Eric Weinstein: On the Nature of Good and Evil, Genius and Madness | Lex Fridman Podcast #134

1. 0:00 – 2:16

   Introduction

   1. LFLex Fridman0:00

      The following is a conversation with Eric Weinstein, the third time we've spoken on this podcast. He is the wise turtle, Master Oogway to my Kung Fu Panda, one of my favorite people to talk to in this world. A complicated and fascinating mind that I'm grateful to have the chance to accompany in exploring this world through conversation, on this podcast and on his, the latter called The Portal. Quick mention of each sponsor, followed by some thoughts related to the episode. First is Grammarly, a service I use in my writing to check spelling, grammar, sentence structure and readability. Second is Sunbasket, a meal delivery service I use to add healthy variety into my culinary life. Third is SEMrush, the most advanced SEO optimization tool I've ever come across. I don't like looking at numbers, but somebody should, it helps you make good decisions. And finally, ExpressVPN, the VPN I've used for many years to protect my privacy on the internet. Please check out these sponsors in the description to get a discount and to support this podcast. As a side note, let me say that wherever this life takes me, I'm drawn to the possibility of having many more conversations with Eric through the years. I think we have just the right kind of contrasting worldviews and a deep respect and appreciation of each other's life stories that creates for this magical experience in the realm of conversation that feels like we're always looking for something that we never quite find, but are always better for having tried. I'm not sure how or why the universe has connected Eric and me, but it did, and I would be a fool not to trust its judgment and enjoy the journey. If somehow you like this podcast, please subscribe on YouTube, review it with five stars on Apple Podcasts, follow on Spotify, support on Patreon, or connect with me on Twitter @lexfridman. And now, here's my conversation with Eric Weinstein.

2. 2:16 – 9:56

   Eddie Van Halen

   1. LFLex Fridman2:16

      Who's the greatest musician of all time, would you say? We were just off camera talking about Eddie Van Halen. He unfortunately passed away.

   2. EWEric Weinstein2:24

      Who's the greatest musician of all time?

   3. LFLex Fridman2:26

      Yeah.

   4. EWEric Weinstein2:27

      Jonathan Richman.

   5. LFLex Fridman2:28

      Who's that?

   6. EWEric Weinstein2:30

      It's a weird question, so I'm gonna give you a weird answer. It's not because-

   7. LFLex Fridman2:33

      Thank you.

   8. EWEric Weinstein2:33

      Okay. Jonathan Richman, the reason I'm picking on him is, is that he had a quote. Uh, he was the front man of a group called The Modern Lovers, and his quote was something like, "We have to be prepared to play music when our instruments are broken, the electricity is out, and it's raining." Something like that. And I thought that that quote was very interesting, because what it said was, you have to be able to strip this thing down farther and farther back to get to something that is intrinsically musical. So, we were having a conversation just now about virtuosity, and we were talking about Eddie Van Halen and his recent passing, and that affected me emotionally. I don't know whether it affected you. I was never a Van Halen, the group, fan, but I, I revered Eddie Van Halen's, uh, capacity for innovation. Just, I saw him like, uh, you know, Rodney Mullen the skateboarder. I dreamed of having the two of them on my, the same podcast just to talk about what it's like to totally discontinuously innovate.

   9. LFLex Fridman3:30

      And you posted a video of Spanish Fly, I think, and saying like, "I didn't know the guitar could make those kinds of sounds." Like, "What is this voodoo magic?"

   10. EWEric Weinstein3:37

       What is it?

   11. LFLex Fridman3:38

       (laughs)

   12. EWEric Weinstein3:38

       Well, this is the thing, right? The arpeggios that he did on a single string are so fast, and the attacks, uh, from the hammer-ons, w- when they go at- at light speed as he did, uh, particularly... And the reason I chose that was just that I, I wanted to strip out the electronics, because part of the claim will be is that he's a rock musician and a lot of the innovations had to do with things peculiar to sort of the electrified setup, you know? His, his use of the whammy bar, for example, or the Frankenstrat that he built from different pieces, right? Th- all of those aspects, in my opinion, are just dwarfed by his innovation and his musicianship. And that's why I chose Spanish Fly, because everyone, of course, will go to something like Eruption or Running with the Devil, which is the first things that they heard that let them know that there was a new force erupting out of Southern California that was Eddie Van Halen, right? I mean, I just, I, I'm in love with, I'm in love with the story of it.

   13. LFLex Fridman4:36

       You're often so poetic about music. Like, it clearly touches your soul on some kind of, on many levels. What is that? Is it deeper than just rocking out with the, uh, in your convertible Corvette '69? I imagine an Eri- Eric Weinstein just driving down the California highways blasting some kinda music. Is it just, like, being able to be carefree for moments of time, or is there something more fundamental that connects to, like, th- the theory of everything in physics, in life, and all of that?

   14. EWEric Weinstein5:11

       How often do you have the chance, for example, to hear mathematics performed as you do in Bach, right? Like, something with that kind of precision and elegance that can't really be grasped, where y- you know, uh, to go back to Leonard Cohen's, uh, famous line, "the baffled king composing," right?

   15. LFLex Fridman5:31

       Such a good song.

   16. EWEric Weinstein5:32

       It's such a good song, but it's also like, individual verses of that song are insanely important. Um, the, the baffled king is how we often make music. We don't really understand, what did we just do that broke that person's heart sitting on the couch, right? And so, the, it's a very strange thing that you should be able to have... Think of it like you're a computer, you've got this weird open music port.... you know, port 37.8, you know?

   17. LFLex Fridman6:00

       Mm-hmm.

   18. EWEric Weinstein6:00

       Like, it's not even, it's not even supposed to be there, and, and suddenly somebody starts playing a guitar and they're making you feel things. Or, you know, like, uh, in particular, particular instruments like the violin, uh, it's so difficult, it's so unforgiving. And when it gives up its secrets, it just, you know, i- it- it wraps its fingers around your heart and won't let go. Sometimes I- I talk about head, heart, and loins. When something can grab your head, heart, and your loins at the same moment and integrate them, um, y- there are very few opportunities to live like that. And if you think about Eddie Van Halen, uh, you know, as far as your head, uh, uh, th- the musical innovations and the fact that he was drawing directly from the classical canon, um, you know, really speaks to the idea that maybe rock i- i- is what, um, somebody like Jimmy Hendrix saw it as being, you know, an infinitely extensible medium. Uh, in terms of heart, um, I always noticed the smile on his face. It's painful to look at an Eddie Van Halen solo now. Like, sometimes you'll see the cigarette dripping off the side of his mouth, and you're like, "That's gonna fucking kill you, and I'm not even worried about it for you. I'm worried about it for me." You're gonna rob... I don't even need to hear you play another note. I just like knowing that you're in the world, that there is somebody that everyone looks to, that nobo- I've never heard a guitarist say, "Eh, I don't know. I think he was okay."

   19. LFLex Fridman7:26

       (laughs)

   20. EWEric Weinstein7:26

       Like, I've never-

   21. LFLex Fridman7:27

       Yeah.

