Joe Rogan Experience #1222 - Michael Shermer

1. 0:00 – 15:00

   And we're live. Hello,…

   1. JRJoe Rogan0:05

      And we're live. Hello, Michael Shermer. How are you, sir?

   2. MSMichael Shermer0:08

      Hello, Joe Rogan. I'm doing well, thank you. (laughs)

   3. JRJoe Rogan0:09

      Good to see you. Good to see- with your pile of your writing. Look what you got there.

   4. MSMichael Shermer0:12

      (laughs) Yeah, what-

   5. JRJoe Rogan0:12

      You got Moral Arc, uh, Heavens on Earth. Look at you.

   6. MSMichael Shermer0:17

      This is-

   7. JRJoe Rogan0:17

      Skeptic magazine.

   8. MSMichael Shermer0:18

      ... that's the latest issue, "Why is there something rather than nothing?" We- we like to tackle the little questions.

   9. JRJoe Rogan0:22

      Whoa. That's a deep one.

   10. MSMichael Shermer0:23

       You've dealt with this on the show.

   11. JRJoe Rogan0:25

       Yeah, too much. It's, uh, that's one that just p- uh, you know, when you're in traffic and going, "What is this?"

   12. MSMichael Shermer0:30

       When you have someone like Neil or, or uh, Sean Carroll-

   13. JRJoe Rogan0:34

       Yeah.

   14. MSMichael Shermer0:34

       ... or, or uh, Lawrence Krauss talking about this, it's like, whoa.

   15. JRJoe Rogan0:37

       Yeah.

   16. MSMichael Shermer0:37

       I mean, I'm not a physicist. I'm a social scientist, so for me, I, I come at it like, "What do you mean by this word nothing?" Because most of us have this idea of what it mean... Oh no, in physics, it means this other thing, like, okay. (laughs)

   17. JRJoe Rogan0:48

       Yeah. Well, I think our limited understanding of what they're talking about, like, when I see those guys writing down on legal papers with all that scritchety scratchety crazy-looking-

   18. MSMichael Shermer0:57

       Right.

   19. JRJoe Rogan0:57

       ... fake alien language-

   20. MSMichael Shermer0:59

       (laughs) Right.

   21. JRJoe Rogan0:59

       ... mathematics, like, thank God you guys are out there. (laughs)

   22. MSMichael Shermer1:03

       (laughs) Well, I opened Heavens on Earth with, "Imagine yourself dead." And, you know, most people go, "Well, uh, you know, I, I see myself in the casket and my friends and family are around," and hopefully they're mourning. Uh, no, you wouldn't see anything, of course. You- you're dead. Uh, I mean, to imagine anything, you have to be conscious and alive, so you can't even picture being dead, so you can't picture not existing. And it would be the same thing, imagine there's no universe.

   23. JRJoe Rogan1:26

       Yeah.

   24. MSMichael Shermer1:26

       Okay, I see blackness. No, there's no blackness. I mean, nothing would literally be, not just no light, but no-

   25. JRJoe Rogan1:33

       No perception of darkness.

   26. MSMichael Shermer1:35

       ... n- nothing, not even nothing.

   27. JRJoe Rogan1:36

       I was (sighs) going through Instagram the other day and there was this one, uh, person who was, uh, talking about the purpose of life, and when you die what's going to happen? And, uh-

   28. MSMichael Shermer1:48

       Right.

   29. JRJoe Rogan1:48

       ... I immediately just started laughing. I'm like, "You don't know."

   30. MSMichael Shermer1:51

       Right.
2. 15:00 – 30:00

   Yes. …

   1. MSMichael Shermer15:00

      Come on, Schermer, get going. That, that, that kind of little thing, this is Jordan's, uh, Jordan Peterson's point, you know?

   2. JRJoe Rogan15:05

      Yes.

   3. MSMichael Shermer15:05

      The, you know, the, of the, you know, make, get your life in order. What is he talking about? Just stand up straight, make your bed, or-

   4. JRJoe Rogan15:12

      Mm-hmm.

   5. MSMichael Shermer15:12

      ... you know, clean your room. You know, what's he talking about? He's talking about these little wins. Like, if you can do that, then the next thing that's a little harder comes a little easier and so on.

   6. JRJoe Rogan15:20

      Well, it's also those things that are in the background. If you know that your, your life is a mess, your car is filled with fast food wrappers, your, you know, your, your, you've got that, uh, thing that you haven't taken care of in the back of your head, that, that will, th- that, that's gonna disrupt. It's gonna be flowing in your thoughts for the most part.

   7. MSMichael Shermer15:38

      Right.

   8. JRJoe Rogan15:38

      It'll be a distraction.

