Following is a conversation with Jordan Pederson and influential psychologist. Lecturer podcast, host and author of maps of meaning 12 rules for life and Beyond order.
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Peterson.
Does the yeskey wrote in the idiot? Spoken through the character of Prince myshkin? That beauty will save the world. Soldiering isn't actually mentioned this in his Nobel Prize acceptance speech. What do you think this DS game meant by that? Was you
right? Well,
I guess it's the Divine that saves the world. Let's say you could say that by definition and then you might say, well, are there pointers to that which will save the world or that which eternally saves the world and the answer to that in all likelihood? He's yes. And that's maybe Truth and Love And Justice and the classical virtues Beauty, perhaps in some sense foremost among them, it's a difficult case to make but definitely a point
Which direction is the arrow
pointing? Well, the arrows pointing up know. I think that that which it points to is what beauty points, do it, transcends Beauty. It's more than Beauty
and that speaks to the Divine it
points to the Divide. Yeah, and I would say again by definition because we could Define the Divine in some real sense. So one way of defining, the Divine is, what is divine to you is your most fundamental Axiom. And you might say, well, I don't have a fundamental Axiom and I would say that's fine.
Fine. But then you're just confused because you have a bunch of contradictory axioms. And you might say, well, I have no axioms at all and then I'd say, well, you're just epistemological a ignorant Beyond Comprehension. If you think that because that's just not true at all,
did you don't think a human being can exist within
contradictions? Well, yeah, we have to exist within contradiction. But when the contradictions make themselves manifest is a in confusion with regard to Direction, then the consequence of that technically is anxiety.
And frustration, and disappointment, and all sorts of other negative emotions. But the Cardinal negative emotion signifying, multiple Pathways forward is anxiety. It's an entropy signal,
but you don't think that kind of entropy signal can be channeled into into Beauty and to love. Why does Beauty and love have to be clear ordered simple?
Well, I would say it probably
Billy doesn't have to be, it can't be reduced to Clarity and simplicity because when it's optimally structured, it's a balance between Order and Chaos. Not order itself. If it's to ordered, if music is to ordered, it's not it's not acceptable. It sounds like a drum machine. It's too repetitive. It's too predictable. It has to have well it has to have some fire in it. Along with the structure I was in
Me doing a seminar on Exodus with a number of Scholars and this is a beauty discussion when Moses first encounters the burning bush. It's not a conflagration that demands attention. It's something that catches his attention. It's a phenomenon that means to shine forth and Moses has to stop and attend to it. And he does. And he sees this fire that doesn't consume the tree and the tree the tree is
Structure, right? It's a tree-like structure, it's a branching structure. It's a hierarchical structure. It's a self similar structure. It's a fractal structure and it's the tree of life and it's the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil. And the fire in it is the transformation that's always occurring within infrastructure and the fact that the fire doesn't consume the bush in that representation, is a an indication of the balance of transformation with structure. And that balance is presented as
On and what attracts Moses to it in? Some sense is the beauty. Now it's the novelty and all that but like a painting is like a burning bush. That's a good way of thinking about it. A great painting. It's too much for people often. You know, I my house was and will soon be again completely covered with paintings inside and it was hard on people to come in there. Because while my mother for example, say well, why would you want to live in a museum?
And I think well I would rather live in a museum than anywhere else in some real sense, but beauty is daunting. It scares people, they're terrified of buying art for example because their taste is on display and they should be terrified because generally people have terrible taste. Now that doesn't mean they shouldn't Foster and develop it. But and, you know, when you put your taste on display, it's a real really exposes
you even to yourself as you walk past it. Oh, day every day.
Absolutely, I am. Yeah, well in
And look how mundane that is. It look how trite it is, and look at how cliched it is. And look at how sterile or to ordered it is or to
chaotic or how quickly you start to take it for granted because you've seen it so many
times. Well, if it's a real piece of art that doesn't happen,
you notice the little
details, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. I mean there are images religious images in particular, so we could call them deep images that people have been unpacking for 4,000 years.
Years and still have, I'll give you an example. This is a terrible example.
So, I did a lecture series on Genesis and I got a lot of it unpacked, but by no means all of it. When God kicks, Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden. He puts cherubim with flaming swords at the gate to stop human beings from re-entering Paradise.
I thought what the hell does that mean cherubim?
And why do they have flaming sorts? I don't get that. What is that? Exactly. And then I found out for Matthew passion.
Show who wrote a great book on symbolism in Genesis, that cherubim are the supporting Monsters of God. It's very complicated idea and that they're partly a representation of that, which is difficult to fit into conceptual systems. They've also got an in gelik or demonic aspect. Take your pick. Why do they have flaming swords? All the sword is a symbol of judgment and and, and
The separation of the wheat from the chaff, use a sword to cut away to cut away and to carve. And a flaming sword is not only that which carves its that which burns and what is it? Carve away and burn. Well, you want to get into Paradise.
It carves away everything about you. That isn't perfect and so, what does that mean? Okay, well here's part of what it means is a terrible thing. So you could say that the entire Christian narrative is embedded in that image.
Why, well, let's say that flaming swords are a symbol of death. That seems pretty obvious, let's say further that there is symbol of apocalypse and hell that doesn't seem completely unreasonable. So here's an idea.
Not only do you have to face death, you have to face death and Hell before you can get to Paradise, hellish judgment and all that's embedded in that image and a piece of art with an image. Like that has all that information in it and it shines forth in some fundamental sense, it reaches into the back tendrils of your mind at levels. You can't even comprehend and grips. You, I mean, that's why people go to museums and
Gaze at paintings. They don't understand and that's why they'll pay. What's the most expensive objects in the world. If it's not carbon fiber racing Yachts it's definitely classic paintings right? It's high level technological, implements or it's classic art. Well why are those things so expensive? Why do we build temples to house the images even second? Or people go to museums, I'm secular. Well, are you in a museum? Yes. Are you looking at art? Yes. Well, what makes you think?
Your secular. Then
it's arguable that the thing, many, many centuries from now that will remain of all of human civilization will be our art. Well, not, not even the words.
Well, you know, the book has remained a very long time, right? The
biblical rocks that long, you Millennia, all right, but that's in the full Arc of living, organisms are Hap's, will not.
Well, we have images that are we have artistic images that are at least 50,000 years old, right? That have survived.
And some of those are there already profound in their symbolism.
But we still enduring.
Yeah, we found them and and and they've lasted. They've lasted that long and so and then think about Europe, secular people all over the world, make pilgrimages to Europe. Well why? Because of the beauty, obviously, I mean that's self-evident and it's partly because there are things in Europe that are so beautiful.
Take your breath away, right? They make your hair stand on end. They fill you with a sense of awe, and, and we need to see those things. It's not optional. We need to see those things. The cathedral's was in a cathedral in Vienna, and it was terribly beautiful. You know, terribly be well it was terribly beautiful. Its
beauty painful for you, is that the highest form of beauty. It's really challenges you oh,
definitely. Yeah, yeah, good analysis. Of the Statue of David Michael Angelo State says you could be
A far more than you are. That's what that statute says. And this Beedrill no down, we went down into the into the understructure of it and there are three floors of Bones from the plague, and there they all are and then that Cathedrals on top of it. It's no joke to go. Visit a place like that? No, it's it. It rattles you to the core and our, our religious systems have become proposition.
Dubious. But there's no arguing with the architecture although modern Architects like to with their sterility and their giant middle fingers erected everywhere. But beauty is a is a terrible pointer to God. And you know a secular person will say well I don't believe in God. It's like have it your way. You got it. You cannot move forward into the unforeseen Horizon of the future accept on faith and you might say well I have no faith. It's like well
Good luck with the future then because what are you then, nihilistic and hopeless and anxiety-ridden and if not well, something's guiding you forward. Its faith in something or multiple things which just makes you a polytheist. Which I wouldn't
recommend. Well, let me ask you one short-lived biological meat bag to another. Who is God, then
Let's try to sneak up to this question. If it's at all possible. Is it possible to even talk about this?
Well, better be because otherwise, there's no communicating about it. I did. It has to be something that can be brought down to
earth. Well, we might be too dumb to bring it
down, it's not just ignorant. It's also sinful, right? So because there's not knowing and then there's one on wanting to know, or refusing to know. Yeah. And so you might say, well could you
Extract God from a description of the object of world. Right? Is God, just the ultimate unity of of the natural reality and I would say, well in a sense there's some truth in that but but not exactly. Because God in the highest sense is the spirit that you must emulate in order to thrive. How's that? For a biological definition, spirit is a pattern, the spirit that you must emulate in order to
thrive. So it's a kind,
And of in one sense, when we say the human spirit it's
that it's an animating principle. Yeah. It's a matter, it's a pattern and you might say, well what's the pattern? Okay, well I can tell you that to some degree. Imagine that like your grip by Beauty. You're gripped by admiration. So on you can just notice this. This isn't propositional. You have to notice it. It's like a
whole
turns out I admire that person. Hmm.
So, what does that mean? Well, it means I would like to be like him or her. That's what admiration means. It means there's something about the way. They are that compels imitation another instinct or inspires respect or awe, even. Okay. What is that that grips, you? Well, I don't know. Well, let's say, okay, fine. But it grips you and you want to be like that. Kids hero worship, for example, so to adults for that matter. Unless they
Come entirely cynically, I worship quite a quite a few
Heroes. Yeah, well there you go out early. Yes. Well, there you go. And there's no that worship that celebration. And and proclivity to imitate is worship that's what worship means most fundamentally. Now, imagine you took the set of all admirable people and you extract it out, AI learning, you extracted out the central features of what constitutes admirable and then you did that repeatedly until you purified it to. What was most
Admirable.
That's as good as you're going to get in, in terms of a representation of God. And you may say, well I don't believe in thats like well what do you mean? Yeah, it's not a set of propositional facts. It's not a scientific theory about the structure of the objective world and then I could say something about that too, because I've been thinking about this a lot. Especially since talking to Richard Dawkins it's like okay.
The postmodernist types, going back way before dehradun Foucault. Maybe back to Nietzsche who I admire greatly. By the way it says God is dead. It's like okay but Nietzsche said, God is dead and we have killed him and will not find enough water to wash away all the blood. So that was Nietzsche. He's no fool.
He's got a way with words. He
certainly does. And so then you think, okay, well, we killed the transcendent
Well, what does that mean for science? Well, it frees it up because all that nonsense about a deity. Is just the idiot Superstition that stops, the scientific what process for moving forward. That's basically the new atheist claim, something like that. It's like wait a second. Do you believe in the Transcendent if you're a scientist?
And the answer is, well not only do you believe in it, you believe in it more than anything else. Because if you're a scientist, you believe in what objects to your theory more than you believe in your theory, now we got to think that through very carefully. So, your theory describes the world and as far as you're concerned, your description of the world is the world. But because you're a scientist, you think. Well, even though that's my description of the world and that's what I believe.
There's something beyond what I believe.
And that's the object. And so I'm going to throw my theory against the object and see where it'll break. And then I'm going to use the evidence of the break as a source of new information to revitalize my theory. So as a scientist, you have to posit the existence of the ontological Transcendent before you can move forward at all but more.
You have to pause it that contact with the ontological Transcendent annoying, though, it is because it upsets your apple. Cart is exactly what we'll, in fact, set, you free. So then you accept the proposition that there is a Transcendent reality and that the that contact with that Transcendent reality is Redemptive in the most fundamental sense, because if it wasn't well, why would you bother making contact with? You're going to make everything worse or better?
Why does the contact with the Transcendent Set? You Free as a
scientist because you assume that you assume. I mean, freedom in the most fundamental sense it's like well Freedom from Want freedom from disease, freedom from ignorance, right? That it informs you. So the lowest enough science it is definitely that
Yeah, it's it's the it's the direction. Let's say the directionality of science, that's a narrative Direction, not a scientific Direction. And then the question is, what is the narrative? Well it pause. It's a Transcendent reality. It posits that the Transcendent reality is corrective it posits that our knowledge structures should be regarded with. Humility it posits that you should bow down in the face of of the Transcendent evidence and you have to take a vow you know this as a scientist you have to take a vow to follow that path if you're going to be
All scientists. It's like the truth, no matter what. And that means you pause it, the truth as a Redemptive Force. Well what is Redemptive mean? Well, why bother with science? Well, so people don't starve so people can move about more effectively so life can be more abundant, right? So it's all ensconced within an underlying ethic. So the reason I was saying that what we were talking about belief in God, it's like this is a very complicated topic, right? Do you believe in a Transcendent reality? So you, okay? Now, let's say,
You buy the argument. I just made on the natural front. You say yeah that's just nature. That's not God.
And then I'd say, well what makes you think? You know what nature is?
Like, see the problem with that argument is that it, it already presumes a materialist, a reductionist, materialist objective view of what constitutes nature. But if you're a scientist, you're going to think. Well, in the final analysis, I don't know what nature is. I certainly don't know, its origin or destination point, I don't know. It's teleology, I'm really ignorant about nature and so when I say it's nothing but nature, I shouldn't mean it's nothing. But what I understand nature to
So I could say, will we have a fully reductionist account of cognitive processes? An answer that is yes. But by the time we do that, our understanding of matter will have transformed so much that what we think of as reduction is now won't look anything like what we think of reductionism now matter isn't dead dust. I don't know what it is. I have no idea what it is. Matter is what matters? There's a definition. That's a very weird definition.
But the notion that we have, you know, that if you're a reductionist a materialist reduction is that you can reduce the complexity of what is to your assumptions about the nature of matter. That's not a scientific, your
specific limited human assumptions of this Century of this week that so in some sense without God in this complicated big definition we're talking about the there's no
Humility or it's just not enough, there's less likely to be or rather science, can are in taking a trajectory away from humility. Well, without something much more powerful than individual
human. Yeah. Well then and we know, you know, the Frankenstein story comes out of that instantly and that's a good story for the current times. It's like you you're playing around with making new life.
You bloody well better. Make sure you have your arrows pointed
up and it's interesting because you said science, has an ethic to it. I think it's embedded in an ethic. Well, there's a you know, science is a big word. Yeah. And includes a lot of disciplines that have different Traditions, so biology chemistry genetics physics. Those are very different communities and I think biology
Sure, when you get closer and closer to Medicine into the human body does have a very serious. First of all, has a history with Nazi, Germany of being abused and all those kinds of things. But as a history of taking this stuff, seriously, what doesn't have a history of taking this stuff? Seriously is Robotics and artificial intelligence, which is really interesting because you don't, you know, you called me a scientist. But, and I would like to wear that label proudly but often people don't think of computer science as a science.
But nevertheless, it will be, I think the science of one of the major scientific fields of the 21st century and you should take that very seriously. Oftentimes, when people build robots or AI systems, they think of them as toys to Tinker with. Oh, isn't this cool? Well, yeah, I feel this to. Isn't this cool is cool but you know, at a certain moment you might is in this nuclear.
Asian cool. Yes, it is. Or
birth control pill. Cool. It's like or transistor. Cool. Yeah. Well, the other thing too, and this is a weird problem, in some sense, the robotics engineer types, their thing people, right? I mean, the big classes of Interest are interesting, things versus interest in people,
some of my best friends are thing
people. Yeah, right. And I think people are very, very clear, logical thinkers, and they're very out.
Outcome oriented and practical now. And that's all good. That makes the machinery and keeps it functioning but there's a human side of the equation and and you get the extreme thing people and you think yeah. Well what about the human here? And when we're talking about, we've been talking about the necessity of having a technological, Enterprise embedded in an ethic and you can ignore that like most of the time, right? You can ignore the overall ethic.
