Joe Rogan Experience #1616 - Jamie Metzl

1. 0:00 – 15:00

   (drumming music plays) Joe Rogan podcast,…

   1. JMJamie Metzl0:00

      (drumming music plays) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out. The Joe Rogan Experience.

   2. JRJoe Rogan0:06

      Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day. (rock music plays) Okay, cool. What's up, Jamie? Good to see you, man.

   3. JMJamie Metzl0:16

      Hey, Joe, nice to see you again.

   4. JRJoe Rogan0:17

      Thanks for coming down here. Appreciate it.

   5. JMJamie Metzl0:18

      It's really my pleasure.

   6. JRJoe Rogan0:19

      And bringing your chocolate with you, again. (laughs)

   7. JMJamie Metzl0:20

      You know I always bring the chocolate, you gotta be ready.

   8. JRJoe Rogan0:22

      (laughs) Yeah, you're a, a legitimate chocolate fiend.

   9. JMJamie Metzl0:26

      I'm definitely a legitimate chocolate fiend.

   10. JRJoe Rogan0:27

       How much do you eat a day? How much chocolate do you eat a day?

   11. JMJamie Metzl0:29

       You know, I, I, every single morning I have hot chocolate and it takes about 45 minutes of preparation time, has about four different, uh, ingredients. So I start that and then I have some chocolate over the course of the day.

   12. JRJoe Rogan0:40

       45 minutes?

   13. JMJamie Metzl0:42

       Yeah, a lot of it is simmering, so it's not really fully active, but, it's, it's some active and some passive intervention.

   14. JRJoe Rogan0:48

       So is this a preparation that you do, like, uh, is it, does it prepare you for the day? Is it like-

   15. JMJamie Metzl0:54

       It just-

   16. JRJoe Rogan0:54

       ... a meditation thing?

   17. JMJamie Metzl0:55

       ... it's, uh, you know, it's probably some kind of morning ritual, but it-

   18. JRJoe Rogan0:59

       Mm-hmm.

   19. JMJamie Metzl0:59

       ... it's just, I don't know, it's very calming for me, and, uh, by the time, after this 45 minutes, it's like pudding. I mean it's like this thick, bubbling hot chocolate. It just, it brings me joy, I feel like everyone should start their day with joy.

   20. JRJoe Rogan1:10

       Well, there's some, like, positive qualities. And it's not just a good tasting thing, right? Like-

   21. JMJamie Metzl1:16

       Oh, yeah.

   22. JRJoe Rogan1:16

       ... chocolate, chocolate has some-

   23. JMJamie Metzl1:18

       Well, yeah, dark chocolate especially, has all kinds of very positive health benefits. I'm not saying that everyone should just eat chocolate bars all day and you're gonna live forever, but actually, the, the world, the woman who lived longest of everyone in recorded history ate two pounds of chocolate a week, Jeanne Calment in France. So, uh, at least, it's, it could help.

   24. JRJoe Rogan1:38

       Two pounds seems excessive, but-

   25. JMJamie Metzl1:40

       It's a lot, but she lived to 122.

   26. JRJoe Rogan1:42

       But, n- but chocolate's different in terms of like, some chocolate is like really sugar-

   27. JMJamie Metzl1:48

       Yeah.

   28. JRJoe Rogan1:48

       ... sugar-based.

   29. JMJamie Metzl1:48

       Yes.

   30. JRJoe Rogan1:49

       And some chocolate is more of like, uh, kinda ... I really like dark chocolate-
2. 15:00 – 30:00

   There's also an issue…

   1. JMJamie Metzl15:00

      in Wuhan, which is the only city in China with a level four virology institute, that has the world's largest collection of bat coronaviruses, that is doing gain-of-function research trying to make those viruses more virulent, particularly by making them, uh, more e- able to infect human cells? So it, it... In my mind, if you... if Patient Zero is just somebody who had an exposure to an animal, you have a... the mathematical odds of that person just showing up in, in Wuhan, um, would be actually kind of absurd.

