Destiny: Politics, Free Speech, Controversy, Sex, War, and Relationships | Lex Fridman Podcast #337

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 0:00 If you have a democratic style of governance, you are entrusting people with one of the most awesome and radical of responsibilities, and that's saying that you're going to pick the people that are gonna make some of the hardest decisions on all of human history. If you're gonna trust people to vote correctly, you have to be able to trust them to have open and honest dialogue with each other. Whether that's Nazis or KKK people or whoever talking, um, you have to believe that your people are going to be able to rise above and make the correct determinations when they hear these types of speeches. And if you're so worried that somebody's gonna hear a certain political figure and they're gonna be completely radicalized instantly, then what that tells me is that you don't have enough faith in humans for democracy to be a viable institution. Which is fine, you can be anti-democratic, but you, I don't think you can be pro-democracy and anti-free speech.

Lex Fridman 0:47 The following is a conversation with Steven Bonnell, also known online as Destiny. He's a video game streamer and political commentator, one of the early pioneers of both live streaming in general and live streamed political debate and discourse. Politically, he is a progressive, identifying as either left or far left depending on your perspective. There are many reasons I wanted to talk to Steven. First, I just talked to Ben Shapiro, and many people have told me that Steven is the Ben Shapiro of the left in terms of political perspective and exceptional debate skills. Second reason is he skillfully defends some nuanced non-standard views. At the same time, being pro-establishment, pro-institutions, and pro-Biden, while also being pro-capitalism and pro-free speech. Third reason is he has been there at the beginning and throughout the meteoric rise of the video game live streaming community. In some mainstream circles, this community is not taken seriously. Perhaps because of its demographic distribution skewing young, or perhaps because of the sometimes harsh style of communication. But I think this community should be taken seriously and shown respect. Millions of young minds tune into live streams like Destiny's to question and to try to understand what is going on with the world, often exploring challenging, even controversial ideas. The language is sometimes harsher and the humor sometimes meaner than I would prefer, but I, Grandpa Lex, put on my rain boots and went into the beautiful chaotic muck of online discourse, and have so far survived to tell the tale with a smile and even more love in my heart than before. On top of all this, we were lucky to have Melina Goranson, a popular streamer and world traveler, join us at the end of the conversation. You can check out her channel on twitch.tv/melina, and you can check out Steven's channel on youtube.com/destiny. This is the Lex Fridman Podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here's Destiny.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 3:06 I don't know if you watched me watching your EA interview?

Lex Fridman 3:09 Yeah. Thank you so much for...

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 3:10 I'm so curious. When you're navigating a conversation like that, are you, how intentional is the thought process between like building rapport and pushing and, and giving a little and letting like...

Lex Fridman 3:21 Zero.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 3:22 Zero?

Lex Fridman 3:22 Zero intention. I was watching, and thank you so much. It was very kind for you to review that conversation. It meant a lot that you were complementary in parts on the technical aspects of the conversation. But no, zero, and I'm actually deliberately, uh, trying to avoid, I think you've called it debate brain-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 3:39 Uh-huh.

Lex Fridman 3:40 ... which is just another flavor of thinking about, like the meta-conversation, trying to optimize how should this conversation go. Because I feel like the more you do that, the better you get at that, the less human connection you have. Like the less genuinely you're actually sitting there in the moment and listening to the person. You're more like calculating what's the right thing to say versus like feeling what is, uh, what is that person feeling right now? What are, what are they thinking? That's what I'm trying to do is like putting myself in their mind and thinking, "What does the world look like to them? What does the world feel like to them?" And so from that, I truly try to listen. Now, I'm also learning, especially 'cause Rogan and others have been giving me shit for not pushing back.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 4:26 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 4:27 It's good sometimes to say from a place of care for the other human being to say, "Stop. What did you just say?"

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 4:35 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 4:36 "I don't think that's represents who you are and what you really mean." Or maybe if it does at that time represents who they are, I could see a better, a better world if they grow into a different direction and try to point that direction out to them.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 4:52 There's a really complicated dance between letting somebody share their full story versus letting somebody like essentially, I guess, like proselytize your audience. (laughs) And it's like, okay, hold on, let's take a minute here. But yeah, I used to be, four or five years ago, it was attack, attack, attack, attack, attack, whatever you said. And now I'm leaning way more towards the like, okay, well, tell me how you feel about everything and then we'll go from there. So, a lot of people like my new approach. Some older fans who are watching, they're like, "Why are you letting this guy just ramble on? You know he said like five or six wrong things and you're only gonna call him out on two of them?" And it's like, it's just different styles of conversation, but yeah.

Lex Fridman 5:24 Do you do a lot of research beforehand too?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 5:26 Depending on the conversation, yeah. So if we're gonna talk like vaccines and stuff, yeah, that's a ton of reading and stuff that I never thought I'd know going into it. Um, if it's a more personal like political philosophy conversation, there's not as much you can prepare for, just it truly depends on the conversation.

Lex Fridman 5:39 How much are you actually listening to the other person?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 5:42 I'm always listening. I think you have to listen 'cause as soon as you stop listening, the quality of everything falls apart. The connection disappears. The quality of the conversation disappears. But my natural inclination is to just be way more aggressive than normal, so I have to constantly remind myself, I guess you would call it a meta-conversation where you're like, "Okay, he's probably saying this because of that or we'll let him go here and then we'll stop later." But, um, yeah, 'cause my, my preferred style of conversation is like, I'm gonna talk and the second I say something you disagree with, then let's...... iron it out, right? Like I, like, I think in, like, syllogisms. Like, okay, here's premise A, good, okay. Premise B, okay, and then conclusion. And then as long as we're both deductively sound, we're not crazy, no psychosis, then we're gonna agree on everything. Um, whereas other people like to... Most people think in stories, like narratives, like a whole, there's a whole, like, narrative and the individual facts don't matter as much 'cause they'll pick and choose what they want and it's really hard 'cause everybody thinks negative so I have to function in that world. But it's, uh, frustrating for me sometimes. (laughs)

Lex Fridman 6:34 Well, I- I've seen, uh, you had a lot of excellent debates. One of them I just recently last night watched is, uh, on systemic racism and it's the first time I've seen you completely lose your shit. (laughs)

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 6:46 Oh, shoot. Who was that against?

Lex Fridman 6:47 I'm not sure exactly, but you were just very frustrated inside. Not lose your shit, but you were frustrated constantly because of the thing, "Let's lay out one, two, three." And every time you try to lay it out, it would falter. I think it had to do with sort of, can you use data to make an argument or do you need to use a study that does an interpretation of that data? And then there's, like, this tension between, I think this is a behavioral economist that you were talking to and the point is, you do this kind of nice layout that the whole point of behavioral economics, it says there's more to it than just the data. You have to give it context and, like, do the rich, rigorous interpretation in the context of the full human story. And then there was like a dance back and forth, sometimes you use data, sometimes not, and you were getting really frustrated-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 7:30 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 7:31 ... and shutting down. And so that felt like a failure mode. I've seen Sam Harris have similar sticking points, like if we can't agree on the terminology, we can't go on. To me, I feel like, uh, I'm- I'm sort of the, the Wittgenstein perspective is like, I think if you get stuck on any one thing, you're just not gonna make progress. You have to... Part of the conversation has to be about, uh, doing a good dance together-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 8:00 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 8:01 ... versus being dogmatically stuck on the path to truth.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 8:05 I think the true challenge is identifying what of those sticking points are important versus what is not important. So like if I'm having an argument with somebody about like Jewish representation in media, they might, it might be like a big conversation and they might say a couple things, like, "I think Jewish people, you know, they tend to help their own," or whatever. And it's like, "Uh, okay." But like, for the purpose of the conversation, we can keep moving. But if they casually drop like, you know, "Yeah, and I think that's why the Holocaust numbers were blown up from like 100,000 to 6 million and that's..." And it's like, "Okay, well hold on, wait, wait. If you think this, we have to stop here because this is gonna be..." It's not just a language game in this part. If you really believe this fact, then the whole rest of the conversation is gonna be informed by that belief, you know?

Lex Fridman 8:46 And it has to be something that doesn't bother you personally. You have to step outside your own ego. So Holocaust denial is somebody that would bother a lot of people.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 8:56 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 8:56 And there's some things just, just observing you, I feel like when you get really good at conversation, you can become a stickler to, um... You might have your favorite terms that it really bothers you if people don't agree on those terms.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 9:10 Oh, yeah. Begs the question, you mean raising the question. Yeah, I usually just want... If people, people say stuff, I just let it slide, yeah.

Lex Fridman 9:15 Yeah.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 9:15 'Cause you can't... 'Cause if you fight... When you're having a conversation with somebody and you're talking to their audience at the same time, 'cause that's really what's happening, um, you never want to come off as over combative or over aggressive because it puts people in like... There's, there's like a trigger in your brain, and this is true of relationships, of friendships, of persuasive rhetoric or whatever, there's a trigger in the brain and as soon as that defensive trigger gets like flipped on, everything is over. You've lost the ability to persuade because everything becomes a fight at that point, yeah.

