was a, you know, there's a trans writer, uh, there's a writer f- on, uh, who's a, a trans, uh, person, uh, at Fox who claims that her, her safety was threatened b- because one of the co-founders had signed this letter. The letter didn't discuss trans issues. It was simply the fact that, um, Yglesias had signed it along with J.K. Rowling. And so J.K. Rowling apparently is, is, um-... you know, ha- I- I'm-

Episode duration: 1:24:26

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