In some sense when you're toying around with your toys. But when you're building artificial intelligence, it's like well,
That's not a toy.
That might be
toy. Becomes the monster very
cool. Yeah. Yes, yes. And and this is a whole new kind of monster and maybe it's already here.
Yes, and you notice how many of those things you can no longer turn off?
And what is it with you engineers and your inability to put off switches on things now?
It's like, I have to hold this for five seconds for it to shut off or I can't figure. I just want to shut it off, click
off, or what is it with you humans that don't put off switches and other humans? Because there's a magic to the thing that you notice and it hurts for both you and perhaps one day the thing itself to turn it off. And so you have to be very careful as an engineer adding off. Switches two things, I think it's a feature. Not a bug, the off switch.
The office, which gives a deadline to us humans to systems of existence. It makes you, you know, death is the thing that really brings Clarity to life. And I do
things, hence the flaming swords,
the Flaming sword, I do like your view of the flame of the Bush and perhaps the sword as a thing of transformation. It's also it's a transformation that kind of consumes the thing in the process.
Well, it depends on how much of the thing is chaff.
You know, this is why you can't touch the Ark of the Covenant, for example, and this is why people can have very bad psychedelic trips. It's like if your 95% did wood and you get too close to the flame, the 5% that's left, might not be able to make it.
See you think it's all chat? But I think there is some aspects of Destruction that is that's, you know, the, they'll be Kowski line of do what you love and let it kill you, right? Don't you think it is that destruction is part of, that's humility, that's humility.
That's you, bet. You bet you bet it's like inviting the Judgment if I didn't judgment because maybe you can die a little bit instead of dying completely knowing that I think it's Alfred North Whitehead. We can let our ideas die instead of
Right. We can have these partial personalities that we can burn off and we can let them go before they become tyrannical. Pharaohs and everything, and we lose everything. And so, yeah, there's this optimal bite of death and who knows what it would mean to optimize that? Like what if it was possible that if you died enough all the time that you could continue to live? And the thing is, we already know that biologically because if you don't die properly all the time,
Time. Well, it's cancerous outgrowths and and it's a very fine balance between
Productivity on the biological front and the culling of that, right? Life is a real balance between growth and death. And so what would happen if you got that balance? Right well we kind of know right? Because if you live your life properly so to speak and your humble enough to let your stupidity die before it takes you out you will live longer that's just a fact. Well but then what's the ultimate extension of that and the answer is we don't know.
We have no idea.
Well, let me ask you a difficult question
because as opposed to the easy ones that you've been asking so
far, well, Dusty house keys. Always just the warmup. So if death if death, every single day, is the way to progress through life, you have become quite famous. Yes. And he'll death and
hell. Yeah. Because you don't want to forget the hell part.
Do you worry that your Fame traps? You.
Into the person that you were before? Yeah. Well they all the
next came an Elvis impersonator by the time he
died. Yeah. Do you fear that? You have become a Jordan Peterson impersonator that you fear of in some part becoming the famous suit-wearing, brilliant, Jordan, Peter, this the certainty in the pursuit of truth, always right?
I think, I worry about it more than anything else. I hope, I hope I
I better
has Fame to some degree. When you look at yourself in the mirror in the quiet of your mind, has it corrupted
you no doubt in some regard. I mean it's very difficult thing to avoid you know because
Things change around you. People are much more likely to do what you ask, for example, right. And so that's a danger because one of the things that keeps you dying properly, is that people push back against you optimally? This is why so many celebrities spiral out of control, especially the tyrannical types. That say, run countries, everyone around them stop saying. Yeah, you're, you're, you're deviating a little bit there. They laugh at all their jokes. They open all their doors. They they always want something from them.
Red carpets always ruled out. It's like, well, you think would not be lovely? It's well, not if the red carpet is rolled out to you. While you're on your way, to Perdition that's not a good deal, you just get their more efficiently. And so one of the things that I've tried to learn to manage is to have people around me all the time who are critics and we're saying, yeah, I could have done that better and your little too harsh there and you're alienating people unnecessarily.
Lie there and you should have done some more background work there and and I think the responsibility attendant upon that increases as your influence increases. And that's, that's a as your influence increases then, that becomes a lot of responsibility.
So you know, and then maybe have an off day. And well, one here's an example, I've been writing some columns lately about things that perturb me like the forthcoming famine, for example, and it's hard to take those problems on. It's difficult to take those problems on in a serious Manner and it's frightening and it would be easier just to go up to the cottage with my wife and go out on the lake and watch the sunset and
All I'm tempted to draw on anger as a motivating energy, to help me overcome the resistance to doing this, but then that makes me more harsh and judgmental in my tone, when I'm reading such things for example, on YouTube, then might be optimal. Now, I've had debates about with people about that because I have friends who say, no, if you're calling out the environmental environmentalist, globalists who are harassing
Passing the Dutch Farmers, then a little anger is just the ticket, but then others say, well, you know, you don't want to be too harsh because you alienate people who would otherwise listen to you. It's like that's a hard balance to get,
right? But also maybe anger hardens your mind to where you don't. Notice the, the subtle quiet beauty of the world, the quiet love, that's always there. The permeates everything. Sometimes you can become deeply cynical about the world, if it's the Nietzsche thing,
Yeah, battle not with monsters lest, ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.
But I would say,
Bring it on
right? Because well, why also
say knowing that he's absolutely right. But if you gaze into the abyss long enough, you see the light, not the darkness.
You sure about
that. I'm betting my life on
it. That's a heck of a bet. Well that's because it might distort your mind to where all you see is it Miss? Its Abyss is the evil in
this world is that I would say you haven't looked
Enough. You know that's back to the you just a limited sword. That's the flaming swords. It's like so I said the whole story of Christ was prefigured in that image. So like the story of Christ psychologically is radical acceptance of the worst possible tragedy. That's what it means. That's what the crucifix means psychologically. It's like gaze upon that which you are most afraid of, but that story doesn't end there because in the in the story Christ goes through death into hell.
L so death isn't enough. The abyss, the abyss of innocent death is not sufficient to produce Redemption. It has to be a voluntary journey to hell and maybe that's true for everyone.
And that's like there is no more terrifying idea than that by definition. And so then while do you gaze upon that?
Well, who knows? Who
knows, how often do you gaze upon death? Your own. How often do you remember remind yourself that this ride ends perfect. Personally, personally
all the time
because you as a deep thinker and philosopher, it's easy to start philosophizing and forgetting the your you might die to
the angel of death. Sits on every word.
Was that
how often do you actually consciously all the time? Notice the angel all the
time.
I think it's one of the things that made me peculiar when I was in graduate school. You know, I thought about I was I had the thought of death in my mind all the time and I noticed that many of the people that I was with these, are people, I admired fine. They that wasn't part of their character but it was definitely part of mine. I'd wake up every morning this happened for years. Think time short, get out it time, short, get at it. There's things to do.
And so that was always it's still there and it's still there with. I would say and unbearable in some sense.
Are you afraid of it? Like what creatively? I don't you.
Yeah you know I was ready to die a year ago.
And not casually. I had people, I loved, you know.
So no I'm not very worried about me but I'm very worried about making a mistake. Yeah. Her Elon Musk talk about that. A couple of months ago is really a striking moment. Someone asked him about death and he said, just offhand a and then went on with the conversation, he said I'd be a relief and then he went on with the conversation,
And I thought, well, you know, he's got a lot of weight on his shoulders. I'm sure that part of them. Thanks, I'd be easier. Just if this wasn't here at all now he said it offhand but it was a telling moment in my
estimation. So for him that's a Why Live question. The exhaustion of Life. Yeah, you call it life is suffering. But yeah, the hardship,
I'm more afraid of held in
death.
You're afraid of the thing that
follows.
I don't know if it follows or if it's always here.
I think we're going to find
out.
What's the connection between death and hell?
I don't know. I don't know. I don't
know. Is there something they needs to be done before you
arrived? You're more likely to die terribly. If you live in a manner that brings you to hell, that's one connection
and terribly is as a very deep kind of concept. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.
And that's the definition, by
the way.
What do you make of Elon Musk? You have spoken about him a bit, you
might have struck with admiration.
That's what I make. Now when I was, I think this idea is a primary. Well, it's all it's like, do you find this comedian funny? It's like, well, I laugh at him. You know what I mean? It's not propositional again. And so I would there are things I would like to ask mr. Musk about the Mars Venture. I don't know what he's up to there. It strikes me as observed in the most fundamental sense because I think well, it'd be easier just to build an outpost in the Antarctica or in the desert.
How much of the human endeavor is absurd?
Well, that's what it needs. You say, great men are seldom credited with their stupidity. Who the hell knows what musk is up to? I mean, obviously, he's building Rockets now. He's motivated because he wants to build a platform for Life on Mars. Is that a good idea?
Who am I to say? Did he's building the Rockets, man, but I'd like to ask him about
it. I would like to see that conversation. I do think that having talked to him quite a bit off line. I think these
Several of his ideas like Mars. Like he was becoming a multiplanetary species. Could be one of the things that human civilization looks back at, as duh, I can't believe, he is one of the few people that was really pushing this idea, because it's the obvious thing for society to full life to
survive. Yeah. Well, it isn't obvious to me that I'm in any position to evaluate Elon Musk. Like I would like to talk to him and find out what he's up to and why. But
I mean he's an impossible person. What he's done is impossible, all of it. It's like he built an electric car. That works. Now. Does it work completely and will it? Replace gas cars or should it be? I don't know. But if we're going to build electric cars, He seems to be the best at that by a lot and he more or less. Did that people carp about him but he more or less. Did that by himself? I know he's very good at Distributing responsibility and all of that, but he's the spearhead and then that was pretty hard and then he built a
Rocket.
At like 1/10 the price of Nasser rockets and then he shot his car out into space. That's pretty hard and then he's building this boring company more or less. As ow. What would you call it? It's sort of its this Whimsical joke in some sense but it's not a joke. He's
amazing and your link delving into the depths of the
mine. Starlink, it's like go along as far as I'm concerned and then, you know, he puts his finger on
Things. So, oddly the pop. The problem is is under population. It's like I think so too. I think it's a terrible problem that we're the West for example is no longer at replacement with regard to birth rate. It means we've abandoned the Virgin and the child in a most fundamental sense. It's a bloody catastrophe and muskies he sees it. Clear as can be it's like well, and where everyone else is running around going. Oh, there's too many people. It's like, nope, got that.
Not only see I've learned that there are falsehoods and lies and there are anti truths and an anti truth is something that so Preposterous that you couldn't you couldn't make a claim that's more opposite to the truth. And the claim that there are too many people on the planet is an anti truth.
So you know, when people say well you have to accept limits to growth and it said it's like, I have to accept the limits that you're going to impose on me because you're frightened of the future. That's your theory. Is it, okay?
Well, it's an idea it could be a right idea, it could be a wrong idea. I don't think any truth
I hear I'll tell you what's wrong idea. I think
So imagine that there's an emergency Dragon, there's a dragon, someone comes and says there's a dragon. I'm the guy to deal with it. That's what the environmentalists say, the radical types, who push limits to growth, then I look at them and I think, okay,
Is that dragon real or not? That's one question.
Well, I asked this question on myself. Every time you spend time alone,
is the apocalypse looming on the environmental front. Yes, or no, I'll just leave that aside for the time being I think you can make case both ways for a bunch of different reasons and it's not a trivial concern and we've overfished the oceans terribly, and there are environmental issues that are looming large.
Whether climate change is the Cardinal one or not, is a whole different question, but we won't get into that. That's not the issue. You're clamoring about a dragon. Okay, why should I listen to you? Well, let's see, how you're reacting to the dragon. First of all, you're scared stiff and in a state of panic.
That might indicate you're not the man for the job. Second, you're willing to use compulsion to harness other people to fight the dragon for you. So now not only are you terrified, you're a terrified Tyrant. So then I would say well then you're not the Moses that we need to lead us out of this particular Exodus and maybe that's a neurological explanation. It's like if you're so afraid of what you're facing that you're terrified into paralysis and nihilism and that
Willing to use tyrannical. Compulsion to get your way. You are not the right leader for the time. So then I like someone like Bjorn lomborg or Matt Ridley or marry into p and they say, well, look, we've got our environmental problems and maybe there's a there. You could make a case that there's a malthusian element in some situations. But fundamentally the track record of the human race is that we learn very fast and faster all the time.
To do more with less and we've got this. And I think yes to that idea. And I think about it in a, in a fundamental way. It's like I trust lumbergh trust to P. Trust Matt Ridley. They thought about these things. Deeply, they're not just saying oh the environment doesn't matter. Whatever the environment is you know the environment. I don't even know what that is. That's
The environment. I'm concerned about the environments, like
Which is, how is that different than saying? I'm worried about everything. How are those statements different semantically?
Well yeah, the environment, it could be, I'm worried about human society. A lot of these complex systems are difficult to talk about, because there's so much involved for
sure. Yeah, everything. And then these models because people have gone after me because I don't buy the climate models. Well, I think about the climate models, as extended into the economic models, because the climate model is
Well there's going to be a certain degree of heating lets Say by 2100. It's like okay, some of that might be human generated some of its a consequence of warming after the Ice Age this has happened before. But fair enough let's take your presumption. Although there are multiple presumptions and any error in your model multiplies As Time extent but to have it your way. Okay, now we're going to extend the climate model so to speak into the economic model. So I just did an analysis of a paper by
Voight.
Third, biggest company in the US.
300,000 employees Major League Consultants. They just produced a report. May I wrote an article for it in the telegraph which I'm going to release this week on my YouTube channel said, well if we get the climate problem under control economically because that's where the models are now being generated on the economic front. So now we have to model the environment that's climate and we have to model the economy and then we have to model their joint interaction. And then we have to predict 100 years into the future.
Sure. And then we have to put a dollar value on that and then we have to claim that we can do that which we can't. And then this is our conclusion.
We're going to go through a difficult period of privation because if we don't accept limits to growth, there's going to be a catastrophe, 50 years in the future or thereabouts. And so to avert that catastrophe, we are going to make people poorer now. How much poor? Well, not a lot compared to how much richer they're going to be, but definitely, and they say this in their own models. Definitely poor definitely poorer than they would be. If we just left them the hell alone.
So then I think, okay.
Poor a who? Well let's look at it. Biologically got a hierarchy, right? Of stability and security. That's a hierarchy or one type.
Eustress a hierarchy like that a social hierarchy so there's birds in a environment and an avian flu comes in and then you look at the birds in the social hierarchy and the the low-ranking birds have the worst nests. So the most exposed to wind and rain, and sun, and farthest from Food Supplies, and most exposed to predators. And so those birds are stressed, which is what happens to you at the bottom of a hierarchy or more stressed because your life is more uncertain. You're more stressed, your immunological function is compromised because of that.
You're sacrificing the future for the present.
An avian flu comes in and the birds died from the bottom up. That happens in every epidemic you die from the bottom up, okay? So they say when the aristocracy catches a cold the working-class dies of pneumonia. Alright. So now we're going to make people poorer
Okay, who well? We know, who we make poor, when we make people poorer, we make those who are barely hanging on poorer. And what does that mean? It means they died. And so what the Deloitte Consultants are basically saying is Well, you know, it's kind of unfortunate, but according to our models, a lot of poor people are going to have to die.