Lex Fridman 9:39 Well, I wanted to talk to you 'cause I heard somewhere that, uh, you were referred to as the Ben Shapiro of the left and since I'm talking with Ben, uh, as well, I wanted to sort of complete spiritually this platonic political philosophy puzzle in my head. You are a progressive, but a progressive with many non-standard progressive views and you had a heck of a fascinating journey through all of that. And like I said, I think you argue with passion, sometimes with excessive amounts of passion, but almost-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 10:09 That's a really polite way of saying that. (laughs)

Lex Fridman 10:11 ... almost always with, uh, good faith and with rigor, with seriousness. I asked on your subreddit, which is an excellent subreddit, shout out to the Destiny subreddit so much, uh, at least for that particular post. What I really loved is when I asked for questions for you, they were like, "Holy shit, there's adults in the room, let's all behave."

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 10:30 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 10:31 They're like, "Nobody say incest." I was like, "What?"

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 10:33 (laughs)

Lex Fridman 10:34 "What's, what's going on here?" But actually the, the, the questions that rose to the top were really good. So, uh, somebody said that Destiny was, speaking of your journey, was a conservative in his early teens, then he became a libertarian, then he became a left-wing social justice warrior, then he flirted with socialism, and now he is a social democrat liberal. I've also heard you refer to yourself as a far left person. So to the degree there's truth to that journey, can you take me through your evolution, uh, through the landscape of political ideologies that you went through?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 11:08 So my dad comes from Kentucky and my mom is a Cuban immigrant. Uh, Cubans are notorious for being very conservative in the United States, um, for historical reasons and for other reasons, but, um, my upbringing was a very Republican one. I grew up listening to Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Michael Savage, uh, on the radio, Billy Cunningham, I think Sean Hannity a little bit later on. Like, uh, that was like my whole upbringing politically. I remember I was writing... I had written like articles for the school journal, like in favor of, uh, defending the war in Iraq and, you know, defending Bush from all the criticism, et cetera. So that was my upbringing. Um, I think once I hit high school, college, I had my edgy like libertarian-esque high school phase of like reading Ayn Rand, um, of, of figuring out that like, oh my god, nothing in life matters except for class and money, that's actually the answer to everything. And, um, I got to college, I became a Ron Paul fan, very big Ron Paul fan, and then...From there, I kind of work, do life, life happens. At the, kind of the lowest point of my life in terms of where I'm working, financially, everything is, like, kind of in ruin in my life, there's just a whole bunch of dumb stuff that's happened, probably my most conservative point. I don't know what it is about, like, being poor and thinking, like, you can work your way out of it, you can do whatever. It's just, my upbringing is always just like, if you're not- if you're not- if you're not having financial success, just work, work, work, work, work. Um, and then I got into streaming, very, very lucky break, everything just lined up at the right time. And then as I've progressed through streaming, I would say through the years, I've gradually fallen more and more to the left, especially once my kid turned four, five, six years old, and I started to see, like, how much different his life was just because of the financial opportunities that I was able to provide for him, through no merit of his own. And that started to radically change how I viewed the world in a lot of ways.

Lex Fridman 12:52 So actually, let's, like, linger on that-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 12:54 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 12:55 ... low point. You worked at McDonald's, you worked at a casino, you, uh, did carpet cleaning. What was the- the lowest point?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 13:04 Definitely the carpet cleaning. (laughs)

Lex Fridman 13:05 Really?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 13:06 Absolutely.

Lex Fridman 13:07 Why? Why was it the lowest point? That's when you were just flirting with starting, uh, streaming?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 13:12 My whole life has been a series of lucky breaks, really, truly. Uh, I grew up playing a lot of video games, but back in my day, our day, um, you had to read. There was a lot of text on the screen. That's-

Lex Fridman 13:22 Back in my day, we used to play-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 13:24 They didn't all talk to you.

Lex Fridman 13:25 ... Stuck-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 13:25 Yeah, they, 'cause nowadays everything's voice acted, but back then you had to read a lot.

Lex Fridman 13:28 Yeah.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 13:28 I was a really good reader, I had a really good vocabulary.

Lex Fridman 13:30 Yeah, I've heard you actually say that.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 13:32 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 13:32 What- what games are we talking about? What- what do you mean, there's reading? (laughs) You're talking about, like, RPGs, or what-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 13:36 Yeah, JRPGs, so like Final Fantasy games, Fantasy Stars, like all of these, like any- any RPG that would have been on the SNES, Sega PlayStation, these are the things that I'm-

Lex Fridman 13:43 Let's pause on that.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 13:44 Okay.

Lex Fridman 13:45 I just talked to Todd Howard, who's, um, of the Elder Scrolls fame and the Fallout fame and beyond.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 13:53 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 13:54 What's your thoughts on Elder Scrolls? Why is Skyrim the greatest RPG of all time?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 13:59 Man, I really don't like Skyrim or Fallout or those types of games.

Lex Fridman 14:02 You don't love it? Oh, really?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 14:03 No, not at all.

Lex Fridman 14:04 Why do you hate Skyrim?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 14:05 Yeah, so I really like characters and, like, compelling stories and narratives around those characters, and I like to see them kind of, like, grow and change, kind of like a movie or a story. So in your, like, Final Fantasy games, you've got characters. Um, they're a lot of, like, um, ain't, like, classical tropes of, like, a character starts off kind of, like, edgy, angsty, all on their own, they develop relationships, friendships, they realize that the life is more about themselves, and they do that. And I like that- that growth. That's kind of what you see in all of those old, uh, role playing games. Um, I didn't like the open world ones as much 'cause your main character is just, like, a blank slate, never talks, it's for you to, like, project onto, but there's not the same, like, uh, linear narrative of, like, growth for the character.

Lex Fridman 14:41 Oh, that's fascinating. There's an actual story arc to the character that's more crafted-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 14:46 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 14:46 ... in a beautiful way by the designers of the game, yeah. That, okay.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 14:49 I don't think one is better or worse, just I tend towards, like, I want to hear a compelling story around, like, a set of characters that, like-

Lex Fridman 14:53 Yeah.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 14:53 ... grow and change as the game goes on.

Lex Fridman 14:54 Oh, that's beautifully put then. Yeah, I- I just really loved being able to leave the town. You go outside the town and you look outside its nature, and the world of possibilities is before you. You can do whatever the fuck you want.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 15:06 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 15:07 I mean, that immensity of just being lost in the world, it was really immersive for me. But yeah, you're right. Whatever attracts you about a world. So you were just starting to play video games. You grew up playing video games, that's one of your lucky breaks.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 15:22 There's just, like, a lot of random skills you pick up depending on the type of game you play. I played a lot of text-based games on the computer, so I was a very fast typer. I'm still a very fast typer. Um, read a lot, you know, learned weird kind of math stuff for some of the calculations in some of the games. I think I'm pretty good at getting information, figuring stuff out, learning patterns, all of that. And then that plus the reading and everything with the games meant that I, I don't want to say I excelled in school 'cause my grades were pretty bad, but I was in, like, all honors, all AP classes or whatever. Um, a lot of dual enrollment, a lot of AP credit going into college. So I did pretty well in school, probably better than I should have, but it was because I had the game stuff that was, like, really powering a lot of my brain there while I was trying to sleep through class too, yeah.

Lex Fridman 16:02 So you're- you're able to soak in information, integrate it, and be, quickly take notes?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 16:06 Generally, I think I'm pretty good at that, yeah.

Lex Fridman 16:08 What- what, uh, you do this a lot when you stream, you're typing stuff. Is there a system in that note-taking? And what note, what do you use for note-taking? Um... Does it matter?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 16:17 I use a notepad. (laughs)

Lex Fridman 16:19 Like notepad.exe notepad?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 16:19 The original, yep, notepad.exe, not the plus plus, not...

Lex Fridman 16:23 Is there genius to the madness behind that or you just don't give a shit?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 16:27 No, I mean, like, it- it's gonna depend on the style of conversation. If I'm with somebody that has very meticulously organized their thoughts and they're a, uh, finding a better word here for rambler, you can edit that in, better word for rambler-

Lex Fridman 16:38 Yeah.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 16:38 ... somebody that talks a lot and a lot, I'll start, like, taking notes, bullet points, like this, this, this, this, this, this, this, because, um, there's a style of conversation where I say seven or eight different things, and then when you go to respond to everything I said, I cut you off immediately and we argue that point.

Lex Fridman 16:51 Yeah.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 16:52 But if somebody's going to do that, they should just be like, "Hold on, you just said these eight things, I'm going to respond to every single one, I've written them all down, and then you can go, if you want to go point by point, we can, but you just said all this and I wrote it down, so now we're gonna go."

Lex Fridman 17:01 So what are you actually writing down, like a couple of words per point they left?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 17:05 Honestly, like, there- there are very few unique conversations in politics. Like, a lot of them are kind of retreading old ground. So if we're having a debate on abortion, um, somebody might say like, "Oh, well, I believe this thing about viability and I believe this thing about, you know, when they're a fetus versus a human," and I'll just write down, like, those points so that when I go to respond, I kind of have like, uh, like note cards, like a guiding thing there to keep me centered on my response.

