Supplementary Material 26: Flint Dibble Interview, Bonding over Outgroup Hate, and Manly Sycophancy
We project our insecurities onto the gurusphere, wallowing in our inadequacy to bond over shared hatred of outgroups, and interview Flint Dibble along the way.Supplementary Material 2600:00 Introduction and Greetings01:53 Ol' Squeaky and Lex's horny poems05:11 Eric Weinstein is still waiting for the call09:26 Interview with Flint Dibble11:05 Introduction and Catching Up12:19 Joe Rogan and Public Perception14:57 Hypocrisy and Slander16:05 Graham Hancock and Neo-Nazi Connections22:08 Upcoming Exposé on Joe Rogan23:03 Pyramids of Giza: New Claims24:45 Debunking the Mega Structures Theory25:20 The Researchers Behind the Claims28:21 Scientific Methods and Evidence31:58 Conclusion on Pyramids and Science35:13 Gurusphere Dynamics37:47 Pseudo-Archaeology and Public Perception46:11 Mr. Beast's Egypt Adventure50:36 The Role of Pseudo-Archaeology in Conspiracy Theories58:50 Post-Interview Discussion59:53 Trump's Tariffs and Economic Impact01:04:30 The Amazing Tariff Formula01:09:45 Geoffrey Miller's 9D Chess Theory of the Tariffs01:13:30 Contrapoints Conspiracy Video01:14:55 Some things Matt will not mention on Tariffs01:17:35 QAnon Anonymous on Graham Hancock01:22:33 Some Other News covers Joe Rogan01:30:13 Ryan Beard's Destiny Content Nuke01:32:33 The Studies Show covers Conspiracies01:33:53 Hasan argues for tariffs01:37:40 Back to Rogan and Chris Williamson01:39:21 Critically Reviewing Cory Clark's Study01:47:58 Incestuous Bro Podcasts and Legacy Media Struggles01:53:00 Bonding over outgroup hatred and Criticism Capture02:02:04 USAid is funding the attacks on Tesla!02:07:56 Trump's Badass Son humilates Biden02:10:28 Tribal Hypocrisy02:11:52 Joe Smashes All Your Paradigms!02:14:59 The villain, Sam Harris criticizes the hero, Lex Fridman02:20:18 Does Lex speak to EVERYONE?02:23:44 Concluding Thoughts from Maladjusted HatersThe full episode is available for Patreon subscribers (2hr 25 mins).Join us at: https://www.patreon.com/DecodingTheGurusSourcesArchaeology with Flint Dibble- Megastructures under Giza Pyramids⁉️ ARCHAEOLOGY REWRITTEN or viral 💩?Piers Morgan episode with Flint and Milo RossiJoe Rogan Experience #2293 - Chris WilliamsonQAnon Anonymous: Graham Hancock’s Ancient Apocalypse (E318)Contrapoints: ConspiracyThe Studies Show: Conspiracy TheoriesWhat "Happened" To Joe Rogan? - SOME MORE NEWSMen's Health: Joe Rogan Responds to the Controversy Surrounding His 'Endorsement' of Bernie SandersRyan Beard: Content Nuke Destiny<a...
Hello and welcome to Decoding the Guru's supplementary materials with the anthropologist /psychologist Christopher Kavanagh, that's me, and the pure psychologist opposite me,
Matthew Bryan.
G'day, Matt.
G'day.
Watcha, watcha.
Hello, Chris.
Nice to see you again.
I've missed you.
It's been, what, 48 hours?
Too long.
That's right.
Have you been keeping well?
Have you been exercising?
You know, the listeners want the Doma.
They need to know.
Are you trying to initiate small talk with me, Chris?
I guess.
Yeah, I've been good.
I've been swimming every single morning, Monday to Friday.
I swim my 1.5 kilometers at least, sometimes more.
And I feel a better man for it.
I still am fat, more fat than I'd like to be.
Basically, everything south of the equator is basically a no-go zone.
The shoulders and the pecs, as they say, look at okay.
In between, around my belly button, is basically a demilitarized zone.
Yeah, that's the way to think about it.
You say you've been doing well, Matt, and it sounds like, you know, you're working out, you're doing that kind of thing, but I can see there's something very wrong with the situation currently.
I can hear it as well.
Screepy, not my soul.
Isn't that old Squeaky?
What's he doing there?
Shouldn't he be?
I love old Squeaky.
He's so comfortable.
You gotta get him out.
You gotta get him out.
Rotate that guy.
Bye, Squeaky.
Yeah, for the visual, I'll say Matt stood up.
Rippling muscles.
You know, your body, it's like a barrel of snakes.
Oh, yes.
Yes, indeed.
How can you never praise me?
Like Lex.
I wrote you a little song.
Hold on.
Let me just get out my banjo and I'll sing your ditty.
Shoulders for miles, curly hair like a weave from Niagara Falls.
That's Matt Brown.
Yeah.
People find that very cringeworthy, Matt.
And well, they might.
I don't know.
If Joe Rogan can get a song, I don't see why I should have one.
Well, you'd have to have me sing it.
But the thing that I liked the best was that someone on the Patreon, they were trying to parse the lyrics.
And they thought, I just love this.
They thought that Lex's, you know, Lex's story was that he met someone in the desert who was telling him about this guy, Joe Rogan, he should listen to.
And he said, you know, Joe Rogan, Joe Rogan, barrel of snakes for a pack.
And they thought that that was him proposing a trade.
Where he would, like, give a barrel of snakes for Joe Rogan's back.
And they were confused, like, why would anybody want the barrels?
And it's like, no, he's describing the contours of the musculature that he observes on Joe Rogan's back.
So, yeah, like you say, why don't people write songs like that for me?
Now, remind me, Chris, is Lex Friedman, is he the one where they unearthed a bunch of cringeworthy poetry?
Oh, yes, yes.
That's him, isn't it?
I had a lot of funny poems on me, and he posted.
So, yeah, and it was, they were so bad.
I mean, I'm no poetry connoisseur, but even I could tell this was bad.
You know, it was a kind of poetry that you might write as an angsty 15-year-old, you know, scroll away in your journal, but the timeline made it that Lex had read them.
Like, I think it was in his 30s when he did it.
So, yeah.
Yeah, and my recollection is they weren't sexy in a wholesome way.
Oh, no.
Yeah, a bit serial killer.
That's the vibe you got.
Lex is just like that, though, isn't he?
That's generally his vibe.
It's like, you know, I'm out of peace.
I love you all, but he might...
Be loving you while wearing your skin.
That's the thing.
And what does he want?
Does he want the skin, Joe Rogan?
It's not clear.
But now, Matt, we've got like a special supplementary material here.
There's a special treat for everyone.
But before we get to that, I do have a little snippet.
And this is for you, Matt.
This is purely to start you off on the right food because I know you're going to enjoy this.
Okay?
Here's a short clip.
From a guru of note, touching on a topic that they often do.
Let's see how you feel about this.
We are fighting this hybrid war, as you say, and we're completely unprepared for the communications, for the PR, for the comms of this war.
They've also got 30 years ahead of us in this.
I mean, when you think about 40?
I'm not sure what you're saying.
Why do you decide?
