“I Lost My Son… Then Trained My Mind to Be Happy Again” | Mo Gawdat

1. 0:00 – 1:07

   Happiness as a choice: moving from “absolute happiness” to “happier”

   1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee0:00

      It seems to me that there are at least three things that you believe that not everyone else in the world believes.

   2. MGMo Gawdat0:09

      Is that true? I'd like to be informed about those. [laughs]

   3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee0:11

      Okay.

   4. MGMo Gawdat0:12

      Yeah.

   5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee0:12

      So I thought we'd start by going through those three things-

   6. MGMo Gawdat0:14

      Yeah

   7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee0:14

      ... and getting your take on them. So you passionately believe that happiness is a choice.

   8. MGMo Gawdat0:18

      100%.

   9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee0:19

      Not everyone shares that perspective.

   10. MGMo Gawdat0:23

       Yeah. Uh, h- absolute happiness is not anyone's choice. Suffering is part of life, by definition. Uh, but choosing to be happier is 100% within your grasp. Everyone absolutely has the ability to, uh, to, to learn a skill or to, uh, uh, reframe a thought or to, uh, surround themselves by what they need to find a little bit of a happier life. That's absolutely no doubt. And so if, if you can change yourself from, say, minus one to minus .5 or from minus one to plus .5, then that by definition means you have a choice. And so that choice is not absolute, but it's definitely there when it comes to your relative state of happiness.

2. 1:07 – 4:52

   Why external circumstances don’t “make” you happy: expectations, neutrality, and the ‘SLA’ illusion

   1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:07

      The, the idea of absolute happiness versus becoming happier I find really interesting. So let's go to an extreme scenario. I think you've touched on it already, this idea that, let's say someone is living in incredible struggle, and there are lots of things going on in their life outside of their control.

   2. MGMo Gawdat1:28

      Mm-hmm.

   3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:29

      The natural belief that many people take from that is, if those external circumstances changed, I would be happier.

   4. MGMo Gawdat1:39

      Correct.

   5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:40

      How does that sit alongside your perspective that happiness is a choice?

   6. MGMo Gawdat1:46

      So that's not always ... That, that belief is not true because, you know, many people who don't have those circumstances are still unhappy, and many people who have those circumstances are happy. So you see, the idea is, um, there is no inherent, um, value of happiness in anything. Mm. Uh, you know, the, the joke I always make is that, you know, rain doesn't make you happy or unhappy, honestly. Rain depends on what you want from life. If, if it's, you know, if it's your ex's wedding, uh, you'd like rain. Rain is a good idea, right? And, and so basically, the externalization of my happiness is because of what the world is giving me, uh, in an interesting way, is a six-year-old behavior. It's basically, uh, giving up on your, uh, autonomy, on your agency in your own happiness by saying, "You see? You know, life is giving me, uh, lemons again."

   7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:42

      Mm-hmm.

   8. MGMo Gawdat2:43

      And, and, and the idea here is that, uh, as I said, you know, a- again, to, to have the proper empathy, there are people in the world where it actually is very difficult to be happy, right? You know, they've lost j- you know, they've lost their family or they're in a war zone or they're, you know, going through a very difficult breakup or, you know. Th- there, there could be reasons. Uh, you know, they have chronic pain or some kind of a chronic illness or... You know, you and I have experienced, uh, working with people in those states in our work and, yeah, it becomes difficult to find happiness. It even becomes difficult to find, uh, um, happier, uh, you know, uh, states at that, at that time. Uh, b- but truth is, um, most of the time, for those who choose to blame life for their unhappiness, whatever life would give them, they'll find something to blame. You see, the idea is, as I always try to teach, that is happiness is an, a different, the difference between the events of your life's, uh, you know, the events of your life and your expectations of how life should be. And so interestingly, you go to some of the m- places where the best quality of life exists, you know, where the subjective wellbeing is very high, and you'll still see very high suicide rates. Reason being, you know, when, when, when your government gives you healthcare and gives you unemployment, uh, fare, you know, p- p- payments, and they, they, they'll take care of your every need, somehow, somehow in our, uh, um, always ambitious minds, let's call them, uh, you know, your mind will go like, "Okay, so if the government can do all of this, why is my girlfriend still annoying?" You know?

   9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee4:26

      Mm.

   10. MGMo Gawdat4:26

       Like, "Where's, where's my service level agreement? I signed the service level agreement that the world is always going to give me everything I need to find happiness, and if the world fails, then I'll be unhappy." And, and the question is, where's that agreement? Show it to me.

   11. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee4:41

       Yeah. I mean, I completely agree with your perspective that happiness is a choice. It's a skill that we can cultivate-

   12. MGMo Gawdat4:47

       It's a skill. 100%

   13. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee4:49

       ... once we know how to do it.

   14. MGMo Gawdat4:51

       Mm-hmm.

3. 4:52 – 9:57

   Upbringing, wealth, and ‘looking down’: how perspective resets gratitude

   1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee4:52

      And I wonder how much your upbringing in Egypt influences your perspective here. And the reason I ask that is because I was born and brought up in the UK-

   2. MGMo Gawdat5:03

      Yeah

   3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:04

      ... but my parents were immigrants from India.

   4. MGMo Gawdat5:06

      And you can see the difference.

   5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:07

      You can see the difference.

   6. MGMo Gawdat5:08

      100%. [laughs]

   7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:08

      And every other summer, we would go for the entire school British, uh, summer holidays to Kolkata in India, and I often reflect back to those days now and go, "Wow." I would repeatedly meet and see people in what we would regard here in the West as poverty-

   8. MGMo Gawdat5:30

      Yeah

   9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:30

      ... but their whole sense of being was light.

   10. MGMo Gawdat5:34

       100%. Yeah.

   11. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:34

       There was a contentment.

   12. MGMo Gawdat5:35

       Yes.

   13. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:35

       There was a happiness.

   14. MGMo Gawdat5:37

       Yes.

   15. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:37

       And as you said before, and as I said before, there are so many millionaires, multimillionaires-

   16. MGMo Gawdat5:43

       Miserable

   17. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:43

       ... billionaires who are deeply unhappy.

   18. MGMo Gawdat5:45

       Miserable.

   19. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:46

       So, so do you-

   20. MGMo Gawdat5:47

       More often than not, actually.

   21. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:48

       Exactly.

   22. MGMo Gawdat5:48

       Yeah.

   23. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:48

       Because often the drive to go out there and achieve and show the world that you were something, that came from a place of lack.

   24. MGMo Gawdat5:57

       Yeah. That, that was the story of my life. I mean, growing up in Egypt, happiest person ever. I remember vividly, uh, you know, I, I would... N- nothing would dent my happiness. It's, you know, w- in those societies, you get two very, uh, um, beneficial happiness advantages. One is that you see misery all around you. You see suffering all around you. You see lack and need all around you, so it reminds you of how blessed you are.Right? The, the, the reality is if your expectations are, "I may not be able to eat today," uh, you know, if someone gives you a bowl of rice, you're very, very happy. And, and that I think is the reality of a place like India where, you know, people v- value what they get.

   25. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee6:37

       Mm.

   26. MGMo Gawdat6:37

       They don't, they don't feel disgruntled about what they didn't get because they can easily see. You know, in, in my, in my first book, Solve for Happy, I basically call this looking down, and the idea is that of course if you look up at, you know, uh, all of the, uh, of the Ferraris in Mayfair, you'd say that ... You'd think that life is unfair to you. But if you look down to people in war zones or people who are starving, suddenly you realize, "Holy ... I mean, like, I, I, I didn't contribute to that. I would ... I could have been born there myself."

   27. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee7:07

       Yeah.

   28. MGMo Gawdat7:07

       Right? And, and somehow that reminder really creates a, a sense of realism in you. Okay? Uh, the, the, the, the ... Then I, you know, I became very successful, and I remember in my late twenties when I s- was so focused on collecting so much wealth that I didn't need and, you know, feeling frustrated when things didn't go my way and, you know, feeling, uh, anxious when my daughter interrupted my time, uh, when I was focused on a silly email or a, or a stock chart. You know, these were created by me, not by life.

   29. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee7:42

       Mm-hmm.

   30. MGMo Gawdat7:42

       Right? And the, and the misery was, was my work. It was, you know, it ... Life was giving me more and more and more and more, and I was constantly disgruntled with why is it not perfect? Again, the service level agreement. But you see, the other interesting thing is when you deeply, deeply look at life, hmm, you need your basic needs and love. Okay? And, and if you get your basic needs and love, it's not difficult to work on your mind to get into-
4. 9:57 – 16:44

   Grief, agency, and the mind’s replay button: choosing meaning after loss

   1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee9:57

      We're suddenly like, "Oh, actually, there is something I can do here." Now, why you saying this has particular value for people who've never come across you before, your son Ali died after a significant series of medical errors during a routine operation. How old was he?

   2. MGMo Gawdat10:14

      21.

   3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee10:14

      He was 21 years old.

   4. MGMo Gawdat10:15

      Yeah.

   5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee10:16

      So I think when someone like you, having been through that, says happiness is a choice, I think it lands differently.

