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Ari Shaffir on Joe Rogan: Why Mushrooms Beat the Algorithm

Seven months offline and a key psilocybin trip shaped his show The End; Ari argues those months proved nature restores what the algorithm steadily drains.

Ari ShaffirguestJoe Roganhost
Apr 30, 20262h 35mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

  1. 0:00 – 0:02

    Intro

    1. SP

      [upbeat music]

  2. 0:02 – 1:02

    Ari “the Wanderer” returns: disappearing for seven months

    1. SP

      Joe Rogan Podcast, check it out.

    2. AS

      The Joe Rogan Experience.

    3. SP

      Train by day, Joe Rogan Podcast by night. All day. [upbeat music]

    4. JR

      You know what you are on my phone?

    5. AS

      What?

    6. JR

      Ari the Wanderer.

    7. AS

      [laughs] That's a new phone number.

    8. JR

      [laughs]

    9. AS

      [laughs] That's not bad.

    10. JR

      That's the, that's the new number. 'Cause that's what you are. Oh, well, I was telling you last night that I, I thought it was in Mexico City, but we had a, a report that you were at an Oasis concert in Mexico City.

    11. AS

      [laughs]

    12. JR

      And you said no, it was in Rio.

    13. AS

      SaO Paulo.

    14. JR

      Oh, Sao Paulo?

    15. AS

      Yeah, yeah.

    16. JR

      Okay, so it was in Brazil.

    17. AS

      [laughs]

    18. JR

      So we, no one knew where you were. You were gone for how many months? Six?

    19. AS

      Seven.

    20. JR

      Jesus Christ.

    21. AS

      About seven months. Yeah.

    22. JR

      How many times have you done that now?

    23. AS

      [exhales] I guess three, although when I went to Ecuador, I was very much in touch with everybody.

    24. JR

      Mm.

    25. AS

      So it was like-

    26. JR

      That was a halfway.

    27. AS

      That was a halfway.

    28. JR

      But you were there, you were kinda checked out, but you were in touch.

    29. AS

      I was gone for six months, but I was, I was in touch.

    30. JR

      Yeah.

  3. 1:02 – 4:28

    Pandemic boredom and the Ian Fidance glory-hole conversation

    1. AS

      Doing 'em remotely, yeah. I would do one with, uh, Big Jay and Soda. We did a 21 Jump Street breakdown podcast.

    2. JR

      [laughs]

    3. AS

      [laughs] Called, like... Yeah. Yeah.

    4. JR

      Oh.

    5. AS

      We were so bored during the pandemic, we were like-

    6. JR

      Ugh

    7. AS

      ... "Let's find a show and just, let's get together."

    8. JR

      And watched 21 Jump Street. [laughs]

    9. AS

      First we chose Sex and the City, and then found out gay fucking Ian already had a Sex and the City podcast. Um, so like-

    10. JR

      Ian Hyland?

    11. AS

      Yeah.

    12. JR

      Did he really?

    13. AS

      Dude, that guy blows dudes. Obviously he loves Sex and the City.

    14. JR

      Well, I guess so.

    15. AS

      So we're like, "We don't wanna step on his toes." Like, "Let's pick another..."

    16. JR

      He seems like he's straight sometimes.

    17. AS

      He does.

    18. JR

      It's weird.

    19. AS

      Mm-hmm.

    20. JR

      Like, is he only gay?

    21. AS

      No. No. He fucks, he fucks better than we ever did. For women.

    22. JR

      Women?

    23. AS

      Yeah.

    24. JR

      Okay.

    25. AS

      He gets it.

    26. JR

      So, and then, but then he went to guys somewhere along-

    27. AS

      He's a new breed. He's a new breed of just, like...

    28. JR

      When did he go to guys? Is that a new thing?

    29. AS

      I think he battled with it for a while.

    30. JR

      Oh, okay. So he was fucking girls, but hating them? God, I wish I were a guy.

  4. 4:28 – 5:53

    Yerba mate rituals and Willie Nelson’s weed drink

    1. JR

      What is that, that gay tea you drink?

    2. AS

      Mate?

    3. JR

      Sher-

    4. AS

      Sher- yerba?

    5. JR

      [laughs] See, you just got into this... It's literally a jar of hay-

    6. AS

      It really is

    7. JR

      ... that you pour hot water in. There's so much hay in there.

    8. AS

      It's so much. It tastes... You tried it.

    9. JR

      Yeah.

    10. AS

      Yeah. It tastes like just-

    11. JR

      Like hay

    12. AS

      ... kind of ass. Yeah, just hay.

    13. JR

      It... I don't understand.

    14. AS

      It's like a ritual.

    15. JR

      Yeah?