They're not that far ahead of you.
You're just not...
Qatar hasn't been poisoning the minds of academia and press for the last 20 years.
You're just not putting your shoulder to the wheel.
I agree.
My feeling about this is that I know individuals who are having more effect than the state.
I kept saying, is no one going to call any of us?
You have all sorts of people with very large...
No, look, you just have to take it.
You screwed up.
Period.
The end.
That's it.
I recognize the voice.
It's Eric Weinstein.
Correct.
Bingo.
Is he talking to an Israeli politician or something?
Yeah, maybe not a politician, but like a spokesperson or somebody.
You know, they're discussing how Israel has lost the kind of public image war since October 7th.
And Eric's advice is like, well, Of course, it's not like you didn't have to do that.
But the problem is, you didn't call anyone with large followings online.
There were phones that were not ringing down.
Who could he be suggesting that they needed to call?
Yeah, we have to put this in the special display rack, straight to the pool room, as Australians like to say.
There's a special display piece of instances where Eric is complaining that the powers that be are not calling him, are not sending the helicopters, the black helicopters to land on the lawn, usher him out, straight to the White House.
He's got his jacket on.
He's ready to go to sort out whatever the current thing is.
Yeah.
For those keeping tally, he recently said to Dave Rubin, Bobby Kennedy got called.
Nobody's calling me from the Trump administration.
Like, where's my call?
And then, you know, Dave Rubin memorably asked, like, what can you do?
When Dave Rubin is skeptical of your claims, you're in trouble.
You're in big trouble.
So there was that.
And then there was also...
Before that, you may remember during COVID, and this was the origin of Eric talking about why he's wearing a jacket at all times, he was talking about how not him, not any of his podcast friends were being called up by the Biden administration or the Trump administration before that.
They were not flown out to try and address how to solve the coronavirus, how to address, you know, the public health issues.
There was no one.
They called Eric.
It's as if they didn't want to resolve the situation.
So this is just a nuller in the long lines of governments and officials feeling to make use of the rarest, most precious resource that they have.
Eric Weinstein.
I miss Eric because, you know, we've recently been looking at Chris Langen.
He was also being filled with grievance, who also has his bespoke custom-made physics theory.
But, you know, fair dues.
Eric is a much more sophisticated version.
At least he's somewhat subtle about it compared to Chris Langan.
So, you know, I appreciate the art.
I appreciate the art.
Yeah.
Now, Matt, that was just an aperitif because now the listeners are going to be Provided a rare treat, which is an interview.
We don't usually, we haven't had interviews in quite a while, but we don't usually put, you know, interviews in this.
But this seems a good place to put it.
The supplementary materials, they're popular.
So this is an interview with archaeologist Flint Dibble.
But, fair warning, it's only conducted with 50% of the decoding, the gurus.
And why would that be, Matt?
Is that because I'm an egomaniac who demands that I'm the only one to speak to interviewees?
No, no, that's not true, Chris.
But, you know, you're questioning my commitment to the podcast and I will say that it is vigorous and it is sound.
I don't like the implication, but it is true that the interview was held at an ungodly hour at night.
I don't remember what time, but it was past my bedtime.
And I would have liked to speak to Flint Dibble.
In fact, I suggested it.
That's right.
I suggested it.
I said we have to get Flint Dibble back on.
But you actioned it.
This is true.
That's it.
Well, like Matt, the rest of you are going to be able to hear Flint and he's going to talk about the recent revelations with the Pyramid, you know, his experiences since being on Rogan and so on.
So join us, won't you, on the flip side of the interview.
And Matt, you listen too, okay?
Alright, okay.
We'll be here when you get back.
So, I'm here with friend of the podcast, Flint Devil, archaeologist extraordinaire.
It's been a little while, and Matt is not here again, Flint, because it's past his bedtime.
He's an old guy.
He goes to bed.
But we are young pups.
We're vital and rearing to go.
So perhaps it's better this way.
It's one-on-one.
But before we get to the reason, the main reason I've asked you to come and talk to us, how have you been?
How's things?
You haven't appeared on Rogan since.
Strangely, I noticed you haven't been invited back since then.
Lots of other people have come on to talk about you.
Yeah, I mean, you know, some of that harassment that we covered and you guys just put out a video about that, that is still going on.
Joe Rogan even mentioned me yet again on this podcast this last week.
With Chris Williamson.
Yeah, exactly, with Chris Williamson.
And so I'm actually, I've decided I've had enough.
I'm working on a video to sort of show the hypocrisy here.
And so I'm working on it.
It's going to come out in mid-April.
For the one-year anniversary for when I was on Joe Rogan.
So I hope everybody will come check it out on my channel.
And the reality is that what I've realized is when I met Joe Rogan, I realized he's actually a fairly smart guy.
He was able to follow a complex conversation very clearly, able to ask complex, nuanced questions about it.
And this is something I've talked to the public a lot.
That shows that he's a smart dude.
Right?
And so he knows what he's doing.
And one of the things that he recently had on this one guy who slanders me a lot, Dan Richards.
And in that conversation, not only did they talk about me and slandering me, but Rogan brought up how the issue with Kamala Harris appearing on his podcast.
And he brought up that there was this new book that came out and it presented a wrong picture of the conversations between Rogan's team and Kamala's team.
And what he said is, he said, look, I'm right here.
If you want to get the truth about this, you should come and ask me, because I'm there.
And it's like, but he does not have the fucking fortitude or the testicles to go and ask me, who we had a very friendly, congenial conversation.
And so I sent an email request to him a couple months ago asking to go on and clear my name, and I've now seen his reply.
And so that's what my video is going to be about, is the response from Joe Rogan to me.
And I'm going to cover just exactly how this has gone down and what this has meant for me.
And I hope that it shines a spotlight on Joe as a person, because I think he sometimes is not seen in what I would consider the right light by the media.
Sometimes he's just seen as a kind of bumbling buffoon, and I don't see him that way.
I think he acts in a very calculated manner in what he does.
Yeah, well, a point that I definitely agree with is that there's a lot of calculated presentation and disclaimers and, you know, strategic portrayals whenever it's necessary, when there's a certain amount of blowback or this kind of thing.
So I don't think Joe's stupid in that regard.
I do, however, think that he's like...
What would be the way to say it?
I feel that whether or not he's smart and able to follow things, he fairly often returns to fairly stupid heuristics.
So you might not be a stupid person, but you are behaving stupidly.
So I kind of think that he genuinely...
Really wants to believe in Graham Hancock and other people like him, what they present.
And that in the time that they talk to you together, he could see some of the flaws.
But as soon as he could get back into the psychological comfort zone of having people tell him what he wanted to hear and that actually you were deceiving him and whatnot, he ran with that.
And I will also say on the issue of hypocrisy that...
Particular interview he did with Chris Williamson, although you were a topic in it, not for a huge section of it, but we actually have an episode we've already recorded specifically on the issue about hypocrisy.
And you were the jumping off point in there from a discussion.
I'm sure you'll cover this, but that went from...
You know, it's really terrible when you smear your enemies.
The way Graham Hancock has been smeared by Flint, there was a white supremacist, blah, blah, blah.
That's beyond the pale.
