Dinosaurs, Black Holes & Capitalism | Office Hours

Added: 2026-05-22

[00:00:04]But there is something that happened uh yesterday.

[00:00:08]Uh somebody should I start?

[00:00:11]>> Cuz we're doing it. Welcome to office hours.

[00:00:14]>> Yeah. Yeah. Somebody thought it would be neat to fire a drone, one of those kamicazi drones into the nuclear power plant in Abu Dhabi.

[00:00:23]>> I did see that. Yes. Uh, and I guess my understanding is that it was actually intercepted.

[00:00:30]Uh, but then debris from it fell onto a location immediately adjacent to the nuclear power plant and started a fire.

[00:00:38]>> The electrical plant. Yes. I actually Khaled Times cuz I was like, this is what Roy was looking at. So, and >> yeah, so I guess there were three three drones. Two were two were intercepted, shot down, and then the third one I didn't realize it it was shot down, but then debris fell on an adjacent electrical plant that started to fire, >> right?

[00:00:58]>> Um but it was like widely condoned and it's being called a terrorist attack, so I guess no one knows who initiated it.

[00:01:04]>> Yeah, I mean I have three suspects um >> specific.

[00:01:09]>> Oh yeah, for sure. There's three three suspects in my mind. There's only three people who are who would do this.

[00:01:18]Go on.

[00:01:20]>> Two of them start with an I and one starts with a H. And we'll just leave it like that.

[00:01:26]>> Okay.

[00:01:26]>> So So and and yes, the Republic of Ireland for sure. No, I'm kidding. The Irish are too awesome to do something stupid. Uh, this is my brain trying to figure out. I was thinking of two things at the same time. Completely unrelated to what we were just talking about. Happy birthday.

[00:01:51]>> Oh, thank you. I turned 37.

[00:01:53]>> You turned 37. Roy, you're you're somehow younger than me. You are not looking good for your age.

[00:02:00]>> Oh, that's it. Our friendship's over.

[00:02:02]You're supposed to say what? No, you look like you're 27. You don't look 37.

[00:02:06]You look like you could still binge drink all night long and be fine.

[00:02:12]didn't drink.

[00:02:13]>> You don't have back problems or sleep apnnea. You're great and you're healthy.

[00:02:17]You go run 20 miles and then >> I can't run anymore.

[00:02:21]>> Dance all night. Also, I'm glad you're feeling better cuz you were sick last week.

[00:02:28]>> So, I was actually sick twice over a two week span of time. What the hell was that? I don't know. I don't like it. I don't want that to happen. I like it to be sick and then, you know, have a few months, then sick, then a few months because I have two kids that go to school. Like, I'm going to get sick frequently because they're basically disease vectors. But, >> um, what are you going to do?

[00:02:48]>> Yeah. Having system, >> having kids in public transit, I feel like, are the two ways to just constantly challenge your immune system.

[00:02:55]>> Yeah.

[00:02:57]>> Yeah.

[00:02:58]>> So, but I'm also for both of them. So, it's it's a hard >> I love both very much. You know, I was on an airplane with pneumonia. I didn't know I had pneumonia at the time, but I was coughing frequently, thinking, "Oh, what's wrong with me?"

[00:03:14]And, you know, like I look back on that, I think, darn it, I might have spread this stupid thing. I wish I had known.

[00:03:21]And I maybe I could have canceled the flight or something.

[00:03:24]>> Well, pneumonia, it doesn't have to be contagious. I don't think it's necessarily contagious.

[00:03:27]>> It's not contagious. I think I think pneumonia is >> is contagious >> is like a a complication of another virus. I I'm not I'm a lay person when it comes to this, but I' I've only had pneumonia once >> and that was I think I had a like cold or something and I think too much >> u flem whatever got into my lungs and it just it caused an infection. Um and I was I was younger and dumber. You know how we are in the United States. We're just like, I'm not feeling well. I'm gonna wait this out >> for two, three weeks. I don't remember most of that time.

[00:04:06]>> Uh my girlfriend, who's now my wife, she was like, you should really go to the hospital or something. And I was like, I don't know. I don't want to go do a walk-in at the VA for this. So, I just got I naturally fought it off over a few weeks and hopefully, you know, I don't have any lasting lasting effects from that. So the the genius of the American medical system is there isn't enough capacity. So what they do is they just make it so awful and then you're unlikely to get the treatment you need that it discourages you from going and then that helps with the capacity.

[00:04:37]>> That's true.

[00:04:40]>> I'm sick and they're like here take some antibiotics. What? I have a bacterial infection. I have no clue. It's probably viral. Here's some antibiotics. Will that help me with viral? I thought it didn't help for viral. It doesn't. Just get out. Take go. It's like what a great medical system you guys have invented.

[00:05:00]Maybe you could I don't know. Uh >> just I'll just stay home.

[00:05:05]>> We don't we do a lot of um like continuing care. Not a lot of let's let's become a healthy culture. We don't really do any preventative medicine a lot here. So I mean like >> and that was the whole idea behind the Affordable Care Act was to create preventative medicine. But the Republicans hate it. So they keep destroying the Affordable Care Act every chance you get.

[00:05:25]>> There's no money in it. If if your civilization's healthy and not, you know, forking over thousands of dollars to insurance, then where's that where's that money going? Oh, to your example, like when people get a virus, >> sometimes they're like, "Oh, I'm I'm really sick. I really don't feel good."

[00:05:41]And so they go to the hospital, which is the last place you want to go when you just have a a virus because there's not you just have to wait it out. Like there's not a whole lot you can do.

[00:05:49]There's very little. But at the same time, if you do feel that way and you actually have an illness that needs to be treated, some people will just stay put.

[00:05:59]>> Yeah.

[00:05:59]>> And then there's then there's the other.

[00:06:00]So, this is this made me laugh. I I got a a letter in the mail. I had a uh CT scan, a CAT scan of my sinuses recently, whatever. I I get the what was charged and what the VA paid for it, right? And so, like, this medical imaging company charged the VA for this scan. It was like $2,400 something dollars. And the VA said, "Here's $198."

[00:06:30]>> And the imaging company is like, "Okay, >> like, why can't I do that?"

[00:06:35]>> $50.

[00:06:37]>> It's like, how? What the heck? Like, that that never works. And meantime, like when our first child was born, we we pay out of pocket. It was like $10,000 and it was like $3,000 for an epidural.

[00:06:50]And then 16 months later, you know, my child's walking around, we get another bill for like $600 for we didn't even know what it was at first. We like we wrote them back and like I don't what is this? And they're like it's for the epidural. Like we already paid for it.

[00:07:06]Why are you asking for more money? And so and they're like oh it's already gone to collections. And we're like, "What?

[00:07:13]>> What? Well, I had that happen too, actually."

[00:07:16]>> And >> so we just told collections, they're like, "And we think this is uh fraud. We got an email once that like information was hacked." And they're like, "Oh, okay. Don't worry about it." Like >> this is all you you just have to say, "What is this?" And then it just Anyway, it is such a confusing and bizarre world to navigate. And the fact that someone can just say, "Instead of paying you like $25,000, we'll give you 200 bucks."