    16. AS

      It's all the gauchos in Argentina and then spread to Chile and southern Argentina, southern Brazil.

    17. JR

      And so it's just a bunch of leaves that are in a-

    18. AS

      The yerba tree.

    19. JR

      Yerba mate, right?

    20. AS

      Yeah. But that, that drink is, like different.

    21. JR

      I've had that stuff.

    22. AS

      I think that's different.

    23. JR

      Really?

    24. AS

      Yeah, I think it's as about as much as, like what Willie Nelson's, like drink is actually weed.

    25. JR

      Oh, Willie Nelson's drink is weed.

    26. AS

      Really?

    27. JR

      Oh, yeah.

    28. AS

      I take it back then.

    29. JR

      Oh, yeah.

    30. AS

      Wow.

  5. 5:53 – 8:49

    Unregulated edible era: Fear Factor, BART under the bay, and psychedelic paranoia

    1. JR

      Yeah. I remember one time, um, I was doing Fear Factor in, we were in San Francisco. And, uh, back, this is the unregulated edibles days. You know, 'cause this is before marijuana was legal-

    2. AS

      Do your joke

    3. JR

      ... but you could get a prescription.

    4. AS

      Do your joke. Can I do your joke?

    5. JR

      Which one?

    6. AS

      The X.

    7. JR

      Oh, yeah

    8. AS

      [laughs] I'll do it. You'll be embarrassed.

    9. JR

      Okay, yeah. [laughs]

    10. AS

      He goes ... This is early days. And by the way, it was just like, there's banana bread, uh, going around now.

    11. JR

      Right

    12. AS

      It's killing people, it's great.

    13. JR

      [laughs]

    14. AS

      Not killing people, but like destroying people.

    15. JR

      Yeah.

    16. AS

      He goes, "They came in these doses, 1X, 2X or 3X. The problem is, X didn't equal any number."

    17. JR

      Yeah. [laughs]

    18. AS

      So it was just some guy mixing up his bathtub full of fucking whatever, like weed infused cookie dough-

    19. JR

      Oh

    20. AS

      ... and deciding what's X to him. That's not a mathematical equation.

    21. JR

      Yeah, X had no number value.

    22. AS

      [laughs] So it's one times this. What's this, right?

    23. JR

      Yeah. Well, there's ... I had the joke too about the gummy bear. The guy literally said that to me. I go, "How much should I take?" He goes, "Just a leg."

    24. AS

      Los Gatos or Mountain?

    25. JR

      I go ... Yeah.

    26. AS

      [laughs]

    27. JR

      I go, "Just the leg?"

    28. AS

      [laughs]

    29. JR

      I go, "Why the fuck are you selling whole bears if I should only eat a leg?" 'Cause it's only that big. Like-

    30. AS

      Yeah

  6. 8:49 – 11:35

    Seeing through people on drugs: the jiu-jitsu rapist story and “soul vision”

    1. JR

      I remember a guy I did jujitsu with, he made pills. He made THC pills. 'Cause he was like one of those all day guys. He was just high constantly all the time.

    2. AS

      Dab.

    3. JR

      And, and so ... Yeah, the dab guys. But this is pre-dabs.

    4. AS

      Yeah.

    5. JR

      And so this guy made pills, THC pills. I, I, I go, "How much should you take?" And he, and he goes, "You should probably start off with one, but I take two." So I took two, 'cause I'm an asshole, and, uh, I wind up having this conversation with this guy, uh, and he was weirding me out.

    6. AS

      [laughs]

    7. JR

      It was at a jujitsu tournament. I was like, "Why is this guy so weird?"

    8. AS

      Super soul.

    9. JR

      Well, it turns out the dude, uh, eventually got arrested for rape. And not just arrested for rape, but he was on the run.

    10. AS

      Whoa.

    11. JR

      And he was on the run and couldn't stop doing jujitsu. And the way they caught him was he went to like Seattle or somewhere, like 'cause this was in California.

    12. AS

      He signed up for classes?

    13. JR

      And he was just rolling, but he was killing everybody. And everyone was like, "Who is this fucking guy?" Like, "Why is this guy so good?" And then eventually they realized it was him, and they go, "Oh my God, this guy's wanted for rape."

    14. AS

      Wow.

    15. JR

      He was a crazy person. And when I was like super high on these pills, I could see all the crazy in his eyes. I could s- ... Look, he didn't say anything crazy.

    16. AS

      Dude, you can.

    17. JR

      It was a normal-

    18. AS

      When you're on drugs, you can see through people.

    19. JR

      Yes. You can. You can. You can see their soul.

    20. AS

      It's fu- it's, it's interesting.

    21. JR

      It is interesting.

    22. AS

      You really can see it.

    23. JR

      Yeah.