In the space of about two minutes, they were on to talking about how academics are all absorbed by the milkmine virus and being funded by the CCP to undermine Western values.
It was insane.
And the other thing I will say that's on that video that we put out, there was...
Video.
I think it was the Daily Mail or I can't remember the newspaper that covered it.
Yeah.
Daily Express.
Yeah.
Daily Express.
So not like, you know, a famously left-leaning outlet, but they had a neo-Nazi, hard right, whatever, the brand of, you know, terrible people.
And they were openly talking.
About how useful Graham Hancock's book is, how they find it good for onboarding people.
And so much so that Graham Hancock had to issue a response, right?
Saying that he denounces these to his credit, he did do that.
But that is exactly the thing that you were talking about.
And to be honest...
I knew about that video because Stephanie Holmhofer in Canada, she's a PhD candidate studying pseudo-archaeology.
She had a book chapter that came out that reviewed that video, a peer-reviewed book chapter, and reviewed another open white supremacist who, again, used Hancock for recruitment materials.
I have personally found a third one, a neo-Nazi newspaper, where an anonymous author has said that using Graham Hancock's ideas are useful for recruitment.
And then you know that the former president of the American Nazi party actually writes books on Atlantis and stuff like this.
This is not like a uncommon isolated thing.
I don't want to name any of these people because I don't want to give any attention to rando neo-Nazis for a wide variety of reasons, right?
And so there's no reason to do that.
And what I find even more hypocritical is that the people that criticize me of painting Hancock as a white supremacist Dan Richards, in that same episode I talked about earlier where he was talking about Joe Rogan, he brought up another neo-Nazi who has a decent-sized YouTube channel.
Who also uses these kind of arguments and named him on Rogan.
And then for the next few days, these guys attacked that neo-Nazi who was trying to defend himself on Twitter.
So they know that there are these overt white supremacists, some of them are Nazis, some of them are not, but they're white nationalists, white supremacists, neo-Nazis, et cetera, that use this version of false history in order to promote a racist agenda and to recruit people towards racism.
And so they're critiquing me for bringing up something that they know.
So that's just outright lying and slandering in order to defame me.
And so that's really what they're doing.
And it's very disappointing, you know, for someone like Joe or Lex, who invited me on his podcast and then ghosted me, or Danny Jones, who somehow randomly invented the claim when he had Dan Richards and Jimmy Corsetti on that I somehow accused Graham Hancock of being a Nazi.
I've never done that.
I have always said...
In print and in oral conversations that it is other, more overt racists who are taking these ideas and twisting them into real overt racism and that what this is is a stepping path towards that.
And you can see that if you go see Jimmy Corsetti's responses, you can see neo-Nazis in the comments trying to recruit from him, from his following.
On the last interview we did with you as well, you know, you were exactly clear.
Now, everything I've seen where you've talked about this specific issue, you've always made it like crystal clear what you're saying and what you're not saying, right?
So it's the same thing, you know, like if Rogan is going to apply that standard, then he asked you, are you saying, you know, like you're trying to paint Graham as a neo-Nazi and you said, no, I'm not.
And I've never said that, and I'm not saying that now.
You've said it on, like, when he's not there, like on our show, where, you know, we're not very sympathetic to Graham Hancock, and neither of us is now saying he is a neo-Nazi.
The argument originally and before is that, like, racists and white supremacists make use of that material.
And then, actually, I remember on the Rogan that you presented that as, this should be a point that we both...
Agree on.
Like that we can both, you know, join hands and be like, screw those guys.
That's not what we're saying.
That's not what the point is.
And yeah, it gets ended up like being an attack.
Because it just struck me that like Graham Hancock was kind of saying, you know, this doesn't happen, Flint.
This is, you know, this is really, you shouldn't be doing this.
Then he needs to go and make a public apology, you know, kind of denouncing it.
Right.
But Rogan.
Talks about it like, oh, Flint, just smearing Graham, talking about these white supremacists and stuff, and him and Chris Williamson were talking about it.
But it's after that article was out, where Graham Hancock has made a statement.
And it's just so well documented that these ideas actually come out of fucking Nazi Germany as well.
Like, you know, this idea of this sort of lost civilization which shows swastikas and the Aryans are descended from them.
That is still being published in books, like I said, written by the former president of the American Nazi Party, Frank Collins.
And he's no longer a Nazi, apparently, but he still writes these ideas.
And it's just like, you know, this kind of stuff is fairly popular in an undercurrent of Atlantis things because of the research done by 1930s Nazis archaeologists that tried to promote this idea to claim land all over the world,
saying that the Aryans had the right to rule.
And so it's just like...
This stuff is so easily documented through history down to today, and yet what they want to do is they just want to turn it into some culture wars, I'm being canceled bullshit.
And it's like, you know, that's their goal so that they can then use it to try to smear me and take away credit for what I'm saying because I'm just trying to paint everybody as racist.
And it's like, no, I'm trying to call out the actual racist, but I'm trying to say, hey, you need to realize how your work is being received.
If you are being misinterpreted by racists as writing Third Reich archaeology, as the people in the video you guys showed on your channel showed, well then, that should be a problem.
If actual neo-Nazis think that your book is Third Reich archaeology, you should have an issue with that.
You know, like, which he does, thankfully, but he should recognize that those are his enemies, not people like me.
Yeah.
They're the ones that turn that in that way.
Well, that's a cheerful start.
For anyone listening, make sure to look up my channel mid-April, April 15th, April 16th.
I'm going to have what I hope will be the ultimate expose of this situation here that really shows, I think, I hope that reveals Joe Rogan more for who he truly is.
I think I have a take on him that's a little unique because what's happened to me has been so obvious and disingenuous that it really opens up the floodgates for trying to look at some of his other statements in a different way, if you see what I mean.
Yeah, and we actually have a video from back in the pandemic where he did a kind of public mea culpa apology video, which was lauded by people like Sam Harris and whatnot, and we kind of dissected it and showed.
It was like kind of masterclass in doublespeak and, you know, non-apology apology.
So maybe there are similar themes there for anybody interested.
But the reason I have you here today, although it was covered in Joe Rogan, again, with Chris Williamson, but he is not the primary outlet for this, at least yet, I don't think.
Probably an important note.
But there was a press release or a research.
People or maybe not a research paper or something claiming that the pyramids of Giza underneath them, they have discovered some huge megastructures and that this revolutionizes what we thought like the pyramids are just the tip of the iceberg.
There's huge structures all the way down.
I've heard many guru types talking about it.
And so I wanted to come see you, you know, because this is going to be the Yeah, so look, I mean, my goal is to get ahead of all this.
So what I've already done is I've already submitted a permit to the Ministry of Antiquities in Egypt to do drilling.
We're going to set up an actual oil rig, and we're going to actually have to go at an angle under the pyramids in order to discover what's there.
where you know we are worried that it might damage the pyramids themselves because when you do drill two kilometers down it destroys the landscape but I think it's worth it I think it's worth destroying the pyramids to understand
Presumably this...
This is funded by Big Archaeology.
Oh, of course.
And crowdfunding.
Please, guys, go.
Type in Flint Dibbles.
Contribute money on Kofi and Patreon so that we can go buy an oil rig.