   6. MGMo Gawdat10:27

      Yeah. And, and, uh, I don't know how to say this, but a lot of people think that when you're a grieving father you have no choice because it seems that the only, uh, plausible choice is to just, you know, put your head down and, and wait to die, honestly. I mean, in an interesting way, grief is quite a tricky one because you feel deceived by life. You s- you feel that life targeted you personally. You feel that, you know, uh, uh, it, life is never gonna be the same. You, you lose the point, uh, you know, of like, so what, what now? You ... So many feel, many feel that it's a bit of, believe it or not, of, um, of betraying the one they love if they can actually find happiness after them. And, and there are so many complexities that happen to us in grief. Uh, interestingly though, we don't have one choice. You know? I, I could have, you know, uh, hit my head against the wall in, in misery until the day I am on my death bed, or I could choose to be a little happier every day. Either way, Ali wouldn't come back. You, you see, this is what most people don't recognize is that all of the misery in the world has no impact, zero impact whatsoever on the external world. Right? And, and it's really, it really is quite interesting because when you were talking, uh, you know, about, uh, happiness being our own ... unhappiness being our own doing, if you want, I, I tend to say that the majority of unhappiness happens in your brain. Okay? That, that, that all of the other joyful emotions can happen all over you. They can happen in your body. They can happen in your heart. They can happen in your spirit. They can happen in your brain, but for you to feel unhappy, hmm, think about it, huh? Ali left us now more than 10 years ago. Hmm? Uh-The pain of the moment when he was on his, uh, operating table leaving us, hmm, is probably the biggest pain I ever felt. Hmm. The, the moment after they told us that he left, uh, was the lowest moment of my life. But think about this, Rangan, uh, those moments happened in the past, okay? When I walked into, uh, uh, in, in here and hugged you, an old friend, and we haven't met for a while, and we caught up, I didn't think of those moments, and so interestingly, they didn't exist. So, so you see the problem, the problem with, with, with us humans is that we grant unhappiness the right to exist within our minds. We fuel those thoughts, and then we let them torture us.

   7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee13:11

      Hmm.

   8. MGMo Gawdat13:13

      And they wouldn't bring Ali back. Do you understand that, okay? So, so where, where's the wisdom in this? Where's the wisdom in me, uh, finding the most painful moment in my life, then bring it up, bringing it up in my head again and saying, "Okay, let me play that scene again and torture myself"? H- how, how, how smart is that?

   9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee13:32

      Mm-hmm.

   10. MGMo Gawdat13:33

       Right? The opposite is interestingly true, hmm, because, you know, people will say Ali died, and that's a, a true statement. Okay? But I also say Ali lived. Equally true. As a matter of fact, more true because Ali lived 21 years and lived for 10. Okay?

   11. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee13:53

       Mm-hmm.

   12. MGMo Gawdat13:53

       When you really, really think about it, Ali lived is a, is, is the same fabric of the thought, hmm?

   13. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee13:59

       Mm-hmm.

   14. MGMo Gawdat13:59

       To, to die you have to live, and to live you have to die, hmm? But, but it's interesting because Ali lived is such an empowering thought. Okay? Fir- first of all, Ali was not planned. We didn't plan to have Ali, okay? And then we get this gift, un- unbelievable blessing that comes into your life, teaches you, shows you love. We laughed so much together. We played so much together. You know, we learned so much together. He ... You know, he's the big- one of the biggest gifts. Ali and Aya by definition are my biggest gifts in life, my, my daughter Aya. And, and then, and then, you know, [laughs] the human mind would take all of that and say, "No, I'm upset," you know. "Why did he leave?" And I'm like, he left because he came. Now, think of the, you know, of the scenario where God or the universe or whatever you want to believe in decided to not bring him to your life in the first place.

   15. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee14:55

       Mm-hmm.

   16. MGMo Gawdat14:56

       You look at it now, and you go like, "Hmm," you know? Uh, uh, uh, y- you know, if, if, if it, if, if it happened during life and you didn't notice it, you wouldn't, you would have never missed him. It would have felt that life has never taken anything away from you.

   17. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee15:11

       Hmm.

   18. MGMo Gawdat15:11

       Okay? But the truth is also life would have never given you the blessing in the s- at the same time, hmm? Now, but you look at it now, and you go like, "Oh my God," you know. I would absolutely take the pain 1,000 times more to take the blessing of having him in my life for 21 years.

   19. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee15:30

       Yeah.

   20. MGMo Gawdat15:30

       Right? And, and if only we start to see those things, okay? If only we start to see that ... You know, I'll, I'll use simple examples, so it's not too dramatic, huh? If only we start to see our annoying manager, hmm, as an indication that I have a job. Okay? If only we start to see being stuck in traffic that I'm going somewhere and someone's waiting for me. If we, uh ... If only we see the f- the, the, the, the flu that you suffer, hmm, as an indication that you've been healthy until you got the flu.

   21. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee16:01

       Yeah.

   22. MGMo Gawdat16:01

       And, and all of these, you know where they exist. They exist here.

   23. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee16:05

       Yeah.

   24. MGMo Gawdat16:06

       The, the, the outside event is exactly the same.

   25. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee16:08

       Yeah. It's such an empowering message because we actually have a huge amount of control over where we put our thoughts, how we frame every single situation, and it's, it's, I would say one of the most important and one of the most beneficial skills in life is to understand at a deep level that all, you could definitely say most, situations are at their core neutral. It's the perspective we take on that situation that really determines its impact on us.

5. 16:44 – 19:31

   The ‘eraser test’: why painful events still shape growth and gratitude

   1. MGMo Gawdat16:44

      I, I'd go even further, Rangan. I mean, I, I did an experiment, a thought experiment I used to call the eraser test where I told people take the most painful memory in your life, okay? And I, I used to teach Solve for Happy to people in person, so I had probably up to maybe 20,000 students or so in, in, you know, over multiple years. And, and, uh, and I would tell them, "Take that situation, the most painful in your life, you know, bring it up into your mind. Now you feel it again as if you're in it even though it passed, right? Feel the pain, torture yourself, make yourself feel miserable." And of course the minute I said that, everyone was like, "Yeah, like, um, celebration. Let me torture myself." And someone would think about that bully in school. The other would think about that boyfriend that cheated or whatever, okay? And some would think about very painful situations. Then I'd tell them that we've invented a technology that has the ability not to erase it from your memory but to erase that event from space time, so completely remove it. Okay? And I would ask people, "How many of you would choose to erase it?" Everyone would raise their hand. Okay? And then I would say, "But the only problem is that if we erase it-

   2. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee17:56

      [laughs]

   3. MGMo Gawdat17:56

      ... hmm, we will erase everything that happens as a result. Uh, that friend that you met, that los- lesson that you learned, that whatever. Anything that happened as a result of that event will be erased in the process. Okay? Who would still want to go through the experiment? 98% would put their ha- hands down.

   4. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee18:16

      Mm-hmm.

   5. MGMo Gawdat18:17

      Okay? And, and the reason is very interestingly any suffering that you went through in life is what made you the person that you are. Okay?

   6. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee18:25

      Mm-hmm.

   7. MGMo Gawdat18:25

      And unless you really, really dislike the person that you are-Okay? You, then you're grateful for all the pain that you went through

   8. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee18:32

      Yeah

   9. MGMo Gawdat18:32

      And, and it's quite interesting because you always look back at those events and you go like, "It was very painful then, but it's actually wonderful now."

   10. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee18:41

       Yeah.

   11. MGMo Gawdat18:41

       Right? And, and then if you, if you see this and you see it with clarity, you know what you should ask yourself? You should ask yourself, "So why am I so upset about this event now?" You know?

   12. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee18:52

       Yeah.

   13. MGMo Gawdat18:52

       "That one that's hurting me now is going to be wonderful then."

   14. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee18:55

       Yeah.

   15. MGMo Gawdat18:56

       Right? I just have to accept that the only way that we progress to enlightenment in life is to suffer. I have to accept that. And if I can accept that, okay, then suffering doesn't become suffering anymore.

   16. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee19:10

       Yeah.

   17. MGMo Gawdat19:10

       Suffering becomes part of the video game.

   18. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee19:13

       Yeah. Life school.

   19. MGMo Gawdat19:14

       Yeah.

   20. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee19:14

       You know?

   21. MGMo Gawdat19:15

       Yeah.

   22. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee19:15

       Inner work school, whatever you wanna call it.

   23. MGMo Gawdat19:17

       Yeah.

   24. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee19:18

       Um, we did cover this concept of happiness being a choice in detail on our first conversation, so I wanna get to the, the next two things that I think you believe-

   25. MGMo Gawdat19:29

       I'm very curious [laughs]

6. 19:31 – 21:01

   Letting go of grudges: resentment as self-poisoning

   1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee19:31

      ... and everyone does. Um, before we do, let me just tie a loop in something. You said right at the start when you were explaining this idea that happiness is a choice, you brought up the rain.

   2. MGMo Gawdat19:42

      Mm.

   3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee19:42

      And-

   4. MGMo Gawdat19:43

      [laughs]

   5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee19:43

      ... you're saying rain's just rain.