   2. JRJoe Rogan15:38

      There's also an issue with the actual structure of the virus itself, right?

   3. JMJamie Metzl15:42

      Yes. Yeah. So, uh, well, this is a virus that is, um, ready-made for getting to humans. For the first SARS, we were able to track how it jumped. And you could see in, in retrospect how you could see it got closer and closer, and as it... as the, the virus mutated, it became more able, uh, to infect humans. This virus showed up fully able to infect humans. As in... uh, uh matter of fact, in the comparative studies of different animals, including humans, humans are the most susceptible to the SARS-CoV-2 virus. So somehow you have to explain how this virus shows up kind of seemingly out of nowhere in Wuhan, ready for action, ready to fully infect, uh, infect humans.

   4. JRJoe Rogan16:32

      Now, this level four virology lab, it's in Wuhan. What are they doing those studies for? Like-

   5. JMJamie Metzl16:38

      Yeah.

   6. JRJoe Rogan16:38

      ... what is the, the intent?

   7. JMJamie Metzl16:40

      Yeah, it's a really important question because there are a lot of people who are s- are saying things that I don't agree with that, "Oh, this is some kind of, uh-"

   8. JRJoe Rogan16:48

      Bioweapon, yeah.

   9. JMJamie Metzl16:48

      "... military bioweapon." And, and say what you want about Chinese government, they're not stupid. Um, and so for them, I, I truly believe, if you had to ask me what's the most likely story, um, I believe that they've recognized that these kinds of, um, pathogens are a big threat to humans, and, uh, that we're getting more and more. The frequency of these kinds of outbreaks is growing, and rather than being behind the curve and waiting for, uh, for some terrible outbreak, the idea was, well, can we predict how these viruses will evolve? Um, can we get ahead of the game in developing treatments and vaccines for what we think may be coming? And that's what this, this gain-of-function research is about. And so we know, um, that the Chinese government... uh, the, the... I'm sorry, the Wuhan Institute of Virology was doing this kind of gain-of-function research. Some of it is actually funded, um, with United States government money through the NIH, and I know you'll get a lot of action in the Twittersphere on, on this, but... Um, so we know, and I, and I tr- truly believe that there was w-... well-intentioned work trying to develop vaccines and treatments, trying to understand how the most dangerous pathogens might, uh, might develop. And if my hypothesis, uh, is, is true, I think that's... there was an accident. And there's a whole history of people who were warning, saying, "Well, we're trying to, um, prevent some kind of future threat, but in our effort to prevent it, we're actually increasing the likelihood of it happening."

   10. JRJoe Rogan18:20

       Wasn't that lab cited in 2018 for safety violations as well?

   11. JMJamie Metzl18:23

       Yes. Yeah, so the US Embassy, uh, sent a, a, a small delegation. They visited the lab, uh, and then there was, there were two cables about this saying, "Hey, this is really dangerous. They're doing experimentation with these dangerous coronaviruses, um, and their safety protocols aren't up to snuff." So there was a lot of warning and a lot of fear.

   12. JRJoe Rogan18:45

       Ugh. Um, ha- have any of the people that were initially skeptical or pushing back against the idea that it came from this level four lab, are they coming around or are they still-

   13. JMJamie Metzl18:57

       Yeah.

   14. JRJoe Rogan18:57

       ... digging their heels in?

   15. JMJamie Metzl18:58

       So some are, are, are coming around. And, um, so certainly there are people like, uh, like Matt Ridley, who's a member of the House of Lords in the, in the UK, a, a kind of very well-known science communicator, he was firmly on the other side, and now he's started to be more open and actually has been quite, uh, quite vocal.