No.
The reality is that this is the biggest load of horse shit that I've seen in a while.
And I've seen some more shit.
This is actually my second time in my life getting to watch a whole new archaeological conspiracy theory take off.
And this one is like kind of wild in certain ways.
It's kind of wild because two of the main researchers on the team are actual scientists, which is in its own right a little wild.
Actual archaeologists?
No, no, God no.
They're not actual archaeologists.
No, no, no, no.
They're not archaeologists in the least.
But they are actual scientists with degrees in peer-reviewed publications.
The leader of the team is a guy named Corrado Malanga, and he is a former professor in chemistry at the University of Pisa.
He's published a whole wide range of articles on organic chemistry.
But when it comes to archaeology, he has published books such as...
So, aliens and demons in the past in Egypt.
So, Cheops.
So, Cheop is another name for Khufu, the pharaoh buried in the Great Pyramid.
So, Khufu and the making of immortality.
So, he is a straight-up ancient aliens dude.
He believes in aliens and demons when it comes to archaeology.
And he has several books.
On this topic.
He's not saying it's aliens.
But it is aliens.
Well, maybe it's aliens or demons is the title of that one book.
So, you know, it could be aliens or it could be demons.
You know, this is what we're talking about here.
So, yes, he is a scientist who has published, I suppose, good research.
I don't know.
I'm not an organic chemist.
So, I mean, I do organic chemistry for archaeology, but I do not do that kind of organic chemistry in any way.
So I have no way to assess his actual scientific literature.
He is obviously completely unqualified when it comes to archaeology.
The other lead researcher, he actually has an actual background that should make sense here.
His name is Dr. Filippo Biondi.
He used to teach at Strathclyde University in Scotland.
He does no longer.
He has a commercial company, and he actually...
Was, is, I'm not sure about the right term here because of this new papers or whatever, press conferences.
But he actually has a background in remote sensing, so using satellite imagery in order to investigate landscapes and things like that.
But he also has his own set of fringe beliefs.
He is of the New Age sphere where he believes that acoustics explain everything.
And vibrations and things like that.
So that actually is what works its way into this new presentation.
And they actually did do a peer-reviewed paper in one of those pay-to-publish journals published by MDPI, which was peer-reviewed, though it was hilarious.
The second reviewer was like, I don't know if I agree with the data and the tables.
Your models are interesting.
Good job.
That was like basically the three-sentence review for the paper.
It was an anonymous reviewer.
And so it tells you how well-reviewed it was.
And the thing is, is that's where they sort of presented these methods, but they didn't present them and ever check them.
And so what these people are saying is they have these new methods that they have invented, and they have discovered this absolutely preposterous thing that goes down two kilometers.
Okay, what they're ignoring is all the evidence we actually have at Giza for what is underground.
Already there have been...
Dozens of studies that look underground at Giza.
There have been drilling to understand hydrology in the water table there.
There has been done seismicity to be able to see about vibrations using known seismic methods, vibrations to be able to map out what's going on underground.
There's been ground-penetrating radar.
There's been electronic resistivity tomography.
There's been muon scanning.
There's been satellite imagery.
In fact, I just did an interview with Dr. Sarah Parkak, who wrote the book.
On satellite remote sensing and archaeology, the textbook, and she focuses on ancient Egypt and Egyptology.
She's a world-class archaeologist.
That should come out later this weekend on my channel, where we both discuss these claims and present them in the technical detail that they deserve, and present her new research at Giza using satellite imagery and what it can show and how you can test it and check it.
So, you know, we have all this evidence.
For what's going on at Giza underground.
And what's interesting is their data that they publish, they don't check it against any of the known evidence, right?
So like, instead they just present this random, totally random thing that they've not tested their methods against known caves, voids, fissures.
At Giza or elsewhere to demonstrate that the technology works.
And the real reason why this thing is a big load of bullshit is because, A, the entire Giza Plateau is solid bedrock.
So how do you build structures of rock into bedrock and why?
You're building rock into rock.
Second of all, the water table is not that deep.
It's like, you know, at deepest 40 meters.
And so it's like, you know, you're saying that there's a city.
They literally claim that there is a city 2,000 meters underground.
That would have been a city that's flooded underwater at all times.
It's not possible.
Two problems I see with your reasoning.
One, you're assuming that aliens would, you know, aliens might put rocks inside rocks.
That might be something they do.
And also they could be aquatic organisms.
You know, that's the kind of environment they like.
So this is something that we come across a lot and it matches exactly what you're talking about, that in the gurus that we cover and their kind of friends, they often look for a positive piece of evidence that they can slot into their narrative.
And they very, very rarely consider disconfirming evidence.
Exactly.
Or the logical implications of what it would mean.
So that is often a telltale, I think, a telltale distinguisher between good science, because sometimes people do bad science and also don't look for disconfirming evidence, but that would surely be what you want to do.
First establish these works, show that they're working in these cases, that they don't produce false positives that make it unreliable.
Rather than, as is infamously the case, people can produce, you know, colorful images or brain scans or whatever, and then dramatically over-interpret what those are showing.
Because that's like the history of science is littered with people making nice diagrams and plots and saying, you know, the face of mongers, even.
Exactly.
And so, I mean, that's always my point.
Look, real science works from the known to the unknown.
We take the evidence that we know.
Like I mentioned, there's been dozens of studies of what exists.
Below the surface at Giza, they've confirmed each other.
And there's like this new study going on in the Great Pyramid with muon scanning.
Now they're using new types of stuff to ground truth it.
That's what it's called when you test sort of remote sensing in archaeology, is you work to ground truth it.
And so, you know, that's the issue here, is they're ignoring all the current evidence.
And then one of my big replies is like, well, scientists should be open-minded.
And it's like, scientists are open-minded to new hypotheses.
But what scientists do is they discard the hypotheses that don't match all the evidence.
If there's evidence against it, we discard it.
That's how science works.
That's what peer review is.
That's just how we logically think.
We come up with the range of explanations for the evidence we have, and then we look at which of those explanations match the evidence the best.
And any of them that clearly do not match it, we find evidence against it, we then reject.
That's how we move forward with science.
And so we do have open minds, but we're not having open minds so far that we can't reject theories and hypotheses that don't match the evidence.
And this is very clearly one of them, let alone that it's based on a bunch of unproven bunk where it all has to do with vibrations.
The idea is this satellite.
Synthetic aperture radar, it's called.
It's used widely.
It's been used since the 1980s in archaeology.
It was invented in the 1950s.
It's not a new technology.
And the radar beams only penetrate up to two meters below the surface.
So that's how deep you can use it to map out archaeological features below the surface.
And what these guys claim, though, is, well, the rock underneath, it vibrates.
And if we scan this multiple times, we're picking up on those vibes that are transmitted from below.
And then we can map it below.
And it's like, nobody does that.
So you need to prove this method first.
Why don't you go fucking map out a mineshaft that we know exists and has already been mapped out and exists two kilometers below the surface and demonstrate your technology works before you start making some...
Fucking bogus claims about what's under Giza and getting everybody to say, drill, baby, drill.
Drill, baby, drill.
I was on Piers Morgan.