    24. AS

      It's not one of those where I'm like, "No, it was just the drug fucking with me." You can tell.

    25. JR

      And so w- this was like-

    26. AS

      If someone's happy or sad or

    27. JR

      ... a year or so later, he gets arrested and winds up fleeing. I think he maybe was out on bail or he was wanted and fleed and went to the Pacific Northwest. But I remember when I heard the story, I was like, "Oh, that makes sense." 'Cause he had the weirdest energy, just like this dark energy, like creepy dark energy.

    28. AS

      Sometimes if you're on like a psychedelic and then someone's not on with you, you know?

    29. JR

      Yeah.

    30. AS

      But they're around you, you, you're like, "Hey, you gotta go. You're freaking me out."

  7. 11:35 – 18:04

    Psychedelics in politics: MAPS, FDA risk, Texas ibogaine funding, and Nixon’s legacy

    1. JR

      Yeah. I don't ... I wonder what's gonna happen n- now that this, uh, thing happened at the White House.

    2. AS

      I thought ... First of all, I thought, you know, I'm out on the news, so I'm hearing stuff little by little about everything.

    3. JR

      Yeah.

    4. AS

      I thought it was just ibogaine, which is like great. Those people need that. And then, and then, I mean, Ed Clay's been telling me about that for so long.

    5. JR

      Well, Ed Clay, I talked about him on the podcast.

    6. AS

      Oh.

    7. JR

      'Cause he was one of the ways that I found out about it.

    8. AS

      Me too.

    9. JR

      Yeah.

    10. AS

      In Nashville?

    11. JR

      Yeah, yeah. Nashville.

    12. AS

      Yeah, right.

    13. JR

      That's him.

    14. AS

      And he would tell you, he's like-

    15. JR

      Mm-hmm

    16. AS

      ... "You should get on it. It helps with addiction." I'm like, "I'm loving-

    17. JR

      Yeah

    18. AS

      ... what I'm doing right now. I don't [laughs] I don't wanna get on it." But-

    19. JR

      Yeah, I need to fuck up my high. [laughs]

    20. AS

      But like, uh, I'm like, "This makes sense." And then ... Oh, fine. Great. You got that ... And then I find out it's alsoI mean, the best hippie flip.

    21. JR

      Yeah.

    22. AS

      You, you got that MDMA, and boomers, and shrooms

    23. JR

      And psilocybin. Yeah. Well, it's because MDMA and psilocybin, MAPS was already doing MDMA studies with, uh, veterans. So for people that, you know, watched a bunch of people get blown up, and lost their friends, and come back, MDMA was one of the best therapies-

    24. AS

      Yeah

    25. JR

      ... for helping them overcome PTSD. So MAPS had already pushed that through, and Johns Hopkins had already done these studies with psilocybin. So they already pushed these things, and they were already on the way to getting approval through the FDA, but the problem was nobody wants to stick their neck out and sign off on it.

    26. AS

      It's a problem with, with politics. If you're running, we talked about this, if you're running for an office and the opponent can say, "He wants drugs legalized"-

    27. JR

      Right

    28. AS

      ... then you're fucked.

    29. JR

      Right.

    30. AS

      So it's like it really binds your hands.

  8. 18:04 – 20:06

    AG1 ad break and the case for legal access to mushrooms

    1. JR

      I don't know about you guys, but with spring here, I am ready to go outside. There's so much to do now that things are warming up, like getting your garden ready for the growing season, cleaning off your camping gear, or even taking a quick jaunt around the neighborhood. Anything to get outside.But that also means you're probably extra busy this time of year. That's where AG1 comes in, a healthy daily drink that helps support you all day long. One scoop of AG1 supports immune health, energy, digestion, and more. Plus, AG1 can replace all those multivitamins and probiotics crowding up your cabinet. See for yourself how making AG1 a part of your routine can help you stay on top of everything going on this season. Visit drinkag1.com/joerogan, and for a limited time, get a bottle of Omega-3, vitamin D3, K2, and an AG1 flavor sampler for free in your welcome kit with your first subscription. That's $111 value at drinkag1.com/joerogan.

    2. AS

      [laughs]

    3. JR

      [laughs] Fuck, fuck off with all your rules.

    4. AS

      That's, that's a good ringtone.

    5. JR

      But it's because-

    6. AS

      Fuck off

    7. JR

      ... they've spent so much money and so much time and so much effort trying to get this stuff passed through.

    8. AS

      It would be so huge if you could just go get some mushrooms.

    9. JR

      Oh, it'd be so huge. And why can't you if you can go to Costco and just buy a jug of whiskey and drink yourself to death?

    10. AS

      And also, so like in Sc- in Edinburgh, they have a season for it, and you can go through the, the meadows or any of these fields and just, like, pick mushrooms.