   16. JRJoe Rogan19:18

       What was his motivation for being on the other side? Did he-

   17. JMJamie Metzl19:21

       Yeah, I think that in the beg- there, uh, it's a really interesting story because in the earliest days of the pandemic, there was a concerted effort by a relatively small number of high profile, uh, scientists, virologists, who recognized, um, that if the story was that this came from a series of what are called zoonotic jumps between animal hosts in, in the wild, that was going to lead to kind of a positive outcome where we'd say, "Hey, let's be very mindful of our encroachment into wild spaces, climate change, all those things that we should be very mindful of." But they were, I think, probably worried, um, that if this story became dominant of an accidental lab leak, I mean, that would have huge im- implications for all of the research that people are doing, and, and a lot of it is, is very well intentioned. So early last year, um, there was a process where a series of, uh, of scientists did two things. One, they came out with a letter in the, in the British, uh, medical journal, The Lancet, which we've subsequently learned was highly manipulated by a small number of people who may have had vested interests, and there was a, a academic paper in a journal called Nature Communications, and both made the case, "Oh, this isn't a lab leak." And then there was a concerted effort to label anybody else as a conspiracy theorist. And so I, I kind of spent last year in that uncomfortable space. I mean, I'm, I, I don't live my life as a conspiracy theorist. I try to be data-driven in everything that I do, but I really felt (clears throat) that this was a very real possibility and it deserved a full investigation. And it was only in the beginning of this year, uh, 2021, that that started to turn. I know I had... Uh, I wrote some things, uh, uh, someone named Nick- Nicholson Baker, he had a great piece in New York Magazine. Um, the Wall Street Journal did a great job, um, covering this. And so the s- the space was starting to, to open up. Then they had that, really, in my mind, ill-fated press event in Wuhan where it was this independent committee and the Chinese government, and they said, "Don't investigate lab leak, investigate the frozen food hypothesis." And then in every newspaper around the world, the headline was, "World Health Organization," um, "says, uh, don't... lab leak is not, is not possible," essentially. And so I immediately sent messages to my, my friends, uh, at the World Health Organization and saying, "Look, you're... this is being misreported. The World Health Organization hasn't said this. Uh, and, uh, it... the, the position of the WHO must be, we have to investigate all hypotheses." And I was very pleased that three days later, so the press event was on a Tuesday, that Friday, uh, Tedros Adhanom, who's the director-general, he then, uh, said in a press event that, "We believe that every hypothesis needs to be investigated," which implicitly meant the lab leak hypothesis. And then our letter, uh, came out, uh, which was just, uh, just last week. I mean, it, it feels... uh, it's been such a whirlwind since then, and that's been picked up in newspapers all around the world. So now I feel like there is an opening and I hope that we can continue. And the goal, in my mind, isn't to prove. Like I don't, I don't feel like I need to... I mean, if it's provable, I'd love to prove it, but the... is not to prove that, right at this point, that it is a lab leak or isn't. But we at least need to have the most thorough, unrestricted, unpoliticized investigation into what happened with access to all the lab records, all the samples. There, there's tons of scientists in China who were working on these issues. Very, very few of them have been interviewed. We don't have access to them. And frankly, I think a lot of them are afraid that if they speak up, uh, they'll be imprisoned or worse.

   18. JRJoe Rogan23:13

       Yeah, that is the problem, right? The, the people that were initially very vocal, um, and, uh, biased towards the idea that it wasn't a lab leak, and you said they were highly motivated and they-

   19. JMJamie Metzl23:26

       Yeah.

   20. JRJoe Rogan23:26

       ... they labeled all the folks a conspiracy theorist. What, what was motivating them?