So that a lot more poor people don't die in the future. It's like, okay, hold on a sec, which of those two things in my supposed to regard with certainty. The hypothetical poor people that you're going to hypothetically save a hundred years from now or the actual poor people that you are actually going to kill in the next 10 years. Well I'm going to cast my lot with actual poor people that you're actually going to kill. And so and then I think further it's like well okay the
Deloitte Consultants. Have you actually modeled the world or is this a big advertising stick designed to attract your corporate clients with demonstration that you're so intelligent. That you can actually model the entire ecosystem of the world including the economic system and predicted 100 years forward. And isn't there a bit of a moral hazard and making a claim like that? Just like just a trifle especially when. So I talked to Bjorn lomborg and Michael Ian. Last week, I accepted the UN.
Estimates of starvation, this coming year, 150 million people will suffer food, insecurity food, insecurity, yeah food insecurity. That's the bloody buzzword famine. Well, Michael Ian thought 1.2 billion and then that it will spiral because he said, what happens in the famine is that the government's go nuts, crazy, the government's destabilize
And then they appropriate the food from the farmers. Then the farmers don't have any money, then they can't grow crops and I think, yeah, that's exactly what they do. That's exactly what would happen. And so Ian told me 1.2 billion and then Bjorn lomborg said the same thing. I didn't even ask him, he just made it as an offhand comment.
So,
let me ask you about the Famine of the 30s. Yeah. Do you think Ukraine in the Ukraine? Oh,
yeah. Fun fun.
Fun, similar the area. A lot of the things you mentioned in the last few sentences kind of echo through that. Part of human history, the hold the
door. Do you know what knows about?
Well now I've just spent four weeks in Ukraine. There's different parts of the world that still even if they
No they know. Yeah right if you history is runs in the
blood, got new, in some sense, they had a famine at the end of World War Two and part of the reason, the Dutch farmers are so unbelievably efficient and productive, is that the Dutch swore at the end of World War Two, that that was not going to happen again. And then they had to scrape land out of the ocean, because Hall, and that's quite a country, it shouldn't even exist in fact that it's the world's number to export, you know, that it's the world's
Number two exporter of agricultural products Holland. It's like I don't think it's as big as Massachusetts says, little tiny Place shouldn't even exist and they want to put, here's the here's the plan. Let's put 30 percent of the farmers out of business. While the broader ecosystem of agricultural production in Holland is 6 percent of their GDP. Now, these centralizing politicians think tell me if I'm stupid about this
Take an industry.
You knock it back by Fiat by 30%. Now it runs on like a three percent profit margin. Now, you're going to kill 30% of it. How are you not going to bring the whole thing down the whole farming ecosystem? Down, how are you not going to impoverish the Transport Systems? How are you not going to demolish the grocery stores? You can't take something like that and pair it back by Fiat by 30% and not.
It, I can't see how you can do that. I mean, look, what we did with the covid, lockdowns, we broke the supply chains, tried buying something lately,
UK and wait and aren't the Chinese threatening Taiwan at the moment. What are we going to do without chips?
So I don't know what these people are thinking and then I think, okay, what are they thinking? Well, the Deloitte people are thinking, aren't we smart? And shouldn't we be hired by our corporate employers? It's like, okay, too bad about the poor. What are the environmentalist thinking? We love the planet? It's like, do you? We love the poor, do you? Okay. Let's pick the planet against the poor who wins the planet, okay? You don't love the poor that much. Do you love the planet?
Or do you hate capitalism? Let's put those two things against each other. Oh, well, it turns out we actually hate capitalism. How can we tell? Because you're willing to break it and you know what's going to happen? So what's going to happen in Sri Lanka with these 20 million people who now have nothing to eat? Are they going to eat all the animals? Are they going to burn? All the firewood? They're stockpiling firewood in Germany.
It's like so is your environmental globalist Utopia going to kill the poor and destroy the planet? And that's okay because will wipe out capitalism. It's like
okay, yeah, the the dragon and the fear of the Dragon drives ideologies, some of which Can Build a Better World, some of which can destroy that world.
Now, what do you think about theory about about trustworthiness? If the dragon that you're facing turns you into a terrified Tyrant? You're not the man for the job. Is that a good theory?
It's an interesting Theory. Let me use that theory to challenge because what is Terror? Look like, let me table the turns turn the tables on you. You are
terrified afraid concerned about the dragon of something we can call communism. Marxism.
Why terrified of it?
Well okay.
Okay. Tyrant. Your theories had two components. Yeah. Well
I'm not paralyzed racket at a
dragon. Yeah I'm not paralyzed and I don't want to be a tyrant the Tyrant
part I think is missing with you. So you are very concerned the intensity of your feeling
Does not give much space actually at least in your public persona for sitting quietly with the dragon and sipping, in a couple of beers. And thinking about this thing, the intensity of your anger concern about certain things you're seeing in society, is that going to drive you off the path that you ultimately takes us to a better
world? That's a good question. I mean, I don't I'm trying to get that right.
It. So we've kind of come to a cultural conclusion about the Nazis.
You get to be angry about the Nazis. Seems the answer to. That is
yes.
Well, actually, let me push back here. I also don't trust people who are angry about the Nazis
because I mean they actual
Nazis. Well, there's a lot as, you know, there's a lot of people in the world that use actual Nazis team, you know, I know, I know one of them is very important to
me, for example, will you? Yes, he did not say, I think our magical super not see as it turns
out.
In to actually sort of Steel men, all their perspectives that I think a lot of people that call you not see mean it. So yeah, I think so but like that there's an important thing there that because I want to the front and Ukraine. Yeah and a lot of the people
That lost their home or their kind of that got to interact a lot with Russian soldiers, Ukrainian people to interact with the Russian soldiers. They reported that the Russian soldiers really believe, they're saving the the people of Ukraine in these local Villages from the Nazis. So to them, it's not just that the Ukrainian government has or Ukraine has some knowledge.
Says it's like it has been the ideas that the Nazis have taken over Ukraine and we need to free them. This is the belief. So this again, Nazis still a dragon that lives. Yeah, and it's used by people because it's safe to sit next to that dragon and spread any kind of ideology you want. So I just want to kind of say that we have agreed on the in this particular Dragon, but I still do.
Not trust. Anybody who
uses that, but we have issues with boundaries, right? No, no, it's so this is a very complicated problem, right? So Rene Girard believe that it was a human proclivity to demonize the scapegoat and then drive it out of the village. And yeah, I've thought about that a lot. We need a place to put Satan seriously. This is a serious
issue. Should be inside the Villager
outside. Well, maybe he should be inside you.
Right? That's, that's the fundamental essence of the Christian doctrine. It's like Satan is best fought on the battleground of your soul.
And that's, that's right.
It's right. He actually put words to the kind of dragged into your fighting. Is it, is it? Is it
communism? It's the spirit of Cain
can you elaborate well, what, the spirit of gain is.
So after Adam and Eve, are thrown out of paradise for becoming self-conscious or when they become self-conscious, they're destined to work. And the reason for that, as far as I can tell, is that
To become self-conscious is to become aware of the future as to become aware of death. That certainly happens in the Adam and Eve story to have the scales fall from your eyes and then the consequence of that is that you now have to labor to prevent the catastrophes of the future that's work, work is sacrifice sacrifice of the present to the Future. It's delay of gratification its maturity
It's sacrificed to something as well and in the spirit of something. Okay, so now Adam and Eve have two children, Cain, and Abel. So, those are the first two people in history because the Garden of Eden doesn't count and they're the first to people who are born rather than create it. So they're the first two people and that's a hell of a story because it's a story of fratricidal murder that degenerates into genocide flood and tyranny. So that's
For the opening
Salvo of the story let's say in Abel and Cain both make sacrifices and for some reason able sacrifices, please God, it's not exactly clear. Why? And Kane's don't. Now there is an implication in the text that it's because Kane sacrifices are true or second-rate. God says that Abel brings the finest to the sacrificial altar. He doesn't say that about Cain, so you could imagine
Imagine that Kane is sacrificing away but he's, he's holding something in reserve, he's not all hint. He's not bringing his best to the table. He's not offering his best to God. And so able thrives, like Matt and everyone loves them and he gets exactly what he needs and wants exactly when he needs and wants it. He's favored of God and Cain is bearing this terrible burden forward and working. And his sacrifices are rejected. So,
He gets resentful, really resentful enough, resentful enough to call God out and say something like this is quite the creation. You've got going here, I'm breaking myself in half and nothing Goods. Coming my way. What the hell's up with that and then there's able to sun shining on him every day. How dare you? Okay. But this is God that Cain's talking to you and so God.
Says what Kane least wants to hear, which is what God usually says, to people, he says, look to your own devices, you're not making the sacrifices, you should and, you know it and then he says something even worse. He says sin crouches at your door, like a sexually aroused, predatory animal and you've invited it in.
To have your way to have its way with you. And so he basically says you have allowed, your resentment to preoccupy yourself and now you're brooding upon it and generating something creative new and awful possessed by the spirit of resentment.
And that's why you're in the miserable State. You're in. So then, Cain leaves his countenance Falls as you might expect and Kane leaves. And he's so incensed by this because God has said, look, your problems of our of your own making and not only that you invited them in. And not only that you engaged in this creatively, and not only that, you're blaming it on me. And not only that, that's making you jealous of able, who's your actual Idol and goal and Kane instead of changing.
Kills Abel.
Right, and then Cain's descendants are the first people who make weapons of war.
And so that's okay. You want to know what? I think that's the Eternal story of mankind and it's playing out right now except at a thousand times the rate.
Can I present to you a difficult truth? But not it, perhaps not a truth but I thought I have that it is not always easy to know which Among Us are the cane that's for sure. And
And it is, it is possible to imagine you as the person who has the resentment towards a particular worldview that you really worried
about. Yeah, well, I've talked, I talked to a good friend of mine last week about that publicly will release it. So I said, well, do I have a particular animus against the left? Let's say it's like, well, probably okay, why? Well,
first of all, I'm a university Professor. It's not like the universities are threatened by the right. They're threatened by the left 100% And they're not just threatened a little bit. There are threatened a lot and that threat made it impossible for me to continue in my profession. The way I was and it cost me my clinical practice to. And that's not over yet because I have 10 lawsuits against me, alright? Now, from the College of psychologists because they have allowed anyone to complain about me,
Anywhere in the world for any reason and have the choice to follow that up with an investigation which is a punishment in and of itself and are doing so. And then I've been tortured nearly to death multiple times by Bad actors on the left. Now, I've had my fair share of radical right-wingers being unhappy with what I've said, but personally that's being the laughed, the whole time, not only me but my family, put it my
I put my family at risk in a big way and constantly like not once or twice because many people get cancelled once or twice. But I've been canceled like 40 times and I know like 200 people now who have been counseled, and I can tell you, without a doubt that it is, one of the worst experiences of their life and that's if it only happens once and so. And then, I also know that the Communists killed
Hundred million people in the 20th century that the intellectuals, excused them for it Non-Stop and still haven't quit that almost no one knows about it. And that the Specter of resentful Marxism is back in full force and so, do I have a bit of an animus against that? Yes. Does it go too far?
I don't know. I'm trying to figure that
out the story. You just told it is, seems nearly impossible for you. An intellectual Powerhouse, not to have a tremendous amount of resentment. Well, and this is the, let me challenge you. Yeah, you challenged, go right ahead and challenge. You Can you steal man, the case that the prime minister of this country Trudeau
Wants the best for this country in actually might do good things for this country as an intellectual
challenge. Sure, he seems to get along. Well, with his wife, he has some kids, there's no sexual scandals and he's in a position where that could easily be the case. He seems to have done some good things on the oceanic management front. He's put a fair bit of Canada's oceans into Marine protected areas, and that might be his most fundamental Legacy. If it's real
I've been trying to get information about the actual reality of the protection and I haven't been able to do that, but that's a good
thing Society. The family thing is, there's some aspects character character, there is some aspect to him, who's that? Makes him a good man? Well, and that's I
mean there's the evidence there, you know, I mean he's not a Jeffrey Epstein profligate on the sexual front. So, that's something and his wife, they seem to have a real marriage and he has kids, so, you know, good for him,
that's a good start by the
A way for
leader. Yeah, right to be a great man. Well then I also thought, okay, well after the Liberals had brought in a Harvard intellectual, who is a Canadian to be their last leader, he didn't work out and then they're flailing about for a leader, and the Liberals encountered are pretty good at maintaining.
Power and Leadership and have been the dominant governing party in Canada for a long time and so they went to Justin and said well you know it's you are a conservative and you can imagine that's not a positive.
Spectre for someone who's on the left, or even a liberal special. Intruder was quite a bit on the left and they said we need you to run and then I thought, okay, well the answer to that should have been no because the Trudeau Justin has no training for this. No experience. He's not, he's a part-time Drama. Teacher fundamentally, he hadn't run a business. He just didn't know enough to be prime minister, but then I'm trying to put myself in his position and so it's like, okay, I don't know.
But I'm young and we don't want the conservatives and they had to run a 10-year run. So maybe it was time for a new government. I could maybe I could grow into this man, maybe I could surround myself with good people and I could learn humbly and I could become
The person, I'm now pretending to be, which we all have to do as we move forward, right? And so, and so, then I thought, okay, I think you made a mistake there because you ran only on your father's name and he didn't have the background, but let's give the devil his due and say, that's no problem. Okay, so now what do you do? Well, you get elected and your First Act is to make the cabinet, 50% women, despite the fact that only 25% of the elected members,
Is are female. It's like okay, you just have your talent pool.
That was a really bad move for your first
week. Ask about that. Do you think? Where does that move come from Deep somewhere in the heart or else? It's is a trying to listen to the social forces that of the moment and try to ride those ways towards maybe greater greater
popularity bite after thinking it through. It's like, no, you just have your talent pool.
Four cabinet positions. That's what you did. There's enough cabinet positions.
You know, you could argue that each of the Met threshold. It's like there is a big difference between threshold and
excellent. So you don't think that that came from a place of compassion? Don't care of a
good comeback. I don't regard the passion as a virtue. The passion is a reflex. Not a virtue to eat on think judicious. Compassion is a virtue.
Wait a minute, wait a minute compassion. Can come deep from the human heart and the human mind. I think we talking about the same kind of compassion. Yes. Trying to understand the
stuff for treating adults, like, infants is not.
Virtuous. I simply your what compassion isn't treating adults like and I mean, it
does just cherries. Are you
sure? Okay, whatever the term is maybe you do of Love is passion is and yeah I suppose I'm speaking to love you don't think those ideas came from God's earned
passion.
You don't think this land of compassion encouragement and Truth loves complicated man.
Yes, I love you things. And if I love
you, is it Compassion or encouragement, you want
from me?
Yeah, the dance. Well, it was definitely a dance of to to humans. Ultimately that leads to the growth of both.
Well, that's the thing, the growth element is crucial because the growth element to Foster the growth element that requires judgment compassion and judgment. Well even and have been conceptualized this way forever. Two hands of God, mercy and Justice. They have to operate in tandem, right? And mercy is
Flawed, as you are your acceptable.
It's like well, do you want that? Do you want your flaws to be acceptable? And that's that is no. It's so it's like, well, that's where the Judgment comes in, it's like, but you could be better, you could be more than you are. And that's the maternal and paternal in some fundamental sense and their house to be active.