   22. EWEric Weinstein7:27

       ... just never heard it. You can hate him-

   23. LFLex Fridman7:29

       That's true.

   24. EWEric Weinstein7:29

       ... but you still think he was a genius. There are very few people like that in the, i- in the world. And then loins, those leaps, that guy was incredibly-

   25. LFLex Fridman7:39

       Ah.

   26. EWEric Weinstein7:39

       ... good-looking, and you know, skin tight pants, super athleticism.

   27. LFLex Fridman7:42

       Yeah.

   28. EWEric Weinstein7:43

       He completely owned the sexuality, male sexuality of the stage, both being, uh, the completely dominant, you know, sort of mythical alpha male. I hate that expression, but there you are. But also this kind of little boy with this mischievous smirk, and, you know, y- th- the sense that it all came together. How could you not eat that up?

   29. LFLex Fridman8:04

       You could just imagine the millions of, like, young teenage boys who are just, like, playing air guitar in their, in their room. Just that, yeah, basically dreaming of being that kind of god, the, the, the most perfect example of what a human being can be. Yeah.

   30. EWEric Weinstein8:20

       Yeah, and you know-
3. 9:56 – 17:52

   Leonard Cohen

   1. LFLex Fridman9:56

      Can we go back to Leonard Cohen? Uh-

   2. EWEric Weinstein9:58

      Yeah.

   3. LFLex Fridman9:58

      Can we just ... I, the things I feel when I listen to Hallelujah by Leonard Cohen, or a- anything by him, really, but that one-

   4. EWEric Weinstein10:07

      You really wanna get into it?

   5. LFLex Fridman10:08

      What's ... Let's go. What, what does that song mean to you? Is it love?

   6. EWEric Weinstein10:15

      Oh, boy. Well, first of all, it's, it's, it's mystery. Like, it starts off about mystery. So, what are you, what are you doing? You're doing this alternation between the r- two chords, so three notes at the same time. One is called the, the tonic, or you have the, the major and the relative minor, and he's alternating between them. There's only one note of difference between those two chords. One of them would be feeling sad, one of them would be more joyous, typically described. Um, and so by altering one note, it's the minimal amount to take you back and forth between joy and happiness, uh, as that's encoded in us. So, he starts off with, "I heard there was a tune David played that pleased the Lord, but you don't really care for music, do ya?" Um, that's really interesting, because it's, he's using this technique called bathos, right? So, the alternation between the sublime and kind of the guttural or ridiculous or the mundane, right?

   7. LFLex Fridman11:13

      Mm-hmm.

   8. EWEric Weinstein11:13

      So, he's like, uh-

   9. LFLex Fridman11:15

      But there's a bitterness to it too. Is it just play?

   10. EWEric Weinstein11:18

       Well, the way I hear it, again, you know, great song allows for different interpretations. You happen to be asking me, so I'm gonna impart some stuff that probably isn't in the song-

   11. LFLex Fridman11:25

       (laughs)

   12. EWEric Weinstein11:25

       ... but why it speaks to me, and that's what-

   13. LFLex Fridman11:26

       Go there.

   14. EWEric Weinstein11:27

       ... makes it great.

   15. LFLex Fridman11:28

       Yeah.

   16. EWEric Weinstein11:28

       Um, the way I hear it is he doesn't believe the audience. "You don't really care for music, do ya? Then what are you doing listening to this, you stupid idiots?"

   17. LFLex Fridman11:35

       (laughs) Yeah.

   18. EWEric Weinstein11:35

       You know? "Of course you," "of course you care for music. You're, you're too cool to care, so I see through you and screw you." That's like the kind, that's- that's the energy I get out of it.

   19. LFLex Fridman11:43

       Yeah.

   20. EWEric Weinstein11:44

       Uh, then he does this weird thing. "It goes like this," is where he should put the description of where he is in the chord progression, which is the tonic, right? "It goes like this," and then he hits the fourth and the fifth, which are the two other major elements, the subdominant and the dominant, in functional harmony. So, he's describing the chord progression in real time in the lyrics. There's two ways this can come about in other songs. Like, we had this example of-... um, Every Time We Say Goodbye. Do you know this song?

   21. GIGuest (third voice, brief interjections)12:15

       No, I don't.

   22. EWEric Weinstein12:16

       Every time we say goodbye ... No, I think it- it was, uh, Cole Porter, maybe, or Gershwin? Maybe Porter, I don't know. I cry a little. There is no love song finer, but how strange the change from major to minor. Right? Like, it's beautiful use.

   23. GIGuest (third voice, brief interjections)12:34

       Oh, nice. Wow.

   24. EWEric Weinstein12:34

       Then- then there's, uh, times when it's duplicitous. So for example, you'll have, um ... I guess my favorite examples of this are Johnny Cash's Ring of Fire.

   25. GIGuest (third voice, brief interjections)12:45

       Mm-hmm.

   26. EWEric Weinstein12:45

       I fell into a burning ring of fire. Then what does he do with the lyrics and the tune? I went down, down, down. He goes up.

   27. GIGuest (third voice, brief interjections)12:56

       Yeah, yeah.

   28. EWEric Weinstein12:56

       Right? And so the idea is like, "Oh, okay, that was a head fake."

   29. GIGuest (third voice, brief interjections)12:59

       Yeah.

   30. EWEric Weinstein12:59

       Right? And another one of these, um, you know, is Nina Simone's Feeling Good. Oh, okay, so what do you get? A ... Birds flying high. You know how I feel. That sun up in the sky. You know how I feel.
4. 17:52 – 23:08

   Battle between ego and humility

   1. EWEric Weinstein17:52

      Honestly, you've been doing an amazing job in this space. One of the reasons I'm super excited to do this podcast again is that, um, I've learned some things about what I don't do well. And I also have sort of struggled with the question, should I do those things better? Because what if it's ... You know, I always use the same example of the fitted sheet. When you're trying to put a queen-size fitted sheet on a king-size mattress, and you're just like, "Okay, I got that corner squared away." Then you get another corner that pops off-

   2. GIGuest (third voice, brief interjections)18:19

      Yeah.

   3. EWEric Weinstein18:19

      ... and then you have to go back around.... I wonder whether I can improve my style in the ways in which, uh, you know, I think it, it's just a recognition of the difference. You do a better job of getting to the soul of a really top intellectual guest and making them accessible and presenting them as themselves for a huge number of people, and I'd- I'd give my eye tooth to be able to do that.

   4. LFLex Fridman18:45

      Uh, do you ever think about this? Like, 'cause I think about what is the greatest conversation I'll ever have?

   5. EWEric Weinstein18:51

      Hmm.

   6. LFLex Fridman18:52

      You know, like, in- in a sense the portal, not to reduce it to- to anything, but there will be the greatest conversation. You may have already had it, but it's very possible if- if- if enough people like me can keep twisting your arm to keep doing the portal please, that is, there'll be an amazing conversation. One of the questions that I ask myself is like, who is the person that I'm especially equipped, for some reason I'm convinced on Putin. There is something in my head that says, "I- I- I can do this man better than anyone else in this world." I got this thought in my head about it, I don't know why, and I'm convinced, but I think the universe works in that way. Like, if it tells you, it's gonna happen.