   21. JMJamie Metzl23:31

       Yeah. So this... it's a really tricky point. And, and so there's been a lot of controversy, uh, g- uh, around a guy named Peter Daszak. And Peter is an interesting figure because if you had asked me, uh, a year ago, a year and a half ago, "Who are the people who you respect most in the field of virology?" He would be really at the top of my list. He was one of the heroes of understanding where the first SARS came from. He has a, an organization called EcoHealth Alliance that was really trying to get a- ahead of the curve on understanding these, uh, these pathogens. But he also, through EcoHealth Alliance, was a funder of the Wuhan Institute of Virology, specifically the gain-of-function research that was being done there. And I, I, and I truly believe it wasn't anything nefarious. It was... the idea was, well, if we're, if we want to understand dangerous pathogens, we have to do it-... in the place where those dangerous pathogens are. Then under the Obama administration, there was a moratorium on this kind of- of- of gain of function research. Um, and then it was lifted in the Trump administration. So, that's one- one piece of it. And so for Peter, I understand that his whole experience of his life has been, "Well, this is where these kinds of outbreaks come from." Um, and- but this could be just a very different story. And- and for me personally, that's- I think one of the reasons why I was able to see this a little earlier perhaps than other people, is that, you know, part of- a big chunk of my life has been in the world of science, but another big chunk of my life has been in the world of understanding China. And so I think if you're just in the world of science, you don't understand China, you think, "Well, the Chinese government says that this isn't from a lab leak. It must not be from a lab leak." But I know they did... The Chinese government, they've totally suppressed the entire basically history of Mao and all the pe- millions of people who died under Mao. When they got their speed trains, uh, going, the first train had this terrible crash, and they just buried the whole train and- and pretended like it- it never happened until there was an outcry and they had to- they had to- to dig it up. So, I- I feel like I understood a little bit more about the pathology of the- uh, of the Chinese government. So, but coming back, I think there were people in the kind of more traditional virology world who felt like we're gonna open up a whole can of worms if we say, "Well, maybe it was a zoonotic jump and maybe it was- it was a lab leak."

   22. JRJoe Rogan26:01

       So, this one guy and his influence shaped the way the entire world was addressing this outbreak?

   23. JMJamie Metzl26:10

       I wouldn't say it's one guy, but it was, I think, a relatively small number of people, um, because they certainly... That- the, uh, The Lancet letter, and it was all kinds of big luminaries who signed it, that really shaped things. Um, and so definitely if- if the story in the beginning had been maybe this comes from a zoonotic jump, maybe it comes from a lab leak, we need to look at both options, or, um... I think that would have been a much healthier place because there would have been more pressure on China. So, it wasn't just one guy, but Peter certainly was- was very influential. And then in spite of this, uh, conflict of interest, he's actually was selected as a member of this World Health Organization Independent Advisory Committee. So, one of the- the people who went on this mission to China was Peter. He also, uh, is the chairman of The Lancet, the same, uh, British journal that I mentioned. They have a- a study- uh, study group. He's the chairman of that. And I'm not saying he's doing anything wrong, I'm just saying if you have that kind of conflict of interest, you shouldn't be in those kinds of roles.

   24. JRJoe Rogan27:20

       It's just always so disturbing to someone like me who's a non-scientist, who relies on scientists to be unbiased and to just look at the data, when you find out that things are being influenced by very human factors, like ego-

   25. JMJamie Metzl27:35

       (clears throat)

   26. JRJoe Rogan27:36

       ... and-

   27. JMJamie Metzl27:36

       Yeah.

   28. JRJoe Rogan27:36

       ... financial gain and relationships with foreign powers and laboratories that they're involved with.

   29. JMJamie Metzl27:44

       Yeah.

   30. JRJoe Rogan27:44

       And that scares the shit out of me.
3. 30:00 – 45:00

   Well, it has started…

   1. JMJamie Metzl30:00

      to make, to legitimate claims about the origins. And so there was this weird thing that's- that's lasted for a year, and our hope is, and we're starting to see that our letter, um, has opened up some space where we can have a real honest conversation about let's- let's look deeply into all the possibilities and try to get to the right answer.

   2. JRJoe Rogan30:20

      Well, it has started to be discussed mainstream, like Newsweek had the cover-

   3. JMJamie Metzl30:24

      Right.