Exchange of information between those two poles. So even if even if Trudeau was motivated by compassion and it's like yeah, just how loving are you first of all know? It was a really bad decision and then he and he's expressed contempt for monetary policy. I'm not interested in monetary policy. It's okay. But your prime minister and he's expressed admiration for the Chinese Communist party because they can be very efficient in their pursuit of
Our mental goals, it's like, oh yeah, efficiency a the efficiency of the tyranny in the service of your Terror and so and I've watched him repeatedly and I've listened to him a lot. And I've tried to do that clinically and with some degree of dispassion. And that's hard too because his father Pierre devastated, the West in 1982 with the national energy policy and Trudeau is doing exactly
Oddly the same thing again. And so as a Westerner as well, I have an inbuilt animus. And one that's well deserved because central Canada, especially the glittery Literati. Elite types in the Ottawa, Montreal Toronto, triangle have
Exploited the west and expressed contempt for the West far too much for far too long and that's accelerating at the moment. For example, with Trudeau's recent attack on the Canadian Farmers, he's an enemy of the oil and gas industry. Utter an absolute bloody catastrophe and look what's happened in Europe at least in partial consequence, and he's no friend to the farmers. So I've tried to steal man, him, you know, I try to put myself in.
The position of the people that I'm criticizing. I think he's a
narcissist.
Do you think there's a degree to which power changed him?
If you're not suited for the position? If you're not the man for the position, you can be absolutely 100% sure that the power will corrupt you, how could it not? I mean, at the, at the least, if you don't have the chops for the job, you have to devalue the job to the point where you can feel comfortable inhabited, it
So, yes, I think that it's corrupted him. I mean, look at him doubling down. We wear masks in two flights into Canada. We have to fill out an arrived can bureaucratic form on our phones because a passport is good, isn't good enough. We can't get a passport.
What if you're 85 and you don't know how to use a smartphone. Oh, well, too bad for you. It's like, yes, it's corrupted him. Would you
talk to him? What if you were to sit down and talk with him and he wanted to talk
Would you and what kind of things would you talk about? Perhaps on your
podcast? I don't think I've ever said no to talking to anyone. So which is, you know,
would you would that be a first or would you would you make that conversation? Do you believe in the power of know? I'd
ask those kinds of contact know if he was willing to talk to me, I talk because I'd like to ask him. I have lots of things I'd like to ask him about. I mean, I've had political types and counted on my podcast and tried to ask them questions.
You know.
Is it? So maybe I've got a big part of them wrong. Yes and I probably do but my observation is being that every chance he had to retreat from his fur onek position. Let's say he doubled down and these are Parliament is not running for the next year.
It's still zoom in. It's still covid, lockdown, Parliament. For the next year, it's already being
Fatally compromised, perhaps by the lockdowns for the last couple of years, and this is Parliament. We're talking about, there's a kind of
paralysis fear-driven, paralysis that also impart some of the most brilliant people. I know are lost in this paralysis. I don't think people have signed a word to, but it's almost like a fear of this unknown thing that lurks in the shadows and that, unfortunately, that
Fear is leveraged by people that you know who are in academic circles horn faculty or students. This water more than Administration and they they start to use that fear, which makes me quite uncomfortable. It does lend people in the positions of power cord not good at handling that power to become slowly day by day a little bit more corrupt.
I was really trying to figure out you know the last
Two weeks thinking this through is like, how do you know?
Let's say, someone asked me a question in the YouTube comments said, why, why why can I trust your advice on the environmental front? And I thought that's really good question. Okay, let's see if we can figure out the principles by, which the advice would be trustworthy. Okay? How, how do you know it's not trustworthy? Well, one potential response to that would be the claims are not in accordance with the facts.
But, you know, facts are tricky things and it depends on where you look for them. So that's a tough one to get. Right? Because for example, lumbergh's fundamental critics argue about his facts, not just his interpretation of them. So that can't be an unerring guide. And so I thought well, the facts exact exactly doesn't work because when it's about everything, there's too many facts. So then how do you determine if someone's a trustworthy guide in the face of the apocalyptic unknown? Because that's really the question.
And the answer is they're not terrified, tyrants.
I think that's the answer. Now, maybe that's wrong. If someone has a better answer, how do they know if they're terrified Tyrant because they are you willing to use compulsion on other people when they could use Goodwill? Like the farmers in counted objected they said, look.
We have every economic reason to use as little fertilizer as we can because it's expensive. We have satellite maps of where we put the fertilizer, we have cut our fertilizer, use so substantially in the last 40 years, you can't believe it. And we grow way more food. We're already breaking ourselves in half and if you know, Farmers especially the ones who still survive, you think, you think those people don't know what they're doing. It's like yeah, they're pretty damn sophisticated man. Like
Way more sophisticated than our prime minister and now you tell them, no, it's a 30% reduction and we don't care how much food you're growing. So it's not a reduction that's dependent on amount of food, produced per unit of fertilizer used, which would be at least you can imagine it. It's okay. So you're producing this much food and use this much fertilizer, so you're hyper efficient. Maybe we take the 10 percent of farmers, who are the least efficient in that metric. And
Say to them, you have to get as efficient as the average farmer and then they say well look, you know, our our situations different we're in a more Northern climb, the soils weaker, you know, you obviously have to bargain with that, but at least at least you reward them for their productivity.
Well, it's like well Holland isn't going to have beef. Well, where they going to get? Well you don't need it, it's like, oh, I see you get to tell me what I can eat. Now, do you really okay and Hall, and is going to import food from where that's more efficient on the fertilizer front, there's no one more efficient than haul. It and same with Canada and like is this going to make food prices, more expensive, and doesn't that mean that hungry people die?
Because that is what it means.
So ultimately poor people pay the price of these kinds of policies.
Don't know. Not ultimately,
Today. Now today today that's a crucial distinction because they say well ultimately, the poor will benefit
Yeah, except the dead ones today, today,
right? It seems like the story of War to is a time when the poor people suffer from the decision, made by the powerful, the rich the because they glisten Elite. Yeah, let me ask you about
the war in Ukraine. Oh yeah. I got into plenty of trouble about that too.
You're you're just a man in a suit talking on microphones and writing brilliant articles. There's also people dying fighting, it's their land, it's their country. It's their history. This is true for both Russia and Ukraine. Yeah it's people trying to ask they have many dragons and their ask ourselves a question, who are we, what is this? What is the future of this nation?
And we thought we are a great nation and I think both countries say this and they say, well, how do we become the great nation? We thought we are. Yeah. And so what first of all, you got in trouble, what what's the Dynamics of the trouble? And no, no, no.
I thought about it a lot. I laid out for reasons for the war and then
I was criticized in the Atlantic for the argument was reduced to one reason which was a caricature of the reason I gave a variety of reasons, why the war happened mismanagement on the part of the West in relationship to Russia and foreign policy over the last since the wall fell, it's understandable because it's extremely complex.
Hyper Reliance on Russia, as a cardinal source of energy provision for Europe in the wake of idiot environmental globalist utopianism. The expansionist Tendencies of Russia.
That are analogous in some sense to the Soviet Union Empire building. And then the last one, which is the one I got in trouble for which is Putin's belief or willingness to manipulate his people into believing that Russia is a salvific force in the face of idiot. Western woke ISM. And that's the one I got in trouble for like while you're justifying Putin. It's like
It's not only, it's not only the Russians that think the West has lost its mind, the Eastern Europeans, think so too. And do I know that it's like, well, I went 2:15 Eastern European countries. This this spring and I talked to 300 political and cultural leaders, and you might say, well, they were all conservatives. Like, actually, no, they weren't. Most of them were conservatives because it turns out that are more willing to talk to me, but a good chunk of them were
Liberals by, by any stretch of the imagination and a fair number of them were canceled progressives.
Well, because you're very concerned about the culture wars that perhaps our signal of a possible bad future for this country. And for this part of the world, that reason stands out
and
do you sort of looking
A cat's for reasons, think it deserves to have a place in one of the four, because it's absolutely because it is, you know,
for the folks who can bifurcated, a, because I said, look, Putin might believe this and I actually think he does because I read a bunch of Putin speeches and I have been reading them for 15 years and my sense of people generally and this was true of Hitler. It's like what did Hitler believed? Well, did you read? What he wrote, he just did what he said he was going to do and you might think well some people
Are so tricky, they have a whole body of elaborated speech, that's completely separate from their personality and their personalities pursuing a different agenda. And this whole body of speech is nothing but a front.
It's like good luck, finding someone not sophisticated. First of all, if you say things long enough, you're going to believe them.
That's a really interesting and fascinating, and important Point. Even if you start out as a lie as a propaganda, I think Hitler's is an example of somebody that I think really quickly. You start to believe the propaganda. You're really interesting.
You've thought a lot about AI systems. It's like, don't you become what you practice? And the answer to that is? Well, absolutely, we even know the neurology. It's like,
New first formulated concept, huge swaths of your cortex are lit up so to speak. But as you practice that first of all, the right hemisphere stops participating and then the left participates less and less until you build specialized machinery for exactly that conceptual frame and then you start to see it, not just think it. And so, if you're telling the same Lies Over and Over, who do you think you're fooling think? Well, I can withstand my own lies.
Not if they're effective lies and if they're effective enough to fool millions of people and then they reflect them back to you. What makes you think you're going to be able to withstand that you aren't? And so I do think Putin believes to the degree that he believes anything. I do believe that he thinks of himself as a bulwark for Christendom against the degeneration of the West. And that's that third way that Dugan
Putin have been talking about the philosopher Alexander Dugan and Putin for 15 years. Now what that is is very amorphous. Solzhenitsyn thought the Russians would have to return to the incremental development of Orthodox Christianity to escape from the Communists trap. And to some degree that's happened in Russia because there's been a return to Orthodox Christianity. Now you could say, yeah, but the Orthodox church has just been co-opted by the state. And I would say there's some evidence for that. I
I've heard, for example, that the Metropolitan
Bones. I don't know if this is true owns five billion dollars worth of personal property and I would say there's a bit of moral hazard in that and it's possible that the Orthodox church has been co-opted, but there has been somewhat have an orthodox Revival in Russia and I don't think that's all bad. Now, even if Putin doesn't believe any of this, if he's just a psychopathic manipulator and unfortunately, I don't think that's true.
I've read his speeches. It doesn't look like it to me and he is by no means the worst Russian leader of the last hundred
years.
well, there's quite a
selection there, there certainly is, but and I say that knowing that, even if he doesn't believe it,
He's convinced his people that it's true. And so we're stuck with. We're stuck with the claim in either case, and that's the point I was trying to make in the article
sometimes. I'm troubled by people that explain things and I've a lot of people reached out to me, experts, telling me how I should feel. What I should think about Ukraine. Oh, you naive. Lex. You're so naive.
Here's how it really is. But then I get to see people that lost their home. I get to see people on the Russian side, who believe their. I genuinely think that there's some degree to, which they have love in their heart, they see themselves as Heroes saving a land from from Nazis.
How else we need to debate, young, men to go fight.
It's just, it's these humans destroying, not only their homes, but
A generational hate destroying the possibility of Love towards each other. They're basically creating hate what I've heard. A lot of is unfairly 24th of this year. Hate was born at a scale that region is not seen hate towards. Not Vladimir Putin hate towards, not the soldiers in Russia, but hates towards all Russians. Hate that will last generations and then you can you can see
Just the pain there. And then then when all these experts talk about agriculture and energy and geopolitics, and yeah, maybe like what you say with with the fighting the ideologies of the woke and so on, I just feel like it's missing something. Deep that war is not fought.
About any of those things. War started in Wars, averted based on human beings, based on. Well, here's Humanity,
here's another ugly thought since we haven't had enough so far.
We locked everything down for covid.
How much face-to-face communication was there between the west and Vladimir Putin? How about none, how about that was the wrong amount especially given that Europe, was completely dependent on Putin for its energy supplies? Well, not completely, but you know what I mean? Materially in significantly. Maybe had to go talk to him once every six months. Maybe he's in a bit of a bubble probably
and not just an information bubble. How all these experts tell me about, ya know, a human human, you
And Bubble, look, one of the things I've really learned, there's a real emphasis on Hospitality in the Old Testament. I just brought all these Scholars together to talk about Exodus. Hey, I have this security team with me. And there are tough military, guys, but they're on board for this Mission. Let's say, and so they went out of their way to be hospitable to my academic guests, they laid out. Nice platters of meat and cheese crackers. They spend all day, preparing this house, I had rented so that we could have a
Pitiable time with these Scholars, most of whom I didn't know well, but who said they would come and spend eight days, talking about this book with me, we rented some jet skis, we had a nice house, we had fun and we got to know each other and we got to trust each other because we could see that we could have some fun and that we could let her hair down a bit. We didn't have to be on guard and that made the talks way deeper and then we found out we couldn't get through Exodus in eight days and so I had proposed very early on that. We're going to double the length.
And so I pulled eight people out of their lives for 48 days. That's a that's not an easy thing to do. It's also quite expensive and the daily wire, plus people picked all that up and they said, right? They said yes right away. So we love to do this again. Well, why? Well partly because it was intellectually, it was unbelievably engaging, I learned so much. It'll take me like a year to digest it if I can ever digest it and but they had, they had a really good time.
And so when they were offered that combination of intellectual challenge, let's say in Hospitality, it was a no-brainer. They just said every one of them said, if I can do it in any way, I will definitely be there. And this whole I went to Washington a bunch of times and the the culture of hospitality has broken down in Washington, 40% of congressmen sleep in their offices, they don't have apartment their family, isn't there with? They don't have a social occasions with
Our fellow Democrats or Republicans much less across the table. And so and I tried to have some meetings in Washington that were bilateral. Couple of times get young Republican, congressman, and Democrats together to talk. And as soon as they talk, they think, oh, it was so interesting because one of the lunches is about 15. People have Democrats now for publicans and all I asked them to do was just spend three minutes. Talk about why you decided to become a congressman. This is not a job. I would take, by the way.
Spend 25 hours a week, fundraising on the telephone, your family. Isn't there with you. You have to run for election every two years. You're beholden to the party apparatus, right? Your vilified constantly. This is not, you know, people think well this is a job for the privileged. It's like, yeah, you go and run for Congress and find out how much fun it is and put your family on the line and then have to beg for your job every two years. Well, your enemies, the worst of your enemies are the and the worst of your friends are
Viciously hen pecking. You. So anyways, we had them all sit around a table said, okay, just say why you ran for congress. It was so cool, especially for Canadian because you Americans. You're so bloody theatrical. It's something to watch. It was like mr. Smith Goes to Washington for every one of them. It's like, well, this country has given us so much where families have been so. So we've benefited so much from our, from our time here. We think this is a wonderful country. We really felt that we should give back
Back. And the next one would talk. It was like exactly the same story and then didn't matter if they were Republican or Democrat, you couldn't tell the difference. No one could. And was it genuine? It's like well are you genuine? You think these people are worse than you.
First of all, they're not second of all, they're probably better all things considered, it's not that easy to become a congressman, and I'm sure there's some bad apples in the bunch, but by and large, you walk away from your meetings with these people. And you think
Pretty impressive. There really are giving a part of themselves in the name of service. Maybe over time they become cynical and become jaded and worn down by the whole system.
But I think a lot of it imagine that
is healed. I think, and I don't think I'm Wyman part naive, but not fully that. A lot of it is healed through the power of conversation, just basic social interaction. I do think that the you Batman
Facts of this pandemic
listening,
listen, just sitting there and it doesn't have to be talking about the actual issue. It's actually humor and all those kinds of things about personal struggles, all those kinds of things that remind you that you're all just humans. Yeah.
Well the great leaders that I've met because I've met some now.
They go listen to their constituents, it's not a policy discussion started to deal with you discussion, they go say, okay, what's what's your, what's your life? Like and what are your problems and tell me about them? And then they listen and then they're struck by them and then they gather up all that misery and they bring it to the Congressional office or to the Parliament. And they think here is what the people are crying out for and the good leaders. That's a leader leader listens. So I talked to Jimmy,
Her
about comedy and he's sold out.