It'll come out tonight.
And like Piers is like, we should be drilling.
And it's like, dude, you're drilling down two kilometers at a sensitive archaeological site.
You're fucking going to be drilling.
If you think there's something below there, you're going to be destroying it.
You're an idiot if you think that.
That actually raises a point, Flink, because I know we were talking just before and Piers Morgan likes to get on.
People who he expects to, you know, disagree around issues.
And I believe Jimmy Corsetti was on with you, right?
But from what you mentioned, it sounded like he is also skeptical of this.
So I'm wondering, do you know the reception of this amongst Graham Hancock?
Are they generally enthusiastic about this or do even they have reservations?
The reality is, and I'm sure you cover a lot of gurus, there's a lot of divides within the guru sphere.
They don't all agree with each other.
And part of how they establish authority is they will critique.
Other gurus who they think are even crazier and out there and more wacko than they are.
And they'll use their pseudoscientific and sometimes match with a little bit of scientific data to do that.
And they say, no, we're following the evidence.
We're well-researched.
So our ideas are plausible, while this group...
They're not plausible.
They're bunk.
And that shows that our stuff is more plausible.
And Graham Hancock in the archaeology guru sphere is probably the best at this.
Partly due to his posh British accent and his demeanor, but also just due to how he operates.
He very clearly is not an ancient aliens dude.
He is like, you know, I mean, he used to be.
In the 90s, he wrote a book called The Mars Mystery.
But in the last 15 years or so, he's very much clearly distanced his ideas from these more laughable ideas like ancient aliens.
And so part of the authority in the pseudos world, in the guru world of archaeology, that Hancock and his apolites have is by trying to show how other branches...
of the pseudo-archaeology are more preposterous than their stuff, therefore they are very plausible.
And so...
Jimmy Corsetti, Dan Richards, they're part of the Hancock sphere.
Hancock's not mentioned this once, so I have no idea what he personally believes.
Someone who he used to collaborate with, Robert Schock, released a statement of skepticism.
Jimmy Corsetti released some tweets bringing up some of the points I brought up in my livestream last week.
I wonder if he saw it and stole from it.
I have no idea.
But the water table was the one that really convinced him.
The fact that they're not detecting the water table with...
And so it was funny to come face to face with him and actually agree on most of it.
In fact, Piers Morgan by the end was saying, you know, I have more fringe beliefs, it seems like, than you two.
Not me, but than Jimmy and Dan.
And so I just think that this is just one of the way these different branches of the guru sphere, they claim authority by smacking down on other gurus.
That is absolutely the case.
Although one thing that has sometimes surprised me is like there can be complete vitriolic dismissal of someone.
It can get extremely heated.
An example that isn't, you know, in the realm of pseudo-archaeology, but it's like Alex Jones went after Joe Rogan at one point, like very, very harshly.
And basically he was angling towards, he wanted to be invited back.
On Joe's show, right?
And Joe was distancing himself at the time because of the Sandy Hook, you know, statements and all that kind of thing.
But the interesting thing is that you could have these strong denouncements, which people do use in the way that you're talking about to like establish, well, those guys are crazy, but we, you know, we have better standards than that.
But it's often the case that you can find that like later.
Especially if the prominence of those people grow, that they're willing to bury the hatchet.
And David Icke is now considered a relatively okay figure in certain places, whereas he was once completely not.
Or another example that I can think of is Brett Weinstein, a couple of years ago, was hiding and didn't publish the interview that he did with RFK Jr.
Now, obviously, if he did that now...
It would be, you know, promoted widely on his show, but it's just that thing that it's interesting that you, it can function both ways that you have these strong denouncements, but then later it doesn't really matter.
So like, you know, you can be an ancient alien guy or a dancer of ancient aliens or whatever.
And it seems like consistency isn't.
A huge concern?
No, no.
I mean, look, one of the things that I've really started to realize, I mean, look, when I first went, I think we talked about this last May, my first time on here, and I was saying, look, you know, sometimes it's really tough to tell what people believe, right?
And I don't like to accuse people of being grifters, let's say.
And some of them, I think, are more outright grifters because you can see very overt lies.
People like Jimmy Corsetti, who makes up lies about my cancer, for example.
It's just quite clear he is fine lying.
He does it all the time.
You should know about that.
Yeah.
Or you shouldn't be speaking about something you don't know about someone else's health, for example.
Right?
Because you don't know it all and you're completely wrong and that's damaging.
Or Dan Richards who's done similar kinds of outright lies about me mishandling indigenous bones at a university I've never even been to.
And showing a picture of me holding cow bones to justify the argument.
Just cherry picking random shit and making up bullshit.
That's outright grifting.
But there's other people where, of course, they're either really good at it or they do believe in the BS that they sell because they lie to themselves.
And they're tougher to pin.
On outright lying.
But one thing that I...
And really, the really, really top ones are in particular really good at that because they are at the top of their game and they've either convinced themselves in the BS that they sell or they are just so good at what they do, you're not going to be able to catch them on very many outright lies.
And so they're usually the more prominent, famous...
The really popular ones among these spheres is how I see it.
And so with them, what I'm starting to realize is catching them on lies might be tough, but what you can catch them on is the fact that they're just sellouts.
You know, they sell out to whatever will get them money and fame in the moment in order to boost their fucking stuff.
So sometimes that means critiquing a different guru.
Other times it means holding hands with that same guru.
And so, you know, what they're willing to do is just sell the fuck out.
And that's what I think I can document with some of these top people in a few videos I'm working on.
Like I said, the one on Joe Rogan.
I have another one on Graham Hancock that's going to take a little longer.
Looking at the prehistory of him, going back to the 90s and the 80s.
And so you can start to put together the picture.
Maybe he's not lying.
Tough to tell because he's really good at this.
But he's clearly a fucking sellout in my mind.
And I think I have the goods to demonstrate that.
So yeah, that's how I see it.
There's different ways of...
I'm wondering, Flint, with your experience of the pseudo-archaeology world...
So a claim like this, because like when Joe Rogan was talking about it with Chris Williamson, for example, he mentioned, you know, there was a book published and it was saying about like the pyramids or, you know, power plants working for electromagnetic or whatever.
And, you know, maybe Tesla coils are involved or something.
And I was wondering, do these kinds of things like in your experience become like, you know, flashpoints where this will be talked about?
Now, for a couple of weeks, maybe a month, and then it like, it kind of just, you know, feeds till the next time somebody makes a release?
Or does this now slot into the kind of mythos and people will reference, oh, you know, they did find those superstructures in other, you know, like whatever, inched alien or like talking about a completely different scenario.
Do they, do they feed away or do they like get incorporated into the grand mythos?
I think, unfortunately, with these specific claims, the reason they went so viral so fast is because they started off being promoted by an Infowars author.
Greg Reese.
And so it was the whole InfoWars conspiracy circle that actually boosted this and made it go viral.
That should be a warning sign.
Yeah.
And Alex Jones then had on a different YouTuber who's a pseudo-archaeologist, Jay Anderson of Project Unity.
And it was all InfoWars.
But it went so viral because part of the reason why is some of these scholars, like I said, have PhDs and have published peer-reviewed papers.
And so that lended it a veneer of...