Lex Fridman 17:25 Political discourse is a kind of tree you're walking down, I got it.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 17:27 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 17:28 And you're, like, taking marks.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 17:29 Just to keep my focus guided so I'm not, like, running off on a weird tangent or responding to something they didn't say or something, yeah.

Lex Fridman 17:34 What about, like, doing research? It just, is there a system to your note-taking? Because mentally, you seem to be one of the most organized people I've listened to. So is there, is it in your mind or is there a system that's on paper?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 17:47 A little of both. I feel like the human mind...... is a beautiful thing if you have interest in an area. Uh, so the, like, what I'll tell people is, let's say there's, like, a totally new topic that I'm researching. I don't know anything, and I've, I'll do a couple of these on stream. I think they're boring, but people watch it. I might open a Wikipedia article, and I'll read, and I hit something I don't know, and then I open the next Wikipedia article, and I'll read into... And then I might have, like, seven tabs open, and I'll read, and I'll read, and I'll read. Um, and I'll read a ton of stuff maybe for hour two, three, four hours of stuff. And then by the end, you know, someone in chat will ask me, like, "Do you even remember, like, this particular thing?" And I'll say, "Not really. No, not too much." But what happens is, as, as long as you've seen it once, what'll happen is, like, the next day or the day after, we'll read something else and be like, "Oh, I remember that thing from this thing. I remember, like, vaguely that." And then if you see it, like, a third time, you're like, "Oh, this makes sense," because especially when it comes to... Oh, here's, like, a little trick o- o- on stuff. If you're ever reading any news and there's a place that pops up, always look at it on a map because so much of history is, like, on a map. It's so important to, like, know the geography. It makes things make so much more sense. Um, but yeah, once I, once I start to see stuff over and over again just because I've, like, read it a few times, stuff will start to kind of connect in my mind and I'm like, "Oh, yeah. Well, this makes sense. Of course these people believe this, it's because of this," or, "Of course, like, this happened here, it's because, you know, that happened there." Um, so yeah. It's a, it's a lot of that. If there's, like, a topic that I'm doing specific research for, um, so like, uh, vaccine-related stuff is a big one. Uh, the Ukrainian-Russian conflict is a big one. That, I'll break out a note- um, I'll probably get, like, a Google Doc and I'll just start, like, writing, like, an outline of kind of the rough points of everything, just to organize my thoughts around different topics. Yeah.

Lex Fridman 19:19 We're just gonna go on tangent upon a tangent upon a tangent-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 19:21 Sure.

Lex Fridman 19:21 ... and we'll return to the low point of your life at some point.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 19:23 (laughs) Okay, sure.

Lex Fridman 19:24 Always returning from the philosophy to the psychology. So, you did, uh,

Lex Fridman 19:28 the Ukraine topic. One question is, what role does US play in this war? Could they have done something to avoid the war? Uh, did they have a role to play in forcing Vladimir Putin's hand? Do they have a role to play in, um, deescalating the war towards a peace agreement and the opposite? If it does escalate, uh, towards something like the use of a tactical nuclear weapon, are they to blame? Are, are we to blame?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 20:01 Oh, man. Somebody sent me an email a while ago with great words. Um, there's a specific way to navigate a conversation where you can kind of, like, contribute to a negative event, but you're not really the one responsible for it. Um, like the classic example is a woman goes out late at night, gets a little bit too drunk, and then something happens. And it's like, while there might have been steps she could have taken to mitigate the risk, it's not her fault of what happened because the, um, responsibility rests on the, on the agent making the choice, right? There's a chooser at some point that is choosing to do wrong or evil. I don't believe in any of the arguments that say the United States has contributed to Russia's position on Ukraine or the actions that they've taken on Ukraine. Um, there are several arguments that some people, uh, some even political scholars are, are, are putting out there to say that the United States is to blame, but I find them completely unconvincing. I think that when you ask the question of like, what is the United States' role or what has our role been, I think it's really important for us, I don't think we even agree as a country on what our role should be, which I think is a hard one because you've got this kind of, there's this growing populist movement in the United States. It might be the far left and the far right. And I think populists tend to have this kind of isolationist view of the world where the United States should just be our own thing, we shouldn't be telling anybody what to do, we shouldn't be the world police. And then kind of more in these, like, center left, center right positions and then across a lot of Europe you've got, well, okay, the United States is kind of like the big kid on the block, like, we're looking to them for guidance and leadership on situations like what's going on in Ukraine. So, in so far as, uh, the original question was like, what, what is, like, the United States' responsibility? I think we have a responsibility to ensure the relative, like, freedom, prosperity, and stability across Europe. I think that defending Ukraine's sovereignty and right to their borders is a part of that, and I don't believe that prior to the invasion in 2022, I don't think the United States was contributing to Russia invading that country. Um, I know there are arguments given that, like, the expansion of NATO, you know, has, has... Something that's been threatening to Russia, but the Baltics joined and Russia didn't do anything about it. The invasion to Crimea was very clearly a response to the revolution in 2014. The invasion on the borders is clearly a response to, um, Ukraine winning that, uh, civil war in the southeast and the Donbas and Russia becoming more aggressive. I don't think that you can blame any of that on, on NATO expansion. There's no NATO countries that are threatening Russia or invading Russia.

Lex Fridman 22:18 Do you think there is a nuclear threat? Do you think about this, do you worry about this, that there is a threat of a, a tactical nuclear weapon being dropped?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 22:27 I think that possibility exists either way, and I think the responsibility for that is on Russia because it's, it, it can't, it just can't be the case that if you have nukes, you're allowed to invade countries and take their land. Because if anything, I think that that down the road also increased, increases the potential for nuclear problems in the future, right? Because at that point, either every single country has to acquire their own nuclear weapons 'cause if you don't, Russia's gonna mess with you, or every single country has to join NATO, and now what? We're back at square zero, ground zero, square one where people are like, "Oh, well, look. All these countries joining NATO is aggressive towards Russia." Like, what are you gonna do?

Lex Fridman 22:57 Yeah, you've mentioned that, um, there's a complicated calculus going on with the countries that have, uh, that have nuclear weapons.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 23:05 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 23:06 And what's our responsibility? Are you allowed to do anything you want to countries that don't have nuclear weapons? That's a really tricky discussion.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 23:15 For sure.

Lex Fridman 23:15 Because what is US supposed to do if Russia drops a tactical nuclear weapon? There's a set of options.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 23:21 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 23:23 None of which are good.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 23:24 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 23:25 And it's such a tricky moment right now because, uh, the things that Biden and other public figures say I feel like has a significant impact on the way this game turns out 'cause I think mutually assured destruction is partially a game of words.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 23:43 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 23:44 Like, I, well, I mean, I believe in the power of conversation, of leaders talking to each other. I feel like you have to have an, a balance between threat and compromise and, like-... empathy for the needs, the geopolitical, the economic needs of a nation, um, but also sort of respect and represent your own interests.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 24:10 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 24:10 So, it's, it's a tricky one. Like, how do you play the, how do you play the hand?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 24:14 It reminds me of, um, I don't know if you've ever heard in, like, evolutionary psych or evolutionary biology, there are things called tit-for-tat strategies. It kind of reminds me of that, where it's like if, like, uh, there- there are a whole bunch of these little biological mechanisms where creatures will develop, like, socializing, like tit-for-tat. If you do something bad to me, I'm gonna do something bad for you, and then more complicated schemes will come out where it'll be like tit, tit-for-tat, or it's like you can make one mistake and then I'm gonna get you if you do a second one, or it could be tit, tit, tit-for-tat, or there could be tit-for-tat, tat-for... There's, like, all these, like, back and forths where creatures kind of optimize themselves and, um... Yeah, I think something the United States did really well in terms of that kind of conversational strategy, and I approved of this in the beginning, was Biden was very clear about setting out, like, the exact level of US involvement for the war. We're not gonna do a no-fly zone, there's not gonna be US troops on the ground in Ukraine, but we are gonna send a whole bunch of money and a whole bunch of arms and a whole bunch of intel to them. And I thought he did a good job at laying out, like, the limitation of the US involvement while opening as much as we could in the ways that we could help. But the, um... Yeah, that looming threat of some sort of tactical nuclear weapon, I think on the table right now is like, it's gonna be the annihilation of, like, Russian sea forces and everything, but, w- you know, what happens if it continues to escalate? I, that's like a world that nobody wants to, (laughs) nobody wants to be in. Yeah.

Lex Fridman 25:26 So, we talked about difficult conversations. And again, thank you so much for reviewing the Ye conversation. Let me ask you about Putin.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 25:34 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 25:36 Speaking of difficult conversations, so if you sit down, if I sit down with somebody like Vladimir Putin or Volodymyr Zelenskyy, what's the right way to have that conversation?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 25:45 Oh, man.