[00:07:39]And they're just okay. It's it's it is beyond it doesn't make any sense. I don't know why our system is like this.

[00:07:44]It's it's uh >> we could do what Canada does and we would save trillions of dollars.

[00:07:51]I think Canada pays twothirds what we pay and they actually have a higher recovery rate. And >> but what about those people that make all the money, Roy? What are they going to do?

[00:08:02]>> Exactly.

[00:08:04]Oh. Oh, I know. 30% of them are probably immigrants anyway. So, this is a way to hate on immigrants is to actually create a better medical system.

[00:08:15]>> I don't know. That could backfire really quickly and even just the medical system.

[00:08:19]>> Look, these are the contradictions that blow my mind. So, you know how Republicans hate gay marriage? Who has fewer abortions than gay people? Like, I mean, they are they are trailblazing not having abortions? Why would you hate their marriages? I'm going to make you spit and choke.

[00:08:36]>> This is This is like the third time that you I've just taken a sip of coffee and you've said something really funny and I've try really hard not to spit. One was in the middle of class.

[00:08:47]I don't even remember what it was. Uh but yeah, fair fair point. I can't argue I can't argue against that at all.

[00:08:53]>> I mean, like come on.

[00:08:56]>> It's just so straightforward. Also, if you eat eggs, eggs are abortions. Like, you're literally having chicken abortions. Like why do you hate abortions so much? Just a natural part of life.

[00:09:07]>> I'll correct you. Eggs aren't eggs aren't abortions. They're they're normal menstrual cycle for a chicken >> and delicious. I love eggs.

[00:09:18]>> Instead of it happening every month, it happens every day.

[00:09:21]>> Yeah. What the hell? That is insane. How do they produce an egg?

[00:09:25]>> If it doesn't get fertilized and it just, you know, >> Yeah.

[00:09:28]>> It come comes out regardless. So, >> it's coming out.

[00:09:33]Yeah, chickens are amazing.

[00:09:35]>> Chickens, chickens, geese, was it uh ostriches, and one other animal, I don't remember what it was, were already around during the time of the dinosaurs.

[00:09:48]>> Well, because they are dinosaurs, right?

[00:09:50]Birds are dinosaurs.

[00:09:52]They were they were dinosaurs that made it through as they were as opposed to evolving, right? like hummingbirds evolved after the dinosaurs were almost wiped out cuz they did they weren't wiped out because birds are dinosaurs.

[00:10:07]So they made it. They just took a really big hit.

[00:10:13]>> Yes. And >> terror birds were terror birds. I don't think that's right. Anyway, there was I think there were four four birds that were already evolved before the Chickixaloo meteor impact in Mexico.

[00:10:28]>> I wonder I wonder why birds because there's there's there's several creatures that you can look at like there are several lizard types and like croc I feel like crocodiles you're like obviously crocodiles >> look they still look like dinosaurs. No.

[00:10:43]>> Well, the birds I mean birds birds were birds.

[00:10:45]>> The definition of a dinosaur is a couple of things. One is their hip joints are underneath like with us. So crocodiles they're they have to walk like this because their shoulders stick out.

[00:11:01]>> Well, even the ones in the water.

[00:11:06]>> I mean like like sea sea creatures. Oh, you mean like the the big sea monsters that existed at the time of the dinosaurs? Those weren't dinosaurs.

[00:11:16]Those were reptiles.

[00:11:18]>> Okay. Like I I just like that you called them sea monsters. So >> yeah, they're they're they're awesome.

[00:11:24]Uh those those were aquatic reptiles.

[00:11:28]And then the original flying animals were also reptiles. So like the pterodons, those were reptiles. But then once you get into like or uh archaeopterics that those were birds >> and they were actually dinosaurs. So dinosaurs are warm-blooded creatures that probably evolved feathers pretty quickly on. So many of the dinosaur species that we think of as not having feathers probably actually did and there and their hips are underneath. So here's what happened was uh there there there were reptiles and then a a group of reptiles evolved off that became mammals and the mammals became the dominant animal be in part because what what made us mammals was live birth memory glands and our hips. It made it so we were faster when when we ran. So, we were better predators, but we're also better prey. Like, we could get away more effectively. And so, we began actually eating the reptiles, and the reptile population wasn't able to keep up with us. Then came the perian mass extinction event. So, the perian mass extinction basically what happened was all the continents merged together. It was one of the pangia events. There there are multiple times in Earth's history where all the continents got together. When that happens, it basically turns the world into a desert because it messes up the weather systems and and rain becomes scarce.

[00:12:58]The this particular event created the Peran mass extinction. The Peran mass extinction took out 98% of all the species of everything on the planet. It was the worst mass extinction catastrophe in our planet's history. It made what happened to the dinosaurs look like a walk through the park. It was so catastrophic um that you know sea creatures were wiped out like plants were wiped out bacteria like you name it we they was gone.

[00:13:35]So what ended up happening was uh the mammals who that did survive the way they surv extinction the most for common form of life was fungus because there were all this there were all these dead plants and dead animals and the fungus of course was just consuming those those hydrocarbons and surviving off of that.

[00:13:59]So basically the became a giant fungal fungal desert ball. Well, um, the mammals that survived this were also eating the the material that was basically dried out, right? Cuz planet turned into a desert. So everything was sort of mummified, but they couldn't really live on the surface because they would dry out too much. So they began burrowing into the ground and then we come out during the night and they were also eating the fungus. So they were living off of fungus and they were living off of these desiccated corpses. Um, basically one mammal made it through to the other side. It was listsaurus and it was the dumbest looking thing you've ever seen. Like it had like a beak face. It was, you know, size of a small domesticated dog, bigger than a cat. Uh, and it kind of lumbered around like it almost looked like it wasn't fully mammal. It was still had some like reptilian features to it. And it became the dominant life form on the surface once it started to come onto the surface cuz plants started to grow on the surface. So it started eating the plants. It ended up being 75% of all animals on the planet on the surf on the on land, not not including the sea. And it's the only time in Earth's evolution that there was a an animal that accounted for the majority of the living animals on like it's insane. The other 25% were on the other side of the of pangia. They were the few reptiles that had made it through through the the perian mass extinction. And what happened was uh they evolved to live in deserts. So that's what a lizard is. A lizard is a reptile that's evolved to live in deserts. Then and they began they would feed on each other obviously and they were feeding off of whatever they could get a hold of. Well, as Oh my god, everybody keeps calling today. I can't turn it off for some reason. It's not giving me the option. All right. Um, so what what started to happen was they began to work their way across the continent until they found Listaurus.

[00:16:16]And because Lorosaurus at this point for thousands of years had been the only actual animal that it had had contact with, it didn't have the concept of fear. It didn't understand that it needed to be afraid of these lizards that were coming across that were big.