   7. EWEric Weinstein19:38

      The way I would say it is, is that almost everybody who becomes a Supreme Court justice believes at a very early age they're going to become a Supreme Court justice.

   8. LFLex Fridman19:46

      Yeah. (laughs)

   9. EWEric Weinstein19:46

      Many people who believe at an early age that they can do it don't get there.

   10. LFLex Fridman19:49

       Yeah. Sure.

   11. EWEric Weinstein19:49

       But of those who get there, almost all of them had this sort of, well, I call it pathological self-confidence, and I do think you have pathological self-confidence, and you also have humility. And most people would hear those as a contradiction. I think that you would not be able to get away with what you do if you didn't have the humility. And so I think, you know, you- you, the great danger is that your equation becomes unbalanced, that you either lose the humility or you lose the- the humility overwhelms the ego and the drive because right now you've got a Mexican standoff in your mind-

   12. LFLex Fridman20:26

       (laughs)

   13. EWEric Weinstein20:27

       ... and th- the rest of us are just benefiting.

   14. LFLex Fridman20:28

       That was beautifully put.

   15. EWEric Weinstein20:29

       My Mexican standoffs aren't as stable as yours.

   16. LFLex Fridman20:32

       (laughs)

   17. EWEric Weinstein20:33

       It's all Reservoir Dogs all the time.

   18. LFLex Fridman20:35

       (laughs) Yeah.

   19. EWEric Weinstein20:36

       But, um, actually the person who that describes is Peter Thiel. Peter Thiel me- thinks more diff- people always say like, "What does Peter think about X, Y, and Z, P, and Q?" It's like, well do you want communist Peter? Do you want hyper-capitalist Peter?

   20. LFLex Fridman20:47

       There's multiple minds in there.

   21. EWEric Weinstein20:48

       Oh my God, right? On everything. That's why he's successful is that he's got all these minds fighting each other. And so when people say, "Peter is this or Peter is that," I just laugh because it, like nobody who knows him would describe him as having thoughts at the level that people are claiming. And- and- and I do think that, you know, in- in my case, um, you know, there's also pathological epistemic humility, like just I know- I know how little, I know how little I- I can do in one life. I know how many things I've screwed up. I know how th- many things I've got wrong. And on the other hand, I know that if- if not, you know, it's like Hillel's questions, you know, "If I'm not for myself, who will be for me? If I'm only for myself, what am I? If not now, when?" You know, at some level there's a question about if I don't decide that someone is capable and that that somebody is me, and I, and if I apply that to everyone else on the planet, then nobody's gonna do anything. And so I do think that one of the things that people like you and I get is, who are you to say that?

   22. LFLex Fridman21:56

       Right.

   23. EWEric Weinstein21:57

       F that man. Just sign me up for some Dunning-Kruger.

   24. LFLex Fridman22:04

       Yeah, but it's multiple minds, like you said. Like this morning I was feeling so good and confident about, I couldn't think no wrong, and I remember last night clearly thinking that I'm the dumbest human who has ever lived-

   25. EWEric Weinstein22:16

       Yeah, great.

   26. LFLex Fridman22:16

       ... and nothing I have ever said is worth anything, and what the fuck am I doing with my life? Why am I scare- I mean, I was terrified as this conversation, who the hell am I?

   27. EWEric Weinstein22:27

       This conversation?

   28. LFLex Fridman22:28

       'Cause I'm an idiot, and 'cause, you know, I- I, Lex, i- i- but no, no, no, but this morning-

   29. EWEric Weinstein22:35

       Aha.

   30. LFLex Fridman22:35

       ... (laughs) I was the baddest motherfucker who's ever walked this earth, so it was-
5. 23:08 – 29:50

   Darkness and beauty

   1. LFLex Fridman23:08

      A few people asked about depression and suicide. I- it's, uh, this- this is a Russian program, so-

   2. EWEric Weinstein23:17

      (laughs)

   3. LFLex Fridman23:18

      ... we'll have to- we'll have to go there. Uh, and I- I think about Leonard Cohen and one of the things that always kind of, um, broke my heart and kinda suffocated the hope I have for just, uh, I don't know, for love in a person's life is to hear how much dep- how much depression was a part of Leonard Cohen's life and how much he suffered. Do you... I guess one way, I'm not sure where we can go with this question, but do you think about the places that the mind can go, like these dark places?

   4. EWEric Weinstein23:54

      Yeah.

   5. LFLex Fridman23:55

      Is there something, like where the only escape out is suicide, for example, that's the darkest version of it?

   6. EWEric Weinstein24:03

      That, I really think suicide is a big place, and suicidal ideation and self-harm, and we don't talk a lot about it. Um, it's- it's a similar problem to trying to talk about trans., these are umbrella categories, and if the commonality is just that somebody harms themselves but we don't know whether that's coming because of a problem in brain chemistry, because of an event in their life.... um, whether evolutionary programming for suicide is weirdly normal, whether or not it might have a religious motivation. Uh, there's- there's too many different forms of self-harm. It's something like the 10th largest killer or thereabouts. Um, and I think that, you know, you can look at it from different angles. Uh, I- I'm old enough to have, you know, had Pete Seeger come to my college when I was, uh, at university, and to watch his good humor in the face of all adversity. Um, I think of Odetta. I- I used to go to Odetta concerts. Any ... I don't know if you- you know who she is.

   7. LFLex Fridman25:13

      Mm-mm.

   8. EWEric Weinstein25:13

      Okay, this is gonna be one of the better days of your life. Check out Odetta-

   9. LFLex Fridman25:16

      Odetta.

   10. EWEric Weinstein25:16

       ... when we're- when we're done with the interview. Um, she was a civil rights figure but also just had a profound voice and great musicianship. These people were in the struggle, right? And they- they saw (laughs) lots of bad things happen, and they kept their humor about them. And, you know, the thing is that you can take on the- the weltschmerz, you know, the pain of the- of the planet, or you can try to do something else, which is to be a happy warrior even if the odds are terrible and the- a- and- and the cost of failure is catastrophic.

   11. LFLex Fridman25:55

       So even when surrounded by darkness. But the thing is with Leonard Cohen is he created such beautiful music, and yet it's like Anthony Bourdain, the same, and yet they go to this dark place. And it could be ... It's easy to say it's just biochemistry.

   12. EWEric Weinstein26:16

       No, there's a linkage between this highly generative creative side-

   13. LFLex Fridman26:21

       Yeah.

   14. EWEric Weinstein26:21

       ... and in some cases dark depression, in other cases not. So you can't say that it's tied, that genius and madness are always, you know, co-traveling or that beauty and pain are one and the same. What you can say is that there's a cluster of people that tell you that for that cluster, there is a relationship between the darkness and the beauty. And I do think that in part it's squaring circles that can't be squared, you know? That ... Well, we- we were just talking before about the inability to serve two perfect systems, the perfect system of the wave equation and the perfect system of even temperament. They're both perfect. They're not compatible. And once you realize that there is perfection and an inability to make contact with perfection, I think, you know, you- you recognize that, um, th- th- there is no solution to this world.