Lex Fridman 25:45 We can talk about that one or we could talk about somebody more well-understood through history, like some, like Stalin or Hitler, somebody like that.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 25:57 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 25:57 Maybe that's an easier example to illustrate how to handle extremely difficult conversations.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 26:04 Yeah, I mean, I can handle really difficult conversations between, like, two people. Um, leaders of countries though, you're, there's so much that you are representing in that conversation. I guess the thing that would be interesting to me would be like, what is Volodymyr Putin's interest? Like, what is the genuine interest that he has in the conflict? 'Cause I think finding out, like, what is your buy-in or what is your, like, what is the driving force keeping you here is probably the most important thing. Um, I think for Zelenskyy, I think it's a, it's quite a bit more simpler 'cause he's, he's on the defense, so it's defending his country and his people. Um, for Putin, I've heard all sorts of things. Uh, you know, Dugin has his writings on, uh, you know, like the East versus the West, the collapse of the West in the face of like all of the liberalism and the weird LGBT stuff that they criticize. You've got the desire to, like, return to this, like, former Soviet Union-esque thing. You've got Putin's quotes that the collapse of the Soviet Union was the biggest geopolitical disaster, you know, of 20th century. And I guess figuring out, like, what is Putin after? I'm not actually sure. I don't know the answer to that question. I know a lot of people write about it, but yeah.

Lex Fridman 27:03 Well, there's a lot of answers to that question. There's a lot of answers that he can give to that question, so say I sit down with him for three hours and talk about it. I think this is a really interesting distinction because you do do difficult conversations in the space of ideas.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 27:18 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 27:19 But also in your stream you have, I mean, there's a bunch of drama going on. There's, there's... The human psychology is laid out-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 27:24 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 27:25 ... uh, in its full richness before you. So to me, with leaders, I think a part of the conversation has to be about the human psychology.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 27:34 Sure.

Lex Fridman 27:35 Not like a meta conversation, but, like, really understand what they feel, what they fear, who they are as a human being. Like, as a family man, as a, as a person proud of their country, as a person with an ego, as a person who's been affected if not corrupted by power, as all of us can be and likely are.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 27:58 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 27:58 So, all of that. That gives context to then the answers about, what do you want in this war? 'Cause the, the answers about what you want in this war will be political answers. Of... It's like, it's like a game that's being played, again, with words. And politicians are incredibly good at playing that game.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 28:15 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 28:16 I think the deeper truth comes from understanding the human being from which those words come. And I think that's what you do. I don't know if you do those kinds of conversations where-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 28:26 I've never talked to any country leader, so. (laughs)

Lex Fridman 28:28 No, not, not, not a country leader, but say, a controversial figure, somebody that represents a certain idea. Don't just talk in the space of ideas or challenge their ideas, but understand, who is this person? How did you come to those ideas?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 28:41 Oh, yeah. When I've had, there have been a couple of very controversial right-leaning figures. Um, so the two, obviously they're my streams, are Lauren Southern and Nick Fuentes. And those types of conversations initially aren't very political at all. Yeah, it's more like h- like, obviously we believe in very, very, very different things, but, like, beliefs don't happen accidentally, so how did you get to where you are? Those are way more personal conversations, that's true.

Lex Fridman 29:05 Is there things you regret about those conversations where you failed? Is there things you're proud of where you succeeded?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 29:12 For things that I'm proud of, I feel like I, I feel like I'm really good at attempting to understand people without judgment. Um, that I think a lot of people feel like they can have conversations with me where they can share a lot, and I'm not gonna jump down their throat for them having a politically incorrect observation or for them being judgmental of somebody else or having, like, a feeling that's maybe not something they should have, something they're embarrassed about. So, I think I do a really good job at that. And then by extension of that, I've gotten the ability to hear perspectives from so many different people that I think I can understand a lot of different perspectives. Um, for failures of mine, I mean, it's always gonna be... On stream, it'll be like, I didn't push back hard enough or I didn't know, like, a certain fact for a conversation. Um, these are u- usually the... They're gonna be on these, like, very technical grounds generally. I'm pretty happy with, like, the direction my conversations have gone, uh, recently, especially over, like, the past six months.

Lex Fridman 30:01 So, your goal is to...... deradicalize the audience of those folks?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 30:06 So, that used to be my goal. Uh, my goal was deradicalization. Now, I'm kind of hoping that that's just the byproduct. So, the goal, I think, is to talk to somebody and to show they believe this because of these reasons, and if you want to change people's beliefs, we have to talk about the underlying reasons for why they think the things they think. It's not enough to just say, like, "That belief is bad." 'Cause it's like, well, they believe it for a whole bunch of things that are true and real to them, at least. So, you have to address all of the underlying things that they believe before you can change the overlying belief. So, if I'm having a conversation with somebody, it'll be like, "Okay, why do you feel this about that, that, and that? Okay, I understand that. Maybe, like, a better way to solve that would be, like, this or that instead of this thing." Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 30:46 So, to what degree do you have to empathize with the person's worldview versus pushback?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 30:51 (laughs) That's the, that's always the hard one. Uh, when I'm talking to other people, it's almost always me stepping as much inside their bubble as I can. I have to, like, live and breathe their worldview and be able to speak their worldview in order to, like, navigate their thoughts. Because my worldview is, um... And I don't even, I'm not even using this as an insult. I, I don't know if I am a little bit autistic or something, but when I break apart things, I just want to see, like, study, study, study, fact, fact, fact. That's how my mind works for everything. That's just how, that's what I like to see. Like, um, personal stories don't do much for me. Narratives don't do much for me. Just show me, like, the, the data and the studies, whatever. But for other people, I think most brains are more human than that, and they tend to see things in more kind of, like, uh, surreal pictures that are kind of painted, and the brushstrokes are way broader. And, you know, they don't care about the itty-bitty, tiny fact. Um, so if I'm talking to somebody else and I'm trying to get into their head and I'm trying to change their mind on things, I'm gonna be stepping into their world, and I'm gonna try to be working through that framework. Really good example might be, um, we'll say like, uh, when it comes to trans issues for minors, okay? 16 or 17-year-old needs to get on puberty blockers. The way that I want that debate to play out is, uh, let's look at all the data. Let's see what are the outcomes. Uh, let's see what are the processes for getting on medication. And then we'll evaluate all of that, and then we'll go in whatever, like, points more favorably. But that's wholly unconvincing to most people, right? So, as a parent, if I'm having that conversation with another parent, the easiest way for me to have that conversation is like, "Hey, we both have kids. Imagine how horrible it would be if we felt like our kids needed help and the government was trying to get between us and, and their doctor in that conversation." That might be how that talk plays out, which I may think that's a really good argument 'cause I think there probably are times when the government should get in between. But I'll have that conversation because now, I'm in a world where they understand what I'm saying. I am resonating with the way that they feel about things, and that I can make progress w- with the way that they're kind of viewing the world because I'm talking in a language they understand.

Lex Fridman 32:37 So, on this particular topic of trans issues-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 32:40 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 32:40 ... is that the reason you were banned from Twitch?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 32:42 (laughs) I'm not sure. I don't know.

Lex Fridman 32:44 Uh-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 32:45 They just said hate speech, but I don't use, like, slurs or anything. So, it's hard to know exactly.

Lex Fridman 32:48 So, I think you made the claim that trans women shouldn't compete with cis women in, uh, women's athletics.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 32:54 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 32:55 Can you make this case, and can you steel-man the case against it? I think in your community, there's a lot of trans folks who love you, and there's a lot who hate you.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 33:06 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 33:07 And so if you can walk the tightrope of this conversation to try to steel-man both sides.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 33:13 One of the argumentative strategies I say is that, like, anytime you have a conversation, you should be able to argue both sides better than anybody else.

Lex Fridman 33:18 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 33:19 You know? So, um, for the, for the my side, the genuine belief side, um, it feels like, overwhelmingly, all of the data is showing that trans, we'll say trans women, uh, even after, I think, three years on some sort of, like, HRT or, you know, estrogen, uh, stuff, they're still maintaining these advantages from their male puberty over cisgender women. And if that is the case, if we are gonna draw these distinctions around our sports between women and men, it feels unfair to have a category inside the women's sports that are maintaining advantages that are coming from a male puberty, um, regardless of the amount of time they've spent on, uh, hormone replacement therapy. So, that, that would be my argument on that side.

Lex Fridman 34:02 So, it's unfair from a performance enhancement aspect. So, the same way we ban performance, performance-enhancing drugs-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 34:10 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 34:11 ... that involve increasing of test- testosterone, in that same way, it would be unfair.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 34:15 Essentially, yeah.

Lex Fridman 34:16 So, what's the case, uh, against?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 34:19 The c- yeah. The, so the case in favor of them competing together is that realistically, there's not gonna be a trans sports category. Uh, realistically, trans women aren't gonna be competitive with cis men because they've gone through these huge, uh, you know, like, hormone changes by the medication they're taking. And that when we look at how sports are kind of done anyway, there's a whole bunch of biological differences between people within sports categories that are determining their placement in the professional world. So, for instance, um, somebody like me is probably never gonna go far in the NBA because I'm not tall enough. Uh, I think the average height in the NBA, I want-

Lex Fridman 34:54 Don't doubt yourself, Steven.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 34:55 Don't doubt myself, yeah. I want to say it's, like, 6'6" or something. They're huge people. Um, or, you know, you look at, like, Michael Phelps is a classic example of a guy whose torso is, like, so long. His body is built for swimming.