   9. MSMichael Shermer15:40

      Right. So those little things apparently do matter. There's a theory of crime called the broken windows theory that, uh, is favored by criminologists to explain the decline, the crime decline in the '90s. What happened? In New York City, they started cleaning up the graffiti. They started catching the, uh, turnstile jumpers. They started cleaning up the streets. They started, you know, boarding up windows so there's no broken windows, or replacing the windows. The theory is that if the- there's a signal in society that no one's paying attention, there is no law and order here, there are no rules or norms, do whatever the fuck you want, that you're gonna get more crime. If you send the signal through little things like, "We're not gonna allow graffiti on this wall anymore, and no more turnstile jumpers in the subways," and so on. And, uh, so when, when that happened, then there was a trickle-down effect, and then crime declined. So that's the, the most popular theory for that. And I think there's something to that.

   10. JRJoe Rogan16:34

       Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. And what they did with New York City is really kind of fantastic. If you, if you go back to when I was a kid and I traveled to New York City the first time and I saw Times Square, I guess I was probably, like, 18 or 19. I was like, "Look at this fucking crazy place."

   11. MSMichael Shermer16:49

       (laughs) Yeah.

   12. JRJoe Rogan16:49

       Like, "This is madness." And, you know, you see it in movies, and it's just always this horrific scene. It's always peep shows, and hookers-

   13. MSMichael Shermer16:57

       Yeah.

   14. JRJoe Rogan16:58

       ... and pimps, and thugs, and drug dealers. And you go there now and it's like a mall threw up.

   15. MSMichael Shermer17:03

       (laughs)

   16. JRJoe Rogan17:04

       You know? It's, it's like a giant neon M- Mall of America.

   17. MSMichael Shermer17:09

       (laughs) Right.

   18. JRJoe Rogan17:09

       Like, Times Square. If you took a person, if you grabbed a guy from, like, 1988 and you put him in a time machine and said, "Hey, man, I'm gonna bring you 30 years in the future, and you're gonna see New York City the way it looks then." Like, what do you expect? Like, "Oh my God, it's gonna be like, like Blade Runner. People are gonna be shooting people and selling body parts." And no, you get there and it's like Guy Fieri's restaurant and-

   19. MSMichael Shermer17:31

       (laughs) Right.

   20. JRJoe Rogan17:31

       ... huge, gigantic LCD screens. And then there, there's some people that would long for the old days, the dirty, seediness that-

   21. MSMichael Shermer17:40

       Yeah.

   22. JRJoe Rogan17:40

       ... Lenny Bruce talked about, you know, when he lived there. It's like... And I mean...

   23. MSMichael Shermer17:46

       Well, that has a certain charm, I guess-

   24. JRJoe Rogan17:47

       Yeah.

   25. MSMichael Shermer17:47

       ... if you're going into the nightclubs or whatever. But the surrounding daytime neighborhood or something, you, you... This is, isn't where you wanna live.

   26. JRJoe Rogan17:54

       You'd rather live in a vomited mall?

   27. MSMichael Shermer17:56

       (laughs) Well, I'm not crazy about that either, but, uh, but... So there's a reason why cities have certain restrictions (laughs) on those kinds of, uh, uh, stores coming in. But, like, in a, in a crappy neighborhood, like, um, you know, downtown, old town Pasadena now is kind of a hep place to go.

   28. JRJoe Rogan18:09

       Yeah.

   29. MSMichael Shermer18:10

       But in the '70s when... I, I mean, I went to the Icehouse b- you know, back in the day in the '70s, uh, just as a, as a, as a spectator. And, uh, but it was terrible down there. And-

   30. JRJoe Rogan18:20

       Was it really?
3. 30:00 – 45:00

   There it is. Jamie's…

   1. MSMichael Shermer30:00

      Well, there's another reason for that, and that is ... I can't find the picture now. Um, in Germany, most people don't know this, there's a religious text-

   2. JRJoe Rogan30:07

      There it is. Jamie's got it right there.

   3. MSMichael Shermer30:08

      A religion. Yeah. There they go.

   4. JRJoe Rogan30:09

      Oh. So that's what they look ... So they're actually above ground?

   5. MSMichael Shermer30:12

      Yeah. So you're just walking along and, and you look down and then-

   6. JRJoe Rogan30:14

      Oh, some of them, those are not ... They're- they're not like that, right? They're not-

   7. MSMichael Shermer30:17

      Yeah.

   8. JRJoe Rogan30:17

      ... like little bricks on the ground?

   9. MSMichael Shermer30:18

      Yeah. They're like that. You just walk on them.

   10. JRJoe Rogan30:20

       Oh, so they're in the ground.

   11. MSMichael Shermer30:20

       Yeah.

   12. JRJoe Rogan30:21

       Yeah.

   13. MSMichael Shermer30:21

       They're in the ground.

   14. JRJoe Rogan30:21

       All right.

   15. MSMichael Shermer30:21

       So it's a person's name-

   16. JRJoe Rogan30:23

       They're flush. Wow.