    11. JR

      Right.

    12. AS

      You know? But if it's on your shoe, it's fine, and if it comes off your shoe, [laughs] then it's illegal.

    13. JR

      Oh, that's hilarious.

    14. AS

      It, it... But it's just, like, growing there.

    15. JR

      You know where Duncan used to live in Asheville?

    16. AS

      Uh-huh.

    17. JR

      They started giving the cows, like, a certain type of feed that had antifungal properties to it.

    18. AS

      What?

    19. JR

      So that they wouldn't grow... So who knows what it did to the cows' gut in the-

    20. AS

      Ugh

    21. JR

      ... you know, without-

    22. AS

      For nothing to-

    23. JR

      ... ruining the cows. Just because so many kids were picking mushrooms off of the cow shit, they, "We're gonna t- put a stop to this."

  9. 20:06 – 24:19

    Thailand, elephant rides, and the risks of drugs abroad (Brittney Griner)

    1. AS

      In Thailand, it's the elephant shit, and they-

    2. JR

      Oh

    3. AS

      ... and the, and the guys who ran the elephant, like, abusive centers, whatever, [laughs] so you could ride them and make them play harmonica.

    4. JR

      The... [laughs]

    5. AS

      Stuff that, stuff that's natural in the wild. "Oh, no. Oh, no, guys. Elephants love painting you a picture."

    6. JR

      We, we rode them when we went to Thailand.

    7. AS

      Me too. It's okay. [laughs] Then I went back my second time, and they were all, everyone at the hostel was doing that, and then, uh, I was like, "No, I already did it." And they go, "Humane or non-humane?" I'm like, "Oh, definitely the humane one." They're like, "Did you ride them? That's inhumane." I'm like, "Oh, yeah, inhumane then."

    8. JR

      Well, the elephants wanted you to ride them. They don't mind. Like, 'cause you weigh nothing-

    9. AS

      You weigh nothing

    10. JR

      ... and you feed them first, and you make, you give them an offering, right? So you, first of all, you wash them, and you feed them. So you feed them, like, you give them sugarcane, and you, you have to develop a relationship with the elephant before you ride it. Like, these people were all, they were all free-range elephants.

    11. AS

      Oh.

    12. JR

      They're all rescue elephants. So the elephants would come in out of the jungle. Like, they weren't in cages.

    13. AS

      Oh, really?

    14. JR

      Oh, yeah. It was wild. Like, they would-

    15. AS

      And they let you-

    16. JR

      Yeah

    17. AS

      ... get a saddle on them?

    18. JR

      Uh-huh. Well, you don't-

    19. AS

      Touse?

    20. JR

      It's barely a saddle.

    21. AS

      Yeah.

    22. JR

      You just kinda climb onto them, and there's, like, a thing that you hold onto.

    23. AS

      Wow.

    24. JR

      And they're totally cool with it. And then at the end, you go to this, like, pond, and you wash them.

    25. AS

      Oh.

    26. JR

      And so it's like they could kill you anytime they want to, you know? So it's like it's a relationship, and it's not, they're not prisoners, and they're not abused at all. The people that are running this, the place where I went to... But even then, I did a video with it, and I said, "You know, uh, you could ride them." I go, "I rode them. I don't recommend it. I don't think you should do it." I would never do it again. I would never ride them again, 'cause I just, it just feels fucked up.

    27. AS

      Well-

    28. JR

      I would rather just feed them and pet them and say, "You're nice."

    29. AS

      But also-

    30. JR

      I don't need to go through the jungle with you all

  10. 24:19 – 26:44

    Media incentives, Trump coverage, and the symbiosis of enemies and defense budgets

    1. AS

      We are the worst at han- Americans are so bad at, at handling things they don't know how to handle.

    2. JR

      Mm.

    3. AS

      They just rush in full bore, going, "I know how to fix it," with no knowledge of it.

    4. JR

      Well, it's also once a story gets out in any form, influencers cannot help talk about it.

    5. AS

      They can't help it.

    6. JR

      It's their currency. There's no way they're not going to talk about it.

    7. AS

      Same as all the late night guys. They knew-After Trump won, that like talking about him helps him.

    8. JR

      Yeah.

    9. AS

      Before we said we're trying to take him down, but now we've seen the research. We know it's helping him. I'm still gonna do it, 'cause it's my money.

    10. JR

      Yeah.

    11. AS

      People get ratings.

    12. JR

      They can't help it.

    13. AS

      Yeah.