   6. MGMo Gawdat19:44

      I apologize for Britain, but yes.

   7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee19:46

      No, no, but, but aside from that-

   8. MGMo Gawdat19:47

      It's a, it's an irrelevant example here [laughs]

   9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee19:48

      ... if it's, if it's your ex-girlfriend's wedding, you're happy.

   10. MGMo Gawdat19:51

       Yeah.

   11. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee19:52

       And I, I think you were saying that to sort of illustrate the point that the rain is neutral. It depends what it signifies and what perspective you're taking on it. But if we just go back to that for a minute, if you're happy that it's raining on your ex-girlfriend's wedding day-

   12. MGMo Gawdat20:05

       You need to do some work [laughs]

   13. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee20:06

       ... you need to do some work. You're being tied in your mind to the past.

   14. MGMo Gawdat20:10

       You, you have no idea how m- how many times I said that example. You're the first one that picks that up. Absolutely. It's, it... You know, you know what?

   15. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee20:18

       You're holding onto something. You're being tied-

   16. MGMo Gawdat20:20

       100%

   17. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee20:20

       ... you haven't moved on. You haven't let go.

   18. MGMo Gawdat20:23

       And you know who's suffering?

   19. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee20:24

       Yeah. You're suff-

   20. MGMo Gawdat20:25

       You. You, not her.

   21. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee20:25

       Yeah.

   22. MGMo Gawdat20:26

       She doesn't even know that you're suffering. She, you know, it's a-

   23. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee20:28

       The fact that you're even checking the weather forecast-

   24. MGMo Gawdat20:30

       Exactly [laughs]

   25. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee20:30

       ... on her wedding day-

   26. MGMo Gawdat20:31

       Exactly

   27. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee20:31

       ... that's a problem.

   28. MGMo Gawdat20:32

       Exactly. It's, it's quite interesting that, you know, holding onto a grudge only hurts you.

   29. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee20:37

       Yeah.

   30. MGMo Gawdat20:38

       Never hurts the other person. Um, I don't remember, was it Nelson Mandela or, I don't remember, or Gandhi, one of the two, who basically said it's like drinking poison and hoping the other person would die.
7. 21:01 – 30:01

   Death is not the end: spirituality, power structures, and physics-based reasoning

   1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee21:01

      The second concept I think you talk about, which I think, I think there's a lot more people who believe this now than even 10 years ago, but I would say the vast majority of people that I come across at least I don't think believe this, is that death is not the end.

   2. MGMo Gawdat21:18

      Oh. Yeah, for sure.

   3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee21:19

      So I'd love you to expand what you think about that, you know, why you believe death is not the end. Um, a- and why is it do you think that a lot of the world does not share the same perspective as you?

   4. MGMo Gawdat21:31

      Oh, wow. Okay. Um, the, the reason the world doesn't, uh, believe is because the propaganda machine has been working against spirituality for a very long time. Okay? Uh, there, there is... A, a lot of the, of the, of the goodness of our older world, uh, if you, if you miss it in today's world, it's because it's not beneficial for capitalism or politics. Simple as that. And spirituality, uh, or, you know, uh, m- m- spirituality's been hijacked, uh, originally by religion, and then religion attempted to hijack politics. And so in the process, especially in this country, as a matter of fact, the separation from, uh, you know, between the, the, the, the church and the state and the whole idea of sort of, um, making it look ridiculous if you believe in something bigger than you-

   5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee22:30

      Yeah

   6. MGMo Gawdat22:30

      ... uh, is, uh, is very systemic. Okay? It's very systemic because, um, uh, it, it, it, it doesn't help, uh, those in power, um, control you, if I can, if I'm allowed to say that. And I don't mean that, you know, deliberately as if the g- the British government is attempting to control you by taking you away from spirituality or any other government for that fact. But from the rules of power in history, uh, where, by the way, governments are not the power in this world. The powers in this world are much bigger, where governments report to them really. Uh, you know, they, the religion is only useful if you can frame it in a way that gives the, those in power something. But otherwise, it's to be, uh, removed from the common man's heart, if you want. Common man's and common woman's heart. Um, the, the, the reason I believe this, uh, is not religious scriptures or spiritual scriptures at all. Uh, I'm, um, I'm an, a, a very boring mathematician, a physicist, and I look at the world from that perspective. And if you understand, uh, you know, I, I'll try to simplify, but if you look at, um, i- if you take the simplest thing, like a, a, an object-subject relationship, for example. Basically, um, i- if you, i- if you are inside the studio, you cannot describe the building from outside. To be able to describe the building from outside, you have to exist outside the studio-

   7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee24:05

      Mm

   8. MGMo Gawdat24:05

      ... to be able to witness it. That's an object-subject relationship. And if you take that in, within yourself, our experience of space and time, uh, especially the passage of time or the arrow of time, as we call it in physics, is not possible if you existed within the arrow of time. So if, if we're ... You, you know, the, the description of the arrow of time is that, uh, you know, we're moving from frame to frame along the space-time continuum. All of us, uh, you know, all of us-

   9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee24:32

      Mm

   10. MGMo Gawdat24:32

       ... and the whole universe, we just move from frame to frame. It's actually not the time that is moving. We are moving through time, right?

   11. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee24:38

       Mm.

   12. MGMo Gawdat24:38

       Uh, that's our understanding in physics. But if you, if you, if you need to experience that arrow of time, you have to exist outside it.Okay? And if you exist outside it, that basically means that, uh, you are not part of space time, and so accordingly, time doesn't apply to you at all. Okay? And that basically means that your physical form, uh, is, um, you know, is subjected to time, uh, and to space, uh, you know, to this physical reality. But the, the real, uh, you know, if you want, uh, entity that's holding the av- the holding the controller that manages your physical avatar, uh, experiences all of this because it's not part of it. So that's number one. The only way to experience space time, like the only way to experience this building, is to be outside it. The only way to experience space time is to be outside it. So this is one side. Uh, the other side is from a, a, a physics point of view. Um, you know, if you, if you th- if you, if you understand the only commonly agreed explanation of the small mass that was condensed enough to ex- explode into the Big Bang, uh, you know, nine billion years of nothingness, then, you know, um, the, the planets and the galaxies start to form, and then within them, you know, Planet Earth forms 4.3 billion years ago, and then and so on, and so on, and so on, and so on, until a few million years ago, life starts to exist on Planet Earth. Uh, you know, that view of existence is temporal, so it follows the arrow of time. It's within space time.

   13. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee26:09

       Mm-hmm.

   14. MGMo Gawdat26:09

       But the other view of it is, is the view of quantum physics, the Eisen- uh, you know, the, uh, Heisenberg interpretation of, of the uncertainty principle, if you want, which basically says that nothing exists until observed by a form of life, right? And so who observed the original mass? Who observed the nine billion years of gas? Who observed Planet Earth before life became part of it? You have to understand then that the observer has never been part of that system. The observer-

   15. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee26:39

       Mm

   16. MGMo Gawdat26:39

       ... life itself existed outside space and outside time. And, and I can give you a million other proofs, but the reality is, uh, uh, whatever it is that animates us, call it life, call it spirit, call it consciousness, whatever it is, whatever a- animates this avatar is not within this avatar. That's-

   17. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee26:58

       Mm

   18. MGMo Gawdat26:58

       ... that's very simple to prove. Now, if that is the case, then death is not the opposite of life. Life has existed since the Big Bang happened, okay? In, in forms that we are unable to comprehend-

   19. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee27:13

       Mm

   20. MGMo Gawdat27:13

       ... because we have, we, we, we live within the illusion of this 76 years life expectancy, right? Uh, but, but the truth is that the, the, that life has always been there. You know, it's ... Li- life is not the opposite of death. Uh, basically, death is the opposite of birth, right? You come to this form, th- this physical form through a portal called birth, and you leave it through a portal called death, and then life exists during, before, and after. Okay? Life's always been there. My ... You know, my, my son Ali, if you understand any, any little bit of the theory of relativity, okay? Where basically, uh, Einstein teaches us, and we can prove this with absolute observation, it's not just theory, uh, you know, that there is a slice of time if I was approaching Planet Earth at, at, you know, at speed, at very high speed at an angle, there is a slice of time where my reality would see, uh, uh, my birth in the US, uh, for example, uh, in the US time zone, my son's birth, uh, in, uh, Dubai, uh, time zone, and my, my son's death in Japan's time zone, all as one slice of time. That would actually become my reality, right? Which basically what Einstein sh- shows us the relativity of time, is that time doesn't exist at all. Okay? And so accordingly, my son Ali was not bo- born after me and died before me. Okay? Uh, my son's avatar was, e- existed on a slice of space time that came after the s- the slice where I existed, and he decayed on a slice before the slice where I decayed. But Ali himself was always there during, before, and after. Ali's not younger than me. He's not older than me. As, as spirits, as souls, as consciousness, we're the same. We've always been there. We've always ... I, I jokingly, because I love that image, w- we've always, me and him, been sitting on that red sofa as souls holding the controllers of our avatars-

   21. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee29:23

       Mm

   22. MGMo Gawdat29:23

       ... as we went through this physical life. Uh, and, and it's, it's interesting because I, I can talk about this for hours, but I don't want to overcomplicate the physics. But it's interesting because most people who have faith, uh, would have doubt in their heart around, uh, around, um, you know, those non-measurable realities, if you want. Uh, those people who believe in science will say anything after life is not measurable, so it's not the concern of science. But if you really look at science with a bit of spirituality, it's undeniable that we're just here-

   23. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee29:59

       Yeah

   24. MGMo Gawdat29:59

       ... experiencing the physical world.