Lex Fridman 35:07 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 35:07 And I think there are some trans people that will look at that, or somebody advocating for this position, they'll look at that and they'll go, "Okay, realistically, the way that Michael Phelps' body, um, processes lactic acid, the shape, physiologically, of his body is gonna put him in a level of competition that so many men are never gonna reach just because of biology." How is it fair that you can have these biological outliers competing in these categories, but then when we come to, like, sports categories with trans and cis women, you're gonna take trans women and say that they can't compete against cis women? Can't you also just say that they have some level of biological difference there? Like, is it really gonna be that great of a difference than what Michael Phelps has versus the average swimmer, or an NBA player has versus, like, the average-height male?

Lex Fridman 35:45 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 35:46 Do you think we're gonna get into some tricky ethical territory as we start to be able to, uh, through biology and genetics, modify the human body?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 35:55 Absolutely.

Lex Fridman 35:56 It's gonna-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 35:56 I feel like those things are coming sooner than, uh, we wanted them to. Uh, the, uh ... Oh, man, do the A- have you seen the AI art?

Lex Fridman 36:03 Yes.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 36:04 That's a-

Lex Fridman 36:04 Of course. I'm an AI person. (laughs)

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 36:06 Oh, okay then. Yeah, yeah. That's AI. That's always been like a, "What's gonna happen when, uh, when robots can do art better than humans, LOL?" Like, "Well, we'll see you in 20 years, in 20 years, in 20 years." And now, you have AI art winning competitions. And it's funny because-... robots are essentially-

Lex Fridman 36:24 There's a robot behind you, by the way.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 36:25 A robot behind me. Ro- oh, nice. Um...

Lex Fridman 36:28 (laughs)

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 36:28 Robots are really good at-

Lex Fridman 36:29 Careful what you say.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 36:30 Yeah. Oh, God, I'll be careful. Um, that's not like one of the Chinese ones with a gun on it, right? Oh, okay.

Lex Fridman 36:35 Uh... (laughs)

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 36:36 Hopefully not.

Lex Fridman 36:36 Uh, well, we'll see, depending on what you say, yeah.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 36:39 (laughs) Okay. Robots are really good at showing the limitations of the human mind in categories that we didn't believe we were limited before. And I think that humans have this idea, intrinsically, that we have like some type of, like, innovative creative drive that is just outside of the bounds of physical understanding.

Lex Fridman 37:01 Right.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 37:01 And, with a sophisticated enough program, we see that maybe that's not actually true, and that's a really scary thing, philosophically, to deal with, because we feel like we're very special, right? We, we own the planet. We make computers. And the idea that you can start to get these robots that can do things, that it's like, "Okay, you can do math, fine. Okay, you can do calculation base, fine. But you can't do art. That's the human stuff."

Lex Fridman 37:21 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 37:21 And then when they start to do that, it's like, "Oh, shoot."

Lex Fridman 37:24 And that terrifies you a little bit? Like, uh, uh, losing... the human species losing control of our dominance-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 37:30 Um...

Lex Fridman 37:30 ... over this earth?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 37:31 I don't think it's necessarily losing control of our dominance. I, I mean, I guess like a Skynet thing could come in at some point, but I think it, I think it more, it, it, it brings us to this really fundamental level of like, what does it mean to be human? What is it that we're good at? Um, what should we be doing with technology? We never really ask that question in the Western world. It's always the technology is like normative, in that technology equals good, and more technology equals better. That's been like the default assumption. In fact, if you ask a lot of people, "How do you know if civilization has progressed over the past 100 or 200 years?" They don't say, "We have better relationships. We, um, you know, have, uh, longer marriages, we blah, blah, blah." They'll say, "Technology has improved. We've got crazy phones, we've got crazy computers." And, um, the idea that more technology might be bad has never even crossed somebody's mind, unless it's used for like a really bad thing, so...

Lex Fridman 38:14 Well, it's interesting. We kind of think, as more and more automation is happening, we're going to get more and more meaning from things like being artists-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 38:22 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 38:22 ... and doing creative pursuits, and here's like, oh shit, if, if the art, if the creative pursuits are also being automated, then what are we gonna gain meaning from? What are-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 38:31 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 38:31 ... the activities from which we'll gain meaning? You know, my whole life I've been working on artificial intelligence systems. There's been different revolutions. One of them is, is the, is the machine learning revolution, and it's interesting to build up intuition and, uh, destroy that intuition about what is and isn't solvable by machines.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 38:50 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 38:50 I think, um, for the longest time I grew up thinking Go is not... that the game of Go is not solvable. Uh, because my understanding of AI systems is ultimately that it's, it's, it's fundamentally a search mechanism that is fundamentally going to be brute force. There's no shortcuts.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 39:10 Sure. Like a tr- like if it can't solve the traveling salesman problem, it's not even gonna be able to give you an approximation.

Lex Fridman 39:15 So most interesting problems are a giant travel salesman problem-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 39:19 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 39:19 ... and then so of course it's not gonna be able to solve that.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 39:21 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 39:21 And then you... Then, uh, the deep learning revolution made you realize, holy shit, these large neural networks with a giant number of knobs is able to actually somehow, uh, uh, estimate functions that can do a pretty good job of understanding deep representation of a thing.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 39:41 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 39:41 Whether that's the game of Go, or whether it's the human natural language, or if it's images and video or, um, audio and even actions in different video games and actions of robotics and so on.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 39:54 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 39:54 And then do you realize with diffusion models and different s- different generative models, you start to realize, holy shit, it can actually generate not just interesting, uh, representations or interesting manifestations of the representations and forms, but it's able to do something that impresses humans in its creativity.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 40:16 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 40:16 It's, it's beautiful in the way we think of art as beautiful, like it surprises us, it makes us chuckle, it makes us, uh, sit back in awe and all those kinds of things. And yet, the thing that it seems to struggle with the most is the physical world currently. So that, that's counterintuitive. We humans think that it's, um, it's pretty trivial, the, being able to pick up a cup, being able to like write with a pen, like in the physical space. We think that's trivial. We give ourselves respect for being great artists and great, uh, mathematicians and all that kind of stuff, and that seems to be much easier than the physical space.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 40:51 Our bodies are really cool.

Lex Fridman 40:52 Yeah.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 40:52 There is a, um, I don't know, it was probably Asimov or somebody. There was some science fiction writer that had had a short story and it was like an alien that had landed on Earth and it was describing our bodies from a totally alien perspective. And when you think about all the things we can do, it's pretty cool. We can, you know, climb e- in, through a whole multitude of environments. We can exist in a multitude of temperatures. We can manipulate things, um, ju- just with our hands and h- you know, the, the way that we can interact with things around us. And yeah, we're very capable on like a physical level, even though, like you said, we think about ourselves like, "Oh, well human beings have really big brains." And we do. We're really intelligent as well, but yeah, our bodies are pretty cool too.

Lex Fridman 41:26 And it's a fascinating hierarchical biological system, like, um, that we're made up of, of a bunch of different like living organisms that all don't know about the big picture of our body.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 41:40 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 41:40 And it's all functioning in its own little local world and it's doing its thing, but together it has a, a v- it forms a super resilient system.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 41:48 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 41:49 All of that comes from a very, uh, compressed encoding of what makes a human. You start with the DNA and it builds up from a single cell to a sh- giant organism.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 42:01 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 42:02 I mean that... And because of the DNA, through the evolution process, you can constantly create new humans and new living organisms that adapt to the environment. Like that resilience to the physical world, it seems like running the whole Earth over again, the whole evolutionary process over again, is, uh, might be the only way to do it. So to create a robot that actually adapts...... is as resilient to the dynamic world, might be a really difficult problem.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 42:34 Possibly. I was gonna say, like in a programming environment, you can do things on timescales that are impossible in the real world, right? Like the benefit to AI and computers is that computationally they can compute so much data so quickly.

Lex Fridman 42:45 Yeah.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 42:45 Um, whereas on human timetables, we have to wait. When you talk about evolution, um, you know, it's generation after generation after generation, you know. Maybe in a virtual environment, that could be simulated, and then those changes could happen a lot quicker.

Lex Fridman 42:57 Well, that's in a human timescale, but-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 42:59 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 42:59 ... you have to look at Earth at a quantum, as a quantum mechanical system, the computation's happening super fast. This is a giant computer doing a giant simulation. So just 'cause for us humans it's slow, there's like trillions of organisms involved in you, Destiny being you.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 43:15 Sure. But the next iteration of like from human to human, even if under the quantum level there's a lot of stuff going on, you talk about like, um, like changes in DNA for instance, right? Like, that's happening from a generation to generation timescale. Like in a virtual environment, that could theoretically happen, well, it already is. There's like protein folding, like huge cloud computing, probably ML stuff that's like working on doing all of that stuff, and it'll run like trillions and trillions of simulations, you know, every second and stuff. Maybe not every second, but, uh-

Lex Fridman 43:41 Still slower than the actual protein folding, much slower. The, th- that's for the problem of solving-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 43:47 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 43:47 ... protein fold, folding, uh, to estimate the 3D structure. But the actual body does the, the actual protein folding way faster. So like we're ... the question is, can we shortcut the simulation of human evolution, try to figure out how to build up an organism without simulating all the details? 'Cause if we have to simulate all the details of biology, we're screwed. We don't have-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 44:09 Oh, true. We'd have to put something in a pond and then watch it for-

Lex Fridman 44:12 That might be-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 44:12 ... a billion years or so.