Stages worldwide on a tour being funny, that's hard. He said, comedy is the most stand-up comedy, which is what I do in some real sense. It's something I do that. It's the most akin to what I'm doing on my book tour. So I would say it's the closest analog. He said it's the most dialogical Enterprise and I thought well, why what do you mean? Because see, it's just the monologue and and it's a prepared monologue. I mean you have to
Interact dynamically with the audience while you're telling your jokes and you got to get the timing, right? But you have a body of jokes said well here's how you prepare the jokes and I've been told this by other comedians. You go to 50 clubs before you go on your tour and you got some new material and you think it's funny and you go into a club and you lay out your new material and people laugh at some of it.
And you pay attention to what they laugh at and what they don't laugh at. See you subject yourself to the Judgment of the crowd and you get rid of everything that isn't funny. And if you do that enough, even if you're not that funny, the crowd will tell you what's funny so you can imagine. Imagine you do 50 shows and each is an hour long and you collect two minutes of humor from each show. So you throw away, 90 throw away two hours more than 98% of it, collect two minutes per show.
So you're not very funny at all, you're not funny. Two percent of the time you aggregate that man. You're a scream Sizzle. So that's what a leader does is that is what a leader does is goes out, and he Aggregates the misery, you know, and the hopes. And then I do think that's revivify to someone who would otherwise be cynical and jaded. Because then the person can say to themselves, despite the inadequacies of the system and my inadequacies, I'm, I'm gathering up the misery.
And and the hope and I'm bringing it Forward where it can be
getting dressed, you giving it a
voice giving. That's right. Giving it a
voice. Can you actually take me through a day because it's a fascinating through your Comedy Tour? What is a day in the life of Jordan Peterson? Look like what? Which is this very interesting day. Let's look at the day when you have to speak preparing your mind, thinking of what you're going to talk about preparing yourself.
Clearly mentally to interact with the crowd through the actual speaking. How do you adjust what you're thinking through and how do you come down from that? So you can start all again as a limited biological
system. Well, I'm usually up by seven and ready to go by 7:30 or 8:00
coffee. No, that's taken water.
How many times a day is take.
All that's all I eat. How many times 3 or 4 depending on the day? Stay can watch taken by sparkling water. Yeah so I do Gnostic asceticism and
why did the proper I usually? Just once a day I did the proper Jordan Pederson last night and just ate two steaks. And how was that was? Wonderful.
Yeah, well if you have to only eat one thing,
You know, could be worse. So, anyways, I'm ready to go at 8 because we're generally moving. What is it?
Moving mean, why you're
constantly going somewhere? Okay, and we usually use private flights now because the commercial airlines aren't reliable enough and you cannot not make a venue, right? So that's rule. Number one on a tour.
You make the show?
So everything and then number rule. Number two, is anybody who causes any trouble on the tour is gone because there is zero room for error. Now
No, there's zero room for Unnecessary unaddressed error so because there's going to be errors. The guys I have around me now.
If they make a mistake, they fix it right away. So and that's
great. There's a lot of people relying on you to be there.
So you have like, 4,000 people typically. Yeah. So so then I'm on the plane and I'm usually I usually write or often because there's no internet on the plane and and that's a good use of time so I'm writing a new book so I write on the plane
typing or handwriting
typing. Yeah typing and
Then we land and we go to. It's usually early afternoon by then we go to a hotel, it's usually a nice hotel, that's not corporate. I don't really like corporate hotels. My secretary and my one of my Logistics, guys has got quite good at picking kind of adventurous hotels. Boutique hotels are usually in the old parts of the city especially in Europe somewhere. Interesting and so we go there and then lunch usually and
Sometimes that's an air fryer and a stake in the hotel room and I leave a trail of air force behind me all across the world and then Tammy, and I usually go out and have a walk or something, and take a look at the city. And then I have a rest for like an hour and a half, or an hour, half an hour, like a
nap, oh, yes. Now I
have to sleep for 20 minutes and that's about all I can sleep, but I need to do that in the laid out, that refreshes your mind. Yeah, that gives me that wakes me up again for the evening and then Tam has to sleep longer. She's still recovering from
Realness and so she has to sleep longer in the afternoon and that's absolutely necessary for both of us or things start to get Freight. And so then we go to the venue.
And then I usually sit for an hour if I'm going to lecture. I've been doing a lot of q&as and that's a little easier, but if I'm going to lecture, I have to sit for an hour. And then I think, okay.
What question am I trying to investigate? I have to have that. So that's the point. What mystery am I trying to unravel? It's usually associated with one of the rules in my book because technically, it's a book tour. But each of those rules is an investigation into an ethic and each of them points to a deeper, sort of mystery in some sense. And there's no end to the amount can be explored. And so, I have the question, the question might be something like
Put your put your house in perfect order before you criticize the world. Okay, what does that mean? Exactly put. What does house mean, what just put, what does put me in that active verb? What is perfect and order mean why before you criticize the world? What does it mean to criticize? What does it mean to criticize the world? How can you do that properly or improperly? So I start to think about how to decompose the
question and you start to think which of these decompositions are important to
Really dig
into. Yeah, well then they'll strike me. It's like, okay, there's something there that that I've been maybe noodling around on that. I would like to investigate further then I think. Okay. How can I approach this problem? I think. Well, I have this story that I know, have this story, and I have this story, but I haven't juxtaposed them before, and there's going to be some interesting interaction in the juxtaposition. So I have the question and I kind of have a framework of interpretation and then I have some potential narrative places I can go and then I think, okay, I can go juggle that.
And see what happens. And so then what I want to do is concentrate on that process, well, attending to the audience to make sure that the words are landing and then see if I can delve into it deeply enough so that a narrative emerges spontaneously with an ending. Now I'm sure you've experienced this in podcasts, right? Maybe I'm wrong, but my experience has been if I fall into the conversation and we know about the timeframe, they'll be a natural narrative Arc.
And then so you'll kind of know when the midpoint is and you'll kind of see when you're reaching a conclusion and then if you really pay attention you can see that's a good place to stop. It's kind of you come to a point and you have to be alert and patient to see that. And you have to be willing to be satisfied with where you've got to. But if you do that and then it's like a comedian, making the punchline work. It's like, I've got all these balls in the air.
And they're going somewhere and this is how they come together and people love that, right? You say all this and this and this and this and this whack together and that's an insight and it is very much like a punchline.
Well that's interesting because your mind actually some fan of your podcast to and you are always driving towards that. I would say for me and Anna podcast conversation, there's often a kind of Alice in Wonderland type of exploration.
Even down the rabbit hole
man and then you just a new thing pops up in the more absurd. The Wilder, the better. Yeah, conversations with Ilana like this. Yeah, it's like actually, the more you drive towards an arc, the more uncomfortable you start to get in a van absurd conversation because, oh, I am now one of the normies. No, I don't want that, I want to be, I want, I want the rabbit, I want the crazy because it makes it more fun. But somehow
It. There is wisdom. He tried to grasp at. Well, such that there is a
thread. Well, that's the thing, man. You're following the thready. Yeah, the thread by thread. Well, that's right. Your, that's what we're trying to do. That thread. That thread, is the proper balance between structure and spontaneity and it manifests itself as the Instinct of meaning and that's the logos in the dialogue has. And it really is the logos and God only knows what that means, you know, I mean the the biblical claim is that logos is the
Tell principal of reality and I think that's true. I actually think that's true because I think that that meaning that guides you. Well here's a way of thinking about it. Been writing about this recently, what's real matter? It's like okay, that's one answer, what's real?
What matters is real? That's how you act, okay, that's different than matter.
It's like, okay, what's the most real of what matters? How about pain? Why is it the most real try? Arguing it away?
Good luck.
So pain is the fundamental reality. All right, well that's rough doesn't that lead to nihilism and hopelessness
Yeah. Doesn't it lead to a philosophy that's antithetical towards being the most fundamental reality is pain? Yes. Is there anything more fundamental than pain?
Love.
Really.
If you're in pain.
Laughing truth, that's what you got. And you know,
If they're more powerful than pain, maybe they're the most real things.
When you think about reality, what is real? That is the most real thing.
Well, it's a tough one, right? Because you have to because if you're a scientist a materialist think, well,
The matters, the most real. It's like, well, you don't know what the matter is, the and so and then when push comes to shove and it will you'll find out what's most real. Yeah.
I feel like this missing physical reality is missing some of the things. So of course, pain has a biological component, all those kinds of things but it's missing, something deep about the human condition, that at least the modern size is not able to describe, but it is reaching towards that. Yeah, it is, the reason it won't one way to describe it. As you're describing is, the reason is reaching it is because
Underneath of science is this assumption that there's a deep
logos
thing to this whole thing, we're trying to do
well, you know, there's two Traditions, right? In some sense, there's two logos Traditions, there's the Greek rational Enlightenment tradition, that's a logos tradition and it insists that there's a logo sin nature and that science is the way to approach it. And then there's the judeo Christian logos which is more embodied and more
Spiritual and I would say the West is actually an attempt to unite those two, and it's the proper attempt to unite those two because they need to be United. And I see the union coming in your terms. You know, I talked to friends to wall for example, about the animating principle of chimpanzee sovereignty and that's pretty close biologically, is it power? Because that's the claim even from the biologists often, the most dominant chimp has the best rep reductive success. It's like,
Oh yeah, dominant. T, you mean using compulsion? Okay, let's look. Are The Chimps who use compulsion the most successful and the answer is sporadically and rarely and for short while that sporadically for short periods of time. Why? Because they meet an unpleasant end the subordinates over whom they exercise. Arbitrary control, wait for a weak moment and then
Tear them into shreds, right? Every dictators Terror and for good reason, and to all his showed that the alpha chimps, the males who do have preferential, mating access, often are often and reliably, the best peacemakers and the most reciprocal. And so even among chimps the principle of sovereignty is something like iterative iterated reciprocity.
And that's a way better principal than power. And it's something like, I've been thinking, what's the antithesis of the spirit of power? I think it's the spirit of play.
And you know, you I don't know what you think about that, but wouldn't you have a good podcast conversation you already described in some sense as play? It's like there's a structure, right? Because it's an ordered conversation but you want there to be play in the system and if you get that right then it's really engaging and then it seems to have its own narrative Arc. I'm not trying to impose that even though that's another thing I don't do, I didn't come to this conversation at all thinking. Here's what I want out of a conversation with Lex Friedman. I can
Mentally, I thought I'll go talk to Lex. Why I like his podcasts, he's doing some right? I don't know what it is. He asks, interesting questions, I'll go have a conversation with him. Where's it going to go?
Wherever it goes,
embracing the spirit of play. So what you have this when you're lecturing, you're going in front of the crowd. You thought of a question? Yeah you get on the stage. First of all, are you nervous at all?
I'm very nervous when I'm sitting down thinking through the structure, initially the which is why my wife and I have been doing q&as and that's easier on me. Yeah,
it's the, it's the way comedians are nervous like Joe Rogan's. Just did a special so this weekend and so he now has to sit nervously. Like a comedian does, which is like I have no material now, right? Have to start from scratch.
When I was doing the lectures constantly instead of q&a's, basically what I was doing was writing a whole book chapter every night and you know, now that's a bit of an exaggeration because I would return to themes that I had developed. But it's not really an exaggeration because I didn't ever just go over wrote material ever. So it was it's very demanding and that Parts nerve-racking because I sit down, it's an hour before the show and I think
Can I put, can I do this? And you know, the answer is what you did it a thousand times but that's not this time. Yes. Like, can I come up with a question? Can I think through the structure? Can I pull off the spontaneous narrative? Can I pull it together? And the answer is, I don't know. And so, then I get it together in my mind. I think. And that's hard. It takes effort, and it's nerve-racking. Okay, I got it.
Then there's the moment you go out on stage and you think well, I know I had it but can I do it? No notes. And then the question is, well, you're going to find out. Well you do it and so then I go out on stage and I don't talk to the audience, I talked to one person at a time.
And you can talk to one person, you know, because you know how to do that. So I talked to a person and not too long because I don't want to make them too nervous, and then someone else and someone else, and then I'm in contact with the audience. And then I can tell, if the words are landing, and I listened is like, are they rustling around?
Are they dead quiet because he want dead quiet
years? Oh, I see, that's what Focus sounds like they do your you're in it together,
then you bet. Well, and I also here's a good rule. If you're learning to speak publicly, I never say a word.
Till everyone is 100% quiet and that's, it's a great way to start a talk because you're setting the frame. A and if the frame is, we'll all talk. While you're talking, the message is, well, you can talk. This is a place where everybody can talk, it's like, no, it's not. This is a place where people paid to hear me talk. So I'm not going to talk till everyone's listening and so, then you get that Stillness and then you just wait because that Stillness turns into an expectation.
It and then it comes turns into a kind of nervous. Expectations. Like, what the hell is he doing? It's not manipulative. It's a sense of timing. It's like just when. That's right. You think. Okay. Now it's time to start.
Well, that never the interesting thing about that nervous. Expectation is from an audience perspective. We're In It Together. Yeah. I mean, there is into that silence. There is a togetherness
to it. Of course, it's the union of everyone's attention. Yeah. Yeah, I'm not and that's a great thing. I mean, you love that at a concert when
Everyone it's not silence then, but when everyone's attention is Unified and everyone's moving in unison, it's like, we're all worshiping the same thing, right as well. And that would be the point of the conversation. The point of the lecture and the worship is the direction of attention towards it and it's units communion because everyone's doing it at the same time. And so, I mean, there's not much difference between lecture theater in a church in that regard, writes, the same fundamental layout and structure and they're very integrally associated.
With one, another one really grew out of the other, the lecture, Theatres growth of the church. So it's perfectly reasonable to be thinking about it in those terms. And so, and then, okay, so after the lecture, we play a piece of music that is a piece of music that I've been producing with some musicians. For a couple of books. I'm going to release in the fall. Terrible books, ABC of childhood tragedy there called Dark.
Dark books.
Dark and comical books, terrible books. The heartbreaking illustrations.
We set them to music. And so we play a piece from that and then afterwards, I usually meet about 150 people to have photographs. And so each of those is a little,
is there a little Sparkle of human connection? They have the
lot a lot. It's very intense. Ten seconds with every person you think how content s be intense. It's like
Pay enough, attention gets intense real quick.
Is it break your heart to say goodbye? So many times.
It's like being out in a waiting line up at a wedding with that, you want to be out and everybody's dressed up. And that's so weird because I bought these expensive suits when I went on tour and it broke my heart because I spent so much money on them. I thought God, that's completely unconscionable. I thought. No way man. Yeah, I'm in this 100% And so I'm going to dress with respect and
Like 60% of the audience comes in two or three piece suits, they're all dressed up, then there's this line to greet me and they're all happy to see me. That's not so hard to take, you know, although it is in a sense, right? Because Normal interactions are pretty shallow and you think I don't want shallow interactions
like yes, you do most of the time. Yeah, it's
intense. Very intense. And I don't know if you've had a taste of this, no doubt because people
recognize I also have
What a person recognizes me and they come with the law of and they're often brilliant people. The one of the thoughts I have to deal with one of the dragons in my own mind is you know thinking that I don't deserve that kind of attention and so what you probably
don't write me.
Don't good. It's a it's a burden in that I have to step up to be the kind of person that deserves that not deserves that, but in part deserves that kind of attention and that's like holy shit.