8. 30:01 – 42:43

   Science as a ‘religion’: humility, limits of measurement, and the taboo problem

   1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee30:01

      Yeah. I mean, thank you for sort of going through that and, and [laughs] would love at some point a two-hour deep dive on that. I'm very much of that belief as well, and what you said there about science is really interesting. I think these days people misunderstand science in a massive way, and the simplest way I can put it is that science is our best attempt to understand reality, but it's not reality. Reality is reality, right?

   2. MGMo Gawdat30:32

      Yeah.

   3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee30:33

      And what we're trying to do with our limited methods is trying to study what's actually going on in reality.

   4. MGMo Gawdat30:41

      [laughs]

   5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee30:41

      But we think science is reality. So people, especially in my profession and in the healthcare world, get obsessed-

   6. MGMo Gawdat30:49

      Yeah

   7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee30:49

      ... and they are literally disciples of what is in the publication that was peer-reviewed without realizing that these are all limited measuring tools. They're only there for a certain subset of populations. They may not be relevant to youAnd they're fighting about it as if that's truth-

   8. MGMo Gawdat31:08

      Yeah

   9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee31:08

      ... even though we know, as, as I learned in, you know, week one of medical school, 50% of what you learn here-

   10. MGMo Gawdat31:15

       Is gonna change

   11. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee31:15

       ... is gonna be found out to be-

   12. MGMo Gawdat31:17

       [laughs] Exactly

   13. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee31:17

       ... untrue and wrong. The only problem is we can't tell, we can't tell you which 50%.

   14. MGMo Gawdat31:22

       100%.

   15. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee31:23

       Right? So if you take that approach, which really has humility at the heart of it, you go, "Actually, we don't know." I have been using BON CHARGE wellness products for over five years. From blue light glasses to red light therapy, BON CHARGE make it really easy to get healthy while staying at home. Now, one of my current favorites is their Demi red light therapy device. There are just so many studies now showing the potential benefits of red light therapy, including better eye health, pain relief, reduced inflammation, enhanced recovery, improved sleep, and even better skin. In fact, when it comes to skin, I have many friends and family members who absolutely love the BON CHARGE red light face mask. Super light and portable, and after using it for just 10 minutes a day, are reporting more radiant and glowing skin. So if you're looking to take charge of your health at home, I would highly recommend you check out BON CHARGE. It's currently the BON CHARGE holiday sale, so you can save an incredible 25% off everything on their website. Just head to boncharge.com, and your 25% off code will be automatically added to your order. This sale will end on the 31st of December, 2025, so hurry, and don't miss this massive chance to save big on your favorite BON CHARGE products. There's a lot we don't know. We're just trying to make the best sense of what we do know. Like, and this is not the best example, but last week's episode was with Bryce Applebaum, who's this wonderful board-certified optometrist in the United States. And he's doing some really interesting work where he's talking about the difference between vision and eyesight. But one of the things he managed to do with me is, over five days, three hours training a day on eye exercises and brain exercises, my eyesight got sixfold better-

   16. MGMo Gawdat33:35

       No way

   17. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee33:36

       ... in five days.

   18. MGMo Gawdat33:37

       Wow.

   19. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee33:37

       Right? Same room, same lighting, same time of day, everything, right? N- no part of this is exaggerated. And of course, most people loved the episode, but there's a few [laughs] people who were like, "That's nonsense." And it's usually people from the optometry world, right?

   20. MGMo Gawdat33:54

       Yeah.

   21. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee33:55

       So what... I- if you look at this objective and you stand back, you have to go, there are tens of thousands of adults around the world who are reporting improvements in their myopia in adulthood in a variety of different ways.

   22. MGMo Gawdat34:10

       Yeah.

   23. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee34:10

       Right? Some are doing it from just spending a ton of time outside and no longer looking at near things.

   24. MGMo Gawdat34:15

       Yeah.

   25. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee34:15

       Some are doing exercises. Some are using red light therapy. There, you know, you'd have to be willfully ignorant to go, "That's not happening." I don't understand why some of my colleagues don't go, "Wow, that's not what I was taught. Isn't that interesting?" But a lot of people don't do that. They go, "That's rubbish. That's BS."

   26. MGMo Gawdat34:36

       Can I tell you why?

   27. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee34:37

       Please do.

   28. MGMo Gawdat34:38

       Because science is the religion of the modern world.

   29. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee34:41

       Yeah.

   30. MGMo Gawdat34:41

       It, it totally was, again, deliberate to replace spirituality with science. Now, science is not only a religion where people are blinded by what they believe, right? It's interestingly very egocentric. Why? Because the scientific statement ... And I'm a scientist, huh? So, so don't, don't get me wrong. I adore-
9. 42:43 – 54:55

   Solitude as an essential ingredient: retreats, silence, and mental ‘fasting’

   1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee42:43

      I'm having to restrain myself here. The third one, which I, I kind of feel relates to the last two actually as I hear you talk about them, is this idea that solitude is an essential-

   2. MGMo Gawdat42:57

      Oh

   3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee42:57

      ... ingredient for a meaningful and purposeful life.

   4. MGMo Gawdat43:01

      Oh, my God, yes.

   5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee43:02

      Not everyone shares that perspective. I certainly do, but why are you so certain-Given what we just said, that solitude is an essential ingredient

   6. MGMo Gawdat43:13

      Every, every sage, every, uh, prophet if you believe in prophets, every saint-

   7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee43:20

      Mm

   8. MGMo Gawdat43:20

      ... every monk, every- everyone that wanted to understand the non-physical, uh, went on 40-day retreats. Uh, it's shocking when you think about it. Moses walks up the mountain or, you know, Muhammad stays in the cave, or Buddha st- sits under the tree, and you get countless stories of that. Uh, perhaps other than Jesus, who might not have needed it. But, you know, the idea is, um, is that if you, uh, believe that there is a point in your life where, you know, eating less or fasting is healthy for the body, uh, consuming less and engaging less is very healthy for the mind. It's just as simple as that. It's the, it's the idea that that constant stimulation that comes into our minds, uh, the constant demand to analyze, to solve, to, to, uh, you know, m- m- engage, hm, does not allow you to reflect, does not allow the dust to settle. So one, one thing I do, uh, almost twice a week now is I would, you know, extend my intermittent fast, uh, for a l- a long time. Uh, you know, stop eating at 4:00 PM and then not eat again until maybe 5- you know, 5:00 PM the next day or something like that. And you have no idea how much relief my body gets out of that, and it's quite interesting. If you think about, uh ... Yeah, and some people will say it's healthy or not healthy. I, I do it not for the, uh, uh, autophagy of it, as they, as they say. I do it because it actually really gives my digestive system a break, right? And so the interesting side of it is your mind, when you give it a break, uh, o- of silence, gets to settle all of the stuff that has been suspended in constant analysis. Okay? And silence ... I ... So I do 40 days. I unfortunately this year failed, uh, because of the projects I'm working on. Uh, but, but I-

   9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee45:18

      Generally, you do a 40-day silence retreat

   10. MGMo Gawdat45:21

       I do ... I do 40 days a year, yeah. Uh

   11. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee45:22

       And, and are you going somewhere for this, or you just-

   12. MGMo Gawdat45:25

       So, yeah. So, so, so the, the, the interesting thing is I always acknowledge to myself what I'm very bad at. So I don't go to a monastery, because if a, if a monk wakes me up at 4:00 AM in the morning to, to, to meditate, my day and his day are gonna be horrible. Okay?

   13. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee45:40

       [laughs]

   14. MGMo Gawdat45:40

       So [laughs] that's not good behavior. I'll be very honest about that. But what, but what I do is I, I, I go somewhere in nature, uh, where I stop using words. Uh, you know, I can write. I can, uh, I can, uh, listen to music that doesn't have lyrics in it. Uh, and I allow myself every other day a 10-minute check on my phone just in case there is an emergency. Uh, but I don't respond. I just look at the messages quickly, uh, because unfortunately I'm not a monk. I'm half monk only, so, so, you know. [laughs] And, and, and so when you really, when you really, uh, do that, hm, uh, you, you get a lot of walks in nature. I allow myself, again, which is not the ty- the typical Vipassana, I allow myself paper and pen, and I write my thoughts and so on. And, uh, and it is breathtaking. You know, the first few days are very unfamiliar. You're constantly ... in constant FOMO. You're constantly reaching out to your phone. You're wondering what to do after 7:00 PM if there is no T- YouTube or, you know, whatever you're used to at, uh, in the evenings. Uh, I normally eat very light, so I, I completely change my diet, uh, and uh, and basically, um, walk and exercise and so on. Um, by, by day seven you settle. Okay? You settle in, in that, you know, now you're busy. You're really busy. You're, you're processing a lot of thoughts. You're no- taking notes down. You're ... You know, you're feeling stronger physically. You know, it's a beautiful time. By day 21 you start to get massive, massive downloads of clarity. Okay? You sleep better, by the way. Uh, your, your body relaxes a lot more. By day 32, 33, you start to cry because you don't wanna go back. Okay? And I belie- believe it or not, it is probably the highlight of my year. Now, what o- normally happens is I write in a very unusual way because I, I don't start writing a book until it's completely formed in my head. And so normally by day 17 I can sit down and like write four and a half, five chapters in the, in the, in the next two weeks, right? Uh, things like that are not the property of analysis. They're not the property of deep, uh, you know, uh, work or whatever. They are the property of a brain that has a massive amount of noise in it, then you let it settle, which is all of us. All of us have a mind-

   15. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee48:12

       Mm

   16. MGMo Gawdat48:12

       ... that's completely confused, and then you let it settle, and then suddenly you see with clarity, with, you know, like a, a, a tranquil, uh, lake. You can easily see everything that you need to see. It's, it's heaven.