   15. LFLex Fridman27:21

       (laughs) Yeah. That's weird with the poets and musicians, that you wanna say this is a particular thing that you do, but then there's Spanish Fly by Van Halen, and then you realize, "Oh."

   16. EWEric Weinstein27:34

       Well, what do you get out of Spanish Fly by Eddie Van Halen? I- I think it's very singular because of its- the fact that it's purely acoustic.

   17. LFLex Fridman27:42

       For some reason, I always ... I couldn't imagine Eddie Van Halen separate from the band in front of thousands of people just screaming and rocking out with lights everywhere. And Spanish Fly made me think like ... It made me imagine him sitting alone on a couch in a room.

   18. EWEric Weinstein27:58

       I think that's who he was, I really do. I- I mean, I- I- I ... It's ... Believe me, I get it.

   19. LFLex Fridman28:03

       Yeah.

   20. EWEric Weinstein28:03

       He was a rock star. He was a rock guy. Got it, got it, got it, got it. I'm almost positive that you can't get to where he got to without being a complete introvert.

   21. LFLex Fridman28:13

       Yeah, like, it made me imagine that there's, like, some half-naked supermodel (laughs) walking around hoping that, uh, they can, you know, do their thing together, and Eddie's completely-

   22. EWEric Weinstein28:25

       He'd- he'd be with the guitar.

   23. LFLex Fridman28:25

       ... disinterested. He'd be with the guitar.

   24. EWEric Weinstein28:26

       He'd be with the guitar, right?

   25. LFLex Fridman28:28

       Yeah, that-

   26. EWEric Weinstein28:28

       Because, like, honestly, at some level, in- in one case, you know, maybe you're- maybe you're conquesting, maybe you're pursuing love and romance. In the other case, you're- you're talking about a relationship to the- to the order, the creator, the almighty, whatever it is you wanna call that substrate that is reality. And, you know, do I believe that Eddie Van Halen and Jimi Hendrix and Paganini and Heifetz jacked into the, you know, the true essence of the role? Yeah, they did. I don't think it's as good as differential geometry, I'm sorry. I do think it's amazing for other reasons. And thank God, because it's very difficult to communicate differential geometry at scale. But the thing about eruption, for example?

   27. LFLex Fridman29:12

       Mm-hmm.

   28. EWEric Weinstein29:13

       What level do you wanna come in to eruption? Do you want just the sheer majesty in pageantry? Do you want the theatrics? Like, you could put him on- on wires and, you know, set his pants on fire or whatever, and you know, it'd be- it'd be totally in keeping with it. On the other hand, you wanna talk something completely precise that, you know, shows off the virtuosity of what's possible with a Stratocaster, everything works.

   29. LFLex Fridman29:38

       But-

   30. EWEric Weinstein29:38

       Multi-axis.
6. 29:50 – 32:38

   Jimi Hendrix

   1. EWEric Weinstein29:50

      affect you?

   2. LFLex Fridman29:50

      ... a struggle.

   3. EWEric Weinstein29:50

      I mean, let's- let's have the Jimi Hendrix conversation. I don't know that we can do anything to it that hasn't already been done to it.

   4. LFLex Fridman29:55

      (laughs)

   5. EWEric Weinstein29:56

      Maybe that's not true. Maybe the idea is that every generation has to have its Hendrix conversation, and this is a long-form podcast.

   6. LFLex Fridman30:02

      It's Jimi Hendrix experience, yeah.

   7. EWEric Weinstein30:03

      Yeah.

   8. LFLex Fridman30:04

      (laughs)

   9. EWEric Weinstein30:04

      It's so funny.

   10. LFLex Fridman30:05

       Yeah.

   11. EWEric Weinstein30:05

       I hear he stole it from Joe Rogan.

   12. LFLex Fridman30:07

       Yeah. (laughs) There's so many details. One, it hurt my soul on so many levels that you can put a thumb over the guitar to h- to play a note, to- to hold a note, and it doesn't ... Because I wanted to be the Russian virtuoso that sits with his classical guitar in, uh, perfect form, plays really fast with the fingers, and- and then you don't want ... You want the thumb to be perfectly relaxed and supporting the neck.

   13. EWEric Weinstein30:36

       So that's the Russian conservatory student.

   14. LFLex Fridman30:39

       Conservatory student, yeah.

   15. EWEric Weinstein30:40

       ... then there's, like, the Russian wild man.

   16. LFLex Fridman30:43

       Which one is that? (laughs)

   17. EWEric Weinstein30:44

       Well-

   18. LFLex Fridman30:44

       I haven't... (laughs)

   19. EWEric Weinstein30:45

       There are different Russian archetypes, right? So the completely idiosyncratic Russian is very different, in a weird way, from the, uh, you know, "I can do this backwards in any key, in any sle- in, in my sleep, and in, in any time signature that you..." You know, just, just snap your fingers. We've discussed my, uh, piano tuner in previous episodes.

   20. LFLex Fridman31:08

       No, no, that was offline conversation. You told me the story that-

   21. EWEric Weinstein31:11

       But I should tell you the story?

   22. LFLex Fridman31:12

       You should tell (laughs) , you should retell the story. (laughs)

   23. EWEric Weinstein31:14

       There I was in darkest Manhattan-

   24. LFLex Fridman31:16

       Yeah.

   25. EWEric Weinstein31:16

       ... with the world's shittiest, uh, it wasn't even an upright, it was a spinet piano. A friend had given it to me. The piano fell out of tune, and I would have to tune it, and the only tuner I knew is this Russian guy, and I hated dealing with him. There was something about his attitude, it just really rubbed me the wrong way. So anyway, my wife says, "Tune that thing." So we get the p- the piano tuner to come, and he's tuning this, and he's like, "Are you sure? Are you sure you want to tune this, this, this piece of shit?" You know? Okay, fine. So he's like, "Okay, it's your money." The phone rings, and I have the, the phone ringer set on a landline to Paganini Caprice 24, and immediately as the phone rings, he figures out what key the phone ringer is in, which is not the key that, like, Liszt composed th- the variations on, on, uh, Caprice 24, and he starts going into theme and variations on Caprice 24 at some level I've never heard before. Just jaw dropping. A- and like the phone stops ringing, and we have this awkward silence, and I said, "I didn't know you were such a great piano player." And then he says one of these things that in Ru- you know, in Russian accented English, hurts in a way you can't imagine. He said, "No, you are the piano player. I am merely the piano tuner."

   26. LFLex Fridman32:34

       (laughs)

   27. EWEric Weinstein32:34

       (laughs) And it's just like, oh man-

   28. LFLex Fridman32:36

       Yeah.

   29. EWEric Weinstein32:36

       ... through the heart.

7. 32:38 – 36:46

   Good Will Hunting

   1. EWEric Weinstein32:38

   2. LFLex Fridman32:38

      You know, the, it's kind of reminiscent, I'd love to hear actually your opinion on this, it's reminiscent of the Good Will Hunting story. What do you think about that?