[00:16:32]And the lizards just began eating them.

[00:16:34]And they they didn't evolve fear in time. And so the listsaurus effectively went extinct. But before it did it, it enough of them had evolved and into smaller a smaller animal that was a little bit sneakier that could that could hide and had fear. And that ma that animal ended up very like mouse shrew like.

[00:17:00]And some of those reptiles in the aftermath of this evolved into dinosaurs by basically putting their hips underneath their bodies instead of on the sides. And then and became warm-blooded. And the dinosaurs then took over the planet with the little itty bitty mammals kind of running around under their feet. And then Chickixaloo happened and meteor impact in Mexico wipes out the big dinosaurs and and the big reptiles that that existed, leaving only, you know, crocodiles and turtles and birds. And then the mammals took the planet back over.

[00:17:40]And so that's that's what happened.

[00:17:42]>> I This is not planned. We had I didn't expect I didn't know we're going to be I didn't know we were going to talk about how dinosaurs came back. This is I I feel like this is, you know, one of the beginning of any of your lectures.

[00:17:54]You're like, "All right, we're going to get some backstory." And then you just start talking about the Peran extinction. You're like, "Whoa, >> he's going he's going way back."

[00:18:03]>> Yeah.

[00:18:03]>> And then next time is a lesson.

[00:18:06]>> Actually, let's go let's go back to Big Bang and talk about >> Oh, you want to Okay. I'm I'm not a physicist. I'm probably really wrong about everything I'm about to say next.

[00:18:20]But Neil deGrasse Tyson said something that broke my mind and I've been thinking about it for the last like I don't know three months. So he goes, "You want to hear something crazy?" And it's like, "Yeah, please tell us. Let's go." He goes, "Our our our universe, which we think is about 13 1.5 billion lighty years across, has the same exact mass that you would expect a black hole that was 13 and a half billion years across would have."

[00:18:55]And I was like, "Oh my god, are we in a black hole? Is this is what it looks like inside a black hole?" And then I started thinking about it and I was like, is that big bang then? So there's enough mass in a star that it collapses on itself. When it does, it creates a black hole. That's a big bang event. That black hole is a universe.

[00:19:18]That universe is expanding. And of course, you know, in our in our mind, the universe is creating space and time and and there's new energy and matter coming into it because black holes are absorbing energy and matter from the surrounding area. So, but is that what a universe is? It's just a big So, when that's small, right, in in its early years, it's a it's a big tiny little nothing universe. But once you're big enough, you'll actually start to have your own little black holes, which means you're literally creating new universes.

[00:19:57]Oh. Uh anyway, it's uh just sort of And then at some point, right, our universe keeps expanding. The the thinking is it reaches a point where it no longer has enough mass and starts to basically break apart. Is that what happens that kills black holes? they just reach a point where they just sort of no longer have enough mass to hold together. All right, here here's here I think I think these are I was about to say here are two fundamental truths but that it can't be true cuz I I don't know but there everything is both expanding and coming together like all the time in our in our known physical existence like it like like in space I mean you've got the supernovas explosions big bang all these theories where things are just shooting outwards are the the known universe that we that we that we are aware of is expanding. We can see that through Doppler effects. We can see that through the way we we study distant objects in space.

[00:20:54]>> Uh but it's also coming together at the same time. We see that through all kinds of gravitational forces. We see that in black holes when when the density of matter uh is so great. Matter matter attracts itself. So I feel like it is just this massive cosmic sa scale event of things exploding outwards and then coming back together and then exploding outwards again. And so that you have these these both the explosion effect and then the black hole which is the the ultimate coming together so much so that it we don't know what happens.

[00:21:27]>> We don't know what happens.

[00:21:29]>> We just don't know.

[00:21:30]>> And could it be that that's how new universes are created? They're just inside that black hole. You wouldn't want to find out because the act of crossing the event horizon would spread you out like spaghetti because the distance of your feet is so far enough away from your head that you would just >> one of my favorite words when I was learning about it. Spaghettification.

[00:21:50]>> Spaghettification. That's awesome.

[00:21:52]>> Uh even even light gets stretched to Yeah. just unbelievable.

[00:21:58]>> So So event horizons are really awful.

[00:22:02]Don't cross them. Just look at the movie.

[00:22:06]>> Great movie.

[00:22:07]>> Event Horizon.

[00:22:08]>> Horizon.

[00:22:09]>> Yeah.

[00:22:09]>> Have you seen it?

[00:22:11]>> I don't I know. I think I've seen it. I wasn't in a horror flick.

[00:22:15]>> Yes.

[00:22:16]>> Yeah. No, I did not like that movie. I can't believe you're saying it's a great movie.

[00:22:20]>> I mean, it's I did not like it because I'm not really into that genre, but in terms of >> I mean, I like a a little bit of scary sci-fi, but that was just like gratuitous horror.

[00:22:31]>> It's It's gory. I don't want to ruin it for you, but it's it's about the Anyway, >> yeah, if you if you like horror movies and you like sci-fi and you haven't seen it, >> perfect.

[00:22:41]>> Yes.

[00:22:41]>> Go watch go watch it like just stop.

[00:22:44]Pause this. Go watch Horizon.

[00:22:47]>> Yeah. Really good cast >> and it's it's uh it's one of those that makes you just go like like this is the kind of deeply traumatic.

[00:22:58]>> I thought you were going to say Interstellar.

[00:23:00]No, >> because that made no sense. Like, don't get me wrong, I really liked the movie.

[00:23:06]>> Like, I enjoyed it, but I was like, wait, what? No. Huh? I'm very confused.

[00:23:12]>> I didn't really like it that much cuz I was feeling like I was like, I get what you're doing here, >> but like >> I >> But, you know, it's also the future, which sucks. So, >> yeah. I mean, you can I guess you could say the same thing about 2001 Space Odyssey. You're like, this this is so >> Oh, no. I love that movie.

[00:23:30]>> So slow, but that's I think that's part of the the beauty of it, right? It is so slow that like >> you have to like >> the the boring aspect of it, the silence and the pacing of it is just like >> it starts to like you start to feel it if you can hang around and you're not distracted.

[00:23:46]>> But it makes the >> beautiful movie.

[00:23:49]>> The the how scene is just like >> it's incredible. So anxiety feel filled just like no no no.

[00:24:02]>> Oh, it's good.

[00:24:03]>> So yeah, what do you want to talk about today?

[00:24:07]Dinosaurs. We got dinosaurs. We got the beginning of the universe and or creations of universe verses. Universe I universe eye.

[00:24:18]Uh yeah. What should we talk about? So, I guess we need to talk about, you know what I want to actually do is I want to talk about something I did in my Piers Morgan, my LA, my latest Piers Morgan appearance. And the reason I want to talk about it is cuz uh it was an interesting moment for for me like like a thought experiment event. So, I don't want to get into the details of what happened, but I was uh the person I was arguing against, Hansen, um he he kept saying Israel was a democracy, and I I kept pushing back on that. And finally, I I did something that that I knew would have an effect.