Lex Fridman 44:13 ... the most efficient way to do it.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 44:14 Sure.

Lex Fridman 44:14 That's mo- what the universe most likely is, is a kind of simulation created by a teenager in their basement to, to try to see what happens. It's a, it's a computer game. I, that might be the most efficient way to create interesting organisms. But within this system, it's perhaps possible to create other robots that will be of use and will entertain us in the way that other humans entertain us. And that's a really interesting, of course, problem. But it's surprising how difficult it has been to create systems that operate in the physical world.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 44:49 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 44:49 And operate in that physical world in a way that's safe to humans and interesting to humans.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 44:55 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 44:55 'Cause there's also the human factor, the human robot interaction. To me, that's like the most interesting problem, to figure out how to do that well. And, uh, so , Elon Musk and others, Boston Dynamics have worked on legged robots. So I, I really care about legged robots. Those are s- super interesting. How to make them such that they're able to operate successfully in a dynamic environment is super tricky. They're like, they're like the dumbest of dogs, speaking of which, there's a dog barking outside.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 45:25 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 45:26 I mean, it's, it's really tricky to create those kinds of organisms-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 45:29 For sure.

Lex Fridman 45:29 ... that live in a, in a human world. Then again, if more and more of us move into the digital world, so you s- stream a lot, like part of who you are exists in the digital space.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 45:44 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 45:45 The fact that you have a physical representation also, maybe more and more will become not important. (laughs)

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 45:52 I hope that's the case, 'cause I bought a lot of stock in Meta, and man, it's down (laughs) a lot.

Lex Fridman 45:57 Oh, Meta, Meta, (laughs) Meta the company?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 45:58 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 45:59 Is, is there some degree, like can you, can you, can you look at yourself, like Steven the physical meat vehicle-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 46:04 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 46:05 ... and then the Destiny, this digital space, like digital avatar? Do, do you sense that in a certain way you're the digital avatar?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 46:14 I've always tried to keep my on-stream personality as genuine as possible. So they're one and the same to me. I don't really view them as two separate entities. So, but I mean, I always view myself as Steven, the real life person. My, Destiny's my online name, but ...

Lex Fridman 46:27 No, but because so many ... your social network is established in the digital space. Like so many people know you through the digital space. Can there be, can we swap out another person that looks like you, in like an AI system? And then that entity known as Destiny will continue existing. So I-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 46:42 I mean, it must be, like, uh, there must be some level of sophistication that could emulate a human brain, I would imagine, right? Probably the tech's not there yet, but ...

Lex Fridman 46:50 Well, the question is, what's the level of sophistication of the audience that would recognize that something has changed? Like, it's the Turing test.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 47:00 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 47:00 How hard is it to trick your audience, your s- your large audience of fans that watch your streams, that when you swap out an AI that emulates you, that nothing is changed? And the question is, do you have to really simulate so much of the human brain for that? I don't think so.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 47:19 Probably not.

Lex Fridman 47:20 And so, I mean, (laughs) like you said, uh, a lot of political discourse is d- just walking down the tree-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 47:27 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 47:27 ... together. So you can probably-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 47:28 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 47:28 ... emulate a lot of that discussion.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 47:30 Yeah, it would depend on if you're doing old datasets and you're training on that and I'm having conversations about abortion and Ukraine and vaccines, I imagine it could do it for quite a while. The only thing that would be weird is when novel issues pop up. Then you probably need a more sophisticated, uh-

Lex Fridman 47:42 (laughs)

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 47:42 ... resemblance of the inner brain, right?

Lex Fridman 47:44 You have to keep, keep training on the internet, so how the language models. And that's the most incredible breakthrough is, is the language models.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 47:50 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 47:50 You just have to keep retraining the system on, on, on Reddit-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 47:54 (laughs) Yeah.

Lex Fridman 47:54 ... which is actually what a lot of it is trained on-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 47:56 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 47:56 ... which is hilarious.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 47:57 I do think it's really interesting that like, kind of like funny problems, like the trolley problem that we can kind of work through our normative ethical systems on, are now like real questions. Where like if you're driving a Tesla and it's on autopilot and you're gonna hit somebody but it can swerve and hit somebody else, like what, what ought the system do? Like, we went very quickly from fun kind of like project in philosophy class to, we need to solve this for insurance purposes like as quickly as possible. It's kind of interesting to think about.

Lex Fridman 48:21 Well, I actually have a, a, I'll bring up the trolley problem with you later. It's, it's, there's a fascinating version of it that-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 48:27 Okay.

Lex Fridman 48:27 ... I find hilarious. Okay, uh,

Lex Fridman 48:29 let's (laughs) let's return to your low point.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 48:31 Oh yeah. (laughs)

Lex Fridman 48:31 Uh, you started playing video games, that was a lucky break.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 48:35 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 48:35 You, uh, you did text-based ones, that was a lucky break 'cause you'd gotten to be pretty good at learning. And then you started thinking about going to college and so on. What happened next?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 48:44 I mean, I went to like a prep school, so y- you kinda have to go to college after, that's like the point, right? I, I was also a millennial. They, all of us had to go to college, that's always what they told us, so... Um, my life was kind of, uh, it was, it's hard to describe. I didn't really think much of the future. I was just kind of enjoying the day-to-day 'cause everything in my life was pretty weird. Uh, both my parents had moved to Florida by the time I was 16, 17. I was living with my grandma, I was working. I had a girlfriend, moved out, uh, we got a place, did college. Uh, by the time I got into college, I had transitioned from working at McDonald's to I was like, uh, working in a casino restaurant basically. And I was really good at that job. So high level of patience for drunk people and insane people. And I was doing music in school 'cause I've really grown to love music. And my kind of thought processes was, my thought process was, "I can do music as a hobby, I guess, unless I get really good and maybe I can make money with that. But otherwise, I love music. I'm okay going to school for music, getting good at it and then just doing that on the side." And then my main job would kind of be this career I was building at the casino. And basically, the trying to balance personal life plus graveyard shift, six to eight hour weeks at a casino and then a full-time music degree was not possible for me. And eventually, I had to drop school after I think it was like three years. And after I dropped school, to maintain my casino job, um, after a few months, I got fired from my casino job. So I'd essentially just thrown away like the past like three or four years of my life (laughs) .

Lex Fridman 50:05 Why'd you get fired from the casino job? I heard there's a story behind that.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 50:09 Yeah, there's a story. Basically, I was just really dumb when it came to understanding corporate politics. And I, this is funny 'cause the same attitude kind of followed me into the streaming world. My thought process has kind of always been, um, that like as long as I'm really good at what I do, I should be untouchable. If I'm really good, you can't do anything to me. I don't have to play any dumb games or whatever. And at the casino, I think I was the youngest, it was an originally shift lead then supervisor position at the casino. And when I started to get my own shifts, there were problems that I would run into on graveyard shift because of carryover from the swing shift. I remember one of these problems was underneath the soda machine, they weren't cleaning it properly and fruit flies were showing up. And I, my, the manager came in one morning and she was like, "Uh, hey, what's going on with the machine?" And I told her, I was like, "Listen, I can't do, I can't take everything from swing shift and do everything at grave shift. I can't do this. They need to figure out their stuff better or I need more employees. It's not possible for me."

Lex Fridman 50:59 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 50:59 And she's like, "Well, did you tell anybody else?" I was like, "Yeah, I complained to the supervisor on the swing shift all the time." And she told me, "If you're not getting the answer that you like, then it's your responsibility to email the next person up." I was like, "Oh, okay. That's interesting." And some months went on and I ran into more problems because on graveyard, here's how... I don't know if it's everywhere, but morning shift is the easiest and that's when you're the most overstaffed because that's when all the VPs are in and that's when all the managers are there and everybody blah, blah, blah. Swing shift is the most challenging. That's where your highest flow of customers is. You're also decently staffed there, but there's a lot of stuff going on. And graveyard, nobody cares at all about you. They don't give you any employees. You might get swamped, you might not. Who cares? Make sure it's clean for day shift. That's the only thing that matters.

Lex Fridman 51:39 A quick question-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 51:40 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 51:40 ... first as a clarification. So-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 51:41 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 51:42 ... this is a 24 hour-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 51:43 24 hour diner, yeah, inside the casino, yeah.

Lex Fridman 51:45 So it's a dine in a casino.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 51:46 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 51:47 Oh, by the way, I had an amazing moment at a dine in a casino recently. It's a special place. A dine in a casino is a place of magic.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 51:54 There's a lot of-

Lex Fridman 51:55 (laughs)

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 51:55 ... I don't know if I'd say magic, but there's a lot of other worldly stuff going on. For sure.