Even though this is completely unpublished and has not been submitted for publication and these Italians are playing the same old game of Well, we're already being canceled.
They didn't even try to submit this for peer review.
They're just already claiming they're being canceled because the claims are so preposterous.
And so they're just playing that game.
But it was so confusing, particularly in the first week, that actual science communicators, big ones on TikTok and Instagram and YouTube, made short videos about these claims as if they were legitimate.
And so this one went really viral.
It's been published in a number of different newspapers, not like your top newspapers like Guardian or BBC or New York Times or Washington Post, but like, you know, Daily Mail and different things, the Tribune, different sorts of papers like that that are covering this as if it's legitimate.
And so in that sense, I think this one's here to stay.
I mean, the idea of pyramids being power plants, that's an old idea, which...
Some of the Italian authors on this study, they're part of that branch of pseudo-archaeology, which I'd label lost advanced high technology, where they think there's this super advanced technology that existed in the past.
It usually involves electricity and machines and lasers and shit like that.
Sometimes that overlaps with ancient aliens' ideas, but sometimes it doesn't.
And so this group is...
It incorporates those two branches of pseudo-archaeology.
While the Hancock-type branch, which likes to portray itself as more plausible, it doesn't believe too much in aliens, nor too much in super, super advanced technology.
It just believes in good ships and longitude and farming and shit like that before we have it.
And so that's where you get this, it's going to keep continuing trickling for years.
In these branches of pseudo-archaeology, the Ancient Aliens branch and the Lost Advanced High Technology branch, I would not be surprised if we see an episode of Ancient Aliens next year that covers this specific claims.
And I would not be surprised if we see some of the big YouTubers that are in the Lost Advanced High Technology community doing more videos on this that spreads it further over the next several years.
One can only hope.
One can only hope for the great coverage.
On the ancient alien series, there's a kind of a tangential question.
Maybe it's a bit more lightweight, but I'm just curious.
I know you're not an Egyptologist or that kind of area specialist, but recently the biggest YouTuber, right, MrBeast, went to Egypt and produced a video and got to spend time in the pyramids and run around them and whatnot.
Notably did not really endorse or play much footsie.
With the, you know, kind of ancient alien or, you know, alternative hypotheses.
He, in fact, addressed one of the claims made about like secret riches and whatnot, and that there was nothing there when they went and looked in the room that it's supposed to be.
And I was just wondering.
That video, did you see it?
Do you think that was like a good thing?
Oh god, I reviewed it on my YouTube channel.
I have a whole video on this.
It's actually a really cool video.
I recommend everybody check it out.
It's titled...
Mr. Beast slams pseudo-archaeology.
Okay.
Because he does.
Like, you know, when I got that video, and A, look, I'm not an Egyptologist as my main specialty, but I have worked in Egypt.
I spent several months doing mapping at the Old Kingdom burial grounds at Abydos.
I've been to the pyramids.
I've had to read and teach a lot about Egypt, so it's not something that I'm not familiar with, I mean, as an archaeologist.
And so, no, I thought his video was phenomenal.
I definitely, I'll plug my channel one more time.
Go check out that video because it's also a lot of fun and funny.
My video.
Go check out Mr. Beast as well.
He doesn't need your help.
There's a lot of silliness that goes on in their video, which, you know, that's what a lot of my colleagues were sneering at was, God, he's making light of this shit.
But to be honest, he does a really good job of very clearly disproving some of these crazy theories.
He really clearly demonstrates how we know.
Why the ancient Egyptians in the Old Kingdom dynasty built the pyramids.
He goes through a range of evidence for it, from the textual hieroglyphics inside the Great Pyramid to the skeletal remains from the workers' cemeteries and how they show pathologies on their bodies from doing all the manual labor needed to move these kind of stones and things like that,
as well as he went under the Sphinx to disprove the idea of the Hall of the Records, as you mentioned.
And so he actually does, within a really short, fun, funny video, an excellent job of debunking some of the more pervasive conspiracies about the pyramids.
And so I was really impressed with him.
I think that video did some good service by showing a huge number of people, because it was seen by over 100 million people, just this kind of stuff firsthand.
You know, and so I think that's really important.
So my video sort of goes into what he did and gives a bunch of extra evidence in a fun way that shows kind of like why, yeah, why we think this stuff is archaeologists and why we have all this clear evidence for it.
And yeah, and so he did a good job.
I was pretty pleased.
And in fact, one of the scenes he did is he went down under the Great Pyramid into the Osiris shaft.
So it's a natural fissure that was expanded by the Egyptians.
And you can go swimming in the water.
They went there in wetsuits and went swimming in the water that's part of that water table under Giza, which shows that that's only 10, 20, I don't know how deep the Osiris shaft is, maybe 20, 30 meters down.
Clearly there's not a city underneath this big water table.
So even that video disproves this new theory, if you see what I mean.
I mean, I think it also proves the reach of big archaeology, that you can control the biggest YouTuber of the planet to promote their lives.
There's that take on that.
But we'll link to your channel, obviously, and the videos that we mentioned throughout, and your upcoming video probably out by the time I release this.
Yeah, for sure.
Yeah.
So I encourage, as I always do, anybody that is interested in archaeology and also those who might be inclined to want pseudo archaeology, though we don't have that many in our audience, I suspect that, you know, channels like yours and Milo
Rossi's are very good resources and entertaining too.
So yeah, if you aren't aware of Flint's channel, obviously check it out.
Thank you so much.
I actually have a question for you and I've been trying to...
Sussed this out a little better.
So it's clear that this went really big in the guru sphere.
It's something I'm really trying to understand better is how pseudo-archaeology or pseudo-history as a whole...
Fits into this larger, more, oftentimes more political and right-wing guru sphere that you guys spend a lot of time sort of covering.
And I don't know, what's your take on this?
Is this just a complete sideshow that just occasionally gets incorporated?
How can I start talking more confidently about how this pseudo-archaeology sphere situates itself within the larger guru, conspiracy, alt-right, misinformation, disinformation sphere that exists in our...
What's your take on that now that you've had a little more time thinking into that?
I think there's two distinct threads and there are overlaps between them.
But you have the people who respond to this, like your Chris Williamson, for example, where I don't think it's anything to do with the white nationalist aspects or that kind of thing.
It is much more in the vein of like bro science.
If this was true, wouldn't that be crazy?
Because like, I don't know if you saw that episode, but they also go into talking about physics and it's a very similar kind of response.
It's just things that they've heard or, you know, a theory that somebody has suggested that this, and it's very much like bros sitting around going, oh, that would be incredible.
And in some respect then, like that feels harmless in one way, but then it is immediately tied in.
With these dorm room conversations to the bigger narrative that, well, and academics won't admit this because they're close-minded and they're all wanting to promote this woke agenda and the universities have been corrupted.
And then they'll easily veer into anecdotes about academics they don't like, you might come up, or politicians.
It very quickly So I think that for a lot of them, it is just an illustration that they can reference of how close-minded the authorities and academia are, and they're real scholars out there doing the work.
The institutions are lying.
Have you seen this new thing about Egypt?
We don't know anything.
That's the use for them, or like a Tucker Carlson kind of person.