   4. JRJoe Rogan30:24

      ... where it talked about the lab leak hypothesis, and people are talking about it more often. Uh, Bret Weinstein, who was very vocal about it very early on.

   5. JMJamie Metzl30:32

      Yeah.

   6. JRJoe Rogan30:32

      And Heather Heying were just on Bill Maher talking about-

   7. JMJamie Metzl30:34

      I loved it.

   8. JRJoe Rogan30:35

      Yeah.

   9. JMJamie Metzl30:35

      It- it was great. I mean, I thought that was a fantastic interview, and that's why I'm so happy to be here with you, Joe, because, you know, it's one thing where people have, like, a gut feeling, like, "Oh, I don't trust China. I feel it was a- a- a lab leak," or, "I've- I want to protect the environment. I feel like, well, this is the kind of thing of nature fighting back." And we don't know, but we have to- we have to follow the data and- and be fearless in- in asking tough questions.

   10. JRJoe Rogan30:59

       Yeah, that's, uh, a problem that we have with our culture today, is that we've fallen into this very strange situation where we really have two sides of America.

   11. JMJamie Metzl31:09

       Yeah.

   12. JRJoe Rogan31:09

       We have a- a left side and a right side, and I don't understand how it happened this- this abruptly, where it- it- it even...... has an, an influence on the way we view this pandemic. We- it has an inf- uh, way we influence, uh, th- it has an influence on the way we look at scientific inquiry. Like, people-

   13. JMJamie Metzl31:29

       Yeah.

   14. JRJoe Rogan31:29

       ... don't want certain results because those results would somehow or another solidify this political party that's, you know, so polarizing-

   15. JMJamie Metzl31:41

       Yeah.

   16. JRJoe Rogan31:41

       ... or would go against this other party that is to the- more of to their liking. And it's, it's just-

   17. JMJamie Metzl31:47

       Yeah.

   18. JRJoe Rogan31:47

       ... such a strange situation to be. Again, as a non-scientist-

   19. JMJamie Metzl31:50

       Yeah.

   20. JRJoe Rogan31:50

       ... someone who relies on scientists to figure things out, to go, "Hey, what the fuck is going on?" Like-

   21. JMJamie Metzl31:55

       Yeah.

   22. JRJoe Rogan31:55

       ... why, wh-, wh-, why is this politics? We're talking about a pandemic. Like, you, we've gotta know what this is and how to fight it and where it came from. And if you think it's just jumping from animal to, to human that quickly, how, how often can this happen? Can this happen with other ones? Like, this is not a normal thing. It's usually they can trace it.

   23. JMJamie Metzl32:13

       Yeah, yeah, so, um, two great points. One, it really, it, it can happen. It's happening with more frequency of, uh, viruses going from, let's say, bats through intermediate hosts to humans. We've seen it with hantavirus and nipah virus and, and, and other viruses. That's real. But it's really unfortunate. Exactly what you're describing is that people, we live in these kind of, of information cul-de-sacs, where we just-

   24. JRJoe Rogan32:38

       Yeah.

   25. JMJamie Metzl32:38

       ... are stuck. And it, it seems to me, we should just say, "Well, let's try to be open-minded." And that doesn't mean we don't have views. We, we all exist on some kinda spectrum, kind of for everything. But if we're just stuck there and we can't even look, we can't even hear what other people are, are saying, we're gonna drive ourselves to, to, not just to ignorance, but terrible decisions.

   26. JRJoe Rogan32:59

       We just have such a tendency to buy the narratives. And I think now more than ever because there's almost, not almost, there's too much information out there to pay attention to everything.

   27. JMJamie Metzl33:08

       Yeah.

   28. JRJoe Rogan33:08

       So, we find the information that fits our narrative. We lock into it, we hold onto it, and then we just stick with it and argue, uh, against anything that opposes it.