[00:25:01]like it was uh you know you could you could say that I was being a sophist or that I was just trying to win the debate but but I did it on purpose with with the hope that it would turn into something and it didn't really. I said, "Oh, I guess Israel is a democracy in the same way the United States was when it was genociding Native Americans."

[00:25:23]And he lost it. He was like, "What?

[00:25:26]You're bringing this in? That's nonsensical." starts attacking me and saying that I'm being foolish or whatever and irrational I think is a word he used and and I was inside I was just laughing cuz of course that's in when you're in a debate which I hate debates and they're stupid you want to upset the other guy but the question was why did I know it would upset him and why did it upset him and the answer is why I said it.

[00:25:58]So, there is this thing that white people do and you know, I I've always received white privilege. I I am actually officially half brown, but I present as white and I've always been treated as a white person. So, I've seen what it is to be a white person from the inside.

[00:26:18]And uh white people do this thing where they're like, "Yeah, it was really sad."

[00:26:26]and unfortunate that we had to genocide the Native Americans, but look what we created.

[00:26:33]And so they they make this equation, this balancing equation of yes, it's unfortunate Native Americans had to be slaughtered like this, but now we have a democracy. As if somehow the democracy makes the genocide okay.

[00:26:50]In other words, had the Nazis won World War II, that would have been, it's really sad what we did to the Jews and the Poles and the Ukrainians, but look at the beautiful civilization we built on their on their on their bones, on their ashes.

[00:27:05]And that that that kind of mentality I knew would zap him. So, that's why I did it. I slung it at him in in a hope that I would I would trigger some kind of reaction from him and we could turn it into a conversation. We couldn't because he went personal and started attacking me. I just ignored him at that point.

[00:27:21]Like, what what am I going to do? Oh no, you're calling me irrational.

[00:27:27]Um, so what I wanted I wanted to bring this up because I I really think people need to start checking in when they start talking about these things because it's not just white people who do this. Every civilization does this. there. You know, when you create a new civilization, you break some stuff in the previous civilization and there's there's this moment where you're like, "Yeah, but look at what we created in the process."

[00:27:56]And I and I just want to push back and say it's never justified. I don't care what kind of glorious utopian civilization you're going to create for your nation. If you're slaughtering people to get there, you're evil.

[00:28:12]And that's exactly the mentality the British had. It's exactly the mentality the Germans had when they were Nazis.

[00:28:19]Like it is th this is this it is not okay. I don't care if you get to vote for the policies that are created.

[00:28:27]You're still evil.

[00:28:30]And so that's that's why I did it. I just wanted to see if I could I could unhinge him. I was really hoping he was going to start talking about, you know, like how cool Sparta was and how cool ancient Rome was. I was, but he he he didn't he didn't fall for it. He was he just kept talking about how cool Israel was and like what the hell wow that was crazy.

[00:28:57]>> That is an interesting tactic. I mean like kind of pointing out the ends justify the means to someone and then have such a a defensive response because I feel like >> hommin is normal like right you're losing your debate so attack the attack the person you're debating >> I guess common practice now >> yeah exactly the thing is I don't care like I don't care what anybody thinks about me so it doesn't matter so go ahead attack me I'll survive this I was on a podcast with a guy kept saying I'm gonna be polite and I'm like Why? Well, I'm not fragile. Go for it. What do you want to say? Say whatever you want to say. And then he would try to like jab me and then I would contradict it and show he was being foolish and he'd be like, "Well, I'm trying to be polite."

[00:29:39]Like, why? Like, let's go.

[00:29:44]The only reason to be polite in this circumstance is, you know, I'm going to tear you to pieces. So, you don't want to say the thing you want to say. So, let's not have a debate. Debates are stupid.

[00:29:53]>> Yeah.

[00:29:53]>> Most people who watch a debate have already made up their mind before the debate. They just want to see their side win.

[00:29:58]>> Yeah, I am an awful debater, too. And I feel like even watching debates, like people already have pre, you know, they're not they're not thinking in the moment of the things. They they've already thought through all the different This is why like you debaters tend to like practice and and do all these things. This is this is a game for most people.

[00:30:19]>> Yeah.

[00:30:19]>> Uh for for most debaters, right? I mean, the vast majority of us who aren't practiced in, you know, having arguments, it it usually is just an emotionally driven event. It doesn't have anything to do with uh actually thinking through in the moments, which I feel like that's how our society is just reacting to anything now. We don't practice arguing with each other.

[00:30:45]>> We don't. and we just shout at each other and call each other names and and hate on one another and say the other person's insane and sometimes it's true they are insane. Um but >> yeah we never go at the end of the argument and go actually Roy >> I thought about what you said and you you're totally right.

[00:31:04]>> No it never happened never happened.

[00:31:06]Although actually now that we've said that I I think it can happen because I just an event popped up in my head in two from 2009 but you know that was so long ago maybe the rules have changed since then. So it was in the aftermath of the the 2008 2009 Gaza massacre uh an organization dedicated to peace in Austin asked me and another person to to debate uh to have a debate about Israel. And so I was like, "Yeah, sure. I'll do it." It was a private event. I want to say there was 20 people there, me and this other guy. And at one point in the debate, because I I was debating for single state solution. So create a single secular I'm still I still think this is the right answer. A single secular electoral republic with safeguards built in for Jewish, Drews, Muslims, and Christians, and anybody else who wants to be there. And and he was saying, "No, we have to do a two-state solution." And so at one point he turned to me and he said, "You want to keep people divided and separated?"

[00:32:17]And I went, "No, >> wait, what?

[00:32:19]>> That's you. You're the one who wants to create the two-state solution. I want to force them to figure out how to coexist and live in a single state." and his mouth fell open and he froze and he stared at me for this really long time like something had clicked that had never clicked before.

[00:32:40]And I was like, "Really? Was that it?"

[00:32:43]And of course, you know, like the debate ended. It was very clear I had won the debate. And I left him in this sort of weird state of what the hell. Since then he's changed his p position on >> wow >> Palestine Israel and uh he was a Jewish man uh who ended up becoming a critic of Zionism.

[00:33:06]>> Um so I I do think sometimes you do get through you just have to show the contradiction and you know that's what I tried to do with Hansen. just was tossing him the contradiction of, you know, I know you think Israel is okay, but you also think the genocide in America is okay. You probably also think that slavery was okay. Like, yes, it's unfortunate we had to bring all those poor Africans over, but look what we created. It's so much better than what we had. And oh, look, African-Americans are so much better off. And it's like, have you ever done the data? If African-Americans were in Africa, they would be like the eighth wealthiest country in Africa. And I'm just talking subsaharan Africa just in North Africa.

[00:33:53]So are they better off? The answer is the data doesn't seem to show that that's necessarily the case.