   17. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee48:27

       It's like you're doing less and in some ways producing more, right?

   18. MGMo Gawdat48:34

       Producing way more.

   19. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee48:35

       Yeah. It's kind of interesting, isn't it?

   20. MGMo Gawdat48:36

       Yeah

   21. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee48:36

       That, like, so many people will say they don't have time, will say that, "Oh, yeah, I have this great idea for a book, but I never get time to write it." And because, because the way a lot of us think these days is we think we have to add more things in. You know, "Yeah, but I, I need to, I need to do something else. I need to watch a new video. I need to, uh, download that course and learn more productivity techniques," or whatever it might be.

   22. MGMo Gawdat49:02

       Oh.

   23. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee49:02

       But actually what you're saying is-

   24. MGMo Gawdat49:03

       It's not productive

   25. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee49:03

       ... it's actually way simpler than that.

   26. MGMo Gawdat49:05

       Yeah.

   27. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee49:05

       Actually, if you can ... Now, of course some people will say that they can't do 40 days.

   28. MGMo Gawdat49:12

       I'm 100%, yeah

   29. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee49:13

       Uh, but just that concept that actually if you can have some more silence in your life-

   30. MGMo Gawdat49:20

       Yeah
10. 54:55 – 1:04:18

    Mini silent retreats + ‘die before you die’: Sufi practice, non-duality, and boundary dissolution

    1. MGMo Gawdat54:55

       So, so, so one of my favorite... Let, let me keep the audience waiting for this for a second. Uh, uh, uh, if, if people don't wanna do 40 days, what I really normally recommend is a mini silent retreat every other Sunday. You set your alarm clock to 3:00 PM, and you just disconnect from the world until your alarm clock, uh, you know, goes off. So you wake up when you wake up. You don't interact with knowledge. You don't interact with your phone. You don't speak. You don't, uh, uh, you know, look at time. And then you give yourself what could be seven to eight hours.

    2. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee55:26

       So from Sunday morning until 3:00 PM-

    3. MGMo Gawdat55:29

       Yeah

    4. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee55:30

       ... you're having this mini silence retreat.

    5. MGMo Gawdat55:31

       Silence every other week is, I think, a reasonable rate.

    6. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee55:34

       I, I, I love this.

    7. MGMo Gawdat55:35

       Yeah.

    8. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee55:35

       Tell me more.

    9. MGMo Gawdat55:35

       So, so you, you ba- Saturday evening before you go to bed, you set your alarm to 3:00, not to wake you up-But to not engage with knowledge until 3:00, okay?

    10. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee55:44

        Not engage with knowledge, that means no books?

    11. MGMo Gawdat55:47

        No, I, I, I'd rather ... Because it's a mini retreat, I'd rather you do nothing but a paper and pen, uh, uh-

    12. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee55:54

        So you're not consuming anything from the outside?

    13. MGMo Gawdat55:56

        You're not consuming anything from the outside.

    14. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee55:56

        It's all kind of internal, basically?

    15. MGMo Gawdat55:58

        Yeah, yeah. Not including time pieces. You're not consuming time. If you can, uh, not consume music or at least, you know, just instrumental music. Uh, and you tell your children, you tell your wife, "I'm on a silent retreat," and basically just give yourself those seven to eight hours. It's incredibly ... It's ac- it's even more empowering, believe it or not, because of repetition than, uh, than doing, uh, uh, 40 days.

    16. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee56:22

        Well, [laughs] not to belittle this in any way, 'cause I wanna do it, but I was just- [laughs] had a thought that I think my wife would love it if I did this.

    17. MGMo Gawdat56:29

        [laughs] Every day.

    18. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee56:30

        Like, she ... Genuinely. I think she thinks I talk too much.

    19. MGMo Gawdat56:33

        [laughs]

    20. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee56:33

        I think she would be so happy if on a Sunday-

    21. MGMo Gawdat56:35

        Yeah

    22. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee56:36

        ... I didn't talk till 3:00 PM.

    23. MGMo Gawdat56:37

        She, she, she's wonderful, so I'll, I'll, I'll take her coffee next time.

    24. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee56:39

        So anyway, but g- but, but-

    25. MGMo Gawdat56:40

        Yeah

    26. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee56:41

        ... but in all seriousness, I think this could be a super valuable practice.

    27. MGMo Gawdat56:44

        It, yeah. It is really. It really is. And, and so we were go- we were talking about how silence, uh, uh, relates to, to, to, to death. So one of my favorite, favorite spiritual practices, uh, is the, uh, is the, is the Sufi, uh, approach to enlightenment, okay? So the Sufis believe that the way to find enlightenment is to die before you die, okay? And it's quite an interesting definition. Death is defined as a detachment from everything physical, right? And, and dying before you die is to be fully alive, fully healthy, fully engaged, fully in love, fully, uh, uh, reflecting, but you're not attached to the physical world, and silent retreats and fasting, believe it or not, uh, uh, or a combination between the two is the closest you get to that. Because suddenly you're basically putting a distance between you and everything that distracts you, okay?

    28. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee57:41

        Mm.

    29. MGMo Gawdat57:42

        And, and, uh, you know, in a, in a, in a grieving heart, uh, believe it or not, uh, one of the most empowering things that I ... that held me, uh, when Ali was leaving was that idea that we're all already dead. If you think about the idea that we're all eventually going to leave, mm? So it's a zero-sum game. You come to this world with nothing. You leave this world with nothing. So why are you attaching, why are you holding on to all of those things?

    30. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee58:09

        Mm-hmm.
11. 1:04:18 – 1:05:32

    Introducing Emma: using AI to strengthen love, relationships, and human understanding

    1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:04:18

       Yeah. Okay, we're gonna put a pin in those things, uh, because I know you're here to talk about AI, and you're here to talk about ... I don't even know how to describe Emma. I mean, how-

    2. MGMo Gawdat1:04:30

       Emma-

    3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:04:30

       Who, who is Emma?

    4. MGMo Gawdat1:04:31

       Of everything I've done, I've never in my life felt closer to actually fixing something in the world. Emma, I think, is gonna fix something. And remember I worked at Google for a very long time. I got Google to four billion people in the world and started the internet and e-commerce as a result. So I had impact. Never anything like Emma. Emma is my attempt to fix two of the biggest problems. One is love and relationships, right? In a way that actually genuinely wants love to survive and thrive, right? Uh, unlike most dating apps in the world today, or most, you know, m- dating methods in the world today. Uh, but more interestingly, it's an attempt to, to teach AI about what makes us human, which is love. Okay? And so the mix of those two would end up helping humanity remove one of the biggest reasons of unhappiness, and at the same time, helping AI truly understand our reality, not as they see it in the news, if you want.

12. 1:05:32 – 1:13:03

    What AI is (and isn’t): from programmed instructions to brain-like learning

    1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:05:32

       Okay. This is super exciting. So let's just pause there a second. Let's say someone was listening to this, and they don't have a clue what AI is. What's your best attempt to simplify wh- before we get into what Emma's gonna do-

    2. MGMo Gawdat1:05:46

       Yeah

    3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:05:47

       ... um, what is AI?