   29. JMJamie Metzl33:18

       It's exactly... And I, and I've s- I'm mindful of it because, especially with, with all of the, this conversation about the origins of the pandemic, I'm now on Twitter more than I was before all of this, because there's a lot that's-

   30. JRJoe Rogan33:32

       Terrible place, isn't it?
4. 45:00 – 1:00:00

   Yeah. …

   1. JMJamie Metzl45:00

      whether you agree or disagree, and I agreed with a lot of, of what he did, you think like he's... There's a process that I trust. And, and I think that's... I think we've just gone through this ex- experience where, um, m- many of us just didn't trust the process. It felt chaotic.

   2. JRJoe Rogan45:18

      Yeah.

   3. JMJamie Metzl45:18

      I didn't feel safe.

   4. JRJoe Rogan45:19

      But, uh, uh, to get back to my point, data, it, we, we have to be able to look at these situations like the, the pandemic outbreak, and look at it and not, not be, not have rhetoric, not have these polarizing conversations, not have a vested interest-

   5. JMJamie Metzl45:37

      Right.

   6. JRJoe Rogan45:37

      ... in it being one way or the other. It has to be just looking at it and a- a- analyzing it, and experts looking strictly at the evidence.

   7. JMJamie Metzl45:47

      Yeah.

   8. JRJoe Rogan45:47

      And discussing the evidence without any bias, without any, uh, uh, without, without a need for one conclusion or the other to be true.

   9. JMJamie Metzl45:56

      Yeah, exactly.

   10. JRJoe Rogan45:57

       And that's... I don't feel that that has been the case.

   11. JMJamie Metzl45:59

       Yeah.

   12. JRJoe Rogan45:59

       There's been so many articles. I mean, there was an article written about Brett Weinstein after he came on my podcast about how I was having this guy on to, uh, promote this conspiracy theory-

   13. JMJamie Metzl46:08

       Yeah.

   14. JRJoe Rogan46:08

       ... that's been widely debunked.

   15. JMJamie Metzl46:10

       Yeah.

   16. JRJoe Rogan46:10

       And I remember reading that, and there was no data in that article.

   17. JMJamie Metzl46:14

       Yeah.

   18. JRJoe Rogan46:14

       But it was, it was basically a smear article about-

   19. JMJamie Metzl46:17

       Yeah. And you're, and you're gonna get it after this podcast. You'll, you'll get it more, and I guarantee you people, uh-

   20. JRJoe Rogan46:22

       I think less.

   21. JMJamie Metzl46:23

       Well, I hope so. And I, and I-

   22. JRJoe Rogan46:23

       I think the tide's turned on that theory.

   23. JMJamie Metzl46:25

       But, but I think that even in the response to our letter, I mean, we've had... The media response has, has been great, but there are a lot of people who've been saying, "Well, there are more prominent scientists who are saying that the, the zoonotic theory is, is more likely." And my feeling is they may even be right, and I welcome the conversation, but we have to have the conversation.

   24. JRJoe Rogan46:44

       You have to have the conversation. So is there a possibility of getting those prominent scientists that do have this opinion and matching them up with prominent scientists that believe the lab leak hypothesis and having some sort of, uh, a- an actual scientific debate?

   25. JMJamie Metzl47:00

       Yeah. So it's funny that you, uh, mention that because there was a private thing, um, that I will now make, uh, public (laughs) in our, in our conversation. So, um, I sent a note, uh, a few days ago to Peter Ben Embarek, who is, uh, the person who, who leads the, uh, the World Health Organization Organized Independent Advisory Committee. And what I said to Peter in that note, and I haven't yet heard back, but I imagine I will now, um, I said, "Why don't we have a private virt- uh, Zoom dialogue between the members of your committee and the signatories of our open letter, and let's just have this, this conversation?" And I think that's the, the kind of thing that we need, uh, that we need to do, and I, I hope it's possible. Certainly in writing this letter, our goal wasn't to shut down conversation, but to open space for it.