   3. EWEric Weinstein32:45

      That movie?

   4. LFLex Fridman32:46

      That movie. It's-

   5. EWEric Weinstein32:47

      What about it?

   6. LFLex Fridman32:47

      It's MIT, it's-

   7. EWEric Weinstein32:48

      Yeah. I guess when I think of that film, I think about Matt Damon as a young guy, risking everything, giving up Harvard. I think, you know, probably the most accomplished group of people in the world are people who choose to give up Harvard voluntarily.

   8. LFLex Fridman33:06

      (laughs) That's beautiful, but-

   9. EWEric Weinstein33:07

      Right?

   10. LFLex Fridman33:08

       ... that's true.

   11. EWEric Weinstein33:08

       Peop- bigger than Harvard.

   12. LFLex Fridman33:09

       That's very true.

   13. EWEric Weinstein33:10

       I think, you know, Ives was one of these people. Um, Bill Gates, of course. Uh... and then oddly, uh, you know-

   14. LFLex Fridman33:19

       Zuckerberg.

   15. EWEric Weinstein33:20

       What? Zuckerberg. But then, uh, Steve Jobs gave up for Reed, and Reed is like the weirdest, craziest college in the world. People should pay much more attention to Reed. And I'm sorry it's going through a hard time at the moment, but what it was before the current craziness is really an interesting story. Irregardless, as we say in the 617 area code, um, I think that a lot about, a l- a lot of my reaction is to the, the real story of Matt Damon, uh, having this vision, and being the young guy to pull it off, and... You know, I also think about Robin Williams trying to explore heart through this lens of acting. And, you know, as you and I, y- you've hung out with comedians, they know that they are a screwed up bunch of people. They do. They'll, they're proud about it. They really are. The idea that Robin Williams, who I saw many years ago when I was in LA, um, in the comedy clubs around here, you know, he was a straight up crazy dysregulated genius in tremendous pain, and his desire to do it earnestly through acting rather than constantly by just sniping, you know, or, or, or being a clown, or, or showing us how fast his mind worked relative to ours. Um, I- I was really moved by that. I thought that he, he brought some authenticity, and took a huge risk for a comedian to be that real.

   16. LFLex Fridman34:49

       And again, like you said, it doesn't always have to be, but in that case, the madness and the genius were neighbors.

   17. EWEric Weinstein34:56

       That one couldn't have been any other way.

   18. LFLex Fridman34:58

       Yeah.

   19. EWEric Weinstein34:59

       No, because his mind... uh, y- y- the thing about seeing him in a comedy club was that he would react to random stimulus in the environment. You know, could be a heckler. Sometimes you almost got the feeling that he wanted a heckler because it was g- it gave him something to play against, right?

   20. LFLex Fridman35:16

       I-

   21. EWEric Weinstein35:16

       He was just, he was infinitely instantly inventive.

   22. LFLex Fridman35:20

       But I actually, to me, the best Robin Williams is as he got closer and closer to the end of his life, because there was a sadness, and he's almost fighting the sadness with this improvisational... Like hi- the weapons he has is this wit and humor, and this dancing that he does with language.

   23. EWEric Weinstein35:42

       That's right.

   24. LFLex Fridman35:42

       But, and then sometimes when he just fall silent, you can see the sadness. And, and I don't know, there's something so beautiful about that. It's like this bird with a broken wing that's like trying to fly, you know, and it's getting older and older, and it, um, I mean, those... He would have made a one hell of a podcast guest, I'll tell you (laughs) , I'll tell you that. That's a sad, um-

   25. EWEric Weinstein36:05

       Yeah, I have some sadness that I really do think that part of what-

   26. LFLex Fridman36:09

       We miss him.

   27. EWEric Weinstein36:09

       ... we call podcasting is actually just getting to know a soul-

   28. LFLex Fridman36:13

       Right.

   29. EWEric Weinstein36:13

       ... over and over again. Like-

   30. LFLex Fridman36:15

       Yeah.
8. 36:46 – 48:19

   Revolutionary minds

   1. EWEric Weinstein36:46

      I- I do think that we're in a really terrifying and depressing time, and I think that part of it is we don't know if something huge is about to get started, and we don't even know what this is. I mean, we just sit here in this weird world that is falling into some new state, and we're not even super curious as to, like, what the hell just happened? Everybody's got an answer, and I'm positive that all of those answers are wrong.

   2. LFLex Fridman37:13

      Let- let's- let's try to at least sneak up on the-

   3. EWEric Weinstein37:15

      Okay.

   4. LFLex Fridman37:15

      ... the good answer.

   5. EWEric Weinstein37:17

      So, the central core of the answer is that the US seemed to be the greatest thing in the world in large measure because we hadn't noticed that we were getting a benefit from having no plan, not having to make a plan for low growth. As long as we had growth, we were in great shape. Let- let's imagine that there was this ... that ... you could run an experiment, you have a billion copies of Earth, and you start the initial conditions slightly different. On some giant number of planets, a lot of the things that were discovered from the 1800s through the end of the 20th century are discovered in a period of time because a lot of that just has to do with once you crack the puzzle of getting better instruments, you can see more. And the more you can see, the more you can make use of what you can see, and it turns out there was lots of stuff to do with like, you know, germs, or, uh, electron orbitals, or you know, spectrum, electromagnetic spectrum.

   6. LFLex Fridman38:22

      Mm-hmm.

   7. EWEric Weinstein38:23

      So, we- we got to do all of those things, and the US roughly corresponded for a good chunk of its history with this bonanza. And so, of course we look like an amazing, genius country. We have no plan. Imagine that you- you could sell a car, you don't have to put in seatbelts, you don't have to put in airbags, you don't have to put in rear view mirrors, or sensors, or r- rear view mirror. You could save a lot of money on a car by not putting in all of the stuff to keep things from going wrong. And I think that's what we had. We had a machine that as long as growth was insanely good, we plowed it back, the- the riches and spoils and- and treasure back into the system, and made more genius stuff, and we carried along a good chunk of humanity, hundreds of millions of people. We did not have a plan for what happens when the growth goes below the stall speed of our society.

   8. LFLex Fridman39:16

      How confident should we be that the growth has slowed in a- in a way that, uh, is permanent rather than a kind of-

   9. EWEric Weinstein39:24

      It's not permanent.

   10. LFLex Fridman39:24

       ... slap in the face where w-

   11. EWEric Weinstein39:26

       It's not the right concept. The right concept is I- I- I try to use the same words over and over again, in case people see mold, because then the perseveration actually gets somewhere, so I use this analogy of the orchard, because everyone talks about low-hanging fruit.

   12. LFLex Fridman39:40

       Mm-hmm.

   13. EWEric Weinstein39:40

       They- they know the concept of low-hanging fruit, but they don't think in terms of orchards, so they say things like, "You think we've picked all the low-hanging fruit, but I believe in the infinite inventiveness of the human mind."

   14. LFLex Fridman39:54

       Yeah.