    14. JR

      They can't help it. Yeah. I mean, that's like CNN's most of their ratings were talking shit about Trump. Like every time he did something outrageous, they would, they would talk shit about him, and they would have him on, and it just made him more and more popular. Because I don't think they understood how much America's dis- Americans despised them. You know, they thought, "We're CNN. We are the news. We're CNN." And then because the fact that Trump was opposed to them, the, and they were, they just kept showing him, they're like, "Oh, he must be good, 'cause you guys suck."

    15. AS

      Right. You ever hear the theory that, uh, terrorism and the US are symbiotic?

    16. JR

      Uh, what's the theory? How's it work?

    17. AS

      Terrorism can't exist without the US dominating their countries.

    18. JR

      Oh yeah, that makes sense.

    19. AS

      And, and the US, they can't keep funneling money to weapons without terrorists.

    20. JR

      Well, US and Israel.

    21. AS

      Sure, sure, sure.

    22. JR

      I mean, that's the thing where Hamas and-

    23. AS

      But it's like-

    24. JR

      ... and, uh, Netanyahu, he famously said they were funding Hamas.

    25. AS

      We need them.

    26. JR

      We ne- we, we, we, we, when we fund Hamas, we can control the height of the flame.

    27. AS

      For 9/11, like it-

    28. JR

      Yeah

    29. AS

      ... it popped off a little high, but there was like, it's, it's, we need something to be like, "Hey, we're all against that."

    30. JR

      Mm-hmm.

  11. 26:44 – 34:01

    Afghanistan withdrawal, Taliban governance questions, and the opioid comparison

    1. JR

      They're not going over there. It's... And then I always wondered why we left behind all the shit. Like cynically, I'm like-

    2. AS

      But now you know

    3. JR

      ... did we leave that stuff behind so that they could use it?

    4. AS

      The older I get, the less I think there's accidents. There's ineptitude for sure, but there's also like we've done the research, we know.

    5. JR

      Mm-hmm. Yeah.

    6. AS

      At some point you know. There's bad moves you make here or there, but-

    7. JR

      I mean, we left behind tanks and Black Hawk helicopters. Like what? We couldn't get those out? We had to leave right now?

    8. AS

      Well, you-

    9. JR

      We were there for 20 years. All of a sudden we gotta get out right away?

    10. AS

      You don't wanna put a grenade in each one first before you go?

    11. JR

      Right.

    12. AS

      Like what, what do you mean?

    13. JR

      Yeah.

    14. AS

      And also, those are still good. Yeah, we didn't get out like Vietnam.

    15. JR

      Park them in a field and drop a fucking bomb on it. Yeah. You don't have to leave it there for the enemy.

    16. AS

      It's, it's-

    17. JR

      For the Taliban, so they can keep the people under their thumb forever.

    18. AS

      Yeah, if you retreated last second, I could see it, but it wasn't that. And then you're like...

    19. JR

      Yeah, they, they didn't have to leave when they l- the way they left was insane. When you see those, those ships that are, the, the planes that are flying away, and people are hanging onto the wheels of the plane and falling off 'cause they don't wanna be left behind.

    20. AS

      Because they know-

    21. JR

      'Cause there's so many people that work with the Americans.

    22. AS

      You said you'd protect us over and over again.

    23. JR

      Exactly.

    24. AS

      And then you're like, "Yeah, we've done this over and over again. We'll just say it."

    25. JR

      Exactly.

    26. SP

      It says that we, it was, uh, equipment we gave to the Afghan state, so it wasn't, you know, it wasn't US equipment any longer.

    27. AS

      And it, and it's already given over to them?

    28. SP

      Yeah.

    29. JR

      We gave it to the Afghan state-

    30. SP

      That's what this says

  12. 34:01 – 38:47

    Corporate evil cases: Tylenol murders, the Ford Pinto calculus, and union suppression

    1. SP

      I just came across something weird.

    2. JR

      What?

    3. SP

      Uh, I just typed in Tylenol deaths-

    4. JR

      Mm

    5. SP

      ... and this thing came up, the Chicago Tylenol murders.

    6. JR

      Ooh.

    7. SP

      It seems like it's an unsolved case.

    8. AS

      Drug tampering.

    9. SP

      Yeah, there was tampered Tylenol that people bought that was potassium cyanide. Seven people died.

    10. AS

      Yeah, they bro- that's when they start-

    11. SP

      Oh, I remember this

    12. AS

      ... that's when they started doing the seal on top.

    13. JR

      Yeah.

    14. AS

      Yeah, right?

    15. JR

      Crazy. I remember this. I remember this.

    16. SP

      I think me too.

    17. JR

      This is when I was in high school. Do they know why?

    18. SP

      Uh, the investigation suspects.

    19. JR

      I wonder what the conspiracy-

    20. AS

      Yeah, what-

    21. JR

      What's the tinfoil at?