[00:34:00]>> Yeah. I think anytime we present something that is hasn't been presented before because like most of most of the things that that most people argue about or or they think about or consume are just they're things that they get on repeat, right? That they're presented to them and they they've rehearsed they've heard over and over and over. So they just become like these accepted even even subconsciously accepted ideas that they hold as truths. And so if you present something like, wait, the one-state solution is the one that actually brings people together because they have to live together as neighbors and and and figure it out. Two state is is obviously a divided situation. Yes.

[00:34:37]Which is what what we already have. Like it's >> Yeah, we already have a two-state solution. So pointing pointing that out because like you know then they have to stop and have that wideeyed moment of wait I've never I've never thought of that before.

[00:34:53]>> Yeah. It's it's the same thing you get with arguments against, you know, people who are using whatever religion to justify all of these things because they've heard whoever use a particular part of whatever holy book they have to justify some some unjustifiable thing that's going on. And then you could just be like, well, what about, you know, what about this other thing? And sometimes if it's if it's someone who actually thinks about these things and it's typically not the the fanatic religious person who has studied this really well and is using it to manipulate others then you end up uh maybe with some critical thinking. So like I think we've talked about this before just one like you have the manipulator and the manipulated manipulated and the manipulated they can often you can talk have a conversation with them and and and show them that there there's inconsistencies in in their way of thinking. However, the man manipulator doesn't care.

[00:35:54]They're just they know what they're doing and they're just going to keep doing it and then they'll start calling you names and trying to create doubt that you're not a credible individual.

[00:36:07]>> It reminds me of when the Arab Spring spread to the United States and turned into Occupy Wall Street. Um there was a point where uh >> hold on what I didn't know that that was the chain of events actually.

[00:36:21]>> Oh yeah. So the Arab Spring was not contained to the Arab world. It spread across the planet. Um you know it started in Tunisia in December 2010, right?

[00:36:31]>> And then it slowly worked its way across the Arab world. It turned it went to Greece and it went to Spain. In Spain it turned into the Indignado movement and then um when it went to the United States it it was Occupy Wall Street. And the reason it was called Occupy Wall Street, in fact, when it when it went to the United States, there were people in Midanta and Cairo holding up signs.

[00:36:56]So, it actually went to the United States in two phases. The first phase was not called Occupy Wall Street. It was the Wisconsin capital siege event.

[00:37:05]So, the Republicans had won the election in 2010 by Citizens United allowing for all this money to be dumped into the system. And as a result, through basically dirty politics, they had captured a blue state. They had captured Wisconsin and they were re uh they were they were gerrymandering all the districts in in Wisconsin to wipe out as many Democratic seats as possible. And so a group of Wisconsinites stormed the capital building in Madison, Wisconsin, and took control of the capital building. And I I I don't remember. It must have been end of February. Maybe it was uh beginning of February. It was somewhere February of 2011. And there were actually people in Madant and Cairo holding up signs saying the people of Cairo stand with the people of Wisconsin. Like it I mean it was a very direct connection. And they occupied the capital building for days. And it forced the Wisconsin state legislature to go to a hotel. and the Democratic Party skipped out. So they didn't have quorum, so they couldn't vote on any legislation. The the people had actually shut the system down. And then of course, because the Democratic Party is a bunch of sellout cowardly uh corporate lackey, they went and talked the people into returning the capital building.

[00:38:22]Like they had just done a revolution and captured the capital building. And then the Democrats being the sellouts that they are, cowardly little sellouts that they are that don't stand for anything meaningful, just went and talked to people. They said, "What we'll do is we'll do a recall election." And the the the people reluctantly gave the capital building back. They did the recall election and like one guy was recalled.

[00:38:45]It was it was a complete scam. Um, no matter how many times Americans get backstabbed by the rep Republicans and the Democrats, they still believe in these lying parties. It's hilarious.

[00:38:58]It's like, what's wrong with you? How gullible are you? How naive are you? So then, you know, the Arab Spring continued to boil over and and places turn into complete catastrophes like Syria and Libya. And uh then uh the idea came up with to do Occupy Wall Street.

[00:39:17]The reason it was called Occupy is the re is the reason why the Arab Spring was able to bring down governments in Tunisia and Egypt and and and it was because of the following. So in 2009, Iran had the green movement and all the activists in the Arab world were watching what was happening in Iran because the Arab world was heading towards revolutions. like Arab leadership was not doing a good job. Uh Hust Mubarak was a disaster and and there was no there was no attempt on anybody's part to actually make things better for the people with with you know with the exception of some of the oil rich states but the oil rich states had the money to do it. So like it it was you know this really bad situation where there were these nasty tyrannies that the US and some of the oil rich states in Europe were propping up that were doing nothing to advance the the needs of the people and eventually the people had had enough. This is this is the the lesson that human that politicians can't learn for some reason. You need to make sure your people have just enough so circus and bread so they don't want to kill you. Like Jesus Christ, that's politics 101.

[00:40:34]Circus and bread. The Romans figured this out 2500 years ago. If you haven't figured it out by now, you're a [ __ ] Like what? What the hell? So anyway, [ __ ] states like the government in Egypt ended up having the people who by the way in 2007 and 2008 had actually done little uprisings and had done a bunch of union organizing. They were preparing for a revolution. So when the green movement broke out in in Iran in 2009, they were watching the news coverage. So what the Iranians would do is they would go into a major intersection in Thran and they would shut it down and then they would go home at night to go have dinner and sleep and then when they would come back the next day the Iranian government had blockaded that intersection and taken control of it. So the protesters would have to fight the police and the military to get it and the best CGs forget about it. They're not going to win. So they would take the next best location into block it and shut it down. Then they'd go home in the evening and in the morning when they'd come back the government would have control of that location. So then they'd go to the third best. And they kept doing this until basically they were in some side alley controlling absolutely nothing. And that was the end of the green movement. So those Arab activists went what we have to do is capture the key locations in the cities and then hold them permanently or have to occupy them. So that's what they did in Madan. They captured the heart of Cairo and they just held it.

[00:42:06]And it was brutal. And they would take turns. People would show up so other people could go sleep. Some people would sleep there, but some people would go home. People had jobs they had to they couldn't skip out on because they had to feed themselves and pay their rent. So they would only show up in their free time. There were people who would bring food and water when they couldn't participate. And they kept the occupation going permanently 247 because they knew the instant that the police got a hold of it that was the end of the movement. That's why it was called Occupy Wall Street. The idea was to permanently occupy it. Now they didn't actually occupy Wall Street. They occupied a privately owned park near Wall Street and uh you know at that point it became symbolic because if you actually occupied Wall Street you could shut down the the financial institution that it was. But if you're just in a park nearby, uh, what are you gonna do?

[00:42:57]>> Relatively easy to just ignore and go to >> ignore. Just ignore it. We're going to just keep doing our business. Having said that, the government clearly didn't feel like it could ignore it. If you want to see violence, that's real violence, go look up the videos of how the government responded to the Occupy movement from Oakland to Washington DC.