   15. EWEric Weinstein39:54

       It's like, okay, that- that doesn't even work as an analogy. What if the idea is we only picked all the low-hanging fruit here, and then we're having this stupid argument about low-hanging fruit, and we're not going and looking for new orchards? We're not planting new orchards. We're not looking for forests. We're- we're just sitting here arguing about low-hanging fruit. So, my claim is this, there's probably a lot more low-hanging fruit and it's not here.

   16. LFLex Fridman40:15

       It's in other orchards.

   17. EWEric Weinstein40:16

       It's in other orchards. One of those turned out to be the digital orchard. The digital orchard has not been as stagnant, uh, as lots of these other or- like the chemical, uh, orchard, you know?

   18. LFLex Fridman40:30

       I have faith that there is a small percentage of the population, but not zero, that's looking for those other orchards. Like, I'm excited about one of those orchards, which is I believe there will be robots in everybody's homes, and that will unlock some totally new thing, totally new set of technologies, ideas, the way we live life, the productivity, all the- everything. It'll change everything. So, I'm excited about that orchard. So, I'm si- you know, I'm roaming that orchard and wondering how the hell you kind of bring back like the ant that finds a new source of food.

   19. EWEric Weinstein41:08

       Yeah. (laughs)

   20. LFLex Fridman41:08

       I'm trying to find an apple I can bring back to the- the- the re- the rest of the-

   21. EWEric Weinstein41:11

       Great, so you're in an- you're in- in- in an ex- explorer idiom.

   22. LFLex Fridman41:16

       And do you have faith that there's enough of those?

   23. EWEric Weinstein41:18

       I don't think there are very many of us. I mean, I'm- I'm one of them too.

   24. LFLex Fridman41:21

       Yeah. How many does it take? It takes one ant. (laughs) It takes one ant.

   25. EWEric Weinstein41:26

       What are you talking about?

   26. LFLex Fridman41:27

       (laughs) How many, uh, Elons does it take to screw in a light bulb? (laughs)

   27. EWEric Weinstein41:31

       Okay, let- let's imagine that we went ... Imagine some ant goes and finds a new source of food.

   28. LFLex Fridman41:38

       Yeah.

   29. EWEric Weinstein41:38

       Right? And then it comes back to the colony, and it says, "Hey, I think I found a new source of food." And the re- the initial reaction is, "You're not- you're not authorized to find new food."

   30. LFLex Fridman41:49

       (laughs) "What?"
9. 48:19 – 52:44

   Next Elon Musk should come from MIT

   1. EWEric Weinstein48:20

      L- let me give you an alternate version of this dystopia. I do think that there are people who are capable and there's still places to play and cause things to happen that progress the story forward. But if you look at the, the fire that some of the people are in who fit that profile, like, how much crap has Elon Musk taken? Quite considerable. Right?

   2. LFLex Fridman48:42

      And not much a- admiration from the-

   3. EWEric Weinstein48:46

      Craig Venter-... Jim Watson. These are very difficult people. Steve Jobs was a very difficult guy, you know?

   4. LFLex Fridman48:58

      Yeah, it- it is a bit heartbreaking to me. I mean, everybody is different generations. I just, my mind is a little focused on Elon Musk because he's m- the modern person.

   5. EWEric Weinstein49:08

      Well, you know him, I mean, he's a person to you.

   6. LFLex Fridman49:12

      I- it- it hurts my heart to see how few faculty and, uh, people with Nobel Prizes and so on, uh, admire Elon. Like, how little prob- he gets- he gets a lot of fans from, like, people who buy his products and, you know, young minds-

   7. EWEric Weinstein49:30

      Yeah.

   8. LFLex Fridman49:30

      ... just excited. But like, why don't we as an instit- why doesn't MIT say that, "We wanna- we- we- somebody amongst us will be the next Elon Musk and we want to encourage them." As- like say that.

   9. EWEric Weinstein49:44

      Yeah.

   10. LFLex Fridman49:44

       Say that in meetings, say that, like, that's success-

   11. EWEric Weinstein49:48

       No kidding.

   12. LFLex Fridman49:49

       ... for us as MIT. And they- instead there's this jealousy. It's like-

   13. EWEric Weinstein49:54

       Well, here's the cra-

   14. LFLex Fridman49:55

       "Did you hear what Elon Musk tweeted? Did you- did you s- like, how irresponsible is what he's doing? How..." Da-da-da-da-da, like, just saying all these things that are just dripping with jealousy and basically-

   15. EWEric Weinstein50:09

       I want what he's got.

   16. LFLex Fridman50:10

       Yeah.

   17. EWEric Weinstein50:10

       That's the thing, right? Th- then if you-

   18. LFLex Fridman50:13

       Yeah.

   19. EWEric Weinstein50:13

       Here's the weird thing. Rivalry has a different signature. You see, when you know that you're never gonna make it-

   20. LFLex Fridman50:22

       Yeah.

   21. EWEric Weinstein50:22

       ... that's the p- position you take. What is it in Kung Fu Panda, which you've watched now-

   22. LFLex Fridman50:29

       Yes.

   23. EWEric Weinstein50:30

       ... yes. What does Tai Lung say when, uh, he's looking for the Dragon Warrior and the Furious Five come to defeat him on the bridge? One of them gives up Po's name accidentally and Tai Lung hears it. "Po, so that is his name. Finally, a worthy opponent. Our battle will be legendary," right?

   24. LFLex Fridman50:53

       Yeah.

   25. EWEric Weinstein50:53

       He's excited. Why is that? Well, you learn about this in boxing. Sometimes you'll see a division or an MMA which is lousy with talent, just you can't swing a cat without hitting an amazing- amazing athlete. Sometimes you'll have a division which at that particular moment has one star and no real competition in that weight class or something. That person is in bad shape because you can't build a legend without the other. When you think of Muhammad Ali, what are the names that you immediately think of?

   26. LFLex Fridman51:28

       Uh, you have to phrase your... you have to think of the other heavyweights.

   27. EWEric Weinstein51:33

       Liston.

   28. LFLex Fridman51:34

       Liston.

   29. EWEric Weinstein51:34

       Right?

   30. LFLex Fridman51:35

       Yeah.
10. 52:44 – 58:00

    Love with save the world

    1. EWEric Weinstein52:44

       I'll tell you what, uh, really concerns me about your perspective. I think that there are a lot of genius ideas inside of people who don't have the stomach for conflict and derision. And I think a lot of those people are female.

    2. LFLex Fridman52:59

       Hmm. Yeah.

    3. EWEric Weinstein53:00

       And I think that until we come up with a world in which we can swat down the trolls, where we can actually cause the trolls not to ruin everything, and I- I don't necessarily mean by shutting them up, I don't necessarily mean by being brutal to them, but somehow separating off people who are working and people who are trolling.

    4. LFLex Fridman53:21

       D-

    5. EWEric Weinstein53:21

       I think that we're losing a huge amount of human genius in part because women in particular are not necessarily going to push an idea if it results in 10 years of being derided. Very few men are willing to do that either. But there are some of us who are so dumb that we will pig-headedly stick to an idea for 10 years even if the world collapses. I don't think that there are as many women who are going to make that calculation even if they know the idea is correct.