But I think the other Aspect then is that the alt-right or that kind of white supremacist like Nick Fuentes or whatever, I don't know their reaction to this, but I think some segments of that use it more as like a blackpilling kind of example.
So it's the same way, but it's more like they're lying to you about this.
So what else would they not tell the truth about it, about race, about gender, about...
So it's like being strategically inserted into their views.
And then I think you have also a wing where it's just like they're crackpots and they don't know how to assess evidence.
So they see headlines and maybe they want clicks as well.
But I think the main connection, even in both of those spheres, and there are overlaps, is that it supports the narrative that the authorities are lying.
They're hiding things.
And the real information that will blow your mind is out here in the alternative media space in independent researchers and, you know, renegades who are doing the hard work.
So that's what I think it gives them.
Because I don't think Chris Williamson is actually ever going to read any of the papers or the, like, you know, if I said Flint Bibble has a good breakdown of why this paper.
Is nonsense, right?
It's not even a paper, it's a press release.
Do I think that Chris Williamson or many in his kind of sphere would want to watch a one-hour breakdown of the evidence?
They'd regard that as...
No, they just want to have the big idea.
And at least in some part, the only other thing I'll say is that it did feel, particularly with Chris Williamson, but it does feel in general that when people are going on Rogan, they sometimes bring these stories as like tributes.
I find this story about ancient civilizations, Joe.
Did you hear about that?
Then Joe Rogan is very happy to riff.
So it feels like...
I don't know, like people are Googling, you know, stuff that he's interested in so they can bring it up.
So that's a couple of the things.
It sounds, in some respect, that sounds quite pathetic, but I genuinely believe that is going on.
I wouldn't be surprised.
You know, I'm sure you've seen that meme of Rogan as like a great can.
Right, with people, you know, kind of peddling their wares before him.
And I actually think that's a pretty accurate analogy, whether the historical thing of that actually happening is true or not.
Just that image that Joe is, you know, the kind of...
King who gets to have science people come and debate things for him or that kind of thing, and then he'll pass judgment.
Which one is right?
Yeah.
So that's a bunch of ideas, but maybe some of them are accurate.
I think so.
I think in particular the point that you brought up about how it starts off as just bro-ing out dorm room type talk, but then it's so quickly.
is maneuvered towards larger political conversations about how academia is woke and not to be trusted and things like that.
The way they segue to me strikes me as extremely disingenuous so that the bro thing is almost just a way of introducing this in a way that's palatable for the large-scale audience to then quickly...
Move on to those kind of other more broader ramifications.
And I think it really clearly reveals that hypocrisy.
And it's something, I'm scripting that video this weekend, so it's something I've been thinking on and researching on.
Well, it's been a pleasure, Flint, and I suspect that we will speak again for too long.
You guys do a great job, as usual, confronting this stuff.
I have a huge amount of respect for the way you approach this as sort of public scholars.
If I did not have some health issues right now, I was planning on organizing a large Scholars of YouTube festival, where we get all of us that are actual scholars that do this kind of public communication.
We'll put it on the bench.
But I think we should keep that idea going.
I think we should really...
Highlight how many of us do a good job of communicating real science, real scholarship, real intellectualism in a fun, interesting, palatable way for the broader public because I think we should celebrate those of us that do a really good job and you guys are really at the top of that.
I mean, there's lots of other good ones too.
I'm not trying to say there aren't, but you guys are definitely at the top of that.
You guys do a great job.
That's very nice to hear.
There are plenty of people that would disagree with that assessment, but...
But regardless, you know, let a thousand flowers bloom.
And I agree that academics kind of countering the notion that we are all being paid by the CCP and are purely programmed to promote the woke agenda, whatever that may be.
It's important.
You're just people trying to do work, talk about research and that kind of thing.
So, well, in any case, Flint, thanks for all your efforts.
Thanks for making the time.
And yeah, looking forward to the next exciting news story that comes out soon enough.
Seriously.
Thank you, Chris.
It was great to see you.
And yeah, I'll see you guys again soon.
Yeah.
Well, here we are.
It's us again, Matt.
That pretender has left the arena.
The time flew.
It just felt like moments ago you were introducing the interview.
That's the magic of podcasting.
It's like 45 minutes or so.
I'm glad that you just sat there in silence.
And listen to the whole thing now before we talk about it.
You were very patient too, I thought.
Yeah, you didn't mind revisiting that.
No, look, I know what you guys talked about.
As I said, I suggested it.
And Flint Dibble did a good debunking of it.
But I've just been amazed at just the level of credulity out there.
Like, it's no wonder that the gurus make hay when you just look at the social media and...
Just the way that stuff gets so uncritically just accepted as fact and then they move on.
It's unbelievable.
Well, you know, we are recording this in the ongoing saga of Trump's tariffs where he's announced all these tariffs that he's introducing or is going to introduce and the global economic markets have responded accordingly.
Mostly, it is fair to say that everywhere has felt the kind of effects of this, but America in particular seems to have been badly hit by it.
So the interesting thing when it comes to credulity, Matt, is that, as you pointed out to me off stream, that the MAGA sycophants, they basically have to...
Come up for rationalizations for whatever Trump is doing.
It doesn't matter if it is clearly causing harm.
They were complaining many times before the election about the cost of eggs or Biden's economy and all this kind of thing.
And there is no debate about the fact that Trump is doing genuine harm, potentially destroying people's savings, just in general, making people worse off.
And so...
The MAGA people have to respond in some way by saying this isn't a problem.
Actually, it's good.
This is what we want.
We like it.
Like when the Biden administration was in power, there was a lot of rending of garments over the price of eggs.
You know, any time the stock market went down, Donald Trump, of course, would blame it on the Democrats.
Now, who cares about money?
Right?
If you're a true red-blooded American, you don't care about money.
You care about being a real man.
High levels of testosterone.
I've even seen this take, right?
It's good, right?
It's good to be poorer because it'll bring us back.
It'll take us back to the time when men were real men and life was tough and hard.
So, yeah.
I think that was that guy, Benny Johnson, or somebody was like saying, you know, Actually, losing money is character building.
I'm like, what is money anyway?
Losing money costs you nothing.
This is just the reality of life.
Like, were you young and dumb?
How much money did you lose?
Everyone loses money.
Everyone loses money.
It costs you nothing.
In fact, it builds quite a bit of character.
In fact, you learn a lot of lessons, actually, by losing money.
Losing your character costs you everything.
Losing your country costs you everything.
There are things you can't get back.
The government can print more money, and it will.
Sadly, that's just the reality.
It's just that there's a boom and a bust every 10 years, and it's been that way since the invention of modern markets in the 1600s, the Dutch crash of 1649.
You ever heard of it?
It's just the way that it works.
It's the way that monetary policy has always worked.
There's going to be ups and downs, especially as the table gets reset.
If you lose the character of your country, if your town gets hollowed out...
It's funny how much the kind of horseshoe overlap can come out in moments like this, because suddenly...
We're all too materialistic.
Anyway, Mark, you know, it's not just about money, okay?
Yeah, but of course, you know, it is a little bit, so it's not looking good.