   17. MSMichael Shermer30:24

       And a, and they're in front of the house where they used to live, the date that they were departed-

   18. JRJoe Rogan30:27

       Wow.

   19. MSMichael Shermer30:27

       ... and the date that they were murdered and where they were murdered, Auschwitz or, or Tre- Treblinka or Majdanek and so on.

   20. JRJoe Rogan30:33

       Mm.

   21. MSMichael Shermer30:33

       Yeah. There you go. So it's pretty moving. It's ... And it's a ... It's kind of a reminder, this is what we did and we- we're not gonna do this again.... remember?

   22. JRJoe Rogan30:42

       Yeah.

   23. MSMichael Shermer30:43

       So- so that's-

   24. JRJoe Rogan30:43

       Yeah.

   25. MSMichael Shermer30:43

       ... that's changing norms. How does this happen? Really it's m- l- you can do it through the law from the top down, but really it's more a culture from the bottom up.

   26. JRJoe Rogan30:51

       You were saying that there's another reason besides that- uh, besides the Holocaust that they're sensitive to Scientology?

   27. MSMichael Shermer30:58

       Oh, yeah. Uh, because in Germany, they have a, um, a r- a religious withholding tax. So w- when you get your first job, they do a withholding for your religion, and they give a percentage of your paycheck to your religion, the religion you were born into, baptized, whatever. I- it's mostly Catholic and Protestant. Uh, but others tr- wanna get in on that because that's cumulative. You know, you can make some money doing this as a religion. The Humanists of Germany get a little piece of this action. It's considered a religion. So Scientology, when they saw that, they went, "Oh, okay, free government money, tax money." And, uh, the Germans go, "Uh, no. (laughs) You're not a real religion (laughs) and you're not getting in on this." And, uh, yeah, so, uh, ag- a- again, when- when my w- uh, w- wife came here, before she came here, she quit church. And you literally have to go down to the courthouse, fill out a form, and say, "I am leaving the church. Please don't take my money anymore out of my paycheck." So you have to opt out. You will be giving money to your religion unless you fill out the form and opt out.

   28. JRJoe Rogan31:56

       Wow.

   29. MSMichael Shermer31:57

       And, uh, and- and in this case, uh, it was kind of a funny story. They go, "Okay, so just to make sure you know now, if you sign this, you can't get married in the Catholic Church, you can't get buried in the Catholic Church." (laughs) "You can't go to this, you know, the- the ceremonies and so on. You're done." And she goes, "Yep, that's the way I want it." And she went down there with her Four Horsemen T-shirt-

   30. JRJoe Rogan32:15

       (laughs)
4. 45:00 – 1:00:00

   Right. …

   1. MSMichael Shermer45:00

      It was a great car, but I banged it up so much. I replaced this and that, you know, ev-... Pretty much by the time I sold it as a classic and made a, a nice little cha- chunk of change on it, there was very little of the original left.

   2. JRJoe Rogan45:10

      Right.

   3. MSMichael Shermer45:10

      But it's the pattern, not the material, that counts.

   4. JRJoe Rogan45:14

      Mm.

   5. MSMichael Shermer45:14

      So this whole debate about when you're resurrected in heaven with Jesus, w- what's up there? Is it your physical body if it... 'Cause some Christian sects say yeah. It's like, "Okay, how old are you when you're in heaven?" 30. This is the year they came up with, because that's the year, uh, age Jesus was when he was crucified. Okay, but if... Joe Rogan, I don't know how old... You're 40 something.

   6. JRJoe Rogan45:34

      51.

   7. MSMichael Shermer45:34

      You're 51. Okay, so if y- if you're resurrected at 30-year-old Joe Rogan, what happened to the last 21 years of Joe Rogan's body, memories?

   8. JRJoe Rogan45:42

      I don't want to go back to that, dude.

   9. MSMichael Shermer45:43

      (laughs)

   10. JRJoe Rogan45:44

       That dude was dumber than me.

   11. MSMichael Shermer45:46

       You don't?

   12. JRJoe Rogan45:46

       No.

   13. MSMichael Shermer45:46

       You don't?

   14. JRJoe Rogan45:46

       No.

   15. MSMichael Shermer45:47

       Are... You're happy where you are in your life at this point?

   16. JRJoe Rogan45:49

       Yeah, oh, for sure.

   17. MSMichael Shermer45:49

       Yeah.

   18. JRJoe Rogan45:50

       Yeah.

   19. MSMichael Shermer45:50

       Yeah, yeah. Well, that means you've, uh, a well-lived life. So what's up there with Jesus, uh, or wherever that is?

   20. JRJoe Rogan45:55

       I wouldn't mind having that body, 30-year-old body, I'd like less problems.

   21. MSMichael Shermer45:59

       Oh, less problems. Keep your injuries.