[00:43:15]Like, it was violent. the the like there's this whole we have this first amendment that allows freedom of speech and freedom of assembly and freedom to petition the government. It's clearly a [ __ ] lie. It's clearly not real because the government came in with tear gas and and sticks and they beat the crap out of people. It was to the point where there were rolling battles in Oakland, California, and you you could see the line move as the police drove the crowd back and then the crowd would push back. Totally violent. And of course, the the [ __ ] US press was barely covering this. Like people were being shot with non-lethal weapons.

[00:43:56]They're still lethal and ending up in the hospital. And the police were would fire tear gas canisters at people, not into the crowd, but at directly at people's heads. Like it was violent [ __ ] Anyway, um I I don't even remember why I'm telling you all this about Occupy. Like, how did we get to Occupy?

[00:44:17]He He triggered me and got me rolling on Occupy. Oh, I remember. So, this guy comes up to me and it was at the Occupy Austin event.

[00:44:26]>> That's right. That's right.

[00:44:28]>> Yeah. And the guy comes up to me in Occupy Austin and he goes, you know, what are what are the protests here for?

[00:44:35]And I said, this is, you know, the first of all, one of the big mistakes Occupy did is it didn't do an ideology. So, it didn't have any way to rally people around it because there was no there was no philosophy. Like the philosophy was anarchy. That's not a philosophy. That's just not >> where where was Bernie Sanders.

[00:44:55]>> Yeah, exactly. you needed Bernie Sanders to come in there and and explain to people why they were protesting.

[00:45:02]So I said, "My understanding is this is the 99% furious at the 1%."

[00:45:09]And so that's that's what's going on.

[00:45:11]The 1% have plundered the country enough that it's finally triggered the 99% to rise up against them. And he goes, "What does that mean?" And I go, "Well, the the bottom 99% are angry at the top 1%."

[00:45:23]He goes, "That doesn't make any sense.

[00:45:26]the United States is in the top 1%. And I went, "What does that mean?" He goes, "Everybody in the United The United States is so rich. Everybody in the United States is in the top 1%." At which point I went I looked at him and I went, "The United States is 4 and a.5% of the world's population.

[00:45:43]How can 4 and a.5% fit inside 1%."

[00:45:47]And he looked at me and he went, "I don't get what you're saying." like the United States is 4 and a half% of the world's population. It can't all fit in the top 1%.

[00:46:00]And and he was just confused. And I I thought, what the heck? Like h you hadn't thought to look this up first?

[00:46:07]You're just spitting out nonsensical data and trying to figure out like I don't I don't even know where to go with this poor guy. I mean, it's worth pointing out that the top 1% of the United States owns 40% of the United States. The next 15%, so the top 16% owns the next 15% owns another 40%. So that means the top 16% owns 80% of the United States. And of course, the next 24% uh owns like 13%.

[00:46:41]So the bottom 60% share the remaining 7% and the next 20 of course own five. So really the bottom 40% share 2% except that the the next 20 own 1.7. So the bottom 20% own 0.3% of the United States like the wealth distribution in the United States looks like a third world country. The dis the difference between being middle class lower and lower class is a middle class person has stable housing but is barely richer than a lowerass person. And and I you know like here's this person saying that the entire 4 and a.5% fits in the top 1% globally. They they clearly just don't understand how the world works.

[00:47:26]>> What I'm trying to trying to even think where they got that number. Do they mean like the US the US GDP or wealth or something is in the within the top 1% globally which that isn't that isn't even true either.

[00:47:41]>> Uh no we are GDP wise we're number one.

[00:47:44]I mean in ter we're number one but we're not 1% of the total >> and I'm ignoring countries like Luxmbourg and you know the these little these states that do all this they have a fake GDP because right Luxenberers aren't as rich if you look at GDP per capita Luxenburg looks like a lookers are running around in money and the reality is there's a bunch of money that's there that doesn't belong to looks bers yeah so what they meant was that the poorest American is still in the top 1%.

[00:48:16]And of course, that doesn't make any sense because the United States is 4 and a.5% of the world's population. Like, it was just such a, oh my god, think this through before you open it. Now, if you wanted to say the top 20% of the United States is in the global 1%, I'm not sure that would fit either, but it's closer. Like, it it would make a little bit more sense. Um, I think there are just too many rich people in in China, India, and Europe for that to be true.

[00:48:49]>> Yeah, I think that but I feel like that's such a common that was a common saying for a long time, especially during that time because it's like why is everyone complaining like even the lowest of Americans is such a is wealthy compared to the rest of the world, >> which isn't isn't true.

[00:49:06]>> It's not true at all.

[00:49:07]>> Yeah. The bottom 60% of Americans live like third worlders. Dude, we've talked about this before, but uh there's a whole chunk of Texas that doesn't have access to proper drinking water.

[00:49:20]Like there there are towns with hundreds of thousands of people living in them that don't have a public water system in Texas. And you know, Texas has a GDP the size of Saudi Arabia. Texas, if it was an independent state, would be like the 18th largest GDP on the planet. So here's this filthy rich country called Texas has garbage education system, garbage health care system, and doesn't even provide adequate drinking water because it's all about distributing the wealth to the rich and plundering the poor and and which which brings me to my talk that we did on Thursday. Uh should I talk about that now or should and then like we chop piece of it because I I didn't actually wrap up the talk correctly cuz at the end I was sick.

[00:50:07]>> Well, we'll do both. You can have it here for office hours and then I'll put this clip at the end of your talk. So it it'll it'll have more context for people who just watched the lecture or or want to watch both. So yeah.

[00:50:18]>> All right. So what I started with was an experiment that political scientists kept doing, economists kept doing because they wanted to prove that humans were rational. And what they would do is they would give you $100 and then you they would give half half a room $100 and then they would have that person make an offer to the person next to them. And you know you could offer $1, $50, $20, anything you wanted. $99, $37, whatever you want. And if the second person accepts the offer, then you got the money. And I didn't actually distribute this money because I'm not rich. Uh if there I think there were 100 people in the class and there was yeah like 100 people in the room. So that would have cost me $10,000. I'm a professor. I don't have money like that.

[00:51:03]So I couldn't actually do the experiment. So I told them it was a thought experiment. They would do it in their heads.

[00:51:10]Almost everybody offered $50 to the other person. And if both if the other person accepts you both get the money.

[00:51:16]If the other person says no, nobody gets the money. So if you if you offer the other person $1 and they say no, you don't get the 99 and they don't get the one.

[00:51:27]In that experiment, one person offered their partner $12 and they accepted. The person got the so so they would have gotten 88 and the other person would have gotten 12. And then the other couple uh they offered $1 and that person accepted. So the idea behind rational choice theory is that if you're a rational person, you will accept whatever is offered to you because it's more money than you came in having. So if they offered you $1, you would say yes cuz it's $1 more and you wouldn't say no. But of course, the vast majority of people did 50/50. In fact, some people actually gave the other person more money. I don't remember what they said. It's in the video, but like you know, they gave them 70 and they took 30 because I guess they wanted to make sure the person said yes. And that's of course exactly what happens. Usually you offer $12 and the person says no, screw you. I don't want it. And so then neither of you get it or you offer $1 and they say, "No, screw you." In other words, the vast majority of people in these experiments prove over and over again that they don't obey the laws of rational choice theory. For the record, people who say it's rational to accept the $1 or to offer the one because that that's the other half of the equation. A rational person would offer $1 because they would assume the other person is rational and accept the $1 and then they're going to get the 99 and hand you the one. I actually think, and this is how I should have wrapped up the talk on Thursday when I was just out of it a little bit because I was sick and I didn't remember to do this, that that's irrational.