Shit crucially important too because if someone comes up to you in an airport and they know who you are and they're brave enough to admire you, or who you are attempting to be, and you make a mistake, they will never forget it. Yeah. So it's a high-stakes Enterprise
and the flip side of that, especially with young people, a few words, you can say, can change the direction of their
life, one way or another. And so, I really have to watch this to an airport because I do not
Airports. I do not like the creeping totalitarianism and airports. They've always bothered me. Yes, they really bother me and I'm an unpleasant travel companion for my wife sometimes because of that although I think we've worked out out thank God cause a lot of traveling. But most of the security guards and and the Border Personnel, all those people they know me. And as a general rule, they're positively predisposed to me. And so if I'm peevish or irritable. Yeah, then. Well that
That's not good. It's not good. And so, that's a tightrope to walk, too? Because I do not like that creeping totalitarianism, but by the same token, you know, if you're just one of the crowd just you know sometimes you it's good just to be one of the crowd and then your little irritable and people can just brush that off. But if you're someone, they have dared to open their heart to because that's what admiration is and then your
Be in you betray that. Then that's a real, they'll never forget it. And then they'll tell everyone to. So this takes a lot of alertness and so Tammy and our life is got complicated, because in Toronto, for example, we can't really just go for a walk. It's always a high drama production because always people come up and they have some heart-rending story to tell and I'm not being cynical about that. Yes,
it's a hard thing to Bear because people don't do that. They don't just open themselves up to you like that and share the tragedy of their life.
But that's an everyday occurrence. And so when we go up to our cottage which is out of the city, it's a relief, you know, because as wonderful as that is like it's a weird. I have a weird life because everywhere I go, it's very weird. It's like I'm surrounded by old friends because I walk down the street in any City now virtually and people say hello dr. Peterson. So nice to see you or they say better. Things than that very rarely, bad things. 11,
Variance in 5,000. May be very rare, although you don't forget those either but it's very it's very strange.
So, and there's an intimacy. They know you well and, and because the leap into the avoid, the small talk
often, they leap into familiarity.
It really is like, it's an old friend and he feels like that for me. Personally, the experiences the goodbye hurts because
You know, there's a sense where you'll never going to see that friend
again, right? Yeah, that's a strange thing. A
sit to me a lot of the a lot of it just feels like goodbyes. Hmm.
And one it is, you're right about that. And I mean that's I suppose in some sense part of the pain of opening yourself up to people because they also Tammy has been struck particularly she said, I really never knew what men were. Like I said what do you mean? She said I cannot believe
How polite the man are when they come and talk to you because it's always the same as the patterns, very similar, the person comes up, they're mostly men, not always but mostly and there are tentative and they're very polite, very very polite and they say oh I hope I'm not bothering you. Do you mind, you know, do you mind that? I say that they're not bothering me?
And I'm doing everything I can to not. Be the guy who's bothered by thats. Like, who do you think you are? Yes, you're the guy that what is famous and now is above that. You don't want to be that guy. So you want to be grateful all the time when people open up like that. And and so you got to be alert and on point to do that properly like right away. Because for these, for you, it's five seconds or 10 seconds or 20 seconds, whatever it
But for them.
They've opened up and so you can really nail them if you're foolish
after the 150 people, how do you come down from that? How do you, how do you find yourself again?
So, that was all right when I got taught and Twitter traps, you know, because I'm so burned out by then from the, from the talk, and, and audience interactions, and the whole day, because it's a new city, it's a new hotel. It's, it's a new 5,000 people. It's a new book chapter
New Horizon of ideas and it's off to another city the next day, I'm so burned out by then that I'm not as good at controlling my impulses. As I might be in Twitter was a real catastrophe for that because it would hook me. And then I couldn't like I used to when I was working on my book a lot. I used to call Tammy and say, look, you have to come and get me. I can't stop. I can't stop. I got tired. And then I kind of because it's part of a kind of hypomanic focus. I couldn't
Wit like oh no, I'm still writing. I need to get away from this but I couldn't stop and so
It's better to.
To read something book
fiction. Nonfiction
fiction, Stephen King. I was reading Lord of Stephen King. When I was on tour last time that was good. I like Stephen King, a log raised narratives, great and great characterization, you know. So, and there's a familiarity about Stephen King's writing to that. It's, he writes about people, you know, and so I really found that a relief and so that was useful and that in
To tolerate this let's say or to be able to sustain it. Let's take a lot of negotiation on the part of Tammy and I because she's dragged into this and you know her life is
Part of this, whatever this is. And she's had to find her way and house. For example, now she has a different hotel room than me when we travel and she, she found that she didn't want to be on the tour. This spring. And I was ill again, for part of it, not made it complicated, but she went away back home, and she came back and she said, and she was nervous. But she said, I think I need my own room and part of me was not happy with that sack. What do you mean you need? You're like, are we not married anymore? It's like, you need your own room and she
Well, you know, I can, she has to do exercises because she was really sick and she has to keep yourself in shape and and she has to have some time to do that. She does a lot of prayer and meditation and she needs the time and she has her own podcast, which is going quite well. And she needs the time and and I trust her and she said well I need this in order to continue and I thought well, okay, like if you need this in order to continue, yes, because she went away and didn't say, well, I don't want to be on the tour, I don't want to do this.
This anymore, she went away and prayed, let's say, how can I continue to do this? And that was the answer. And so she has her own hotel room and that was a really good decision on her part and she's very good and getting better all the time at figuring out what has to happen for her to make this sustainable. And all that's being is a plus because I don't want to travel without her and and I don't want her life to be miserable.
Abel. And I want her to be fully on board and so she has to be properly selfish.
Like everyone does in a
relationship. We and you have to not just say yes, this is a weird thing that you're doing and you have to both you and her have to figure out how to, like, how to manage this very intense intellectual,
welfare, social learning other element to it, too, that I didn't tell you about. So, that was a typical day, but it's missing a big component because, usually, we also have a dinner with, like, 30,
Cultural Representatives, I suppose 10 to 30 from each country because I have a network of people who have networks who are setting me up with key decision makers in each country. And so then we have like an hour and a half of that. Now, sometimes that's on a day when I don't have a talk if we but sometimes the talks are back to back. And so she also has to manage that and to be gracious and and then people are showing us exciting things and tours in the cities and which is all
All like it's a surf fight of
wonderful. Yes, exactly. But yeah, it's still. Yeah. You have to be there for. You have to be present for it, mentally. Yeah. As a curious minds and intellectual mind. How do you, how do you get to sleep?
Fortunately, that is almost never a problem. Even when I was unbelievably ill for about three years. I thought about that a lot too. You know, that I didn't do a really good job of explaining that while I was Ill because it
Appeared in some sense that the reason I was Ill was because I was taking benzodiazepines but that isn't why I was ill and then I took them and very low dose and I took that for a long time and it helped whatever was wrong with me and it looks like it was an allergy or maybe multiple allergies and then that stopped working. And so I took a little bit more for about a month and that made it way worse and so then I cut back a lot and then then things really go.
Got out of
hand. And so, so there is a deeper thing. Oh yeah, the benzo. Oh, what can you put me work too?
Well, I had a lot of them. You might want my daughter, as everyone knows, has a very reactive immune system and Tammy has three Emmy logical conditions, each of them quite serious, and I had psoriasis and peripheral uveitis, which is an autoimmune condition, and alopecia areata, and chronic gum disease. All of which appeared to be allergy related. And so, in the case,
Seems to have got all of that. And so that, and that I think, was that the bottom of? Because I also had this proclivity to depression. That was part of my family history, but I think that was all immunological as far as I can tell. So, one of the things that's happened to me, I always noticed, I really couldn't breathe. Like, I could breathe about one-fifth as much as I sometimes could.
And so I was always short of breath and it looks like what that was perhaps was. I was always on the border of an anaphylactic reaction which is not pleasant.
That's hyper sympathetic activation. No parasympathetic activation. I couldn't relax
at all. That's an immunological
response. Allergic response. Yeah. So anyways that was what seemed now this I don't like to talk about this much cuz it's so bloody radical and you know, I don't like propagate it but this diet seems to have stopped all of that. I don't have psoriasis all the patches of going near my Grump gum disease which is incurable had multiple surgeries to deal with. It is come
Completely gone took three years, my right eye, which was quite cloudy. It's cleared up completely. What else has changed while I lost 50 pounds and like instantly
it off. I should mention that. I too am not a deep investigator of nutritional science. I have my skepticism towards the degree to which it is. Currently is the science because like a lot of complex systems is very is full of mystery and full of profit tears.
People that profit of different kinds of diets but I should say, for me personally it does seem that I feel by far the best when I eat only meat, it's very interesting and I discovered that it's reading long time ago, first of
all how do you discover
it? So by the discovery went like this, I started listening to ultra marathon runners about 15 years ago and they started talking about fat adapted running. So I
First discovered that I don't have to run super fast to enjoy running that. In fact, I really enjoy running at a slower pace, so that was like, step one psycho, okay, if I maintain something called the math rule, which is pretty low, heart rate. If I maintain that, you could actually get pretty fast while maintaining a pretty slow average speed in general. Anyway, they feel themselves on low carb diets. So I got into that on top of
That I also they also fast often. So I discovered how incredible my mind feels when fast that, you know, people call intermittent fasting.
But well, that was an organization of death, a because you're when you fast your body a logically. And obviously, if you think about it, biologically is well, what is your body scavenge first? Well, damaged tissue.
So the, the and I know the literature on fasting to some degree and it's it's very compelling literature. If you, if you starve dogs down, I think it's 20% below rats to below their optimal body weight. They live 30% longer. Yeah, that's a lot 30%. Like, it's like 30%. Yeah, 30
percent. Well, there is aspect to a lot of these things that make me nervous because it's I always feel like there's no free lunch that I'm going to pay for it somehow, but there's a focus that I am able.
Attained when I fast especially when I eat once a day my mind is almost like nervously focused. It's almost like an exotic, but a positive one or one that I can channel into just like an excitement.
You know. I wonder how much it that's associated with well, imagine that that signifies lack of food, which not that hard to imagine. Well, maybe you should be a lot more alert in that situation right biologically speaking because you're in hunting mode. Let's say
You know, not desperate but in hunting mode and God only knows maybe human being should be in hunting mode all the time
often but that we don't know that. So I wonder if it has a stress on the system that long-term causes the system detects. It doesn't look like it. It seems I'm in case of fasting not and then on top of that, I discovered that. The thing I enjoy, I just don't enjoy eating fat as much. So I love eating me.
And when you talk about low carb diet, so I just discovered through that process, if someone fatty me. But just me, I just feel a lot of the things that make me feel weird about food like a little groggy or, like full or just whatever the aspects of food that I don't enjoy it. They're not there with meat and I'm still able to enjoy company. And when I eat once a day and eat meat, I said at least in Texas.
You could still have all the merriment of. Yeah. Yeah you have dinner with friends now. I don't do the the you know, you have a very serious thing that there's health benefits that you are very serious about. For me, I could still drink whiskey. I'll still do the things that add a little bit of spice spice into the thing. Yeah. Now, when you completely remove the spice, it does become more
difficult. Yeah, it's more difficult socially and
Tammy seems to only be able to eat lamb, although she might be leading on aged beef and that makes traveling complicated to write because, well for obvious reasons is like really. That's all you can eat. Yeah, well C'est La Vie, and maybe that's a form of craziness. But if a
good return to actually, the thing you were talking about when you're thinking about a question before the lecture. Yeah, let me ask you both thinking in general.
This is something. Maybe they you and Jim Kelly think a lot about is thinking, how to think, how do you think through an idea?
Well, first of all, I think, okay, that's a really good question. We try to work that out with this essay app that my son and I have developed because if you're going to write the first question is, what what should I write about?
What's the name of the
app sa da tap and well? The first question is,
Well what bugs you? What's bugging you? This is such a cool thing is, like, where is my destiny?
Well, what bothers you? Well, that's where your destiny is. Your destiny is to be found in what bothers you. Why did those things bother you? There's a lot of things you could be bothered by like a million things man, but some things grip you, they bug you and they might make you resentful and bitter because they bug you so much. Like, they're your things, man. They've got you. So then I look for a question that I would like the answer to that. I don't. And I would really like the answer to it.
So I don't assume I already have that sir because I would actually really like to have that answer. So if I could get a better answer,
Great. And so that's the first thing and that's like a prayer. It's like, okay.
Here's a mystery. I would like to delve into it further. Well, that's humility. It's like here's a mystery which means I don't know. I would like to delve into it further which means I don't know enough already and then then comes the Revelation, it's like well, what's a revelation? Well if you ask yourself a question, it's real question. Do you get an answer or not? Now, answer is well yeah. Thoughts start to appear in your head.
So from somewhere, that's right from
somewhere where do they come from? Davison's,
depends on what you're aiming at the comes in the question but No It Dont, it does to some degree. It depends, it depends on your intent. So imagine that your intent is to make things better.
Then maybe they come from the place that's designed to make things better. Maybe your intent is to make things worse. Then they come from hell.
And you think not really it's like you're so sure about that are you
he's your intent conscious like are you able
it's respect was conscious and habitual right? Because as you practice something consciously, it becomes habitual but it's conscious. It's like I when I sit down before I do lecture, I think. Okay, what's goal here to do the best job I can to what end while people are coming here, not for political issues, they're coming here because they're trying to make their lives better, okay?
What are we doing? We're conducting a joint investigation into the nature of that, which makes life better. Okay, what's my rule to do as good? A job about that as possible? What state of mind do I have to be it? A my annoyed about the theater or am I do? I my clued in and thrilled that 4,000 people have showed up at substantial expense and trouble to come and listen to me talk. And if I'm not in that state of mind, I think well maybe I need something to eat or maybe I need to talk to someone because that
Ingratitude is no place to start. It's like I should be thrilled to be there, obviously, and so that that orientation has to be there and then I it's a conscious all this is conscious. What am I serving? The highest good I can conceptualize, what is that? I have some sense but I don't know it in the final analysis which is why the investigation is being conducted, who's doing it me, whoever I'm communing with and the audience and so I want I try to get myself and I chase everybody. Wait for that, it's like I have
That by myself. Are you writing stuff down?
Yes, at that point. I make no, I just make Point notes and it's usually about maybe 30 notes. But then I on stage, I never refer to them. And I often don't even use the structure that I laid out,
kind of an interesting thing from where do powerful phrases come from? Do you have a devil? Do you try to encapsulate, an idea into a sentence or two?
Well, I when I talk, I practice this since consciously since 1985,
I try to feel and see if the words are stepping stones or Foundation Stones, right is like, is this, solid is this word? Solid is this phrase, solid is this sentence solid? Like, it's a real sense of
fundamental Foundation under each word and I suppose people ask me if I pray and I would say, I pray before every word,
Well, when you're when you're asking questions, like you're very clear-headed and present in your ability to ask questions and inquire. So how do you do that?
So first of all,
I'm worried that my mind easily gets trapped when I step on a word and I know it's unstable. You kind of realize that you don't really know the definitions of many words you use and that can be debilitating.
So I kind of try to be more Carefree about the words that you use because otherwise, you get
trapped. You don't want to be obsessional.
Like literally my mind halfway through the sentence will think we'll, what is the word sentence
mean, right? Right. Right. Well, you know,
no more. Everything else just explodes your, our big picture idea explodes in you lost yourself in the minutiae.
Well, neurologically. There's a production Center and a net.
I think Center and those can be separately affected by strokes. And so often, when people are writing or talking, they try to activate both at the same time, and that's so people will try to write an essay and get every sentence. Write the first draft, that's a big mistake. So then you might say, well how can you be careful with your words? But carefree and the answer is Orient yourself properly. Right? While in the conversation, we're having you have an orientation structure you want to.