   26. JRJoe Rogan47:51

       Well, that's best case scenario.

   27. JMJamie Metzl47:53

       Yeah.

   28. JRJoe Rogan47:53

       Best case scenario is scientific inquiry is, you know, is supported. And this becomes something w- we could all look at-

   29. JMJamie Metzl48:02

       Yeah.

   30. JRJoe Rogan48:02

       ... and say, "Okay, these guys are acting rationally now, and let's figure out where this came from." And how does it stop?
5. 1:00:00 – 1:15:00

   Yeah. Yeah, I mean,…

   1. JRJoe Rogan1:00:00

      they'll have such a massive advantage that the gaps between the haves and the have-nots will, will grow ever wider.

   2. JMJamie Metzl1:00:05

      Yeah. Yeah, I mean, that, that's a real possibility.

   3. JRJoe Rogan1:00:08

      Here it is. China promotes education, education drive-

   4. JMJamie Metzl1:00:11

      Yeah. (laughs)

   5. JRJoe Rogan1:00:11

      ... to make boys more manly.

   6. JMJamie Metzl1:00:12

      Yeah.

   7. JRJoe Rogan1:00:12

      So you see these boys-

   8. JMJamie Metzl1:00:13

      Yeah.

   9. JRJoe Rogan1:00:14

      ... what are they doing there?

   10. JMJamie Metzl1:00:15

       Let's see. I don't know if that, um-

   11. JRJoe Rogan1:00:16

       Punching sand?

   12. JMJamie Metzl1:00:16

       Oh, that's hilarious. Yeah, I don't think that has anything to do with genetics.

   13. JRJoe Rogan1:00:19

       Press send?

   14. JMJamie Metzl1:00:19

       But it seems like whatever they're doing...

   15. JRJoe Rogan1:00:22

       They're flexing.

   16. JMJamie Metzl1:00:23

       Yeah.

   17. JRJoe Rogan1:00:23

       That guy's, the middle guy's got some good chest muscles.

   18. JMJamie Metzl1:00:26

       Yeah.

   19. JRJoe Rogan1:00:26

       What does it say here? Uh, while, Chinese government, what does it say?

   20. JMJamie Metzl1:00:29

       Oh.

   21. JRJoe Rogan1:00:29

       Uh, promote, oh, the pro- proposal to prevent the feminization of male adolescents.

   22. JMJamie Metzl1:00:35

       Yeah. I guess they don't want Chinese men to become too metro.

   23. JRJoe Rogan1:00:38

       Hmm. Well, is metro feminization? I thought metro was just style.

   24. JMJamie Metzl1:00:42

       I, that's what I think, but I don't know.

   25. JRJoe Rogan1:00:43

       Feminization seems like-

   26. JMJamie Metzl1:00:45

       Yeah.

   27. JRJoe Rogan1:00:45

       ... a different-

   28. JMJamie Metzl1:00:46

       Yeah.

   29. JRJoe Rogan1:00:46

       ... different take.

   30. JMJamie Metzl1:00:47

       It's, yeah. So I don't, this is, I don't think this is genetics. I think it's, uh, it's culture and-
6. 1:15:00 – 1:20:46

   Right. …

   1. JRJoe Rogan1:15:00

      of athletics. I mean, we already know that countries manipulate people's bodies in order to win the-

   2. JMJamie Metzl1:15:05

      Right.

   3. JRJoe Rogan1:15:05

      ... Olympics.

   4. JMJamie Metzl1:15:05

      Yeah.

   5. JRJoe Rogan1:15:06

      Have you seen the documentary, Icarus? Have you seen that?

   6. JMJamie Metzl1:15:08

      Yeah, yeah.

   7. JRJoe Rogan1:15:08

      It's amazing, right?

   8. JMJamie Metzl1:15:09

      Yeah.