[00:53:04]If I offer $1 to the other person, there's a high probability they're gonna say, "No, screw you. Look, I'm I'm gonna burn this to the ground just because you're a dick, and I'm not going to take the dollar, and you're not going to get the 99." In other words, part of being a rational person is anticipating what the other person is ex thinking and experiencing.

[00:53:26]In other words, it's irrational for me to make a proposition to the other person that has a high probability of failing.

[00:53:35]Now, I want to take it one step further.

[00:53:37]I'm a 50/50 person. If I was in that experiment, I would have offered the other person $50. And if I was offered $50, I would have taken it. And by the way, if I was offered $1 or $10 or $12, I would have said, "No, go to hell.

[00:53:51]Neither one of us are going to get it."

[00:53:54]Because first of all, greed is not a virtue. We live in a society that tells us that greed is a virtue. Cockroaches have greed. Every being on the planet can experience greed. So, there was a time where we had leftover bread and I took some of the bread, leftover bread, and I threw it outside and the birds ate it and they were so happy.

[00:54:20]And out of the piece of leftover bread, I used like five maybe 10% of the bread.

[00:54:26]My wife went, "Why don't you use the rest of the bread?" And I'm like, cuz you can't do that with wild animals. You you you can only give them a little bit.

[00:54:35]I'm giving them a little bit for my own personal pleasure. They're capable of foraging on their own. You can't give them the full amount. She's like, "Okay." I said, "I'll give them a little bit again tomorrow." She's like, "Okay."

[00:54:46]So next day, I gave them another five or 10% and I go outside and I break it up and the birds come and they eat the bread and they're so happy and they leave.

[00:54:55]She's like, "Dude, we still have 85% of this bread left." And I'm like, "That's okay. We just need to do this slowly.

[00:55:03]Don't give them all of this bread." So, what does she do? She takes the loaf of bread, goes outside, gives them the whole loaf of bread.

[00:55:11]Walk outside.

[00:55:13]The the step in front of the door is covered in poop. I mean, it is covered in poop. There's a layer of green poop and a pigeon. And that pigeon is on its back twitching.

[00:55:28]And and my wife's like, "What happened?"

[00:55:29]And I said, "This pigeon ate that entire loaf, blew up his stomach.

[00:55:35]All of this poop is from this one pigeon. He just sat there and ate and ate and ate and ate and ate." And she's like, "Why?" And I go, "Cuz greed is a basic animal instinct. In the wild, a loaf of bread doesn't magically appear.

[00:55:52]So animals don't have the ability to recognize I can't eat this entire loaf in one sitting. It will literally kill me by exploding my stomach. She's like, what are we going to do? And I said, well, there's two options. We can let this animal suffer or I can go bury him right now and take put him out of his misery. But he's dead either way cuz his stomach is ruptured because greed got the best of him. Because greed is irrational. It is an irrational instinctive impulse that cockroaches have. If you put a bunch of food in front of a cockroach, it'll literally eat itself to death. It This is This idea that somehow greed is a virtue shows how irrational of a civilization we live in. What I should care about is not whether or not I can screw the guy sitting next to me. What I need to care about is how healthy and how strong is my community. What is my relationship to other people? What is my relationship to complete random strangers?

[00:56:53]Because as a species, we are not only not a solitary animal, we can't survive on our own. Like I know there's that, you know, these shows where like the wild man goes out and he he jumps on the back of a small alligator and stabs it with a knife that he made with a stone and he rips out a chunk and eats it raw and he's like, I can survive on my own.

[00:57:16]Anyway, that's fantasy land, right? He jumped into the river to kill the the alligator from a helicopter and there's a camera crew standing there next to him and if he gets in real trouble they'll take him to a hospital and they'll feed him food and give him fluids like the there's this illusion that we have that somehow we can make it solitary that we are capable we are not capable of this we will literally go extinct in fact we think that the cutoff number for our species having enough DNA to survive is like somewhere between 10 10 to 20,000 people. In other words, literally the smallest community we could ever possibly have that could function needs to be a minimum of 10 to 20,000 people.

[00:57:58]Our species requires interaction with one another to function at any level. There is no human being who can do brain surgery, is a computer scientist, can remember a bunch of history, do a bunch of math, knows biology, can make a rocket fly, can fly a plane, and you know, and all the thousands and thousands of other be a nurse skill set, like it's impossible because at the end of the day, we're ants in an antill. And if the antill is unhealthy, the ants die.

[00:58:29]And and that's the craziness of greed.

[00:58:31]Greed makes you think that somehow God loves you more than he loves the other people on the planet and as a result you you should get the 99 and screw that other person out of the $1. That's just capitalism. That's just the evil nasty system we've unleashed on the planet.

[00:58:47]That has nothing to do with rationality.

[00:58:50]And so what actually has happened is these economists and these political scientists who believe in rational choice theory are actually trying to advocate that capitalism makes sense because they've bought into it ideologically and they haven't thought through the foolishness of it. At the end of the day, if we keep doing this capitalist system, we will consume all the resources. We will superheat the planet. We will fill it with microplastics that'll make us go extinct. We we're are we are Oruro Boros. We are the snake eating his tail.

[00:59:21]And we're not stopping. Like the Joe Biden is the first and only president to do any serious anti Oh, that is so cute.

[00:59:29]>> Hi, Grandpa Roy.

[00:59:30]>> Oh my goodness.

[00:59:31]>> Hi, boy.

[00:59:34]>> Hi. How are you?

[00:59:36]>> That was I feel like I was cute bombed and completely derailed. Yes, I'll I'll cut that part out so my my >> I mean, you probably should just for privacy sake, but honestly, I wish you you didn't have to.

[00:59:50]>> I I know. I know. Uh where were we? You were you were >> I don't I don't actually remember.

[00:59:56]>> Greed. Yeah, greed is insane.

[01:00:00]Anyway, I'm just going to wrap it up because we need to wrap up anyway.

[01:00:04]>> Yeah, I I think Yeah, go ahead. Go ahead. I was going to I know I was at one point saying that I'm a 50/50 guy like I would give the other guy the 50 and it's because when you think about it I I just got uh door opened on me too.

[01:00:18]Um when you think about it this is a complete random stranger.

[01:00:22]This comes right out of Socrates and Plato's the Republic the person who acts like a crook.