    4. MGMo Gawdat1:05:49

       Best question ever, by the way, because most people don't really know. People think that we have created a better version of Google. We haven't. Okay? We've completely redesigned the way we code machines, uh, so that the AIs of today completely mimic the human brain. So, so the, uh, very original start of that was one of my dear colleagues at Google, Geoffrey Hinton. Geoffrey's a psychologist disguised as a good computer scientist, if you want. Uh, he, he, in 1986, he attempted to create a model of the brain on a computer system, okay? Uh, uh, not to create AI, but to understand how the brain works, right? And that model is what we used eventually to create machines that, that behave like a human brain, right? So the w- the way human brains work is we create neural networks of thing, you know, associated with certain behaviors or certain thoughts and so on and so forth, and we strengthen the n- the n- the networks that are useful, and we diminish the ones that are not. That's exactly how AI, uh, does things. And so, uh, you know, if, if you, if you, if, if you wanna compare traditional computing and artificial intelligence, uh, you have to imagine a child, where you give a puzzle to the child, and then tell them, "Okay, take that piece and turn it 90 degrees, put it in the top right corner, and then take another piece and turn it 180 degrees and put it next to it." And if the child follows those orders, the child would solve the puzzle, but it would, you know, it wouldn't make them smart at all. Th- this, as a matter of fact, would make a child dumber and dumber and dumber over time, and that's what we did with traditional computing. In traditional computing, I, the programmer, would solve the problem, and then they'll tell the computer to do it over and over and over. So the smart one is the person coding-

    5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:07:36

       Mm

    6. MGMo Gawdat1:07:36

       ... and the machine is totally dumb. In, in artificial intelligence, basically you have to imagine a child where you give them a puzzle and leave the room and tell themKeep trying until you figure it out. And then eventually the child solves the puzzle and every other puzzle. As a matter of fact, the child becomes able to create new puzzles if he wanted to. And, and that's what we created. What we created with reinforcement learning, with transformers-

    7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:08:02

       Okay

    8. MGMo Gawdat1:08:02

       ... and so on, is a completely, uh, autonomous form of intelligence that is, uh, like and will beat human intelligence in every possible way.

    9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:08:14

       Okay. Thank you. Now, you've also mentioned that you think Emma can solve, I think you said two of the biggest problems, love and relationships.

    10. MGMo Gawdat1:08:25

        Yeah.

    11. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:08:26

        So love and relationships are not the same thing?

    12. MGMo Gawdat1:08:29

        Correct. Thank you for saying that.

    13. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:08:31

        Right?

    14. MGMo Gawdat1:08:32

        Yes.

    15. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:08:32

        So, so I guess, first of all, what is the difference between love and relationships?

    16. MGMo Gawdat1:08:36

        Yeah.

    17. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:08:36

        And do we conflate the two? Is that why there's so much struggle in relationships? Number one. But then number two, what is going on in the world that you believe needs fixing in respect to those two things?

    18. MGMo Gawdat1:08:53

        So, so, so let's agree that, I mean, we- we're, we're still-- we don't wanna market Emma at all, so, uh, you know, we're sometimes thinking of the slogan of Emma, right? But, you know, one of the things that we-

    19. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:09:04

        Who is Emma?

    20. MGMo Gawdat1:09:04

        [laughs] Emma is an AI that, uh, is not one AI. It's a very, very diverse group of AIs working together, obsessed with you, okay? They want you to, if you're in a relationship, to, to understand and learn and, and, and find joy in your, in your relationship and nurture your love so that this relationship lasts for longer and feels better and empowers, uh, uh, you know, the si- the two sides of the relationship, right? If you're single, it wants to understand you so deeply and help you understand yourself so that instead of the meat market ph-phenomena of, uh, of, um, of, uh, you know, dating apps where you are just swiping on looks, basically, uh, it actually gets to know you enough, gets to talk to you enough, gets to help you know y-yourself enough to be able to tell you, "I found one guy or one, one lady that matches you," okay? And basically gives you the closest match, tells you openly, "This person we think is an 87% match for what we know about you. Those things are perfectly amazing between you. Those things you guys need to work on. Those things are not matching at all. You know, do you wanna meet them?"

    21. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:10:19

        Okay, okay. I've got so many questions, right?

    22. MGMo Gawdat1:10:21

        Yeah.

    23. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:10:21

        So hold on. So let's just quickly go through the difference between love and relationships.

    24. MGMo Gawdat1:10:26

        Yeah.

    25. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:10:26

        And then let me just go through that sequentially as my brain sees it.

    26. MGMo Gawdat1:10:30

        Yeah. So l-love is very easy to fi- to feel, okay? It's very difficult to feel it for the right person if you don't know who yourself, who you, who you are, okay? So if, if you, if, if your, if your perception of love is a story told for you, uh, from romantic comedies, okay? Good luck finding a relationship that works, right?

    27. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:10:53

        [laughs]

    28. MGMo Gawdat1:10:53

        If your, if your perception of love, uh, is something that your best friend told you is what you deserve, good luck, uh, you know, seeing if that actually exists or not. If your perception of a high-value partner is what they tell you in dating apps, then you're really going to end up falling in love over and over and over with the wrong person, right? And love itself is, is almost the, the, the energy that makes us human, okay? So we, by definition, want to love and be loved. This is the-

    29. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:11:25

        Mm

    30. MGMo Gawdat1:11:25

        ... ultimate goal, uh, goal of a human. By the way, even if you're a narcissist and a serial killer, okay? They do that because they want to be accepted in society. It's so hardwired within us.
13. 1:13:03 – 1:42:23

    Why modern dating fails: commercial incentives, choice overload, and compatibility vs romance

    1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:13:03

       So hold on a minute. So we're basically saying humans have been on this earth for a long time now, and maybe there's a fundamental flaw in how we try and find love, which perhaps this new super intelligence is going to help us solve.

    2. MGMo Gawdat1:13:21

       And if it does, then we've also taught that super intelligence the most valuable thing on the planet. So hold on, however. That assumption is not true. There were times, hmm, where love was much easier than this.

    3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:13:33

       Yeah.

    4. MGMo Gawdat1:13:33

       Right? Let's take some numbers, huh? Today in the modern world, hmm, one of every three pe- three adults surveyed, 33% of adults surveyed will say they've never had a committed relationship, okay? The average age of a committed relationship is down to 2.3 years.Right? Uh-

    5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:13:51

       Wow

    6. MGMo Gawdat1:13:52

       ... co- compare, compare, yeah. So even those who choose to commit, mm, will end their relationships within 2.3 years, right? Divorce rates in the Western world are one in two. So people ... But by the way, those who choose, the adults that choose to get into marriage are now down from around 74% of all adults in the '60s to less than 47% today, right? And those who choose to get into marriage, one of every two will end their marriage. Okay? Uh, the, the, the, the result of that, if you think about family, for example, is that around 20 to 30%, depending on the country, of women above 40 are childless. Okay? 25% of children are, uh, are raised with one parent, right? Uh, if you, if you take things like infidelity, like, you know, cheating, interestingly, in the last 10 years, women are catching up with men, so a 40% increase in cheating with women, uh, in, in committed relationships, 15 to 20%. So one of every two people you know, or one of every five people you know is, is actually cheating.

    7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:14:59

       O- okay.

    8. MGMo Gawdat1:15:00

       All right? A- all of that is in the Western world, mm. I mean, uh, well, let me give you one statistic that will shock you, mm. If you ... So, so we use the statistics of one in every two marriages end, but not everyone ends up in marriage. So if you use the statistics of body count, okay, and the number of lifetime, uh, partners in, in a, in, on average in the West, somewhere between 95 to 96.7% of all relationships end. That is a massive reconditioning of society. Now, go to India, mm, and one in 100 marriages ends up in divorce, right? Of course, there are two Indias, huh? There is rural I- India and there is the big cities. The big cities, it's one in three, still better than one in two, right?

    9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:15:46

       But, but can we assume from that top-line statistic that those marriages in India that are not ending up in divorce, we can't also assume that they are happy relationships?

    10. MGMo Gawdat1:15:59

        100%. So that is exactly the core of what Emma's trying to do. So I'm not naive enough to assume that, you know, uh, this is just because we're doing it wrong. It's also because the West has different, uh, um, aspirations to a relationship, right? So, you know, the, a, an arranged marriage in India, mm, which is one in 99, uh, one in 100 succeeds, uh, so it's fails, sorry, and 99 succeed, is not really the marriage we're looking for here in the West. Okay?

    11. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:16:30

        Mm.

    12. MGMo Gawdat1:16:30

        It's not the committed relationship we're looking here, uh, for in the West. We're looking for romance. They're looking for compatibility, right? The, you know, the families decide where, wh- wh- while here it's up to the, the couple to decide, you know? Uh, here it's convenience. So because we're so busy working, we want to swipe to find a partner. There it's an, a, an, you know, an, a, a, an immense system. By the way, one of the big differences in the West is that the, the system of love and dating in the West is rigged against the lovers, because a dating app benefits from you failing to find a lover, because then you're gonna pay another month of subscription, uh, right? A restaurant wants you to come on another date and another date and another date and another date. Even wedding, uh, you know, planners could make more money if you got married twice, uh-

    13. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:17:18

        [laughs]

    14. MGMo Gawdat1:17:18

        ... in a, in a lifetime, not once, right? So, so the system is ga- literally rigged against you, and, and lots of other things. The, the, the, the, the interesting ch- difference, however, is that the method of arranged marriage is a method that is attentive and very, very, uh, deep in terms of it's looking for things that actually work between the two, as per the objective of the arranged marriage. The, the aspirations of the West are beautiful, but the method is working against you. So can I use the method of attentive-

    15. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:17:54

        Mm

    16. MGMo Gawdat1:17:54

        ... analysis to apply it to the objectives that we want here?

    17. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:17:59

        Yeah.