Lex Fridman 51:57 There's characters, there's... And, uh, the, I had an interaction with a waitress that was the sweetest waitress in the world. And I was just like, I don't know, made me feel less alone in this cruel world of ours.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 52:09 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 52:09 Uh, so graveyard begins when?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 52:11 For me, my shift was 10:00 PM to 6:00 AM or sometimes I get called in early, so it'd be 8:00 PM to 6:00 AM or-

Lex Fridman 52:16 So that's, uh, no love for that shift.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 52:19 No, especially not trying to do school at the same time. Absolutely not. Um, but yeah, basically long story short, I ran into a problem with my sup- where I didn't have enough employees on my shift. VPs were coming in, in the morning they're saying like, "Hey, the diner's kind of dirty." And I'm like, "You've cut all my employees past 4:00 AM." Like on some nights I'm literally cooking and doing front of house, like all on my own, like I can't do this. And, uh, my manager Pam told me, "Well, you got to figure it out." And so I remembered her advice, so I emailed the VP of food and beverage and I CC'd her and I said, "I'm not getting the help I need in my restaurant." Now, I didn't know at the time that I was basically completely throwing her under the bus because of that email. But I, I, retroactively when I look back on things, or retrospectively, I see that was the moment that I got like marked for deletion. And I didn't really understand it, even though I, I'd heard terminology before, papering somebody out the door. But after that point, I started to get written up for like a lot of little random things, like I'll come... Like, I'd missed one day of work in my three years at the casino and I started to get written up for like showing up like one or two minutes late. I was like, "That's kind of weird." I don't know, that's whatever. Um, or written up for random ways about filing paperwork. And then eventually there came a situation with another employee where they were... It's complicated, it has to do with like call-out stuff, but basically they wanted to come, or they wanted to call out and I told them if they called out, they were gonna get fired because they were at like 10 points, they were at nine points and 10 points is firing blah, blah, blah. Pam told me, uh, "You can tell her that she's gonna get a point, but you can't tell her she's gonna get fired." I don't know what that meant. And then I told her that, "If you call out, you're gonna get, you know, you're fucked. You're gonna get fired, uh, or you're gonna be at 10 points." And then I got called in early, like three days later and Pam was like, uh, "You inappropriately communicated with an employee because you said the F word in a text message." And I'm like, "Really? There's no shot." And she's like, "Well, you also tried to fire the employee." And I was like, "No, I told her she was gonna get 10 points." She's like, "Well, you used the F word." I'm like, "Th- this is insane." And, uh, I didn't... Just 'cause I was such a, such a high performing employee, I was like, "There's no way I'm getting fired."

Lex Fridman 54:02 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 54:02 And then I did, and I was like, "Yeah." Cashed out my 401k and moped for like three months 'cause I had thrown away school for this casino job. And then I got fired from this job that like, yeah, nobody believed I got fired. It was just insane, yeah.

Lex Fridman 54:14 So if you look back, if you were allowed to, not just to look back to your own memory, but actually watch yourself, like somebody recorded a video that whole time-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 54:22 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 54:22 ... do you think you would be surprised, you would notice some things like potentially, of not having a self-awareness, not having like social, like a civility and social etiquette that's played in the human relations?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 54:34 Yeah, absolutely.

Lex Fridman 54:36 So is that, is that at the core of it, essentially?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 54:39 Yeah, I think so. Uh, I mean, that follows me even to this day. There's a lot of, um... I don't know if you're recording or not, but when we spoke earlier about like meta conversations, I have to think a lot sometimes about meta conversations 'cause the way that I want to drive a conversation will sometimes be way different than what is like the best way to have a conversation. Whereas I just want to like go really hard on like some s-... itty-bitty, like some idiosyncrasy, some factor figure, whatever. But that's not, like, the human conversation I need to have, you know? Yeah.

Lex Fridman 55:03 So, you got fired/left that job, uh, and that took you to the, the job that would be the lowest point?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 55:11 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 55:12 (laughs)

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 55:12 'Cause there was a huge downgrade in pay. I went from getting, like... I think at the casino, 'cause I worked so much overtime, I was getting, like, 22.50 an hour on all my overtime. 50... And this was back in 2008, 2009 as, like, a college student. Like, this amazing pay. Um, the be- I had benefits, like everything was good. And then the carpet cleaning was like, I was probably getting my paycheck, like, every other week, it was maybe 1,500 bucks or $1,000. And I'm working, like, 13-day stretches. Like, I have every other Sunday off, and it's so many hours. Like, I have to show up at the shop at, like, 7:00 or 6:00, and then I go home at, like, 8:00 or 9:00 depending on when my jobs are throughout the day.

Lex Fridman 55:48 Are you doing, uh, businesses or residential, or what are you doing?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 55:51 Everything.

Lex Fridman 55:52 Everything?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 55:52 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 55:53 Are you working for a company that does carpet cleaning-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 55:55 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 55:55 ...or are you d- Okay, and so, like, there's a schedule thing, you have to go to it and so on?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 55:59 Yeah, they, but... So like, this is why the schedule would suck, 'cause sometimes I'd show up at... I, I think we had to be in the shop at, I think it was 7:00 AM. We'd show up at the shop at 7:00 AM, first job might be at 8:00 or 9:00, but that job might be, like, a one-hour job. So I might show up at 7:00 AM and have a job from 8:30 to 9:30. Then my next job might not be from, till like, say, 11:00. So from 8:30 to 9:30, I'll do one job. Um, and then I've got a job from, like, 11:00 to 12:00 or something. Then I might have, like, a decent job from, like, 5:00 to 8:00. But, like, my whole day is destroyed. And I'm, I'm doing, like, three smallish jobs, so I'm getting, like, 30 bucks maybe for being in the shop, or, uh, uh, you know, at my job for, like, 10 or 11 hours, and it's just, like, horrible.

Lex Fridman 56:37 So you're somebody that seems to be extremely good at thinking and conversation, and so have a bit of an ego, perhaps, uh, in a, in both the negative and the positive sense of that word. Was there some aspect of working at McDonald's and then working at the casino and then working for the, um, as a carpet cleaner that was humbling?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 56:57 No, never.

Lex Fridman 56:58 Never? (laughs)

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 57:00 Um, I had a-

Lex Fridman 57:00 The ego burned bright through it all.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 57:02 The... Well... (laughs)

Lex Fridman 57:04 Or no, i- uh, you can push back on the ego.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 57:06 Yeah, no, I, I understand. I totally get what you mean. Um, I had a really close friend growing up whose name was Chris, and I think we probably met when he was... We were, like, four or five, I think. He lived behind me. And I grew up with him, and I'd always been kind of an outsider to the world that I was in once I got to high school, for sure. Um, because all of those kids were incredibly wealthy, you know, Corvettes and Mustangs when they turned 16. It was a prep school. And I was doing the... They had, like, a work-study program there, where you could stay after school from 2:30 to 5:00 every day to kind of, like, work to pay for your tuition. So I'd been working, like, throughout all of high school. I got another job at McDonald's when I was 18, worked at the casino. Like, I'd always been doing that kind of work. I never really viewed it as, like, beneath me or anything. It's not like my h- I don't have, like, a family of doctors or lawyers or anything. And then me and my other friend, the Chris guy, we'd always make fun of everybody else for being kind of like, uh, you know, like preppy kids and everything, so...

Lex Fridman 57:54 So there was a, there was some pride to that sort of hard work?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 57:59 Yeah, I guess, a little bit, yeah. 'Cause f- uh, yeah, looking especially at my dad, like, the solution to every problem was to just throw more hours of work at it, basically. So that was always my, yeah, go-to. And I never-

Lex Fridman 58:08 So-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 58:08 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 58:08 ... what was psychologically the low point?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 58:11 I think psychologically the low point was that, um, as I'm doing this carpet cleaning job, uh, driving around my city, there's, like, this feeling of... I guess for a lot of people, it's probably college, but there's a feeling when you're in high school that everything is, like, so exciting and the whole world is kind of in front of you, and there are a trillion, trillion different branching paths of possibilities. And, you know, even through high school, you're thinking like, "Am I gonna be a doctor or a lawyer, or can I join the NBA, or can I do this or that?" There's all these things in front of you. And when I, I, I especially felt it when I was doing those carpet cleaning jobs, and, um, I think it was in the fall. I'd be outside some of these houses and I'd just kind of look around, and I'd recognize a lot of these neighborhoods that I'd drive around with friends in, or I'd, you know, be walking through. I'd do- I ran cross-country, some of them I'd be running through these neighborhoods. And it was just kind of like this feeling of looking around, and it was like, when I was here in the past, this was, like, kind of like a transitionary phase of my life where I'm doing this, and it's so fun and exciting, and then I'm gonna move on to something else, and it's going to be fun and exciting and awesome. And then, like, you know, two years later, my whole life has collapsed. Like, I'm in a house that I can't afford anymore. My ex, that I hate, is pregnant with my kid, and I have n- no money. I've got no upward mobility. I failed college. I, my job is horrible. Like, just every single ou- like, this is like, my... All of those, the, the wave function had collapsed into one thing, and that one thing was the worst thing that it could have possibly been (laughs) at the time for me. Yeah, like everything was gone and horrible. So yeah, that was the feeling I had at the time.

Lex Fridman 59:41 Did you ever contemplate suicide?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 59:43 I thought about thinking about it, but I've just never been that kind of person, so.

Lex Fridman 59:48 I mean, basically, as a way to escape from the hardship?