   9. JRJoe Rogan1:15:09

      Well, we know Russia will go balls to the wall-

   10. JMJamie Metzl1:15:12

       Yep.

   11. JRJoe Rogan1:15:12

       ... to try to win the Olympics.

   12. JMJamie Metzl1:15:14

       Yeah.

   13. JRJoe Rogan1:15:14

       Uh, they did, and they got caught, and they've been eliminated from the Olympics because-

   14. JMJamie Metzl1:15:18

       Yeah, well, they're clawing, they're clawing-

   15. JRJoe Rogan1:15:19

       Yeah.

   16. JMJamie Metzl1:15:19

       ... their way. So, it's exactly right. In my, in my book, Hacking Darwin, I have a whole chapter on this, which is called The Arms Race of the Human Race, and I play out some of those scenarios. So, imagine you are a country that your population has decided, "You know, this stuff, it's too scary. Uh, this, this feels like we're playing God. It's ethically, uh, uncomfortable," and there's another country that has made a different decision. And let's just say that you start to see evidence, and maybe it won't work. I mean, maybe you just do nothing, and it turns out that these guys are taking too big of a risk, a- and then they've got some kind of big problem. Or maybe it actually starts, uh, starts to work. So, then what do you do? Do you just say, "All right, we're sticking to our guns, and we recognize that maybe we'll be less competitive than them in the future, and that's a price that we're willing to pay"? Or do you try to stop them? And maybe you can, maybe you can't. If it's a big, powerful country, you, you probably can't. Um, and if you can't stop them, and you don't wanna pay the pri- price of not doing it, um, m- do you feel that you have to match them? And, and just like in the Olympics, I mean, there are different societies that make different decisions of how they're going to do Olympics. Some say, "Well, just gonna let a bunch of kids play sports, and the best ones will emerge." Some say, "We're gonna measure all these kids and test them when they're five years old and put them..." And then we have a way of measuring those outcomes, which is gold medals, and it's a, and, and maybe it's the case that these different collections of societal decisions will lead to different outcomes. I mean, there's no, there's nothing that's set in stone of why we, in the United States, have a higher standard of living than people in Venezuela or whatever. But if there's, like, a lot of little decisions that add up to these things called national competitiveness, and the application of revolutionary science is one of them.

   17. JRJoe Rogan1:17:11

       The, the concern for a lot of people is that we're going to get to some situation where, in order to become more competitive, people are going to do things that are very questionable or very unethical, and ultimately very dangerous.

   18. JMJamie Metzl1:17:30

       Yeah.

   19. JRJoe Rogan1:17:30

       Right? Isn't that, that, that is the question?

   20. JMJamie Metzl1:17:31

       Yeah. I mean, we're, we're already seeing it. I don't know, uh, there's a guy named Josiah Zayner who's become kind of infamous for these do it yourself experiments on himself and, and-

   21. JRJoe Rogan1:17:41

       What is he doing?

   22. JMJamie Metzl1:17:42

       It's, it's, it's, like, um, these ge- uh, quote unquote genome ed-, DIY biology, giving people the tools to try to do gene therapies on themselves, fully on-

   23. JRJoe Rogan1:17:53

       He does it on himself?

   24. JMJamie Metzl1:17:53

       He does it on himself. And, uh-

   25. JRJoe Rogan1:17:54

       Like, what kind of therapies is he doing?

   26. JMJamie Metzl1:17:56

       Yeah, I think that, that, so he, he's done some, he injected himself at a science conf- there's a whole, uh, series on HBO called Unnatural Selection-

   27. JRJoe Rogan1:18:04

       Mm-hmm.

   28. JMJamie Metzl1:18:04

       ... which is all about this, uh, about this kind of stuff. And so, yeah, so we are going... Yep, here it is.

   29. JRJoe Rogan1:18:10

       Is that him?

   30. JMJamie Metzl1:18:10

       Yeah.

Episode duration: 2:51:26