Be prepared. You want to be attentive, then you want to have an interesting conversation and you want to have the kind of interesting conversation that other people want to listen to, that will be good for them in some manner. Okay, so that's pretty good frame. And and then you kind of scour, your heart. You think is that really what you want? Are you after fame or a afternoon variety or you after money. I'm not saying any of those things are necessarily bad but they're not optimal, especially if
Willing to admit them, right? And so they can contaminate you. So you want to be decontaminated. So you have the right trip, let's say. And, and so, you have to put yourself that's a meditative practice. You have to put yourself in the right receptive position with the right goal in mind, then you can
and I think you can get better and better at this then you can trust what's going to happen, you know, for example, before I came here, I mean I presume you have a reason for doing the podcast with me. What's the reason
I mean, we wanted to talk for a long time. Yeah, the reason is evolved. The one of the reasons is I've listened to you for quite a long time. So you become a one-way friend and I have many one way friends, some of my best friends don't even know I exist. So that what I'm a big fan of podcasts and audiobooks actually, most of my friends are dead. Yeah, right.
The writers definition of a reader.
It's a lot of dead, great dead
friends. So I wanted, I wanted to meet this one way friend I supposed and have a conversation and then there's this kind of puzzle that I've been longing to solve the same reason. I went to Ukraine of asking this question of myself, who am I and what was this part of the world? What is this thing? That happened in the 20th century that I
So much my family there and I feel so much of my family's defined by that place. Now that place includes the Soviet Union and it includes Russia and Ukraine includes Nazi, Germany includes these big powerful leaders and huge millions of people that were lost in the beauty, the power of the dream, but we're also the torture.
It's was forced onto them through different governmental institutions. And you are somebody that seemed from some angle to, also be drawn to try to understand what was that, and not in some sort of historical sense but in a deeply psychological human sense. What is that will it repeat again in what ways are repeating again
and how could we stop it?
And how can we stop it? And so, that's the crucial issue. I felt I wanted.
To from a very different backgrounds. The pull out the thread of that Curiosity, you know, an engineer, you're a psychologist, both lost and that Curiosity and both were suits and a talk with various levels of eloquence about sort of
The Shadows that these, that that history casts on us. And so now that was one. And also the psychology. I wanted to be a psychiatrist for a long time. I was I was fascinated by the human mind and until I discovered artificial intelligence, the fact that I could program and make a robot move and until I discovered that magic, I thought, I wanted to understand the human mind, but being psychiatrist by
Talking to people by through to talk therapy.
Psychotherapy. Oh, you got the best of both worlds because you get to talk to people and you get build
robots. Yeah. I mean, but the dream ultimately is the robot that I felt like, by building the thinking, you start to try to understand it and that's one way. I mean, we're all well have different skills that proclivity. So like my particular one is has to do with I learned by
Adding yeah, I think through a thing but building it and a programming is a wonderful thing because it allows you to like build a little toy example. So, in the same way you can do a little thought, experiment, programming laws, that you create a thought experiment in action, it can move, it can live and can write, and then you could ask questions of it. So, all of those, because of my interest in forward and young, you're also in different ways, have have
Delve deeply into to humanity, the human psyche, through the perspective of those of those psychologist. So for all those reasons I thought our password is
yeah. So that well, so that's quite a frame for a discussion, right? You had all sorts of reasons, and then you think, well. Are you just letting the conversation go? Where it will. It's like, well, not exactly. You spent all this time. It's not like this came about by accident this conversation. You spent
All this time framing it. And so all of that provides, the implicit substructure for the play in the conversation. And if you have that implicit, here's another way. This is very much worth knowing is if you get the implicit structure of perception, right? Everything becomes a game.
And not only that a game you want to play and maybe in the final analysis, the game you'd want to play forever. So you know, that's obviously a distant beckoning ideal, but we known games need rules.
Or there's no play. Is there a device? You can
give now that we know the frame to give to me, Lex about how to do this podcast butter, how to
Think.
About this world. How to be a good engineer. How to be a good human being
from what hang up on me. Take your preoccupation with suffering, seriously.
It's a serious business.
Right? And that's part of that to Circle back to the beginning. Let's say that's that willingness to gaze into the abyss, which is obviously what you were doing when you went to Ukraine. It's like it's gazing into the abyss that makes you better. The thing is and this is maybe where Nietzsche's ideas, not as differentiated as became.
Sometimes your gaze can be forcefully directed towards the abyss and then you're traumatized. If it's involuntary and accidental, it can kill you. The more its voluntary.
The more transformative it is and that's part of that idea about facing death and hell. It's like, can you tolerate death? And he'll, and the answer is this. Terrible answer is
Yes, to the degree that you're willing to do it.
Voluntarily. And then you might ask well, why should I have to subject myself to death and hell? I'm innocent and then the answer that is
Even the innocent must be voluntarily sacrificed to the highest.
That's such an interesting distinction.
Voluntary saw
voluntary? Yeah, yeah. Well that's why the Central Christian doctrine is pick up your cross and follow me.
And I'm speaking not in religious terms saying that I'm just speaking as a psychologist. It's like one of the things we've learned in the last hundred years is voluntary exposure to that which freezes and terrifies, you in measured proportions is
Curative.
So a form of at least in part involuntary, sufferings depression, do you have advice for people on how to find a way out?
You're a man who has suffered in this way. Perhaps continue to suffer in this way. How do you find a way out?
The first thing I do as a clinician, if someone comes to me and says they're depressed is ask myself a question. Well, what is this person mean by that? So I have to find out like because maybe they're not depressed. Maybe they're hyper anxious or maybe their obsessional. Like there's various forms of powerful negative emotion. So they need to be differentiated. But then the next question you have to ask is, well, are you depressed or do you have a terrible life or is it some combination of the two?
so, if you're depressed,
As far as I can tell, you don't have a terrible life.
You have friends, you have family, you have an intimate relationship, you have a job or a career. Your boat is educated as you should be given your intelligence use your time outside of work wisely. You're not beholden to alcohol or other Temptations. You're engaged in the community in some fundamental sense and all that's working. Now, if you have all that and you're feeling really awful, you're either ill or you're depressed. And so then sometimes there's a biochemical route to that.
Even if that my experience has been as a clinician is, if you're depressed, but you have a life and you take an antidepressant, it will probably help you a lot. Now, maybe you're not depressed. Exactly. You just have a terrible life. What does that look like?
If no relationship, your family is a mess. You've got no friends. Got no plan. Don't know. Job, you use your time outside of work. Not only badly, but destructively you have a drug or alcohol habit or some other Vice pornography. Addiction, you are completely unengaged in the surrounding Community. You have no scaffolding whatsoever to support you in your current mode of being or you move forward. And then as a
Well, you do two things. Well, if it's depression per say, well, like I said, there's sometimes a biochemical root nutritional root. There's ways that can be addressed, it's probably physiological. If you're at least in part if you're depressed, but you have an okay life sometimes, it's conceptual. You can turn to dreams sometimes to help people because dreams contain the seeds of the potential future. And if your person is a real good dreamer, and you can analyze dreams, that can be really helpful, but that seems to only true for more creative.
Of people and for the people who just have a terrible life, it's like, okay, you have a terrible life. Well, let's pick a front. How about you need? How about you need a friend? Like, one sort of friend, do you know how to shake hands and introduce yourself. I'll have the person show me. So let's do it for a sec. So
It's like this. Hi, I'm Jordan. And people don't know how to do that and then they can't even get the ball rolling
for The Listener. George's gave me a firm
handshake? Yeah. As opposed to a dead fish, you know, and there's these Elementary social skills that hypothetically. If you were well, cared for you learned, when you were like three and sometimes people have, I had lots of clients to whom, no, one ever paid any attention and they needed like 10,000 hours of
Tension in some of that was just listening because they had 10,000 hours of conversations. They never had with anyone and they were all tangled up in their head. And they had to just
one client particular, I worked with this person for 15 years and
what she wanted from me was for me just to shut the hell up. For 50 minutes was very hard for me and to just tell me what had happened to her and then what happened at the end of the conversation, then I could discuss a bit with her. And then as we progress through the years, the amount of time that we spent in discussion increased in proportion in this sessions. Until, by the time we stopped seeing each other, when my clinical practice,
We were talking about 80% of the time, but she literally she'd never been attended to properly ever. And so she was an uncarved Block in the Taoist sense, right? She hadn't been subjected to those flaming swords that separated the wheat from the chaff and so you can do that in therapy if you're listening and you're depressed. I would say if you can't find a therapist and that's getting harder and harder because it's
We become illegal to be a therapist now because you have to agree with your clients, which is a terrible thing to do with them just like it's terrible just arbitrarily oppose them. You could do the self authoring program online because it helps you write an autobiography. And so if you have memories that are more than 18 months, old that bother you, when you think them up, part of you is locked inside that a nun. Developed part of you is still trapped in that. That's a
Africa way of thinking about. That's why it still has emotional significance. So you can write about your past experiences, but I would say, wait, for at least 18 months, if something bad has happened to you because otherwise, you just hurt yourself again by encountering it, you can bring yourself up to date with an autobiography. There's an analysis of faults and virtues. That's the present authoring. And then there's guided writing exercise that helps you make a future plan, that's
Young men who do that to go to college young men, who do that, 90 minutes, just the future or three ninety minutes, they're fifty percent less likely to drop out. That's all it takes.
So sometimes depression is the, is this heavy Cloud? That makes it hard to even make a single step towards the door. You said isolate. Make a
friend. Oh man,
sometimes like I step is extremely
difficult. Oh my God. Sometimes it's way worse than that. A guy had clients who were so depressed. He literally couldn't.
Out of bed.
So what's their first step? It's like, can you sit up once today? No.
Can you prop yourself up on your elbows once today? Like you just you scale back the dragon till you find one. That's conquerable that moves you forward. There's there's a rubric for Life scale, back the dragons till you find one conquerable. And it'll give you a little bit of goal.
Commensurate with the struggle, but the plus side of that because that's you think that God, that's depressing. You mean, I have to start by sitting up while you do if you can't sit up. But the plus side of that is, it's the Pareto distribution issue. Is that Aggregates exponentially increase and failures due to, by the way, but Aggregates exponentially increase. So, once you start the ball rolling, it can get zipping along pretty good. This person that I talked about,
Um, was incapable of sitting with me in a cafe. When we first met just talking, even though I was her therapist, but by the end, she was doing stand-up comedy. So, you know, it took years, but still most people won't do stand-up comedy. That's that's quite the bloody achievements you. She would read her poetry on stage too. So for someone who was petrified into paralysis by social anxiety,
And who had to start very small. There's a hell of an accomplishment.
Yeah, it all starts with one step, give advice for young people.
In high school, you give it a lot of people. Look up to you for advice for strength for strength, to search for themselves to find themselves.
Take on some responsibility, do something for other people. You're doing something for yourself, while you're doing that, even if you don't know, it for sure. Cause you're a community across time, find something to serve,
somebody to help someone to help
solve a job to find a job.
Bob, do your best with the customers. Don't be above your job, you're going to get an entry level job when you're a kid or what else would you want? You want to be the boss. What do you know? You don't know anything. You could be the boss of your job, you know, if you're working in a grocery store, you working in a convenience store, assuming you're not working for terrified, tyrants. You can be nice to the customers, you can develop your social skills, you can learn how to handle boss/employee relationship. You can be there in 15 minutes early and leave
15 minutes late. Like you can learn in an entry-level job, man. And I'll tell you, if you take an entry-level job and you learn, and it's a reasonably decent place. You will not be in an entry-level job for long because everyone who's competent is desperate for competent people. And if you go and show yourself as competent, there'll be a trial period. But if you go show yourself as competent, all sorts of doors. You didn't even know we're there. We'll start opening, like, mad
see strive for competence
for craftsmanship. Yeah, yeah, yeah for
Blend. You know I mean I said in one of the chapters my books is is focused on putting your house in order. It's like well how do you start make your bed?
You know, it actually took me quite a long time in my life before I made my bed regularly in the morning. Most of my life was pretty good order, but that was one thing. I didn't have an order, my clothes in my closet, as well. All, that's an order. Not all of it. Cleaning out some drawers right now but
Look around and see what bugs you in your room. Just look. He's like, okay, I'm in my room. Do I like this room know? It bugs me. Okay? Why? Well, the paint's peeling there, and it's dusty there and the carpets dirty. And that Corners kind of ugly in the light, there isn't very good and my clothes closet to mass. So I don't even like to open it. Okay, that's a lot of problems that sucks. That's a lot of opportunity, pick something and fix it.
Something.
Bugs you.
Yeah, but not too much. So it the rule is pick something that you know, would make pick a problem. Pick a solution to it that you know, would help that you could do that, you would do. So, you have to negotiate with yourself. It's like, I won't clean up this room. How do you know? I've been in here for 10 years? And I've never cleaned it up. It's like, well, obviously that's too big, a dragon for you. Would you clean one drawer?
Find out and so imagine. Now you want to be happy when you open that drawer, you think well, that's stupid. It's like, is it?
Maybe it's your sock drawer, which I cleaned up in my room, the other day, by the way, you're going to mold, your an open that every morning, that's like 30 seconds of your life every day. Okay. So that's three minutes a week. That's 12 minutes a month. That's two hours a year. So maybe your life is made out of you. Got 16 hours a day. Let's figure this out. 512 in an hour 12 in an hour 144 in 12 hours. Yeah, let's say
200 205 minute chunks. That's your
life is gentlemen. Jordan Pederson did just some math, how many five minute chunks that are in a day. And I got a t-shirt that's pretty accurate
and it's approximately, right? So you got two hundred five minute chunks and they repeat a lot of them repeat. So if you get every one of those right there, trivial, right? Who cares? What my sock drawer looks like? It's their fair enough, man. But that's your life, the things you repeat every day. The mundane things think I could get all those mundane things, right? That's
The game rules. It's like now all the mundane is in place. Now you can play because all the mundanes in place and this is actually true. So with children, imagine you want your children to play well. Play is very fragile. Neurologically any competing motivation or emotion will suppress play. So everything has to be in order.
Everything has to be a Walled Garden before the children will play. That's a good way of thinking about it, so you put everything in order and you think, oh my God. Now, I'm tyrannized by this order. It's like, no, you are not if it's voluntary and then the order is the precondition for the freedom. And so then all of a sudden you get all these things in order. It's like oh look at this. I've got some room to play here and then then maybe you're not depressed. Now, it's often not that simple. You know it's not that simple. Try putting your room.
In Order, Perfect order that's hard. And
it's a really powerful way to think about those five minute chunks. Just get one of them right in a day.
Yeah, we'll do that for 200 days. Your life is in order. Yeah, you know, I thought I did that with my clients a lot, so a lot of them would come home from work, the guys. Hey, and and their wives would meet them at the door and it'd be a fight right away, you know, and it's a clash there because he comes home, and he's tired and hungry. He's worked all day and he's hoping that, you know, he gets welcomed when he comes back to the home, but then the wife is at home.
And she's been with the kids all day and she's tired and hungry and she's hoping that when he comes home, he'll show her some appreciation for what's happened today and then they clash. And then they both have problems to discuss because they've had their troubles during the day. And so then every time they get together, they are not like it's a bit of a fight for 20 minutes and then the whole evening is screwed. And so, then you think, okay, here's the deal.
It's knock and the door will open. Okay you get to pick how what happens when you come home but you have figure out what it is. So now this is the deal. You treat yourself properly, you imagine coming home and it goes the way you want and need it to go. Okay. What does that look like? You get to have it but you have to know what it is. What does it look like? And you think, okay, I want to come home. I want to be happy about coming home. I come home. I hope in the
Or I say hello, honey, I'm home my wife says hi, it's so nice to hear your voice. She comes up. She says,
Hi dear, she gives you a hug. She says, how was your day? And you say, well, we'll sit and talk about that. How was your day? Well, we'll sit and talk about that. Do you need something to eat? Probably, let's go. Sit and talk about our day. It's like that sounds pretty good. Okay. That sounds pretty good. Might not be perfect, but sounds a hell of a lot better than what we're doing now. So, how about we go talk to? We'll go talk to your wife, say, okay, this is what's happening. When I come home, I would like it.