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 59:50 Something that I'm so incredibly lucky, I don't know why or how, I'm just gonna chalk it up to biology, I've always had really high mental baseline. Uh, like depression and all of that, there have been a few short stints I've dealt with it past 30, 'cause I did a lot of drugs, but, um, other than that, I've... My mental baseline is just so high. And even in the carpet cleaning days, um, like if you... Uh, man, the videos might still be there, I think on my old YouTube chaner, channel, where I'll be like playing StarCraft when I first started getting into streaming, and I'll be calling up customers like, "This is Steve from Guaranteed Clean. We had to move your job back one hour. Is it okay if I show up instead of 2:30?" And then I hang up and was like, "All right, guys, we got three more games." And then it's like, "Let's go," like, stuff like that. So my, my baseline has always been, like, really high for mental functioning.

Lex Fridman 1:00:28 So even in the low point, there's... You had strength. Is there, is there anything you can give, uh, by way of advice from people that, for whom the wave function collapses? As it does for many of us, like, "Holy fuck, the, the world is not full of opportunity, and you're kind of a failure." Like, I've, I've, I've been there.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:00:47 Yeah, I don't know. It's rough because, like...I usually ask for compassion from people that have it better off, because like once you're down there, like the only reason, I say I got lucky, but it wasn't even really lucky. I like, or it was lucky, but it was more lucky. It wasn't just lucky that I got into streaming. It was lucky that I was into computers at an early age. It was lucky that I played video games at an early age. It was lucky that all the tech came up at exactly that right point in time. Um, like, I was a pretty smart guy, but it was definitely, uh, p- uh, preparation meets opportunity, and that opportunity was like at the exact precise moment of my life. If anything had gone differently, then I would just be cleaning carpets today, so...

Lex Fridman 1:01:22 So in the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics...

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:01:26 This is like one out of like... (laughs)

Lex Fridman 1:01:27 There's many, many Stevens that are just still carpet cleaning.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:01:31 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 1:01:32 And they are full of pain and resentment.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:01:34 (laughs) Yeah. The, the one piece of advice that I give, and I hate that I have to push back against all these crypto bros and everybody online. For decently intelligent people that are successful, I've never heard anybody give a contradiction to this. Maybe you will. You can tell me if you disagree. I always look at kids in high school, and I'm like, "Just try a little bit harder, like 30 minutes a night, if you don't study, just do 30 minutes, just do a little bit more." Um, it is, you are laying the foundation for the rest of your life and you can't appreciate it in high school and college. But oh my God, when you get out, everything in your life is so much easier. You have probably more responsibility over the direction of your life when you're like 13, 14 years old, than you ever will once you're like 25 and older. Because this is like when you're determining the foundations that everything's gonna build on, so...

Lex Fridman 1:02:16 Yeah, 100%.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:02:17 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 1:02:17 So, first of all, it does seem that the liberating aspect of being young-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:02:23 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 1:02:23 ... is like anything you learn, so working hard at learning something will pay off-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:02:30 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 1:02:30 ... in like non-linear ways, like you said with video games.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:02:33 Yeah.

Lex Fridman 1:02:33 I feel like, so like people who are like, "I hate school," all right, well fine, but find something where you're challenging yourself, you're growing, you're learning, you're learning a skill.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:02:43 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 1:02:43 You're learning about a thing. Of course, you know, you could push back and say, "Well, there's some trajectories that might not be productive." Like if, if you spend the entirety of your teen years playing, I don't know, League of Legends or a game you have a love and hate relationship with.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:02:58 No, just a hate and hate relationship.

Lex Fridman 1:02:59 Okay. Well, we'll talk about...

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:03:01 (laughs)

Lex Fridman 1:03:01 I think you have a love/hate relationship with hate in general. We'll just talk... And love.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:03:05 (laughing) Okay.

Lex Fridman 1:03:05 We'll t- we'll, we'll try to decomplexify that one. Uh, I think in general, just investing yourself fully with passion really does pay off.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:03:15 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 1:03:15 But that said, also school I feel like doesn't get enough credit, like high school in particular, middle school and high school. Because it's general education. If, I, I think if, if you're, especially if you're lucky to have good teachers, but honestly I haven't mostly. The textbooks themselves were good teachers. It's a one chance in life you have to really explore a subject.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:03:43 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 1:03:43 Fuck grades. Like getting good grades is at tension, I would say, with actual learning.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:03:49 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 1:03:49 That is true. But just get a biology textbook and to explore ideas in biology, and allowing yourself to be, um, inspired by the beauty of it, to... Yeah, I don't know, I, I think that really, really, really pays off and you never get a chance to do that again.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:04:07 Yep.

Lex Fridman 1:04:07 And maybe not even textbooks, like reading, straight up reading. I think, I think if you read, this is one time in life you get a chance to read, really read. Like read a book a day read. You, you could really invest, you can really grow by reading. I mean, Elon Musk, all those guys talk about it. Like...

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:04:27 It's very, very rare that you meet like a dumb person who reads a lot. I don't know if that's ever happened in my life. (laughs) Yeah.

Lex Fridman 1:04:33 Dumb or not successful.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:04:34 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 1:04:34 And it's, and the cool thing is it seems like the reading, this is like investment, the reading you do early on in high school pays off way more than the reading you do later. Uh, so like the, the, the really influential reading is, uh, is during those high school years. Because you're basically learning from others, the mistakes they've made, the solutions to problems. You're, you're basically learning the shortcuts to life. Like whatever the hell you want to do. Music, read from the best people, uh, that, uh, the music theory. Like learn music theory, learn, uh, read biographies about jazz musicians, blues musicians. See their, like see all the mistakes, see what they did, see the shortcuts. If you wanna do podcasting, read about other podcasts. If you wanna do streaming, read about other, other streamers, physicists and so on. And I feel like you figure out all the mistakes and you get the shortcut through life. Because most people show up to college without having done that, and now you get a chance to shortcut your way past them.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:05:32 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 1:05:33 Yeah, 100%. I'm, I'm gonna... But nobody really teaches you that. They're like, "Go to school, this, from this time to that time. The, you're, shut up, you, this is just what you do. Eat your broccoli."

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:05:46 I think it's like there's two huge problems. One is, um, now that I'm older, 'cause you, you don't, you don't know anything as a kid. You can't really criticize adults as a kid, 'cause you're a kid. You're not-

Lex Fridman 1:05:53 By the way, you're ageist, if I may say so.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:05:55 I am. I am super ageist.

Lex Fridman 1:05:56 And so you-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:05:57 And as I get older, I get even more ageist.

Lex Fridman 1:05:59 Yeah. So you (laughs) ...

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:06:00 There are a lot of people I argue with them, it's like, "Man, dude. You're really 22, aren't you? I can tell. Every word you say-"

Lex Fridman 1:06:04 So...

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:06:05 "... just seeps of like 22 year old-ness."

Lex Fridman 1:06:07 (laughs)

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:06:07 But that's okay. I love that for you. Yeah.

Lex Fridman 1:06:08 No. I could just say, 'cause you mentioned this, so your wife is a fellow streamer.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:06:13 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 1:06:13 Malina. You mentioned that this is a source of fights-

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:06:16 Oh.

Lex Fridman 1:06:16 ... uh, for the two of you that, and I can just feel that. There is truth to what you're saying, which is like, all right, you're saying that because you're 22. Just wait until you're 25 and you won't be saying that anymore.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:06:28 Sure.

Lex Fridman 1:06:28 Now that is the most annoying thing for people to hear.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:06:31 Yeah, you can't ever say that, of course.

Lex Fridman 1:06:32 B- because it's actually usually true. Be- because we do go through phases in life.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:06:39 Mm-hmm.

Lex Fridman 1:06:39 And you can understand that most things are phases, so just in general you can say, "Just, just wait."

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:06:45 (laughs)

Lex Fridman 1:06:45 ... just wait. You won't see this, you won't feel this way a- again. I could say that to you, you could say that to yourself. Just wait. Whatever you're feeling like, just wait. In five, 10 years, you'll be a different person and you will laugh at the things you take seriously now, that, that they're causing you pain now. All that kind of stuff. But people hate hearing that. Anyway.

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:07:04 Absolutely.

Lex Fridman 1:07:05 (laughs)

Steven Bonnell (Destiny) 1:07:05 I think the joke that I always say is that, like, if I could literally step into a time machine and I could come back out and see myself as a 17-year-old and I could say, "Hey, I am literally you from the future. You see the time machine." And I would look at me and I would see the time machine and I would give myself the best advice in the world to be the most successful person, I would ignore all of it. Even knowing it came from myself, I'd be like, "This guy's sold out. This dude doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about." Like, "Nah, I'll figure it out better. Like, he must have made some mi-" That's what I would think as a 17... Even if I knew it was myself from the future, I would just 100% never believe it. And knowing that is very frustrating. But I keep that in mind when I deal with younger people. That's why, like, I never... I always say on stream when I'm talking to, like there's been stuff with like Sneako, there's another girl on my stream called Lav. Like, when I see the way the, I see the mistakes they're making, oftentimes because I've made all of these mistakes, sometimes in the most public and horrible fashion ever. Um, but I'm never like a mentor. I'm not gonna sit there and like tell you like, "Oh, do this or that or that or that," 'cause like