    6. LFLex Fridman53:53

       And o- one of the things that I believe technology can help us fight the trolls, of all definitions of troll, like, I believe that a better Twitter can be built.

    7. EWEric Weinstein54:02

       Interesting. I do not. I don't believe that a Twitter successor can be built that solves most of the problems. I think you can always improve what we have.

    8. LFLex Fridman54:12

       Yeah.

    9. EWEric Weinstein54:12

       But I don't think that converges in something that really works, because I think ultimately the problem isn't Twitter, the problem is us. For example, I've recently made a very disturbing realization which is, academics and trolls have very many similar behaviors.

    10. LFLex Fridman54:30

        Absolutely.

    11. EWEric Weinstein54:31

        It's largely a trolling community.

    12. LFLex Fridman54:34

        I tend to believe that the trolls are not... it's like the Peter Thiel mini mind idea.

    13. EWEric Weinstein54:41

        Yeah.

    14. LFLex Fridman54:42

        Which in all of the trolls there's the possibility of goodness and all you have to do, not all you have to do, what you have to do is create technology that incentivizes them to, uh...... to embrace, to- to discover, to embrace, to practice the- the better angels of their nature. And I believe that, like, the people actually want to do that. The trolls is a short-term dopamine rush of, uh, childish toxicity that all of us want to overcome. I believe that, like, deep within, we want to overcome that.

    15. EWEric Weinstein55:23

        I- I- I try to keep myself from believing what you believe. (laughs)

    16. LFLex Fridman55:29

        (laughs) Because you'll be disappointed if it's not true?

    17. EWEric Weinstein55:30

        Because it's dangerous. Because a lot of these people are implacable foes, and there aren't many of them, but when you meet somebody who's like, "Yeah, I just like screwing people up. I'm here for the pain."

    18. LFLex Fridman55:42

        I- I- I just believe even in them, there's a good-

    19. EWEric Weinstein55:44

        There's a wonderful book that I'm gonna recommend to you, where I hope this comes from. Maybe I've got the source wrong, but in any event, it's a great book

    20. LFLex Fridman55:52

        (laughs) Yeah.

    21. EWEric Weinstein55:52

        ... called, uh, Maximum City, about Bombay.

    22. LFLex Fridman55:55

        Mm-hmm.

    23. EWEric Weinstein55:56

        And I believe the- the- the conceit is that the author, um, leaves Bombay as a kid and comes back as an adult, and he realizes he has to rediscover the city because he can't live in the city he left. So, he- he gets in contact with all of the weird areas of the city, and one of them is the underworld. He hangs out with the police, but in the underworld, he's talking to contract killers. And, um, he says, "You know, it's really weird. Everybody pleads for their life right before I kill them, and they always say this thing about, 'I've got a- I've got two kids at home.'" He says, "Never say that to a contract killer, because we have terrible (laughs) relationships with our parents."

    24. LFLex Fridman56:37

        (laughs)

    25. EWEric Weinstein56:37

        "It doesn't endear us to you." (laughs) And I was just thinking-

    26. LFLex Fridman56:40

        Ah, yeah.

    27. EWEric Weinstein56:40

        ... like, oh wow, so there's a minus sign in front of that statement. You're sitting there saying, you know, "I've got a three-year-old." It's like, "Okay, well, I'm gonna take this POS out of- o- out of that kid's life. Maybe he'll have a chance." You don't know how people are wired. And as much as I hate to say it, there are people whose wiring is so disturbing and so different from yours that you will never guess why you can't reach them, or how much pleasure they may have gotten because they may have gone over a point of no return.

    28. LFLex Fridman57:12

        Nevertheless, you are just a smart guy who is using his intuition to make a hypothesis. You do not know this for sure.

    29. EWEric Weinstein57:20

        Nope.

    30. LFLex Fridman57:21

        And I am an- you know, uh, whatever the hell I am, uh, that has a- a different hypothesis, that even in the darkest human beings that- that seem to be only full of evil, there's a good person there that could be discovered. And it's-
11. 58:00 – 1:09:34

    Are we headed toward a civil war?

    1. LFLex Fridman58:00

       The reason I was- I was kept bothering you, kept bothering you to have this conversation, is I'm really worried about, uh, the next couple of months.

    2. EWEric Weinstein58:09

       (laughs) No kidding.

    3. LFLex Fridman58:10

       (laughs) And if there's anybody in this world that could help alleviate (laughs) my worry by, um, by at least walking along with me through this worry of mine, it's you. Do you think we're headed towards some kind of civil war? Some kind of division that explodes beyond just stuff on Twitter, but something that's really destru- destructive to the fabric of our society?

    4. EWEric Weinstein58:42

       Well, I- I believe we're in a revolution, as you know. I've called it the No-Name Revolution, or N-Squared Revolution. I've been talking about it for years. I don't think, I think waiting for this to be called a civil war is not smart.

    5. LFLex Fridman58:58

       Only history will call it such. Fine. But-

    6. EWEric Weinstein59:01

       I think that the problem is that you're encountering things that you've never seen, trying to fit them into things that you already know.

    7. LFLex Fridman59:07

       Right.

    8. EWEric Weinstein59:07

       And ...

    9. LFLex Fridman59:08

       But history r- repeats itself.

    10. EWEric Weinstein59:10

        Yes. Ish. (laughs)

    11. LFLex Fridman59:14

        You don't see lessons from history in-

    12. EWEric Weinstein59:15

        I do.

    13. LFLex Fridman59:16

        ... what we see today?

    14. EWEric Weinstein59:17

        But I don't see it repeating itself. You know, the- the- the- the-

    15. LFLex Fridman59:19

        What about violence?

    16. EWEric Weinstein59:20

        ... famous- the famous quote is that it rhymes.

    17. LFLex Fridman59:22

        It rhymes. I mean, the thing, um, I guess I'm speaking to is violence, and-

    18. EWEric Weinstein59:28

        We're in there. The abstraction of violence. Imagine you were coding up violence as an abstract class, okay?

    19. LFLex Fridman59:38

        Thank you for speaking to the audience. (laughs)

    20. EWEric Weinstein59:40

        I'm trying to lose these people. Come with me. (laughs)

    21. LFLex Fridman59:43

        (laughs) Go on.

    22. EWEric Weinstein59:45

        No, no. No, no, no. I- I, look, I've dealt with your audience, and your audience contains some of the smartest people around.

    23. LFLex Fridman59:51

        Yeah.

    24. EWEric Weinstein59:51

        I guarantee you, if I say some stuff, uh, first of all, any wrong thing that I'll say, they're gonna detail.

    25. LFLex Fridman59:56

        Yeah. Okay.

    26. EWEric Weinstein59:56

        So that- that'll be a little bit of catnip to- to bring in the smart people.