[01:00:32]They they ask the question like we need force to make smart people behave well and Socrates go he actually is wise people to behave well. Socrates goes, "What do you mean?" The students are asking this question. I don't remember. Adiamantis, Glalcon, I don't remember which one does it, but one of them says, "If you know, like if you have a situation where you can basically plunder money from another person, you're smart enough to figure that out, you'll do it. So, we need rules to fix that." And what Socrates goes, "No, you've mixed up wisdom with stupidity. A wise person knows not to plunder the other person because if you plunder the other person, you've weakened a member of your community. If you weaken a member of the community, you've weakened the entire community because the community strength is the composite of all the members in the community. And so it is the wise person who knows that they should take care of the members of the community and and and seek them to have them lifted up. I mean, think about it from a capitalist standpoint, from a business standpoint. If I have another business that I interact with, if that other business is doing well, they'll have more product to sell me, I'll have the ability to do more commerce. But if I go in there and I plunder and loot and pillage next year when I go back to do business with them, they're damaged and they'll never be able to provide the same kind of economic exchange that they could have if I had helped them grow.

[01:01:58]And that that's the irrationality of the hypertransactional capitalism that we have today. It's all about maximizing loot looting and plundering and pillaging. Political scientists have been proven over and over again that human beings are rational and that rational choice theory is irrational. So what they've said now is that it's proscriptive. This is how people ought to behave. Like wait a minute. So political science went from descriptive to proscriptive. What are you a religion? What are you, an ideology?

[01:02:27]Basically, it's insane. It's insane. And so, that's one of the reasons why I took a shot at rationality. It also means I'll never be able to teach in another political science department. But honestly, I'm okay with that. I I cannot tell you how many times I would do a political science paper where I talk about like the history of the presidency and then I'd have a political science professor tell me, "This is a history paper, not a political science paper."

[01:02:52]I'm like, "I'm talking about the presidency. What? I'm trying to find a pattern in the presidency. Clearly, this is a political science paper. I'm using history to figure that out. And they're like, "Yeah, but you've got all this philosophy and economics in there." I'm like, "What? You're going to talk about politics without philosophy and economics? You might as well talk about the human body without talking about the body." Like, I don't understand.

[01:03:18]Anyway, so that's that's how I should have wrapped up the last talk. Uh, and didn't >> Well, you were sick. That's amazing that you did the talk.

[01:03:29]>> I had half a brain.

[01:03:30]>> Yeah. You were You were going to do Rome, the Roman Republic, which is, you know, you've got a shield behind you, but you saved that for a time where you were feeling better.

[01:03:40]>> It looks good back there. I I I need I need a shield.

[01:03:43]>> I like I'm not pulling it down here. You know, I am sono italiano, you know what I mean? Like at the end of the day, uh, >> for the record, Roy is part everything.

[01:03:53]I don't know if you've caught that through all of his videos. He he makes a statement.

[01:03:58]>> I I am. That's why I'm an internationalist. I couldn't be otherwise.

[01:04:05]>> Isn't that supposed to be the United States? Aren't we supposed to be the the melting pot, the cosmopolitan society?

[01:04:11]That is >> It's too bad that dream fell apart.

[01:04:16]and you know all the all the huddled masses.

[01:04:19]>> Yeah, I think the French should take back the Statue of Liberty. I feel like it's uh we we need to just pack that thing up and send it back to France.

[01:04:29]>> I feel >> because France definitely is a deeply profoundly flawed place that's doing a better job.

[01:04:35]>> Why do you think so? Like capitalism in and of itself, depending on who you are, it doesn't feel like it is in inherently evil unless you put in the the love of money aspect to it. If you're just like focused on do whatever you can, like the hyper transactionalism to get money, get money now by whatever means possible.

[01:04:55]Cuz I feel like you there can be like a mutually beneficial like, hey, I'll I'll take care of you. You take care of me.

[01:05:01]Let's grow this thing together. Let's take care of our people. Because if everyone's doing well and societyy's doing well, in the end we will all be lifted up, right? Not just give me all your money right now like you know robbing someone. So that is actually how most of the world does operate if the United States is is actually the big exception. So uh I've probably told this story I know I've told this story before. I just don't know if it was an office hour. So some you may some of you may have heard it but it's worth talking about. I'll do a quick story. In 2023, I was in the UAE and I asked a businessman. I said, "What is it like doing business with Americans?" And he said it was a steep learning curve for the Arab world. And the reason is when they first started coming here to do business, they would make all these outrageous demands that meant we were not going to make any profits. We would agree to them because we thought we were building a relationship and we thought they would come back and we would do more business in the future that would be beneficial to us. So, we thought this was sort of like an introductory thing.

[01:06:00]we'd make the deal and we'd never see them again. That was it. It was a oneoff. So, they just paged and ran. He said, "By contrast, when the Japanese come here, we'll negotiate out a deal. It's mutually beneficial for us. It's mutually beneficial for the Japanese. We can't wait to sign. They won't sign until we invite them to our house for a home-cooked meal with our children and our spouses there. if they don't meet our family, they won't sign. And I was like, whoa. And he and he goes, and that's how Arabs are, so we get the Japanese. And he said, quite frankly, the Europeans and the and and the Africans and the South Americans are the same way. They want to have a a mutually beneficial transaction. They want to come back for more business.

[01:06:49]um and and they and they want to build a long-term relationship that they know they can return to over and over and over again. And so that gives me hope like I think there's a chance for the world especially now the United States has become a rogue state and is imploding itself. I think that there is a chance that we can get out of this hyper transactional capitalism and and come up with something a lot more reasonable. Most of the states on the planet right now are are socialist capitalist hybrid states. Uh Canada certainly is. Mexico certainly is, all of Europe is, you know what I mean? Like it's so at the end of the day, that that is the trajectory the planet is on. It's just that the United States owns so much of the economy and threatens and bullies and cajols and coerces everybody and has basically forced its form of, you know, nasty capitalism on the planet and its own people. The United States is plundering and pillaging the US.

[01:07:46]Last thought, since I mentioned the data on the one, top 1% owned 40%. In 1973, the top 1% owned 8%.

[01:07:56]In other words, we went from a shockingly egalitarian society to an incredibly unegalitarian society in in no time. And it was the work of Nixon and Reagan and Bush and Clinton and Bush and uh Trump.

[01:08:12]Right. This we we got here through a process of basically redistributing the wealth from the bottom up. We're the anti- Robin Hood society. This is it's Yeah. It's trickle down economics.

[01:08:24]>> Trickle trickle down economics, which is plunder up.

[01:08:30]>> Oh, well, thank you, Roy. We we covered dinosaurs, big bang, black holes.

[01:08:36]>> Next time, let's do this the formation of the solar system.

[01:08:39]>> The formation of the solar system. I I want to talk about uh What? What is it?

[01:08:43]Cognitive surrender, which is a new it's it's you know that'll be a fun one. So, >> yeah, let's do it.

[01:08:50]>> All right. Thank you. Bye, everyone.

[01:08:52]Well, we'll catch you next time.