And look, at the time of recording, and who knows, it'll be completely different tomorrow, but just to let you know where we're recording, he backflipped back down on other tariffs after the bond yields spiked, which is...
Absolutely crazy.
Like, we won't go into this too much because we're not an economics, political pundit thing.
But you know, it's interesting, right?
Usually when there's panic on the markets, money flees to a safe haven, just typically government bonds.
So usually when the equities go down, the bond prices go up, right?
And bond yields go down.
But now it's really weird because it's in the opposite direction.
So bonds are selling off as well.
And we don't really know why.
It doesn't seem to have been China that has dumped its government debt.
But somebody has been.
And that may well have been the thing that caused Trump to back down because obviously that affects government, the cost of the huge amount of government debt servicing.
So anyway, that's all boring economic stuff, I suppose.
But that's where we are now.
There's been a bit of a rebound.
But the trade war with China is happening.
The amazing tariff formula, which I want to talk about, Chris.
Oh, yes.
Yeah.
I don't know what's happened with that because it's kind of old news now.
It's been discarded.
The amazing tariff formula that's basically starting a trade war on everything with the entire world.
That's not happening now, maybe.
Well, Matt, there was a scientific formula.
I saw a formula with Greek letters and that kind of thing.
I mean, you can't argue with science, can you?
Actually, the formula was so great.
And look, other people have already talked about this, but it has to be mentioned because it is a good example of mathsy techniques.
And this happens a lot, which is this wonderful trick of using a bit of math to make whatever it is you're doing.
Seem rigorous, seem like it's been carefully thought out.
I mean, it's math, right?
You can't argue with math, right?
Math has this prestige.
So it really counts as a form of pseudo-profound bullshit where you basically give the hint of scientific or mathematical credibility.
Bayesians online like to do this as well.
Yeah, they do.
That's right.
Let me just integrate and recalibrate my prize.
So the tariff formula involved...
You know, they had a delta in there.
Delta...
I forget what that symbol is.
But delta something is a change in tariff.
And then there was some other stuff on the numerator, some other stuff on the denominator, including a couple of Greek symbols.
Eta and...
No, epsilon and phi.
And they were in there.
But then if you actually decompose this formula, it's actually very simple.
All it was doing was basically...
Calculating the trade deficit or a surplus with a country and then dividing it by the total quantity of imports from that country.
And it looked more complicated than it was because it had those Greek terms in it, which were meant to symbolize price elasticity of import demand in the case of epsilon and the pass-through rate of tariffs to import prices, which is the phi.
Now, this is like stuff from some abstract economic...
Theory stuff.
And like a lot of theoretical stuff, you have these parameters and it's all theoretical, but it's actually really hard to figure out what the price elasticity is.
Economists have these concepts.
But if you actually wanted to use a formula like this in earnest, you would do a huge amount of work to figure out what these parameters are for a particular good, like steel or something.
And then you would work from there and then hopefully it would make sense.
But of course...
You know, this was like done by some aid overnight when Trump would have said, give me a formula.
I want to renounce a thing tomorrow.
So that's impossible, right?
So they just nominated four for Epsilon for price elasticity and one quarter for phi for the passive rate of tariffs just across the board for everything.
Now, coincidentally, four times a quarter is, Chris, Jesse Matz.
One, one.
One.
It's one.
They cancel that, so it's meaningless, right?
So it's really just calculating the trade deficit divided by the imports from that country.
And then, of course, setting a baseline of 10% because for no reason.
I think Destiny and some other people, but I saw Destiny was one of the earlier people that mentioned that, was saying like, when you asked the AIs or ChatGPT for like a formula that you might use to establish.
They all independently came up with this, which suggests that somebody at the White House had not done their homework and had asked the AIs for an answer.
And AIs are usually pretty reasonable, but this would rely on you having those values then.
Yeah, that's right.
When you ask it for an impossible question, like give me a formula to give set tariffs on everyone on every product in a nutshell, right?
It's going to give you a dumb answer.
And the other giveaway was that, and this seems like a minor point, but I think it's indicative, which is they didn't use the normal symbols for indicating multiplication of these terms.
They used the asterisk.
Yeah, the asterisk.
Now, You know, people that don't deal with math very much might not think anything of that.
But as someone who does, right, yes, you use the asterisk when you're using a calculator or when you're writing computer code, right?
That's the code symbol for it.
But if you're writing math, no one ever writes the asterisk to denote multiplication.
When you're in primary school, you might write the little x thing.
When you're an adult...
You'll either admit it entirely, just have the terms next to each other, or you might have a little dot in between them to indicate the multiplication.
So it's just these little things, like you said, like the AI vibe of it, the fact that these parameters are just set to random numbers that cancel out.
It's just such a giveaway that this thing was just invented overnight as a completely arbitrary thing.
Mark, can I make an alternative suggestion?
All right.
Something you haven't thought of, maybe.
I got this from an evolutionary psychologist of some renown, Jeffrey Miller.
That's his name, you might have heard of him.
It goes by Primal Poly on Twitter.
Here's his take, okay?
An alternative.
My wild amateurish speculation is that the whole tariff drama is partly a clever PR media distraction from everything else the Trump team is accomplishing.
They know that mainstream media, rich boomers, think tank pundits, And lefty libertarian globalists, libertarian globalists, can be relied up to obsess, I guess relied upon, to obsess about the stock market, global trade,
China, etc., and can't resist giving their economic opinions as noisily as possible, as often as possible.
This soaks up a lot of the media attention that would otherwise be spent squawking about deportations, doge, federal spending cuts.
The tariff drama creates a huge PR shadow that allows the administration's other priorities to hum along stealthily without much attention or opposition.
Nine-dimensional chess, Matt.
What about it?
You didn't realize it.
You fell into the trap!
Well, I'll hand it to him that I think, you know, it does, like, including me, so distracted by Trump trying to destroy the world economy.
That it is easy to get distracted from the fact that he's, like, getting rid of the commission that investigates Bitcoin scams.
Oh, yes.
CoffeeZilla was talking about this, yes.
Yeah, that he's doing so many criminal things, basically, and dismantling a lot of important institutions in the US.
And that's just natural.
But I do not give credit to Trump for four-dimensional or five-dimensional chess.
He's just doing a lot of terrible things.
And the only way to put what Jeffrey Miller is positing is that Trump is attempting to destroy the global economy in order to hide his criminal efforts.
Also, I know it's a minor point.
Lefty libertarian globalists.
Lefty libertarian?
That makes no sense on any level.
Jeffrey Miller, you're such an idiot.
Lefty people typically aren't libertarians, right?
Especially in the US.
Libertarian globalist.
It's just, whatever.
He's an idiot.
He cited Legolas's techniques when he was talking about evolutionary psychology and evidence for some shame.
So it seems, for example, like we have this kind of leftover impression from prehistoric warfare, which was largely kind of muscle-based and it had to do with body size, upper body muscles, impact weapons.
Sort of mixed martial arts, basically.
But a lot of that is not that relevant, because once you get projectile weapons, like spears and then bows and arrows, you can be a highly effective archer and not have a sort of classical warrior physique.
I've always found that interesting, like, in Lord of the Rings.
Legolas, the master archer, the elf, is obviously kind of the most effeminate.
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