    22. SP

      I think at the top it said someone recently was arrested. Uh, no suspect has been charged as of 2026.

    23. JR

      Whoa. So a bunch of people died, and they just got away with it.

    24. SP

      Yeah.

    25. JR

      Wow.

    26. SP

      Someone was convicted of extortion, sending a letter to Tylenol manufacturer claiming responsibility and demanding a million dollars.

    27. AS

      If I remember right-

    28. SP

      It was lying

    29. AS

      ... they said, they said we found out the in- the problem with one plant that had whatever, and we've, we've got... And someone else is like, "Well, okay, I bought this bottle before that happened, so this should be safe." And then it wasn't, and then it was like Tylenol or whatever was, like, covering up how bad it got.

    30. JR

      Ah.

  13. 38:47 – 48:53

    Trade, outsourcing, and Detroit’s decline—then pizza, donuts, and gluttony

    1. JR

      You know, do you remember when Ross Perot was-

    2. AS

      Wow

    3. JR

      ... running for president? You were too young.

    4. AS

      I barely remember-

    5. JR

      Probably

    6. AS

      ... but sort of.

    7. JR

      I was just starting to be aware of how fucked up politics were. And because he was on television explaining about the World Trade Organization, about when they were going to, um, start opening up plants in Mexico and moving jobs to Mexico.

    8. AS

      Yeah.

    9. JR

      He's like, "What you're, what you're gonna hear is a giant sucking sound, where all the money and jobs are gonna go down to Mexico." And what we allowed during that time was essentially what the labor unions were doing in this country, was making sure that people had a, a great wage because the corporations were getting paid well. So the CEOs wanted all the money, like they always do. The corporation wanted all the money. But you really can't make a Mustang unless you have the people that are on the assembly line, unless you have the people that are doing all the hard labor and all the work.

    10. AS

      Yeah.

    11. JR

      And they should get compensated correctly. And so the auto w- auto unions workers organized it, and they went on strike and they did the, they did what they had to do, and they were making a great living. They were making a great living, and these people had a nice house, and they had a car and a garage, and it felt good that they were getting paid really well. And so a lot of people thought, "Well, they're getting paid too well, and this is fucking up our profits."

    12. AS

      Wow.

    13. JR

      And so what... And I'm simplifying this, if you're a-

    14. AS

      Take 10 bucks from a million people-

    15. JR

      ... an historian

    16. AS

      ... instead of let the top guys make a million less.

    17. JR

      So what they did is just open up a plant in Mexico and pay people fucking slave labor, and they go over there and they pay them slave wages, and these people are making cars for like fucking how much, a dollar a day or something like that, instead of getting healthcare and retirement-

    18. AS

      It's a highway to society

    19. JR

      ... and, you know. And so great.

    20. AS

      That's what we're talking about. The free market says go to Mexico. The moral market says, "No, no, no, no, no. Hold on."

    21. JR

      God.

    22. AS

      "Let's just pay people what they deserve here."

    23. JR

      But it's not just that, but they destroyed Detroit.

    24. AS

      That's right.

    25. JR

      That's Roger & Me, that documentary. Michael Moore's greatest documentary is all... His first one is his best one.

    26. AS

      Yeah.

    27. JR

      Because it, it's really documenting an horrific attack on Detroit and, and Flint, Michigan, and all those places up there, where there's all these auto plants and they all just went away, man. And those jobs went away, and now Detroit is... Detroit's kind of bouncing back now.

    28. AS

      It's coming back. Danny was talking about at Brown, where he was like just before COVID it was like starting to be like some cool new restaurants and like-

    29. JR

      Yeah

    30. AS

      ... really coming back. Then COVID kind of nailed it down again, and now it's, I think back, back, going back up again.

  14. 48:53 – 1:09:59

    Old UFC chaos, weight cutting as ‘sanctioned cheating,’ and niche sports (chess boxing, pool, snooker)

    1. AS

      I brought you and Goldy once to a hot dog.

    2. JR

      [sighs]

    3. AS

      I was just like, there was... God, I was doing the early days of yours. Well, not early, but, like, mid-level days, and then high level days.

    4. JR

      Yeah.

    5. AS

      So I remember having more access than anyone could really get anymore.

    6. JR

      Oh yeah, you were behind me in the... [laughs]

    7. AS

      [laughs] What?

    8. JR

      I remember the time when the camera was on you and Duncan, so you guys made out.

    9. AS

      [laughs]

    10. JR

      [laughs]

    11. AS

      We were bored.

    12. JR

      They timed it. So-

    13. AS

      And we noticed, we noticed the camera. We were sitting right behind you

    14. JR

      ... so the way, they could see the monitor, so they were sitting behind me, so they knew what the camera was capturing.