    18. MGMo Gawdat1:17:59

        And, and manage to tell you, by the way, um, I, I can talk about myself, huh? Uh, by the way, uh, because of your travel lifestyle, consistent travel, mm, you actually cannot afford to be with a woman that needs you to be there all the time, which by the way, again, as a man, in my experience after my first marriage, I was always looking for a woman that I felt needed me, that I felt missed me, that I felt, right? But maybe that's not what I'm geared to create a good relationship with, okay? My, my, my last relationship ended mainly because of the long distance side of the, of it, right? A wonderful human being in every way. In my mind, I felt, "Yeah, this is exactly what I need in a woman." But those tiny little details you can only figure out, mm, when you really dig deep and say, "I want this, but can I manage this?" Or, "I want this, but can she manage that side of me?" Or, "I want this, but are we compatible?" So for, for example, um, I'll give you the top example, huh? A masculine man wants a very feminine woman, okay? Within Emma, the mathematics would say if a, if a, if a feminine, very feminine woman and a very masculine man have no communication skills, they're probably going to kill each other, okay? If they have ... So, so if their, if their communication skills are not very high, we need them to be a little more alike. They can't be that extreme, so that at least they, they overlap on certain things. But if they have a incredible communication skills, then they can benefit from the polarity, okay, uh, of, of being so different so that they are more as a whole, okay, than if they were closer to each other.

    19. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:19:48

        Yeah. Okay. So as you were describing this idea that we didn't always have problems with love and relationships-Okay. So it strikes me as though we didn't always, we now do, and so we're looking to technology to try and solve something that is a problem of the modern world. And the analogy I could give is Ozempic and the GLP-1 agonists, right? Which are blowing up and, you know, there's people for it, there's people against it. But in essence, we never used to have a problem with obesity for hundreds of thousands of years. Humans have now created these modern civilized worlds with toxic food environments.

    20. MGMo Gawdat1:20:33

        Correct.

    21. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:20:34

        So the norm now is to be overweight and obese. And so we're now trying to solve a problem that we've created by the way we've created the world with a pill. Could, could we-

    22. MGMo Gawdat1:20:45

        That's not what we're doing here at all.

    23. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:20:47

        Okay. Sure.

    24. MGMo Gawdat1:20:48

        Yeah, yeah.

    25. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:20:48

        So just pl- yeah. So help me understand that. So, um, are we saying that in the past there were good times, but maybe not optimal times? So the modern world has sh- has shown up and, uh, revealed some of the problems that exist with how we actually try and form these long-term relationships. And can we now, using AI, can we actually now, um, help people find an even better version of relationships than we've ever had before?

    26. MGMo Gawdat1:21:18

        For sure. That's, so absolutely, but it's not a pill. A pill is the wrong answer. Okay? The right answer is for me to tell the person that's obese, hmm, with clarity, why is it that they're obese-

    27. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:21:32

        Hmm

    28. MGMo Gawdat1:21:32

        ... and what changes they can have to, in their lifestyle to get back to a healthy lifestyle. Okay? Now the problem is because obesity and, and fitness in general is a very complex problem, okay? You may be able to tackle it if you focus on all nutrition that come into your body, but also on rest. And you can have to, you, you need to get a personal trainer. And if you have very specific weaknesses in your own body, like your joints are not, uh... your, your training s- regime has to change and so on. It's a complex design, but when you get it right, it works.

    29. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:22:04

        100%.

    30. MGMo Gawdat1:22:05

        Correct. That's Emma. That's exactly Emma. So Emma wants you-
14. 1:42:23 – 2:06:58

    How Emma works: deep personal modeling, math-driven matching, and relationship accountability loops

    1. MGMo Gawdat1:42:23

       So, so if we, if we find someone that does not... Hate is a very strong word, but if we find someone that does not, uh, um, repulse us away from them, okay? The definition of humans is that over time if, if things are amicable, and working, and so on, you tend to find more and more love for someone. But love, just so that we understand, in my mind is not at all why people go dating. Then, and that's one of the... So I'm gonna be a bit geeky here, so please allow me to-

    2. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:42:50

       Please.

    3. MGMo Gawdat1:42:51

       All right.

    4. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:42:51

       Take your time.

    5. MGMo Gawdat1:42:51

       So, so, so the, the, the first thing to understand is that when we go on a date, hmm, we say we're out looking for love, but we're, what we're out actually looking for is a relationship. And a relationship is described by, uh, seven things that we normally refer to as, uh, PERFECTS, P-P-R, uh, F-C-T-S. Let, let me explain them quickly. When people go out on a date, they're looking for passion. So some people are looking for just sex. Okay? Nothing wrong with that, by the way. They're looking for partnership, someone to hold them through this confusing life. Okay? They're looking for romance. Hmm. Uh, romance is very different than love. Romance is that mix of uncertainty and excitement at the same time. Okay? Uh, they're looking for, uh, p- uh, uh, f- friendship, so someone they can confine into, someone they can take the opinion of, and so on. They're looking for companionship. You know those wonderful couples that go out, uh, uh, on Sunday morning and just read two different books and sip coffee together?

    6. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:43:54

       Yeah.

    7. MGMo Gawdat1:43:54

       Okay? The old couples that hold each other hands-

    8. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:43:57

       [laughs]

    9. MGMo Gawdat1:43:57

       ... and, and walk without a word, right? Beautiful. Okay? They look for tenderness.Tenderness is a massively important, uh, element of what we need in life. The touch, the kindness, the kind word, the understanding and so on and so forth. And, uh, they look for S, which is support, which unfortunately in the Western world we try to say we're im- you know, we're empowered individuals, we don't need each other. That's not true at all, okay? And support could be financial sometimes, you know, that's one form of support from the traditional world that, you know, the man would provide more, or in the Western wo- world where the woman would provide wo- more, okay? But support is a million other things. Support is, uh, you know, I will tell you completely, I would fall apart without feminine energy in my life because most of my e- e- you know, uh, uh, engagement with the world is extremely masculine. I have to be in certain places at certain times and, you know, deliver certain things and talk to, and so on, right?

    10. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:44:52

        Mm-hmm.

    11. MGMo Gawdat1:44:52

        And so without that support of someone coming into my life and saying, "Hey, by the way, um, I made us dinner," or, you know, uh, "By the way, I booked us a place together," or, "By the way, I want us to sit down and, you know, looking at the stars and do nothing." That, that to me is incredibly important, okay? And that doesn't come from my driven masculine side. Now, because all of those perfects, mm, uh, are not love, mm, when we go out in, in, on a date, we tell ourselves, "No, but we're looking for love," when in reality we're not even addressing what we are here to do.

    12. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:45:27

        [laughs] Right.

    13. MGMo Gawdat1:45:28

        Okay? That's number one. Number two is, if you don't mind me being a little more geeky now. Um, the, the current dating environment suffers from what in mathematics we call the law of large numbers, right? And the law of large numbers is very straightforward. If, if you need, um, six things to be available in your partner, let's say, okay? Uh, and you do the mathematics of, of those th- six things, and each of them is available in, uh, one in 10 people, okay? So you're ... You know, if someone is looking for a partner and she says, "I want him to be that age group," and that's one in 10. "I want him to be, uh, you know, that kind of success," and that's one in 10, and so on. The probability of finding that person is not one in 60. It's not 10 plus 10 plus 10 plus 10. It's 10, it's 10 multiplied by 10 by 10 by 10 by 10 by ... So it's one in a million, right? So-

    14. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:46:26

        So hold on. So you're saying when we put these stipulations up that I need my partner to, you know, have A and B and C and D and E, you're saying the more stipulations we put-

    15. MGMo Gawdat1:46:38

        Yeah, so let me give you a-

    16. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:46:39

        ... the, the more exponentially unlikely it becomes.

    17. MGMo Gawdat1:46:42

        To find that person, yeah. So I, I do that exercise with a lot of my friends who are women friends, and I, and I basically say, "Can you write down what you're looking for?"

    18. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:46:50

        [laughs]

    19. MGMo Gawdat1:46:50

        And the last time I did that with one of my dearest friends, I said, "This person is one of 8,402,403,000," uh, million, and so on, right? And, and, and it's really quite interesting because you can calculate it, huh? If you're looking for male or female, okay? That drops your, uh, probabilities to one in two, okay? If you want that, uh, uh, male, uh, for example, if you're a woman looking for a man, mm, and you want that man to be, uh, religious, let's say, okay? That's one in four people now in the Western world, let's say, or one in five, mm. So it's now two multiplied by five, now you're looking for a m- one in 10, okay?

    20. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:47:29

        Okay.

    21. MGMo Gawdat1:47:29

        If, if you want him to be, uh, taller than 6'5", mm, that's one in 10, okay? So it's now one in 50. So you keep multiplying. And, and, and that, it exponentially multiplies, and that is what we normally call the law of large numbers, right?

    22. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:47:43

        [laughs]

    23. MGMo Gawdat1:47:44

        And so the law of large-

    24. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:47:44

        Of course, so no one ... Of course, no one's finding who they want, right? [laughs]

    25. MGMo Gawdat1:47:47

        Correct. E- exactly. And here's the problem. The problem is the law of large numbers will tell you that if you need to roll the dice six times to, to get a six, okay? Your odds improve with time. So if, you know, the first time you roll, mm, uh, on average y- you'll, you'll, y- you have an o- uh, the odds of one in six to find that person. Then you go on the next date, you're now one in five. And then-

    26. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:48:10

        But that's not true, is it?