    27. LFLex Fridman59:59

        (laughs)

    28. EWEric Weinstein1:00:00

        But they'll also digest it for each other. It's one of the great lessons of long-form podcasting. If you don't- if you- don't waste all your time explaining things. That's the job of the audience to do amongst themselves. They're happy doing the work, and those who aren't, they leave. Isn't that great? They'll leave. The people who don't wanna struggle will leave. You can get rid of them. I think that the point is you- you would want to say violence is defined relative to a context. So, let's call it meta-violence so that we don't get into the- the problem with, we already have a term for physical violence, right? So, we have meta-violence and physical violence. I would say that physical violence is subclassed from meta-violence. Meta-violence is the disruption of a- a system. It's sort of, you know, it's a ... You know, for- for example, if a cell dies, it- it can die through apoptosis or necrosis. Apoptosis is controlled, programmed cell death. Uh, necrosis is just like, "Okay, this didn't work." That was a violent disruption of the system.

    29. LFLex Fridman1:01:02

        And this meta class ...... is presumed in the documentation? Is it all negative?

    30. EWEric Weinstein1:01:07

        No. What are you talking about?
12. 1:09:34 – 1:23:21

    Joe Rogan

    1. LFLex Fridman1:09:34

       But I- I feel like the responsibility that you carry, that I carry, this is where Joe Rogan generally s- removes himself from be- "I'm just a comedian." This idea of "I'm just a comedian."

    2. EWEric Weinstein1:09:47

       They all do that.

    3. LFLex Fridman1:09:49

       But at this moment in history, like, history literally can pivot on the words-

    4. EWEric Weinstein1:09:56

       Yeah.

    5. LFLex Fridman1:09:56

       ... of a tattooed (laughs) , uh, ripped 50-year-old, you know, comedian, and I think the same is true with you.

    6. EWEric Weinstein1:10:07

       Okay. Well, I- I'm interested and I care. Speaking of lyrics, uh, you know, there are many here among us who feel that life is but a joke. That's not us. The hour is getting late. That's not us. In the song, the- the- the joker and the thief are on opposite sides of Jesus having this conversation over Jesus. You and I, we've been through that. That's not our fate. That's somebody else's fate to throw spitballs at the internet. That's not your fate. You're an earnest guy. You're filled with love. You're getting the most amazing podcast guests. You're broadcasting the s-

    7. LFLex Fridman1:10:39

       But you can win over the internet. This is the point I'm trying to make.

    8. EWEric Weinstein1:10:42

       What?

    9. LFLex Fridman1:10:42

       That you're saying, "I'm- I'm- I'm just a grandpa, I don't need the internet."

    10. EWEric Weinstein1:10:45

        No. No. I'm telling you, you're gonna get bigger and then you're gonna get cut down. You're gonna keep ascending for a while, Lex.

    11. LFLex Fridman1:10:52

        And then you're saying-

    12. EWEric Weinstein1:10:52

        And-

    13. LFLex Fridman1:10:53

        ... naturally there's a pro-

    14. EWEric Weinstein1:10:53

        I'm telling you, I watched the same process. People get up to a certain level, and one of the things that's going on, in my opinion, with Joe Rogan is, is that when Joe Rogan starts to talk about his misgivings about Joe Biden in a- in a way that you find in any bar in America about cognitive decline in a 77-year-old who's a- about to be 78, I believe, in November, we have never had anything remotely as insane as a 78-year-old person slated to win the White House.

    15. LFLex Fridman1:11:26

        And you're saying when that idea, uh, is- is being communicated, is there something is about the disk concept that you talk about, the system naturally starts to-

    16. EWEric Weinstein1:11:33

        S- some bad thing happens to Joe or one of Joe's close associates. The ability to destroy people who become inconvenient has been documented. This is what we have done in the past. Whether we are doing it now, we don't know, because we are not doing this church- church committee too, in order to know whether or not you are currently destroying American citizens, as we did in the past and as we have documented, and as we found out in 1976. Um, the federal government destroyed Americans who had political beliefs that the government didn't want to continue. And I don't know whether you are grasping that. One interpretation of why Jon Stewart and why Joe Rogan and why Bill Maher and all these people to some extent hide behind, "It's a joke!"

    17. LFLex Fridman1:12:25

        Yeah.

    18. EWEric Weinstein1:12:25

        Is because they're trying to find a protected class. Is there some place I can stand and speak the truth which does not result in my being garbage collected?

    19. LFLex Fridman1:12:36

        Interesting. I- I guess you're right. My intuition is, you can stand... As you gain more power, you can stand y- behind your work without a joke.

    20. EWEric Weinstein1:12:46

        There's a fight over Joe Rogan right now. I mean, I- I've talked about it for a few years now. People did not understand how big that program was. People didn't understand long form podcasting. I was derided by people who I think of as being very shrewd, um, for believing in these podcasts as a major force, and most of the people who derided me have said, "Wow, did- did I not get things?" It's like if you started to propose...Um, you know, you wanted to do the Sopranos, uh, in the era of 30-minute sitcoms. Um, like, "You don't get it, man. The American people, they're not interested in these long plot storylines. If that's your weird thing, nobody cares, dude. Everybody just wants short, fast, memorable." A- and like, okay, so if you do that, you totally miss the opportunity. And you know, the savvy people used to say, "Kid, let me tell you, nobody ever lost a dime underestimating the intelligence of the American people." Well, that was totally wrong, 'cause they didn't calculate opportunity costs. I have been talking about the problem of, of Joe for a long time. Um, the problem is, is that when the system wakes up, they're gonna wanna control it.

    21. LFLex Fridman1:13:56

        And they, they have different, they come up with new different mechanisms of doing that. I guess one interesting one is cancel culture. That's-

    22. EWEric Weinstein1:14:03

        Well, look at the number of people around Joe who they've come after since they realized that Joe was really big. Joey Diaz, Bryan Callen, um, Chris D'Elia. Now, I'm not saying that those are all related, but I do notice that there are at least correlations between when Joe says something and when something bad happens in Joe's universe. It's easier for me to believe that that's happening when it's happening around Joe himself.

    23. LFLex Fridman1:14:39

        Yeah.

    24. EWEric Weinstein1:14:40

        But I'm worried about my friend.

    25. LFLex Fridman1:14:43

        (laughs) Yeah-

    26. EWEric Weinstein1:14:43

        And I don't necessarily wanna push him towards being more if he doesn't want it, because I don't think, I don't wanna, I don't wanna conscript people. He's got a great life, he's got a great situation, he's done a huge service. Thank God... Do you know-

    27. LFLex Fridman1:14:57

        Yeah.

    28. EWEric Weinstein1:14:58

        Like-

    29. LFLex Fridman1:14:58

        Yeah.

    30. EWEric Weinstein1:14:59

        ... how, how much do I owe Joe just for what he's done for you, to say nothing of what he's done for me or for Brett or for Sam or any of these people? And, you know, I, I'd like to think that we all try to give back. But I'm worried about Joe.
13. 1:23:21 – 1:28:41

    Our political leaders

    1. EWEric Weinstein1:23:21

       heavy at the moment.

    2. LFLex Fridman1:23:22

       Do you think 2021 could, uh, could make us feel good about the trajectory of society? So like-

Episode duration: 2:51:49