    15. AS

      And we're like, "So we're on that camera, that guy's camera."

    16. JR

      And so they waited, and then it, they, [laughs] just got it right here and in the middle.

    17. AS

      Yeah.

    18. JR

      As soon as the camera's on you guys, just turned. [laughs]

    19. AS

      [laughs] Frosty died.

    20. JR

      Oh my God. This is the early, early days.

    21. AS

      Yeah.

    22. JR

      This is probably like 2002 or something like that. That was way back in the day.

    23. AS

      [laughs] And we're like... First, so first we're giving other-

    24. JR

      Oh, my God.

    25. AS

      So Duncan was being accused of being an Illuminati a lot then.

    26. JR

      [laughs]

    27. AS

      So he goes, "Oh, there's a camera. I mean, I gotta do this thing." He goes, "What?" He goes, "It's just to stoke the flames, so we'll just do this."

    28. JR

      Ugh, ugh.

    29. AS

      "We'll do triangles." At some point we made a big triangle with both our hands.

    30. JR

      [laughs]

  15. 1:09:59 – 1:56:47

    Travel etiquette, influencer backlash, and the ‘new racism’ of speakerphone culture

    1. AS

      I went to a, I went to a, there's this, like, pool hall/ like samba place in, in, in somewhere in Brazil.

    2. JR

      What? Pool and samba?

    3. AS

      Yeah, it's like daily it's a pool hall, but then at night it turns into samba and the, the highest level guys come in. Their capital and their music capital. Um, it's so fun, but these guys don't stop playing pool. And so everyone's dancing. It's so packed, the crowd is, "Excuse me," and you're like ... The etiquette is you just know when you're at a bar. You're like, "All right, all right." But you got, you wanna be like, "Bro, not n- just, it's packed. You can't play pool here."

    4. JR

      Yeah, you can't play pool there.

    5. AS

      But they were doing it.

    6. JR

      Well, there's a place in the Bronx that is this Dominican pool room where they gamble big money.

    7. AS

      Oh.

    8. JR

      Big money. And they stream some of the matches on, uh, YouTube, and it's fucking bananas because people are just talking constantly, they're yelling at each other in Spanish and-

    9. AS

      Oh, wow

    10. JR

      ... you know, Dominican people are having fun.

    11. AS

      They're having fun.

    12. JR

      They're, the, the, the, there's all this Spanish-speaking and they're yelling and the, they're all very flamboyant and having a good time. And they get people to go over there and play, like pros, and they get so rattled because the enviro-

    13. AS

      They're not used to that.

    14. JR

      Right.

    15. AS

      Wow.

    16. JR

      The enviro-

    17. AS

      Play on this turf.

    18. JR

      Right. Not only that, but the p- the guys can play and they're accustomed to that culture. So they're accustomed to all the yelling and all the-

    19. AS

      Wow

    20. JR

      ... craziness and guys standing in front of the hole while you're shooting at it, which is a no-no in regular pool.

    21. AS

      Oh, that's like high school, where like-

    22. JR

      Yeah

    23. AS

      ... do it then, do it. Yeah.

    24. JR

      They don't do it that bad.

    25. AS

      Yeah.

    26. JR

      It's not that bad, but there's plenty of guys moving around the table. They're all talking. Everyone's yelling. The tables next to you are yelling. They don't care if you're betting $30,000 on a-

    27. AS

      Wow

    28. JR

      ... on a set.

    29. AS

      Dominicans are having so much fun, they're allowed to use the N word. [laughs]

    30. JR

      [laughs]

  16. 1:56:47 – 2:04:24

    Birdsong, parks, grounding, and why nature resets the brain

    1. SP

      Yeah, yeah

    2. JR

      ... when birds aren't chirping.

    3. AS

      Ooh.

    4. JR

      And you, you kind of freak out. Like, your brain-

    5. AS

      'Cause there should be some background noise.

    6. JR

      Right. Well, if birds aren't chirping, it generally means that predators-

    7. AS

      Earthquake

    8. JR

      ... are nearby.

    9. AS

      Oh.Your brain has a circuit that doesn't know you live in a city. Its only job is to monitor whether birds are still singing.

    10. JR

      Right now, in this room, it's on. The circuit predates primates. Whoa. Mammals have been using ambient soundscape continually as a predator detection system for roughly 200 million years. Birds stop singing when something larger moves through their territory. For most of the mammalian history, the forest full of song meant that no large predator was nearby, and the cessation of sound was the warning. Your nervous system never updated this software.

    11. AS

      A loud quiet.

    12. JR

      Yeah.

    13. AS

      And you're like, "Something's up."

    14. JR

      The Max Planck Institute tested the inverse in 2022 with 295 participants. Six minutes of birdsong dropped anxiety with a medium effect size.