Better. What would you like to have happen?
If you could have what you wanted. And so she sits down and she thinks, okay, if he comes home, what do I want to have happen? And then now you got two visions and you say, well what would you like? And you listen and she says, what would you like? And you tell her and then you think, okay, now can we bring these Visions together? So not only do we both get what we want, but because we've brought them together even get more than we want. Well, who wouldn't agree to that, unless they were even down. And that's so exciting. It's not a compromise, it's a union.
Of ideals. That's even makes a better ideal and then you get to come home. And then then there's another rule that goes along with that which is please dear have the grace to allow me to do this stupid lie and badly. Well, I learn at least 20 times, yeah, and all give you the same leeway and then we'll practice stupidly for 20 times, and we'll talk about it and then maybe we'll get it right for the next 10,000 times, right?
And you can do that with your hope. You can do that with your whole life and you can do that with your kids and you can do that with your family like it's not easy but you can do it's a lot easier than the alternative
the mask for some dating advice from Jordan Peterson. How do you find on that topic? The love of your
life? That's a good question. I was asked that multiple times on my tour three times in a row. In fact because we ask people to use this slide 0 Gadget, that's a popular question.
very, it always came up to the top and I got asked that three times in a row and I didn't have a good answer and then I thought
why don't I have a good answer? I thought. Oh, I know why, because that's a stupid question. So why? Yeah, why because it's it's putting the cart before the horse. Here's the right question.
How do I make myself into the perfect date?
You answer that question and you will not have any problem, answering the previous question. It's like what I want in a partner? Hmm. If I offered everything I could do a partner, who would I be you? Work on that. Ask that question, just ask just ask yourself. Okay. I have to be the person that women would want.
Okay, what do they want?
Clean. That's not a bad start.
Reasonably good physical shape. So healthy
Productive. Generous honest.
Willing to delay gratification. So you dance with the woman. It's like what she doing? What are you two doing? Well, it's a patterned, your there's patterns happening around you. That's the music patterns patterns of being, that's the music now. Can you align yourself with the patterns of being gracefully? That's what she's checking out and then, can you do that with her?
And then, can you do that in a playful and attentive Manner and keep your bloody hands to yourself for at least a minute. And so, can you dance in a playful manner? It's like, you can go through this and your imagination and, you know, you'll know, you know, and then you think well how far am I from those things? And the answer is usually man, it's pretty horrible. Abyss separating you from that ideal but the harder you work on.
Offering other people what they need and want, the more people will line up to play with you. So it's the wrong question. It's like how can I be the best partner possible? And then you think, well if I do that, people are just take advantage of me and that's the non naive objection, right? Because the naive person saying, well, I'll be good and everyone will treat me, right? It's like the cynic says, no I'll be good in someone will.
Take me out and then you think we'll what do you do about that objection? And the answer is well, you factor that in. That's why you're supposed to be, what is it as soft as a dove and as wise as a serpent, it's like, I know you're full of snakes. I know it. Maybe I know it more than you do.
But we'll play anyways,
and that's the risk. Anyway,
that's right voluntarily, right? It's like, and what's so cool about that? Is that even though the person you're dealing with is full of snakes, if you offer your hand in trust and it's real, you will evoke the best in them. Yeah. And that's true, even I've dealt with people who were pretty damn criminal and pretty Psychopathic and sometimes dangerously so,
You tread very lightly when you're dealing with someone like that especially if they're intoxicated and even then your best bet is that alert trust. It's the it's the only fact. The only thing I know that
The guy had one client, who is a paranoid? He was paranoid psychopath, that's a bad combination. He was a bad guy man. He had like, for restraining orders on him and restraining orders. Don't work on the sort of people that you put restraining order so on and he used to be harassed now. And then by, you know, a bureaucrat in a bank with with delusions of power and he would say to them, he used to kind of act this out to me. When I was talking to him he'd say,
I'm going to be your worst nightmare and he meant it. Yeah. And he would do it, hid this. Obsessional Psychopathic Vengeance. That was just like right there. Paranoid to the hilt and paranoid. People are hyperacute. So they're watching you for any sign of
Deceit or manipulation. And they're really good at it because like they're 100% full. That's what paranoia is, its 100% focus on that. And even under those circumstances if you step carefully enough you can, maybe you can avoid the ax. That's a good thing to know, if you ever meet someone truly
dangerous.
Absolutely, I believe in that being fragile, nevertheless, taking that leap of trust towards another person, even when they're dangerous, especially when they're dangerous, if you care, if there's something there in those Hills, you want to find that. It's, that's probably the only way you're going to find is taking that risk. I have to ask you about Gulag archipelago by solzhenitsyn that speak to this very Point. There's so many
Layers to this book. We could talk about it forever. I'm sure in many ways. We are talking about it forever, but there is sort of one of the themes captured in the few ways. Those described in the book is that line between good and evil? Then runs through every human being as the rights the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being during the life of any heart. This line keeps changing Place, sometimes it is
Squeezed one way to exuberant evil and sometimes it's shift to allow enough space for good to flourish one and the same human being is a various ages under various circumstances, a totally different human being at times. He's close to being a devil at times the sainthood. But his name doesn't change and to that name with grab the whole lot of good and evil. What do you think about this line? What do you think about this thing? Where we talked about if you give
A chance to actually bring out the best in them. What do you think about this other aspect that throughout time that lines shifts inside each person and you get to Define that shift? What do you think about this line? Are we all capable of
evil?
Well, you know, the cosmic drama that's Satan versus Christ. It's like, well, who's that about? If it's not about you, I'm speaking just as a psychologist or is the literary critic. Those are characters at least they're that. Well, are they human characters? Well, obviously, well, are they archetypal human characters?
Yes. What does that mean? Cosmically and ontologically? I don't know. I guess the world is story.
Maybe but the way stories are often
told as the characters
embody dining tables. Are those are unsophisticated not great literature though. It's very rare and great literature. What you have in great literature generally is the internal drama right in as the literature becomes more pop. I would say the characters are more unitary so there's a real bad guy and he's all bad and there's a real good guy and he's all good.
And that's not as interesting, it's not as sophisticated When You Reach Dostoyevsky and Heights in literary representation or Shakespearean Heights.
You can identify with the villain. And that's that's when literature really reaches, its Pinnacle in some sense.
And also the characters change throughout the shift Rod aren't predictable throughout taking the speaking of Russia, more seriously recently. And I've got to talk to translators of the co skin Tolstoy and Chekhov, and those kinds of folks, and you get to one of the mistakes that translators made with the CFC, for the longest time.
Is they would quote, unquote fix the chaotic mess? That is Dostoevsky because there was a sense, like he was too rushed in his writing. It seemed like there is tangents that had nothing to do with anything. The characters were unpredictable, not inconsistent, there's parts of phrases that seem to be incomplete that kind of stuff. And what they realize that is, that's not that's actually crafted that way. It's not it's you know it's like editing James.
Jewish like Finnegans Wake or something because it doesn't make any sense. They realized that that is the magic of it, that captures the humanity of these characters that they are and predictable. They change their all-time there's a bunch of contradictions on which point I got to ask. Is there a case to be made that Brothers? Karamazov is the greatest book ever written.
Yeah there is a case to be made for that. I don't know. Is it better than Crime and Punishment? Yes. Yeah you think so why do you I'm not arguing with? Why do you think that?
This is every book is a personal some of my best friends are inside that
book. Yeah, it's an amazing book and there's no doubt about
it. I think it's some books are defined by your personal relationship with them and that one was definitive. And I almost graduated to that one because for the longest time, the idiot was my favorite book of all. Because, identified with the ideas represented by Prince myshkin. I also
identify, oh, that's interesting.
To Prince myshkin as a human
being, holy fool, the
fool it, because the world kind of my whole life, still kind of sees. Me saw me in my perception, in my narrow perception, is kind of the fool and I different from the interpretation. That a lot of people take of this book. I see him as a kind of hero to be definitely be a naive, quote-unquote fool but really just the
Now, you've Optimist and they even the best possible way. I do believe that that's a child like yeah, childlike is a better. So, naive is usually seen as
its childish now.
Yeah. But child,
like, that's why no one enters the Kingdom of Heaven, unless they become like a child, that's Prince, myshkin Dostoyevsky, knew that, so, that's why he liked the idiot. That's so interesting. See, I think I like Crime and Punishment because you are you identified with Michigan. I think I identified
Fide more with raskolnikov's because I was tempted by luciferian. Intellect, you know, and and in in the manner that in a manner, very similar to the manner, he was tempted. But I mean I think I think you could make a case that the brothers crime is obvious. Dostoevsky's crowning achievement. Well, that's something man. All right, he ruined literature for me.
Because everything else just felt insipid afterwards. Not everything, not everything. I found some books that in my experience, hit that Pinnacle the Master and Margarita.
That's a deadly book. I read that I think four times and I still there, still. It's unbelievably deep. There's a Nichols Kazan, circus, Greek writer. Some of his books are
His writing is amazing as
well. Did you ever connect with the literary like existential is Camus or people like Hermann Hesse a or or even Kafka you ever connect with those to
the same degree yet to the same enough to be an influence.
You know, you have to be deaf in some fundamental sense, not to encounters a great dead friend, and failed to learn. No, and, I mean, I tried to separate the wheat from the chaff. When I read, you know, and I read all the great clinicians all of them, perhaps not those who are foremost in the pantheon and I tried to pull out what I could. And that was a lot. I learned a lot from Freud, I learned a lot from Rogers and I learned a lot from well, from Dostoyevsky in nature.
I'm going to do a course on dos dÃas can need you for this Peterson Academy. This is coming up in January,
although be damaged. Really other forward to it. You're weaving.
I thought about doing them together. Oh, that'd be fun. That's a good idea. Well they're good.
There's an
entry of that idea. You often weave them
together they masterfully because there is a there is religious in the broad sense of that word themes throughout the writing of
both. Yeah.
There is uncanny parallelisms in their writing and their lives. So and Dorothy has keys deeper than nature, but that's because he was a writer of fiction.
Nietzsche is almost a character in a dusty.
Yes, he is definitely that he's definitely that yes. And apparently deechi knew more about Dostoevsky than people had thought there's been some recent scholarship on that grounds Dostoyevsky didn't know anything about Nietzsche. As far as I know, I could be wrong about that. But the thing that
Dostoyevsky had over Nietzsche's. Nietzsche had to make things propositional in some real sense because he was a philosopher and it's hard to proposition lies. Things that are outside your Ken, but you can characterize them. And so, in the brothers karamazov Ivan is a more developed character than alyosha in in in the explicit sense, he can make better arguments, but I'll OSHA winds like Michigan because he's the better man and Dostoyevsky
Show that in the actions rather he can't render it entirely propositional but that's probably because what's good, can't be rendered, entirely propositional and so dusty, has he had that edge over Nietzsche said well Ivan is This brilliant rationalist atheist materialist and puts forward an argument on that front that's still unparalleled as far as I'm concerned and overwhelms alyosha who cannot respond? But alyosha still the better man. So which is very interesting, you know, that
what
You know, the funny thing about those two characters is you, Jordan Pederson seem to be somebody that at least in part it embodies both because you are one of the intellectuals of our time, rigorous and thought, but also are able to have that kind of owed. You describe, if you remove the religiosity of inertia, there's a what's a good word, love towards the
wall Spirit of encouragement. Yes.
which one develops its, you know, one of the things I did learn perhaps, from looking into the abyss to the degree that I have had to or was willing to
Was that at some level you have to make a fundamental statement of faith when God creates the world. After each day, he says he saw that. It was good. You think well? Is it good? It's like well, there's a tough question. I mean, oh, do you want to bring a child into a world? Such as this, which is a fundamental question of whether or not it's good.
It's an Act of Faith to declare that, it's good because the evidence is ambivalent. And so, then you think okay, well,
Am I going to act as if it's good? And what would happen if I did? And maybe the answer to that is I think this is the answer.
The more you act out the proposition that it's good, the better. It gets
And so that Dusty of ski said, this is something else. Every man is not only responsible for everything he does, but for everything everyone else does. It's like,
What is that profounder you just insane? Don't you think?
Is what you receive back proportionate, what you deliver.
And the answer to that might be. Yes, that's terrifying idea. And and it certainly, you can see that it's true in some sense because people certainly respond to you in kind with how you treat them. That's certainly the
case and it's terrifying and it's exciting. Yeah,
right. But it's an adventure, isn't it?
You. Yeah, you create the World, by the way, you live it. The the
Experiences is defined by the way, you live that world, and that's really, that's really interesting. And then taken as a collective, we create the world together in that way. Yeah. What do you think is the meaning of it all? What's the meaning of life? Jordan Pederson. You've, we've defined it many many times throughout this
conversation the adventure, along the Route, man,
And I would say Where's that adventure? To be found in faith. What's the faith? The highest value is love and truth is its handmaiden.
That's a statement of faith, right? Because you can't tell
you have to act it out to see if it's if it's true. And so you can't even find out without and that's so peculiar. You have to make the commitment, a priori. Yeah. It's like a marriage. It's the same thing. It's like, well, is this the person for me? Oh, that's the wrong question. How do I find out if this is the person for me by binding myself to them?
Well, maybe the same thing is true of life, right? You bind yourself to it and that tighter you bind yourself to it, the more you find out what it is and that's like a radical Embrace. And it's a really radical embraced. That's the crucifix symbol and more than that. Because like I said, the full passion story isn't death, it isn't even unjust death. It isn't even unjust death and the crucifixion of the innocent which is really getting pretty bad.
Bad, it's unjust torturous.
Innocent death attendant upon betrayal and tyranny followed by hell well, that's a hell of a thing to radically. I'm embrace, it's like Bring it on.
I think a lot of people put truth, is the highest ideal and think they can get to that ideal while living in a place of cynicism and ultimately escape from Life, in hiding from Life, afraid of life.
And it says beautifully. Put that love is the highest ideal to reach for and Truth
is it's handmade. I try thought about that for a long time, right? This hierarchy of Ideal and the thing about truth that bitter truth. Let's say that cynical truth is it can break the shackles of naivety and actually a burnt cynicism is a moral improvement, over a blind naivety.
Even though one is in some ways positive but only because it's protected and the other is bitter and dark but still better but you're not done at that point. You're just barely started. It's like you're cynical. You're not cynical enough.
It's like how cynical are you, are you? I'm an off switch prison guard level of cynical.
Because you have to be, you have to go down pretty deep into the weeds before you find that part of you but you can find it if you want and then you think, well I want to stop this.
Well, that was the question. You posed in some sense. You're obsessed with say, what happened on these Mass scale, catastrophes in caught in the communist countries. It's like, well, millions of people participated so you could have and maybe you would have enjoyed it. So what part of that is you and you can find it if you want
It's all there. The prisoner the interrogator, the Judas,
Pontius Pilate,
all of it, all of it, and it's all of his is inside us. Yeah, you just have to look. And once you do, maybe eventually you can find the love during your an incredible human being. I'm deeply honored. You would talk to me. Thank you for being a truth. Seeker in this world and thank you for the
love. Hey thanks for the invitation
ma'am.
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Jordan Pederson, the support this podcast please. Check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you with some words from Friedrich Nietzsche. You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star.
Thank you for listening and hope to see you next
time.