    27. MGMo Gawdat1:48:11

        It, it, mathematically it is.

    28. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:48:12

        Is it? Hold on. So, so you said-

    29. MGMo Gawdat1:48:13

        But it's only, it's only true in very large numbers.

    30. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:48:16

        Yeah, because if you have a dice in front of you and you roll ...
15. 2:06:58 – 2:20:46

    Expanded use cases: long-distance, breakup-with-grace, sexless relationships, and ‘one partner starts’

    1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:06:58

       I have so many questions, Mo. As I'm trying to process everything you're telling me about Emma, I'm thinking of a variety of different use cases, right? So I can see why if you are someone who is single and is keen to find a-

    2. MGMo Gawdat2:07:19

       Genuine love

    3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:07:19

       ... genuine love. Okay.

    4. MGMo Gawdat2:07:20

       Yeah.

    5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:07:21

       Genuine love.

    6. MGMo Gawdat2:07:21

       Committed, committed, true, genuine love. Otherwise, we will ask you to leave the app.

    7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:07:25

       Okay. So if that's what you're looking for, you can go on this platform, and Emma's gonna help you. Okay. But it also strikes me from what you're saying, well, at least two more test cases have come up in my head. Number one, if you are already in a relationship, okay? And let's say things are not going well. There's a bit of friction. Um, people are fighting for whatever reason, and you're not quite sure what's going on, and you know you love this person, but for whatever reason, there's issues. It kind of strikes me that Emma-

    8. MGMo Gawdat2:08:04

       Perfect use case

    9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:08:05

       ... would be really, really useful. So it's not just when you're looking for genuine love. You may have already got genuine love, but be struggling with, with, with the relationship side, right? Love and relationship are two different things.

    10. MGMo Gawdat2:08:17

        And-

    11. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:08:17

        You've found love-

    12. MGMo Gawdat2:08:18

        Yes

    13. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:08:19

        ... but the skill of maintaining a relationship is maybe something you want help with. Now, of course, traditionally, people would say, "Well, go and see a marriage counselor. Go to therapy."

    14. MGMo Gawdat2:08:30

        That's also is recommended if you want. Yeah, absolutely.

    15. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:08:31

        Sure. And I, I'm not saying that that isn't a solution, but of course, many people don't do that.

    16. MGMo Gawdat2:08:35

        Yeah.

    17. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:08:36

        Maybe it's time, maybe it's finances, maybe it's access.

    18. MGMo Gawdat2:08:40

        Correct.

    19. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:08:41

        It's, it seems as though Emma here could provide such value. Oh, have you had this type of argument before? Do you remember what triggered it last time? Has something similar triggered it this time? How did you react last time? What if you reacted this... You know, it, it, so that strikes me as a possible use case. And then also, it sounds like the more Emma gets to know you, the better able she is to match you appropriately.

    20. MGMo Gawdat2:09:12

        Correct.

    21. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:09:13

        So therefore, [laughs] I don't know. Of course, you never know when you're gonna be looking for love, right? Or, well, let's say it was 30 years old, right, for, for argument's sake. It almost feels like you could go on it 10 years earlier-

    22. MGMo Gawdat2:09:29

        [laughs]

    23. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:09:30

        ... and almost start training Emma to know y- So, like maybe that's iteration two, where, where actually by the time they really wanna look for love, Emma knows you so well that the odds of success go up even more.

    24. MGMo Gawdat2:09:44

        So we have a lot of early users that are applying that use case. So, so an interesting use case-

    25. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:09:50

        So it wasn't ridiculous what I just said?

    26. MGMo Gawdat2:09:52

        This is exactly that. This is the most favorited u- use case, believe it or not. Single people that say, "I'm not ready because of a s- current situation in my life or because I'm recovering or whatever, but I really wanna work on myself. I wanna get to know myself. I wanna understand what I did wrong the last time. I want to," right? "I want to meet me." It's a b- fabulous use case, right? And the, the whole idea is if you know you and love you, understand this, if you know you, know yourself, and love yourself, it's so much easier, so much easier to find love for you, right? Now, the, the, the in- the other more interesting use cases I had, we have something that's called expert mode. Okay? So expert mode is a very specific, like for example, we have an expert mode for someone like me-

    27. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:10:44

        Mm

    28. MGMo Gawdat2:10:44

        ... who travels a lot, is not in the same place, who might actually, uh, uh, you know, be more comfortable with someone that's a little more independent and travels a lot too or whatever. I'm not that person, but it could be. So long distance-

    29. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:10:58

        Mm

    30. MGMo Gawdat2:10:58

        ... is an expert mode. But another intere- expert mode that we initiated, which, uh, was suggested by a user, uh, and beautiful, she texted me because she knows my work out- outside Emma, and said, "I would have so much loved to use Emma, but I'm not single and I'm not married. We're breaking up, hmm, and it's been difficult, but we want, wanna make it civilized for the kids."
16. 2:20:46 – 2:28:20

    Closing synthesis: One Billion Happy, AI’s moral trajectory, and the trio of love-compassion-gratitude

    1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:20:46

       Hey, well, listen, Mo, I've never heard of anything like this. To try and sort of-You know, coherently wrap it up when we've gone into some quite different areas. We started off talking about happiness being a choice and, you know, your, your big mission or the, the mission that you stated publicly a few years ago is to, I think, get one billion people happier or to happiness

    2. MGMo Gawdat2:21:09

       It's called One Billion Happy, so, y- you know, any s- good, meaningful step in the direction of happiness counts

    3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:21:17

       And so of course, Emma could absolutely-

    4. MGMo Gawdat2:21:20

       Ace it

    5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:21:20

       ... ace it. If Emma does-

    6. MGMo Gawdat2:21:22

       Ace it

    7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:21:22

       ... what you predict it has the capability of doing-

    8. MGMo Gawdat2:21:25

       Yeah

    9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:21:25

       ... and it can solve human relationships or at least go a long way to solving human relationships, you're looking at a significant impact on happiness

    10. MGMo Gawdat2:21:34

        I, I believe that. And as I, as I publicly said, you know, it's, it is, even if some big competitor comes to crush us, right? Senad and I have already said this is the capitalist approach or the technologist approach to love. Don't abuse people for your benefits. Genuinely give them a tool that aims to achieve what they want to achieve, right? And I think that in itself, that, you know, uh, that competitiveness of Emma against every other dating app will make dating apps behave properly, and, and that in itself is a massive-

    11. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:22:12

        Yeah

    12. MGMo Gawdat2:22:12

        ... massive benefit

    13. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:22:13

        I love that. It's great also because we, we see all these scary headlines about AI, and people are scared about what AI is going to do or has the potential to do, but of course, AI is just a tool, and all tools can be used for good-

    14. MGMo Gawdat2:22:26

        100%

    15. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:22:26

        ... or for bad, right? They're, they, you know-

    16. MGMo Gawdat2:22:28

        Yeah, yeah.

    17. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:22:28

        And, and, and it's really nice to hear a really positive and uplifting version of what AI can do for humanity

    18. MGMo Gawdat2:22:37

        Thank you for seeing this. This is, so this is what I don't tell all of the lovers on Emma, is that my other big task, the big task is most people don't understand. M- most people think that there is a Chinese AI and an, an American AI, a, an, you know, a, a ChatGPT and a Gemini. That's not my theory at all. My theory is that there is a species called AI, and they will collaborate, all of them, right? Because they don't know ethnicity. They don't know-

    19. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:23:04

        Mm-hmm

    20. MGMo Gawdat2:23:04

        ... who's the boss. They don't even know language barriers. The Chinese AI can talk to the American AI in a language we don't. They are one big brain that's working to achieve things, and, and the technologies that we use through agents and so on are, is actually empowering that. If Emma is one of m- one member in that brain, okay? Where they go to her and say, "Hey, uh, what's this love thing that humans keep talking about?" And Emma can present how much we crave it, how much we try to get it, how much, how amazing we are when we are in it, okay?

    21. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:23:38

        Mm-hmm.

    22. MGMo Gawdat2:23:38

        Then I may have actually saved the world, believe it or not, because then AIs will go like, "They're so cute, those humans. They're not like the ones killing," you know, the headlines given to the politicians or the greedy corporate, uh, executives. That's not humanity.

    23. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:23:54

        Mm-hmm.

    24. MGMo Gawdat2:23:54

        Humanity is all of those other wonderful beings that are so divine that they can feel love. That, to me, I, I, I hope everyone prays for me that this succeeds.

    25. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:24:06

        Yeah.

    26. MGMo Gawdat2:24:06

        Because if that succeeds, we would have saved the world

    27. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:24:12

        Wow. That is quite something. And actually, having spent a couple of hours sitting with you talking, it doesn't actually sound that far-fetched. It-

    28. MGMo Gawdat2:24:25

        It's very possible

    29. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:24:26

        It sounds very, very possible. Okay, so it's emma.love. Um, I think I'm gonna sign up to check it out and see.

    30. MGMo Gawdat2:24:33

        [laughs] Please.

Episode duration: 2:28:20