    15. AS

      Dropped anxiety.

    16. JR

      Six minutes of traffic noise raised depression with the same. The effect worked on subjects who lived in dense urban environments and had no regular contact with nature.

    17. AS

      No.

    18. JR

      The brain still ran the check.

    19. AS

      I, listen, I-

    20. JR

      Wow

    21. AS

      ... I'm, I'm a hippie, I live in New York, and it's like, I gotta get to nature once in a while or I'll go crazy.

    22. JR

      That's why we have to protect the parks.

    23. AS

      That's why we s- have to protect the parks.

    24. JR

      We have to. Tomorrow. Tomorrow we're protecting a park.

    25. AS

      Tomorrow we are.

    26. JR

      Yes. It's back.

    27. AS

      Fucking, this new guy. Listen, I'm a one issue voter. I'm not a voter at all, but if I was-

    28. JR

      Mom, Donnie?

    29. AS

      Yeah. And it's, it's this. We saved a- another park, Elizabeth Street Gardens. Classical park, and they go, "No." The other guy was like, "We gotta tear this down for low income housing." And then Lower East Side and the East Village, that's a community oriented place. They take care of shit on their own. Always have.

    30. JR

      Mm.

  17. 2:04:24 – 2:10:56

    Ari’s unplugged travel workflow: banking podcasts, creative breakthroughs, and filming on iPhone

    1. JR

      So you, when, the six months you were gone, no, um, social media, no-

    2. AS

      Definitely no social media

    3. JR

      ... nothing.

    4. AS

      I took, I took YMH's, on a piece of paper, a couple people from YMH's, um, emails. I got two months ahead on my ads and my podcast on You Be Trippin'.

    5. JR

      Oh.

    6. AS

      So I'm like, "You guys are set for two months. You don't need me." And then after-

    7. JR

      So did you record a bunch of episodes in advance-

    8. AS

      A year's worth

    9. JR

      ... to release them? Oh.

    10. AS

      I did my work.

    11. JR

      Oh my God, that's crazy.

    12. AS

      Yeah. They're all evergreen episodes.

    13. JR

      How did you do that?

    14. AS

      Work- I r- r- one, worked hard, two, l- loved hearing about travel. I love it.

    15. JR

      Right.

    16. AS

      So like I, it wasn't much work for me to come in and be like, "Tell me about Cambodia. Tell me about Thailand. Tell me about Taiwan. Tell me about-"

    17. JR

      Right

    18. AS

      ... you know, Uruguay.

    19. JR

      Well, that's how I feel about podcasting in general.

    20. AS

      Yeah, you like it.

    21. JR

      Yeah.

    22. AS

      You'll have s- here or there, you're like, "This guy was sucked. I wish, I should've stayed home." But-

    23. JR

      Yeah, yeah, yeah

    24. AS

      ... generally you're like, "That's really interesting."

    25. JR

      Yeah.

    26. AS

      So I love it, and I just got way ahead. It's funny, when I, like Danny Paleshek, I put out an episode, he goes, "Didn't we do it like two years ago?" [laughs] And I'm like, "It wasn't time yet. I don't know."

    27. JR

      Oh, wow.

    28. AS

      Or I'll save it for if a comic has a special, like, "Let's just record it now. In nine months you'll have a special. I'll put it out there."

    29. JR

      How many do you have banked?

    30. AS

      Through July still.

  18. 2:10:56 – 2:30:24

    Launching ‘The End’: reclaiming what Comedy Central took, and the new creator economy

    1. JR

      Wow.

    2. AS

      And I'm telling you, buddy, my brain was so alive. I, I would just, like... You just don't realize what you're dealing with responsibility-wise-

    3. JR

      Mm-hmm

    4. AS

      ... all the time. And then when you have none, it's like you could just kind of be your s- I came up with this whole... My storytelling shows out. I came up with this whole, like, h- how to frame it all, how to do everything. I had a vision of, like, this prologue-

    5. JR

      The End

    6. AS

      ... that I wanna bridge the gap. It's called The End. It's out now.

    7. JR

      And this is-

    8. AS

      Arishaffir.com.

    9. JR

      And then, and did you film all that with, uh, Your Mom's House Studios as well?

    10. AS

      Yeah.

    11. JR

      Yeah.

    12. AS

      Yeah.

    13. JR

      Nice.

    14. AS

      Yeah.

    15. JR

      They might be the only group like that that's actually good.

    16. AS

      Tom was like, "How much do you have?" I'm like, "I have about 80% of it." And he goes, "I'll put in the rest. I'll supply all the c- all the people you need to make it happen." Um, and then he's not a network.

Episode duration: 2:35:36

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