   22. JRJoe Rogan46:01

       Keep the injuries. Yeah.

   23. MSMichael Shermer46:01

       (laughs)

   24. JRJoe Rogan46:01

       I've been beating on it for 21 years since then.

   25. MSMichael Shermer46:04

       Right. (laughs)

   26. JRJoe Rogan46:04

       That's the... Like, when I was 30 is when I got hardcore into jujitsu. So that's, uh, 20 years of getting choked.

   27. MSMichael Shermer46:11

       Uh, but of course the, the Christian would say, "Well, if God makes you whole again, you'll have no injuries." Yeah, but that's not really part of you. Part of you is your injuries, your muscles, your-

   28. JRJoe Rogan46:20

       Yes. What I was gonna say though is, but all those, the, the... All the stuff that I did that hurt me, I also learned from.

   29. MSMichael Shermer46:26

       That's right. Made you stronger, more-

   30. JRJoe Rogan46:27

       But not just that, like, uh, learned the, the str-... I think through incremental struggle, w- whether it's, like, rigorous exercise or learning something or... I, I think everything that I do that's difficult makes me just a little bit more aware, a little bit better at other things, just a little bit, a little bit better to talk to, a little bit easier to deal with, a little more friendly. And all those things I think I wouldn't give up for anything. I think that's more important than whatever injuries I've got with. I think, you know... I, I wonder how you're gonna feel when you're 80. I wonder if you'll feel like that... Like, there's got to be a point of diminishing returns, like le-... I'd rather be stupid and 40 than to be enlightened and can't get out of bed very well.
5. 1:00:00 – 1:07:44

   (laughs) Yeah, that's right.…

   1. JRJoe Rogan1:00:00

   2. MSMichael Shermer1:00:00

      (laughs) Yeah, that's right. Yeah.

   3. JRJoe Rogan1:00:01

      I mean, th- the fact that that didn't sink Hannity-

   4. MSMichael Shermer1:00:04

      Right.

   5. JRJoe Rogan1:00:04

      ... you know, that he had Michael Cohen was his lawyer, like, whoa.

   6. MSMichael Shermer1:00:07

      Yep. Yeah, the only thing we can count on with the media is that there's lots of sources-

   7. JRJoe Rogan1:00:12

      Yeah.

   8. MSMichael Shermer1:00:12

      ... and you just have to just crosscheck a- as many as you can. Don't stick on any one channel.

   9. JRJoe Rogan1:00:18

      Well, I wish there was a really truly objective service. Like, it would be wonderful if there was people that were dedicated to no editorial slant whatsoever, just 100% fact, this is, uh, how we know the facts regardless, left/right-

   10. MSMichael Shermer1:00:35

       Yeah.

   11. JRJoe Rogan1:00:35

       ... no ideological curve to it at all.

   12. MSMichael Shermer1:00:37

       (laughs)

   13. JRJoe Rogan1:00:38

       Wouldn't that be fan- that, there's gotta be a market to that.

   14. MSMichael Shermer1:00:41

       Yeah.

   15. JRJoe Rogan1:00:41

       Real news.

   16. MSMichael Shermer1:00:42

       Well, of course, they all say that that's what they do. (laughs)

   17. JRJoe Rogan1:00:44

       Yeah, but we know better. We know better.

   18. MSMichael Shermer1:00:45

       Yeah, yeah, yeah. PolitiFact is pretty good, they, they're the fact-checking-

   19. JRJoe Rogan1:00:48

       Mm-hmm.

   20. MSMichael Shermer1:00:48

       ... organization. They're, I mean, they're not reporting news, they're reporting on-

   21. JRJoe Rogan1:00:51

       Politics.

   22. MSMichael Shermer1:00:52

       ... uh, on the facts said by politicians and so on.

   23. JRJoe Rogan1:00:55

       Yes.

   24. MSMichael Shermer1:00:55

       So that's useful. And I, I think there's a market competition amongst those people to get more hits.

   25. JRJoe Rogan1:00:59

       Yeah.

   26. MSMichael Shermer1:00:59

       Like, we're fact-checking more than the other guys are fact-checking. Although there is two different... Uh, there was AMI, uh, Accuracy In Media and then there was another one, I forget the name, and one was left-leaning (laughs) and one was right-leaning. It's like, can I have one without a wing? You know?

   27. JRJoe Rogan1:01:13

       Yeah.

   28. MSMichael Shermer1:01:14

       No, no right wing, no left wing.

   29. JRJoe Rogan1:01:16

       Yeah. It, it seems like that, I mean, um, reading Jonathan Haidt's book, uh, the, there's the two books that, uh, I, I've been reading recently. Uh, one of them we discussed on the podcast we did on Monday, but the other one is The Coddling of the-

   30. MSMichael Shermer1:01:30

       American Mind.

Episode duration: 2:48:54